5 20 03

5:50a

Hosea 8

Too close to home� no comment.

Luke 8

You know� we were listening to a sermon the other day in which the preacher was talking about the firsts of the Bible. His main point was that the first-born belong to God. One of the things he mentioned was that Jesus� resurrection was a first. Though many of the things this specific preacher said had a ring of truth, many of the examples he used were flat-out wrong; specifically his statement that Jesus� resurrection was a first. Dunno, but I thought Lazarus and Jarius� daughter were resurrected before Jesus was.

Why do I say this? Because in Luke 8:40-56 we hear the tale of Jarius� daughter (and the woman who was hemorrhaging for 12 years). See? By the way I read this, seems to me that Jarius� daughter was resurrected before Jesus was even crucified.

Mom said that I should just ignore the parts of this specific preacher�s sermon which were Biblically wrong, but I have trouble with that.

I do believe that the first-borns are reserved for God; that He has first dibs on them, so to speak. But the examples this preacher used� at least two of them were so dead wrong in my opinion that it was hard to credit the parts he got right. Of course, that leads me to wondering if I have any right to claim whether he got stuff right or wrong at all. It is not my job to judge, therefore I really don�t have a right to say one way or the other.

For me, however, Sunday was not set aside as God�s day and Jesus was not the first to be resurrected. I have proof from the Bible for both of those. (the former is in Exodus 20:8-11 and Leviticus 23:3 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15) It was not the first day of the week, as the preacher said, but the seventh. The latter (Lazarus) is in John 11:1-16 and Luke 16:19-31 and (Jarius� daughter) is in Luke 8:40-56 and Mark 5:21-43 and Matthew 9:18-26.

So, those two are somewhat big issues to me. I don�t mind that someone speaks about the dedication of the first-borns, but the importance of the message is almost nullified by the errors I see.

It�s like me saying that I am a good Christian when I�m still smoking. I may be doing a lot of stuff right, but the part I�m doing wrong tends to negate the good stuff.*

*thus the �too close to home� comment at the beginning of this entry.