One of the many offices I held in various music teacher organizations was as Chairman for the State Level vocal competition.  I not only had to procure the judges, I had to brief them as well.  At one of those briefing events one year, one of the three judges, a gentleman in his forties, asked me if I would say something to the young ladies.  As the students came forward to hand their music to the judges, they often had to bend over to lay it on the table and show the judges which song they were singing and point out any changes they were making, like cutting a long intro in the accompaniment, or not taking a repeat for time's sake.  "These young ladies," he said, "seem to have no idea what happens when they bend over and I must constantly avert my eyes to keep from seeing down their necklines.  I know it must look like I am not listening to what they are telling me, and I don't want them to think that."  So yes, I did take the young ladies aside that day and speak to them, asking each to make sure she placed her hand on her neckline when she bent over.  A couple of them looked at me like I was crazy.  A few others simply forgot—I'll give them the benefit of the doubt since it was probably something they had never done before.
            That little experience made me realize that while we have done an admirable job of telling them that bikinis and miniskirts are not appropriate wear for a modest Christian, this latest generation seems to have had absolutely no instruction about basic things, things my generation grew up doing almost instinctively.  As a teen, I fell down the stairs at the church house one Sunday and despite a badly hurt ankle, the first thing I did was pull my skirt down!  A friend of mine, in the midst of a heart attack, played tug-o-war with an ER nurse over her blouse!  That's what I mean about being so well-taught about these things that we didn't even have to think about it, even in the midst of an emergency.
            Could I possibly make a few suggestions to the parents out there?  Here are some areas in which we need to give a little more instruction to our young (and possibly older) women.
            1.  Necklines—First let me just reiterate the lesson above.  Every time you lean over, you should put your hand on your neckline so it won't gape open.  In some cases, I have seen all the way to a young woman's belly button!  This usually happens with vee necks and scoop necks.  Unless your neckline is right at your throat, a turtleneck, mock turtle, or crew collar, hold it shut!
            Second, I am seeing more and more cleavage on Christian women, young, middle-aged, and older.  In the "olden days" as my boys liked to call my childhood, the only women brazen enough to show cleavage were street walkers and movie actresses.  Please, ladies, you can easily sew a small triangle of cloth or even fancy lace across your neckline and avoid this.
            2.  Hemlines—I had so hoped we were past this, but it's coming "up" again.  Any length of bare leg is arousing to a man.  Be careful what you are doing to your brethren.  When a man has to look at a sea of shapely young legs as he passes the Lord's Supper, someone is being horribly inconsiderate to her brethren.
            Second, girls have gotten so out of practice at wearing skirts and dresses that they have forgotten the number one basic rule—keep your knees together!  If you aren't careful, any time you move in your seat, especially turning sideways, you are likely to let them come apart.  No one needs to know the color of your underwear.
            And third, when you cross your legs, you will often get a fly-away hem on the outside of each thigh that leaves you exposed nearly to the hip, and crossing your legs makes the skirt ride up much higher than you realize.  Crossing your legs also tightens the skirt across your knees leaving a little peekaboo triangle.  Please learn to hang on to the hem as you cross your legs and tuck anything in that flips out.  And if it makes the skirt ride a foot above your knees, maybe that's a skirt you should either stop wearing or stop crossing your legs in.
            3.  Armholes—Some tank tops and sleeveless shirts have armholes so large they show half the side of your body.  In addition, they leave a tunnel that anyone can see the light at the end of, even if they try not to.  Make sure the armholes on your sleeveless attire is tight to your skin and relatively small.
            4.  Walking—No, I am not talking about that purposeful hip-sashaying walk we all know about.  I don't really think I need to say anything about that.  But here is another area where our propensity to wear pants most of the time has left young ladies not realizing the basics.  Wearing pants means you are no longer constricted by hemlines around the legs.  That means you take longer strides than the women of my day.  On the few times that you do wear a skirt, if it is constricting at all, like a straight skirt, that longer step you have become accustomed to will first, pull it tight against your body and show not only the form of your hips and bottom, but also every line of your underwear; and second, that skirt will ride up, just like it does when you sit down as you try to take that longer step.  All you need to do is shorten your stride and that usually takes care of that problem.
            And one more thing about walking:  In a time when women become angry at being objectified by men in the worst possible way, why are they wearing spike heels five or six inches high?  Do you not know what that does to your walk and to the looks of your legs and hips?  There is a reason shoe companies produce these things and men like them.  Be aware of what fashion designers are trying to do to you!
            5.  Tightness—I hate to even have to write this on a public blog post.  I have noticed pants, and especially shorts, so tight, that you can actually see the outline of the genitals.  Surely, the problem with that is obvious.
            I know a woman who will not buy an item of apparel until she has looked at it in a mirror from every possible angle, with every possible movement, or had a friend watch her as she goes through the list in her head.  She is obsessed, some of you might think, and I guess she is—obsessed with keeping the way she presents herself to the world from putting the lie to, as the religious world likes to call it, her witness.  She is also concerned with causing her brother, or any man, to sin.  That sounds like Christian love to me, not obsession.  If you are sitting there thinking, "I can do as I please and it's their problem not mine," then maybe you should consider whether you love souls as a follower of Christ ought to.  Just as her Master gave up all, a Christian woman must give up a few things if she wears His name.  If a few items of clothing is all you have to give up, count yourself blessed.
 
