Keller writes on an important topic:
To be bitter and angry in your heart toward someone can lead to great evil, so that makes some sense. But the term raca means only something like “you air-head!” and the word translated fool is likewise not an outrageous or cutting insult. Jesus’ listeners would likely have been smiling as they heard these terms and would have been shocked as he ended the sentence threatening them with hell-fire! What was Jesus’ point? “The deliberate paradox of Jesus’ pronouncement is that ordinary insults may betray an attitude of contempt which God takes extremely seriously.”
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Interesting! Never thought of the rock that Moses struck as being The Rock. . .
I think I’m going to have to read this about 4 times. My contempt doesn’t leave without a fight. Dear God I want to want to repent.
cont’d
Do we take a very low view of humanity so as to not get angry at those subpar people who put us in danger? Lower the bar to avoid judgement? I formerly thought Proverbs backed me up in my opinion towards fools.
subpar people?
Ouch!
We need not look very far back in history to find men with substantially more character and fortitude than most have currently. I am guilty as well. I wonder if the article was off in one regard. Sure Moses was tired of griping but wouldn’t he be more tired of walking more so? He was old when he went back to Egypt. I think he could have been a bit upset that these people were keeping him from the promised land, holding him back. Their shoes didn’t wear out for 40 years but that’s alot on a old mans legs.
Good article, speaks truth to all excercising leadership and those who are not.
Keller has always stood out to me for his gentleness and carefulness. This piece reminds me of Jonathan Edward’s “The Spirit of Love the Opposite of a Censorious Spirit” http://www.biblebb.com/files/edwards/charity10.htm
Not easy being human: from dust we come, dust we go.. Leadership or not, .the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak..or too strongly oppositional to the Lord at times. Some times I ask God, “You expect what from dirt?”
Keller reminds me of Oswald Chambers sometimes in that his writing is succinct and able to convict in one paragraph, and then lift us up and remind us of the source of hope we have in the next.