Shards

Shards or potsherds refer to pieces of pottery, stone or glass relics unearthed by archeologists which can be used for dating history and historical events concerning ancient cultures. Perhaps the most exciting recent discoveries have been those in Biblical lands, scientifically dating King David and King Solomon to Biblical history. You make such discoveries all over the world as you study primitive civilizations. Even the sea reveals shards from containers in seafaring vessels that went down. In America, some Indian pottery has been unearthed, but early history is more actuated by Indian weaponry (arrowheads, tomahawks, etc.).

It is interesting to contemplate just how many civilizations will be revealed. For instance, some nations, some civilizations are so corrupt through bribery, that even American industries (well-known for their corruption) cannot do business there. I remember the bribery in Nigeria. From the time you entered the country until you leave, everyone just expects a bribes or expects to be bribed. All business there is built around bribes, it is just a way of life. At the airport, immigration, the government official will ask you for money in order for you to get your luggage. He pointed to the end of the room to a large pile of luggage which went all the way to the ceiling and said, “those did not pay.” So, I paid him the $5, in order for me to get my bags. My Nigerian guide then told me that this was protocol for his country. I will never forget him saying to me, “it is just luck, your wits, or the grace of God by which you survive here.”

One time, when going through India, my guide went into the airport duty-free shop and buy bottles of liquor and other enticements for me to present to the immigration officials. It was like a time, in my presence, in full-dress uniform, a state senator was given a bribe by one of my friends in the legislative building in Raleigh. My friend said, “this is the way you get things done in the NC legislature.” I truly believe this is the only activity in Congress...the taking of bribes (“political contributions”).

There are 2,300 references to money in God's Word. God only had to say it one time, “the love of money is the root of all evil” (1 Timothy 6:10). Some do get caught, some go to prison (I believe 5 are in prison now from the legislative halls of North Carolina). If written in stone or pottery, this would be the potsherd of American history. When a member of one of America's richest families was running for President, Robert Kennedy said he had discovered a different world, people with whom he had never associated. I remember, when I went off to the university, my mother said, “you will be around completely different people, but if you do not expect such, then there is no need for you to leave.

When you discover the “potsherds” of the world history, when you put flesh on historical figures, the prophets and poets of history, you learn about real people. The poorest people in the world are below the 30^th parallel. I believe God wanted me to see what other people in the world were like and that is the reason I have traveled the world. As I traveled, seeing people and learning things about people which are almost indescribable, but which I thought should be described...I found that in speaking and writing, no one is very interested.

I am convinced that the power brokers of the world, the politicians, that small percentage involved in world politics and commerce have little understanding about the real people of the world...their gifts of personality, their gift of faith and faithfulness, their gift of memory, their gift of forgiveness, their gift of generosity, their gift of genuineness. Indescribable shards almost all found in real people.

What shards of decency can you find in police-state tyranny? We have just learned of the North Korean political prisoner camps...barren, isolated encampments for political indoctrination. We had heard about such from Christian missionaries, but now Amnesty International documents such, camps holding up to 200,000 political prisoners, starved unless able to memorize and recite communist-atheist-humanist rules of life. One man reports that he was forced to watch the execution of his mother and brother; another, starving, beaten for eating kernels of corn from cow manure. Much like the unbelievable atrocities I found in Campala, Uganda, the Congo, Liberia. The unbelievable harshness, cruelty, evil of the people, ruled by rape and machetes. In other commentaries, I have described what I saw and experienced in Africa and other places.

In our comfortable Christian isolation from the shards of the world, the anguish of some cultures, we bash the world, the flesh, the devil while knowing full well that Satan and religious bigots can quote scripture. Perhaps this the reason Dietrich Bonhoeffer, preacher of righteousness, who was hanged by the Nazis, was criticized for writing to his best friend that Christianity should be separated from religion. The road to hell is paved with religion, religion is very active in some police state tyrannies, but Christianity is a relationship, through Christ, with a Holy God. Two hours before he died, Bonhoeffer preached to his fellow inmates. He preached from Isaiah 53, that Christ on the Cross, paid-in-full, took the full wrath of God for all the sins of the world and all the sicknesses of the world.

I will never understand why the liberals developed a taste for the sewage of the world, the ugliness, the perversion, the political, economic and spiritual decadence found in every socialist society. As with a magnificent beauty of the world, shown in mountain ranges, flowers, even beauty captured by individuals on canvas or musical scale. Holy God is a matter of beauty, found in places and people around the world, separated from the ugly.

Open my eyes, that I may see
Glimpses of truth Thou hast for me;

--Open My Eyes, That I May See (Hymn)