So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God...just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved (1Cor 10:31-33).
 
Dene Ward

My mother taught me when I was a teenager, that if you make the bed the minute you get out of it, it's done in 5 minutes and it was no big deal.  Marrying a man who thinks that making the bed is ridiculous got me out of that habit, but I still get it done eventually, and usually before the morning is half over.
            I've heard it from many:  why make the bed when you are just going to get back into it that night?  Well, for one thing, I like for things to look tidy and making a bed makes a bedroom 90% tidy all by itself.  For another, my bedroom is visible from our dining room table, which is usually where we are entertaining guests.  For another, when you leave it unmade, all those sheets that you put your face on all night long are open to catching whatever dust falls on them—and I have a dust mite allergy.           
            But as for that reason most people give, "why make it when you are just going to get back into it?"  Let's think about that for a few minutes.  Why wash your clothes when you are just going to wear them again?  Why wash the dishes when you are just going to eat off of them again?  In fact, why cook dinner when you are just going to get hungry again?  Doesn't work so well with all those things does it?
            What I am afraid of is that attitude will bleed off into something really important, like why try to overcome a temptation when you know you are just going to sin again?  I hope you can see that one really doesn't work.  Overcoming once will make it easier to overcome the next time, and then the next, and then the next, and someday you may find yourself sinning less often.  Isn't that what you are hoping for?  Not to mention, God always gives you a way out.  Try working your little argument on him after he has gone to all that trouble, and his Son has died in order to help you win those battles over Satan.
            No, it isn't a sin not to make your bed, not even if your mother said it was, but be careful with the arguments you use for the simple things.  Don't let it affect the things that really do matter.
 
For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world— our faith (1John 5:4).
 
