Hi family.  Last week, Lyn had a toe amputation on his right foot.  Sunday, after many tests, his lower right leg was amputated mid-shin down.  I have been trying to be at the hospital as much as I can.  It's in downtown Raleigh, so a bit of a busy drive.  I have been in touch with all of his doctors.  With diabetes, End-Stage Renal disease and dialysis and now a lower extremity amputation, the outlook is not good.  However, Lyn's spirit is up and he remains hopeful.

Please continue to pray for him and his son, Joe.

Thanks,  family.  Love you all

Here we run into a very potent example of the continuity between the Old and New Covenants. Granted, what Paul talks about in this chapter is disturbingly not a sin in to western minds. But even among Gentiles of his day, Paul knew that this issue crossed boundaries well established even outside the Law of Moses.

In the background of our awareness, we know that Leviticus 18:8 prohibits a man cohabiting with his stepmother (or any other woman in his father's harem). When God made that command at Mount Sinai, it was already a major taboo among most pagan nations, as well. It was considered utterly repulsive for a father and son to have sex with the same woman, regardless of the context. At the least, this was a grave insult to the father. Even the filthy Canaanites would do something like that only as a sacred pagan ritual, not as routine domestic behavior.

It was scandal enough to do this even in Corinth, the capital of self-indulgent hedonism in the Roman Empire. But the offending couple were members of the church! Somehow, at least a portion of church leadership were standing up to defend this, as if it were something God favored, when it was patently obvious He forbade it.

This was such a flagrant breach, such a horrifying defilement of the Body of Christ, that Paul was compelled to demand strong sanctions. This fellow and his woman must be ostracized at a minimum. Then again, that was the most extreme punishment a church body could lawfully exercise under Roman authority. Paul was firm on this; it didn't matter if he was there in person to conduct any ceremonies. He was there in spirit, and they must agree as one body that this grave sin cannot be ignored.

Paul refers to turning their flesh over to Satan. There are whole books on the implications of this. The point is that God has appointed someone to be His Left Hand to enslave/imprison anyone who walks by the flesh. Satan can't touch your spirit. Paul emphasizes the point that the flesh must die so that the spirit can be redeemed and rescued from this awful defilement. As long as the man still wants this woman in his bed, he is walking by the flesh, and not following Christ at all. As long as she is willing to be with this man, she cannot claim Jesus as her Savior. If their spirits were reborn, they would be repulsed by the whole idea.

Think about it: Christ Himself would denounce the two of them. He will offer no covering for such people who serve the flesh.

Then Paul refers to the church using this "acceptance" as some kind of public boast to the outsiders. Christ calls us to take up our cross, not to drag every sin we can imagine into His Presence. Referring to the symbolism of leaven, Paul warns that this kind of sin can destroy the church. We need to celebrate the Sparing (AKA Passover) again by cleaning our lives so the Lamb of God can be present.

On the other hand, it's not as if we could avoid sinners outside the church. Paul had written to them to disassociate from church members who couldn't be bothered to admit the sexual sins were sin, but that didn't mean to avoid sinners who didn't claim to be Christians. The whole point is that sinners are not family. Family might sin, and there was plenty of teaching about how to handle that, but the point here is to discern whether someone was spiritual family or not.

We are participating in our weekly prayer time at 5pm EST. Check out the prayer request forum for some prayer topics, but feel free to lift up your own.

You may also fast. There's no obligation or guidelines to how you should do it, or if you should do it at all. Just fast as the Lord leads and speaks to your convictions.

    It arrived today via UPS. Oddly, it came while I was in the process of removing fluff from the old bike so I could give it someone else. Today I told the apartment management that I was ready to give it to anyone who needed it could sit on it safely.

So our dumpsters are quite a ways behind the buildings and across the parking lot from us, and I just rode the bike around, dragging the box with me. It rides quite differently, and I sit quite upright. Once we get the pictures moved from Veloyce's phone, I'll make a montage for the old blog. FYI, the black bag on the handlebars is a soft bottle carrier. It's rather common with folks who do bikepacking.

