Covenant Orthodox Presbyterian Church Blog

The potato chip. Nature’s most nearly perfect food. OK, maybe not but oh so very good. Of course we are told, often in quite stern voices, that they are very bad for us. I still love ‘em. It seems these days that a lot of things that taste great are on the verge of being forbidden. Our society, or at least large parts of it, are moving in two directions I find alarming. One is this move toward new dietary laws. They are pursued by some with a religious zeal that would do a Pharisee proud, although the god served is Good Health. The other is the disregard for language. In marking the passing of George Carlin nearly every story I heard or article I saw mentioned his “Seven Words You Can’t Say on Television”. The bit really isn’t that old and yet, in the age of satellite and cable, seems so antiquated and passé. There are no words you cannot say on cable and fewer and fewer that cannot be uttered on broadcast TV.

Both of these trends run exactly counter to what Jesus taught. He said it really didn’t matter what went into you and it really does matter what comes out. Certainly Christians may say, for reasons of preserving a healthy heart, voluntarily submit to a restrictive diet. But what our Lord is far more concerned with is a healthy heart in the biblical sense. How do we know the condition of our heart? He gives us a great diagnostic tool in the section of Matthew’s Gospel we will be looking at Sunday morning. If you are keeping up with Jeff’s blog from Ireland (http://jromissions.blogspot.com) you will have a good head start on thinking about this.

Sunday evening we will look at the difficulties and trials Paul faced and the attitudes and results of them. Inspired writing and inspiring reading!

Don’t know when you may read this but I’m writing it on the 4th of July. The 232nd anniversary of our independence. They day we celebrate freedom. As Christians we especially celebrate and thank God for the freedom to worship him openly, publicly. We’ll be doing that at New Hope Sunday at 10:45 and 5:30. Hope you can be there.

Jack