Dene Ward

Masquerade balls have a varied and grisly history, depending upon which historian you believe.  Some say they were invented by the Venetian upper classes in the sixteenth century during Carnival season as a way to let loose without getting into trouble.  Others say they began in the fourteenth century in France when whole villages celebrated an important event, often a welcome of some high dignitary into their town.  Crimes were sometimes committed amid the anonymity, as well as immorality of all sorts, especially drunkenness, gluttony and lust.  The English took them up in the eighteenth century, though some considered them outings for “The Man of Taste.”  Then the Swedes discovered them, but on the night of March 16, 1792, King Gustav III was attacked at his own masquerade ball by a disgruntled nobleman.  He died two weeks later on March 29, and due to an informant among the cabal, so did the murderer’s anonymity.
            God’s people would never try to hide their sins would they?  The people of God have always understood that as God, He knew everything they did, even the things done “in secret,” right?
            At that time Abijah the son of Jeroboam fell sick. And Jeroboam said to his wife, “Arise, and disguise yourself, that it not be known that you are the wife of Jeroboam, and go to Shiloh. Behold, Ahijah the prophet is there, who said of me that I should be king over this people. Take with you ten loaves, some cakes, and a jar of honey, and go to him. He will tell you what shall happen to the child,” 1Kgs 14:1-3.
            Consider the foolishness of this situation.  Jeroboam believes this man is a prophet of God, yet he thinks he can trick him, first by sending someone instead of going himself, and second by disguising that someone.  If God can do what Jeroboam believes He can, then how will He be fooled by a disguise?
            This isn’t the only instance recorded in the scriptures.  Ananias and Sapphira come quickly to mind.  But in my lifetime, I’ve seen Christians do the same thing again and again, and sadly, sometimes I have fallen into this trap too. 
            Usually it’s the obvious—Sunday morning Christians who seem to think that God does not know what goes on the rest of the week, as if He is bound by the meetinghouse doors.
            But there are a few more complex ways of disguising ourselves.  Some of us do the right things, but without the heart, or with entirely the wrong heart.  As long as God sees me take the Lord’s Supper every Sunday or attend whenever the doors are opened, it doesn’t matter that I hate every minute of it.   As long as I give, it doesn’t really matter if I do it grudgingly or not.  As long as I shake everyone’s hand, it doesn’t matter if I hate the very sight of them.  Really?
            But then there are those who raise their hands and shout hallelujah, who “give God the glory” every other sentence and hug everyone in sight, but who are quick to find an excuse for not doing exactly what God says He wants.  “It’s such a little thing…”  “God wouldn’t mind…”  “But God knows my heart.”  Yep.  He knows it’s a heart of self will that only pretends to love and worship Him as long as it gets things its way.
            Hypocrisy, legalism, ritualism, emotionalism—God wants none of these disguises.  He wants people who love Him and serve Him the way He wants to be served, because He is the great and glorious God who sees all we do and knows our hearts, and He alone deserves it.  God has never gone for masquerades.
 
The LORD looks down from heaven; he sees all the children of man; from where he sits enthroned he looks out on all the inhabitants of the earth, he who fashions the hearts of them all and observes all their deeds, Ps 33:13-15.
 
Dene Ward

My mother came from a family of long-lived women.  Her grandmother was well into her 80s when she passed away, and her own mother was 97.  When Mama reached 87 with no signs of stopping, we decided that, due to our own health problems, we needed to move her closer than two hours away so we could care for her as we ought.  But even then, there were issues.  Our home is way out in the country, nearly an hour from her doctors and the hospital.  We have steps she could no longer negotiate and her walker would not even fit through our doors.  Then there is the issue of independence; she wanted to live on her own for as long as she possibly could, and we wanted to honor that wish.
            At first she bought her own little house in the city and managed that for a year and a half.  Then we moved her up a step to an independent living facility.  They provided meals and housekeeping for a nice little apartment as long as she could get back and forth to the dining room and take care of all her other needs.  And ultimately, we had to go the assisted living route.  Gainesville has a couple of very nice ones and she was very happy there until her death last year at the age of 91.
            One thing I noticed, and it was not just those last few years.  No matter where she lived, she managed to find the friendless, the outcasts, the ones who were "different" in some way that meant everyone else ignored or even shunned them, and she befriended them.  (Even in churches, mind you.)  She looked after them.  She defended them.  She made sure they had someone to sit by at meals, talk to during the day, and share their troubles with.  She could tell me more details about the lives of more people than I thought she even knew within two weeks of moving somewhere, and because we were now able to see her three or four times a week, this really became noticeable.
            My mother was a good woman, generous with her time and her talents, given to hospitality, always feeding visitors, college students, and friends.  I was never embarrassed to ask someone from church to spend Sunday afternoon with me, or even a whole weekend.  I knew the food would be plenteous and delicious, and the welcome warm.  If someone needed a home for a wedding or baby shower, she offered, even making and decorating the cake which was always elaborate and creative.  She sewed for people, sometimes just mending, but other times the whole outfit.  Whenever she went shopping, if something caught her eye, it was seldom for herself.  It was always that person or this person "would love that," and she picked it up, usually for no reason at all except she saw it and thought of them.  But once I began to really notice this habit of hers to gravitate to the social misfits, I thought to myself, "This is what it really means to be Christlike."
            What did Isaiah say about the Messiah?   The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; ​to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion— to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he may be glorified. (Isa 61:1-3)
            And whom did Jesus seek out?  Not the wealthy, not the powerful, not the popular, not the "in-crowd," but a bunch of poor, "unlearned" fishermen, the hated publicans, the sinners who lived on the edge of a society that was happy to use and then discard them, a Samaritan woman who herself was an outcast among outcasts, those with demons, those with illnesses which were considered signs of sin.  He gave them a champion who saw them and their pain rather than leaders who considered them beneath their notice.  He fulfilled his mission "...to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, " (Luke 4:18) and "A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory. " (Matt 12:20).
            Today, examine your heart.  Who do you gravitate toward?  Who do you run to and why?  Our Lord actively looked for the outsiders just as we should search for the ones who come in among us and leave quietly because they are so sure no one even cares if they are there at all.  No one should come in among the people of God and feel like that.  What will you do about it today?
 
