I wonder where I got all my rebellious nature. My parents did not seem to have such a bent. Maybe it was the middle child thing. This country was built by a bunch of rebels. When my brother was trying to channel Billy Williams and Carl Yastrzemski, I was trying to understand the footsteps of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Henry David Thoreau came into my life when I was a teenager. I tried reading a bunch of stuff he wrote but it was like eating really spicy chili. On the food note, his grandfather was responsible for the first known student protest in the Americas, The Butter Rebellion. I guess the food sucked at Harvard. "Behold, our butter stinketh!— give us therefore, butter that stinketh not." Not as good as "Give me liver or give me death" but close. Back to the spiced chili thing. It tastes so good yet you know the pain is coming with it. You have to eat it slow and chew it completely. That is why reading Thoreau is like eating really spicy chili.
Lets distinguish rebellion from sinning and criminal activity. To the some who color within the lines always, whether a minister or fruit cake, there is little wiggle room and willful deviation is as sin. One of the great rebels, Martin Luther said something like "we are all sinners......and fall short...." so shut up. Martin knew something about sin that had been lost in the translation or the drifts of the years. He also knew that he had to deviate, he had to run outside the lines because the people who drew the lines, either intentionally or inadvertently left out a few important facts. These facts were going to cut into the bottom line of Big Business (the Church). People did not need the Church for salvation. It was a gift from God. REBEL, indeed. That would be like saying we did not need the FDA, Homeland Security, the Congress of the United States and giving proof to the degree that the common man understood just how feeble those institution are.
So, if I want to drive the wrong way in a poorly designed, nearly empty parking lot that was built for a thousand cars, I think I can do it without sinning. That is all I am saying.
Lets distinguish rebellion from sinning and criminal activity. To the some who color within the lines always, whether a minister or fruit cake, there is little wiggle room and willful deviation is as sin. One of the great rebels, Martin Luther said something like "we are all sinners......and fall short...." so shut up. Martin knew something about sin that had been lost in the translation or the drifts of the years. He also knew that he had to deviate, he had to run outside the lines because the people who drew the lines, either intentionally or inadvertently left out a few important facts. These facts were going to cut into the bottom line of Big Business (the Church). People did not need the Church for salvation. It was a gift from God. REBEL, indeed. That would be like saying we did not need the FDA, Homeland Security, the Congress of the United States and giving proof to the degree that the common man understood just how feeble those institution are.
So, if I want to drive the wrong way in a poorly designed, nearly empty parking lot that was built for a thousand cars, I think I can do it without sinning. That is all I am saying.
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