Once again, it's best to share here my previous commentary on this chapter.

In the Kingdom of Heaven, a mystery is mysterious, not because those who know it keep it away from prying eyes and ears, but because it can scarcely be spoken under any circumstances. The Ultimate Truth of things is ineffable, cannot be told, only indicated by human words. It is so much greater than any of us that we wisely avoid taking ourselves seriously. Those whose spirits are dead cannot grasp any part of this. Paul says the Corinthian church acts too much like they have no spirits.

A mystical faith is self-effacing, making no claim in the person of any. So it was Paul said the most important thing any man could know of him was his service in the Realm of the Spirit. The one and only thing that matters is a desire and commitment to serve. Paul had no concern whatsoever how the Corinthians or any human court might judge him. By the same token, he didn’t trust his own judgment of himself. While his conscience was clean, that was no proof of innocence. God alone judges and God alone can say whether Paul pleased Him. So it is we who walk in Christ refrain from presuming to judge anyone, because God alone will reveal such things when He is ready.

By using himself and Apollos as examples, Paul simply offered a demonstration of the principles. No one on this earth has a call from God to lord it over anyone else in Kingdom matters. The only difference between any two believers is whatever God has done in their individual lives. No one has any gift, calling, office or anointing that they earned, so no one has any reason to boast at all. The Corinthians were so full of themselves! What marvelous things they boasted! If only it was true, Paul and the other preachers could then share in the blessings.

It seems God left out the poor apostles. Instead of big titles, accolades, power and riches, they got death sentences, public ridicule, and were a laughingstock in view of heaven and earth. They did not compare well with the boasts of the Corinthians. The apostles barely survived in a very hard life, and many had to pay their own way. But they never took it personally; they accepted every abuse as an opportunity to bless. Sorrow was something they took for granted. They knew they were called to walk the Way of the Cross.

Paul wasn’t trying to make the Corinthians feel sorry for him. Rather, he was trying to warn them. Now, a child might pass through any number of teachers and tutors, but he would only ever have one father. Paul was their spiritual father, and it was only natural that they should model themselves on him. Toward this end, Paul sent Timothy, rather like their big brother that had already begun walking in Paul’s footsteps. His very presence would remind them of Paul’s teachings, the same teachings Paul consistently shared wherever he went.

The Corinthians weren’t being short-changed. Paul had the same mission to teach everywhere he went, and the Corinthian church was hardly the only one he started. Their pity-party was unjustified, and accusations that Paul had abandoned them were silly. If God allowed, Paul would return to them shortly following this letter. He was not concerned about the rowdy talk against him. People say all kinds of things having no connection to reality. What mattered was whether God worked through them. The gospel of Christ, and His Kingdom, is not wrapped up in mere words of human language, but in the power to turn men’s hearts to eternal things.

Would they be impressed if Paul showed up with a fasces, some symbol or means of exerting human authority? Or would the Corinthians want to learn the power of God through love and gentleness? That’s how the Kingdom of Heaven operates.

We are participating in our weekly prayer time at 5pm EST. Check out the prayer request forum for some prayer topics, but feel free to lift up your own.

You may also fast. There's no obligation or guidelines to how you should do it, or if you should do it at all. Just fast as the Lord leads and speaks to your convictions.

Hellenism was a man-centered religion. Man was the measure of all things, and the whole goal was to rise to the full potential of what mankind could be from strictly human resources. This breeds the Boastful Pride of Life. And in the end, you would die, and your only hope was that others still living would remember you. Only the most elite could gain that kind of "immortality".

What a contrast from the free offer of the gospel message, the path to Eternity for everyone. Paul had wanted so much to share the depth of that message, but it seemed the Corinthians took forever to grasp the simple truth: This human existence is a tragedy. The greatest human triumph is nothing, a bit of trash left on the earth to be cleansed when Christ returns. Wisdom that belongs to Eternity was far beyond the Corinthian reach. Paul had to restrict his message to mere baby formula, because they seemed so severely locked into the fleshly orientation. Even as he wrote this letter, they were not ready.

