#1864 Between the Lines

#1864

Between the Lines

"Welcome to My World"  Jim Reeves

     Welcome to my world
     Won't you come on in?
     Miracles, I guess
     Still happen now and then

     Step into my heart
     Leave your cares behind
     Welcome to my world
     Built with you in mind

It is so important to learn early in life, as we observe the multitalented, multi-featured, fellow human-beings around us, attempt to understand the thoughts and actions of others.  Each person has his own experiences, feelings, mind history.  We can never know the baggage that our fellow man carries around.  Native Americans are very different from most of us, our Puritan ancestors, even the more recent arrivals of immigrants, were and are very different from us...each has a heritage of their own.

In recent years, governments have been besieged by some "do-gooders" who want the statues-memorials of those with whom they do not agree, taken down or destroyed.  One UK university, Oxford, wants the statue of Cecil Rhodes taken down, even though this one man gave so much money towards education...the same group wants the statue of David Livingston taken down because they are not Christian believers.  In Rome, there is the statue of an emperor, hailed as a hero by Romans, people who would never consider the thousands that perished at his whim.  We will never know the mental guidelines of other people, great or small.  In communist China and Taiwan (Ancient Formosa), this world-traveler was stupefied at the antiquarian Chinese relics transported to Taiwan (filling caves) by dictators, Generalissimo and Madame Chiang Kai-shek retreating to that island, as one hundred million coolies were slaughtered in the Communist Revolution.  They considered things (ancient art, ancient parchments, etc) more important than their human-being subjects.  Even the town where I live, an old southern port city, so many of our historical "prize" buildings, constructed by black, slave labor.  In between some intricate brain functioning, how long will it be between historical preservation and social experimentation BEFORE the same caustic "do-gooders" will want these buildings torn down?  They already have a thorn in their flesh about any flag with which they do not agree.   Most of these people think that history started the day they were born.  There is no recluse for objectivity in the liberal-socialistic mind, no room for compromise between the lines.

Most evangelicals cannot understand Roman Catholic traditions...bowing to a statue-transubstantiation.  The Catholic cannot understand the anointing of the Buddhist with saffron on the forehead.  The Buddhist cannot understand the ashes on the Catholic forehead. Perhaps the most evident between the lines thought process in the human mind, traditions-holidays-religious security.

The most complex creation of creator God, the complex brain of man.  How does some DNA transfer from one generation to another enabling descendents a superior ability to carve wood or stone?  One human-being to have the hand-eye coordination to marvelously play an instrument, to intricately use a scalpel in surgery while, there are those whose minds between the lines of good and evil result in rage-robbery-rape.  And then, there are those who possess the intangibles...abilities in dancing, weaving, engineering.

In Africa, wealth is determined not by what a person possesses but by what he gives away.  We are surrounded by grabbers and givers, governed and rebellient. 

The talking box, a costumed world has convinced many that advertisements are real.  People don't live as depicted, between the lines in TV sitcoms.  Food does not look like that in the pictures of gourmet magazines.  We lie to keep from hurting someone's feelings.   Don't be more specific in lying than necessary, this is what we consume with political correctness.  You can deodorize-glamorize anything-rage-robbery by politicians-reasoning of the business man.

He may be trimming hedges next door.  She may sit next to you on a plane.  Even your family, friends, associates, may hide their inner conflicts, their jostlings between the lines.  JUST REMEMBER, WE ALL HAVE THEM.  The theme of the entire bible is God.  Some use God to beat us up, some use God for that ever present ever lasting arm.  Not one can understand or measure God.  Bildad's last words to Job, "You are a worm."

This blind writer cannot throw away all his thoughts of integrity, not believing the justice of God.  The words come to me over and over again, do not seek wisdom in your own eyes. (Proverbs 3:7)  Wisdom is beyond understanding.  The time honed image of yourself, keep between the lines.  Not all of us can put things in mental trash cans where they belong, escape with cover up-witticisms- just laughing at everything.

The greatest news of the universe, not that you love God but that God loves you.