And Jesus perceiving it withdrew from thence: and many followed him; and he healed them all, and charged them that they should not make him known: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through Isaiah the prophet, saying, Behold, my servant whom I have chosen; My beloved in whom my soul is well pleased: I will put my Spirit upon him, And he shall declare judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive, nor cry aloud; Neither shall any one hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall he not break, And smoking flax shall he not quench, Till he send forth judgment unto victory. And in his name shall the Gentiles hope  (Matt 12:15-21).
 
Dene Ward
           

I don’t know how many times in my life I have heard unbelievers make fun of the scriptures, but they obviously do not realize what they show themselves to be when they do.  Most of them would call themselves intellectuals, but the statements that come out of their mouths prove they are simply ignorant—at least of the thing they have chosen to ridicule. 
            Have you ever heard them talk about “the God of the Old Testament” and “the God of the New Testament?”  They do this to “prove” that our beliefs are based upon our society, subject to change just as society does, which means that it is all an invention of man.  Everyone knows, they affirm, that the God of the Old Testament was a cruel, angry God who punished indiscriminately for even the most minor infraction, while the God of the New Testament is a mild, friendly, grandfatherly sort who forgives anything whether we repent of it or not.  Study the two paragraphs below for a few minutes this morning.
            And Jehovah passed before him and proclaimed, Jehovah, Jehovah, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness and truth.  / Jehovah is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression. / Know therefore that Jehovah your God, he is God, the faithful God, who keeps covenant and lovingkindness to those who love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations. / The earth is full of the lovingkindness of Jehovah, / Your lovingkindness, O Jehovah, is in the heavens, your faithfulness reaches to the skies. / Great are your tender mercies, O Jehovah. / Jehovah is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works.
            And these shall go away into eternal punishment. / where their worm dies not and the fire is not quenched. / with angels in flaming fire rendering vengeance on those who know not God and obey not the gospel. / It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. / Our God is a consuming fire. / But the fearful and unbelieving, and abominable, and murderers, and fornicators, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their part shall be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.
            If you know your scriptures, you probably recognize that the first paragraph is taken entirely from the Old Testament and the second from the New.  In fact, I found that the Old Testament uses descriptions of God like “merciful, gracious, and lovingkindness” 312 times, while the New Testament only uses them 200 times!  Considering that a good portion of the Old Testament is history rather than teaching about God, that seems significant.  So much for the intellectuals and all their theories about God. 
            Do you want to see a God full of compassion and mercy?  Read the book of Hosea (an Old Testament prophet) and hear the ache in God’s voice as He describes His people, first as a wife He loved who betrayed Him (2:19) and then as a son He cared for and taught, who turned against His father (11:1-4).
            Remember Jonah, that Old Testament prophet who tried to run from his mission to preach to the wicked city of Nineveh?  What did he say about why he ran?  I hasted to flee to Tarshish because I knew you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness, and would repent of the threatened judgment, Jonah 4:2.  Jonah knew God would forgive, and he didn’t want those people saved!
            God has not “changed with the times” because He was not invented.  Look at the Greek gods through their mythology and see what types of gods men create.  The true God could never have come from the mind of any man, no matter how intellectual he thinks he is.  A God who gave His creatures the freewill to reject Him?  A God who gave up His Son for creatures who did not deserve it?  A God who lowered Himself to become human, and allowed those same creatures to torture Him? 
            Don’t let the ignorant fools of the world steal your faith.  They have no answers at all for what they believe.  Our God loves us—look at what He did for us.  But our God will only save those who trust Him, obey Him, and live faithfully.  His prophets have been speaking this message for thousands of years--the same message, an unchanging message, a message so far above the intellect of man that no man anywhere could have made it up.
 