As I wrote elsewhere: "Spiritual people did not give much attention to human significance. If you are seeking Christ, you aren’t going to pay much attention to what other people have. Spiritual folks have no use for political maneuvering, jockeying for position, or forming teams and parties."

Paul regarded himself as of no significance. Of the things he did, only what brought his Lord glory would be remembered. He had zero appetite for leadership on human terms, no ambition at all. As far as he was concerned, he and his associates were just hired farmers, or even better, a building crew.

The greatest foundation of our existence is Christ. Paul knew just enough to recognize this, so his whole business in life was laying that foundation wherever he went. He was not in a position to say much about what others built on that, but he knew it was the best he could possibly do. God would sift out what He wanted built on His Son, testing everything as if by fire, whether it would stand.

Building a faith community on anything human will see you standing in the smoky ruin with nothing, and fortunate to be alive.

Did the Corinthians together not know that they were God's Temple on this earth? His Holy Spirit resided in them. If anyone sought to defile that Temple by inserting man-made trash into the structure, God would treat him as trash and consume him. Don't bring that stuff into the church.

They aren't fooling God, only themselves. As long as you revere human wisdom, you can never learn divine wisdom. Discard the trash so you can be filled with treasure. Paul mentions a quote from Job indicating that God is not impressed with human wisdom, and the quote from Psalm 94 says the same thing. Stop boasting in mortal accomplishments. Learn to place a high value on the moral and spiritual treasure that God offers in His Son. Our divine inheritance is all of Creation, and we in turn are the inheritance of Christ, who is the heir of God.

Mainstream media news is banned in my house...I only found out about it while I was having breakfast at the hotel I was staying at for vacation. Had anyone else heard of this? How it exploded is still being determined, but this feels unreal. Houses shouldn't explode like that.

We are participating in our weekly prayer time at 5pm EST. Check out the prayer request forum for some prayer topics, but feel free to lift up your own.

You may also fast. There's no obligation or guidelines to how you should do it, or if you should do it at all. Just fast as the Lord leads and speaks to your convictions.

This isn't simple enough that I want to put it into the Prayer Request forum.

The move is done. The new apartment is still loaded with boxes and I'm still throwing away stuff I should not have moved. Most of it right now is aging networking gear for computers. Nobody is using that stuff any more; it's obsolete. Our household was more or less forced to become wireless altogether. It's okay. I'm getting used to it.

The old apartment is almost totally cleaned out. We have one more trip for important tools and such. I have been trying very hard to sell our refrigerator. It's too tall for the space in our new apartment and we can live with what they provide here. I may have sold it, but I'm praying the guy carries through. Otherwise I'll have to just give it away.

My bike is too big for the apartment, but I dare not park it outside overnight. Since I'm no longer planning to take long rides any more, I've decided to pray the Lord will show me someone who needs it, and I'll replace it with a folding bicycle that will fit more nicely.

Right in the middle of the move, one of my teeth became super sensitive. But then, my dentist is moving away, and finding another that takes my insurance has been tricky. I finally got an appointment for Tuesday. As it was, I had gone to the VA ER the other night because of the pain, and the doctor said it looked like a serious infection in the gum below the tooth that was causing so much trouble. She ordered a round of antibiotics, since a dentist won't work on it much until the infection is knocked down, anyway. So, the timing turns out to be about right. Meanwhile, the pain can be blinding, causing something like what people describe as migraines. It flares up in waves every few hours. It is getting better as the treatment is working, but slowly. Eating is the hard part, because it's nearly impossible to avoid bumping the bad tooth while chewing.

So, between the massive hard work of moving in this heat, and not being able to eat much, I've lost some weight. Not that I was eager for it, but I'll play along and see what happens. The new place has a real gym, so I need not ride across town to an outdoor gym, but I probably will do that weekly just for the fun. And I'll ride that folding bike to get there. Pictures when I get it, but I have to unload the old one first.