Where is the wise?  Where is the scribe?  Where is the disputer of this world?  Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?  For seeing that in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom knew not God, it was God’s good pleasure through the thing preached to save those who believe.  Seeing that Jews ask for signs and Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, unto Jews a stumblingblock, and unto Gentiles foolishness; but unto those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, the wisdom of God.  Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men, 1 Cor 1:20-25.
 
Dene Ward

Then the king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, “When you serve as midwife to the Hebrew women and see them on the birthstool, if it is a son, you shall kill him, but if it is a daughter, she shall live.” But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live (Exod 1:15-17).
            Those verses seem straightforward enough, don't they?  So I thought until I started digging a little deeper.  Imagine my surprise to find out that several conservative Bible scholars, meaning they believe that the Bible is actually God's Word, say that the Hebrew here is in the genitive case and can be translated "midwives of the Hebrew women," meaning [Egyptian] midwives who served Hebrew women. Logic also comes to play in that how could Pharaoh have expected Hebrew women to kill the infants of their own people, and that the Hebrew women themselves, were probably toiling as slaves for Pharaoh rather than working in service roles to others.  However, Keil and Delitzch, two of the most notable conservative scholars of their time, come right out and say, "The midwives were Hebrews." 
            So why does any of that matter?  Just this:  if these women were Hebrews, they as a nation understood the sanctity of life as far back as 3000+ years ago.  If they were Egyptians, we can be even more amazed that pagans believed in the sanctity of life.  Some things were just understood—you don't slaughter babies. 
           Fast forward a couple thousand years and you will find Cicero, the Roman statesman, lawyer, and scholar, stating in his On the Laws 3.8, "Deformed infants shall be killed."  That "deformity" included an unwanted child, a sickly child, a deformed child, or simply a child of the "wrong" gender.  Seneca, the Roman philosopher said, "…mad dogs we knock on the head…unnatural progeny we destroy; we drown even children at birth who are weakly and abnormal."
            After reading that, it is surprising to find that a few centuries before, killing infants was not looked on favorably.  The Etruscans were notable in that they raised all the children borne to them.  These people influenced the Roman Empire until about 400 BC, and things seemed to take a downhill turn from there.  By the time of Caesar Augustus, the one who taxed the Roman world in the first century, the institution of the family had become so endangered that he enacted laws against adultery and "unchastity."  Epictetus, a stoic philosopher of the same era, stated that even a sheep or a wolf does not abandon its own offspring.  Thus the "progress" of the Roman Empire was actually seen as their downfall by some of their own.  Not every Roman believed babies could be killed just to suit their parents' lifestyles.
            And what has happened to us?  Have we "progressed" like the Roman Empire?  Are you aware that some infants are born alive after abortions and then left to die?  If this is progress, I want no part of it.  And neither did a lot of pagans. 
             
For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them  (Rom 2:14-15).
 
Dene Ward
 

I recently came across an article titled “How to Avoid the Natural Reactions that Affect Good Decision Making.”  It is too long to go over here, but it did make me realize that natural reactions can be controlled.  How?  The author, who was not interested in spiritual matters at all, listed several ways, but they all boiled down to this—control yourself and do not let those “natural” reactions rule you.  The Sermon on the Mount is full of exactly those kinds of statements.
            Rejoice and be glad [when others revile you and persecute you] for so persecuted they the prophets before you.
            But I say to you, Do not resist the one who is evil. But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.
            But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.
            And that’s only a few from Matthew 5.  This is not easy, but I think the key is this:  God doesn’t expect us to control our natural reactions—he expects us to change what comes naturally to us.  And He expects us to do it during the most difficult times of our lives.  His people have been doing it for thousands of years.
            Jesus went to Peter’s house one evening and found his mother-in-law lying sick with a fever.  What did she do the moment she was healed?  And he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up, and the fever left her, and she began to serve them, Mark 1:30.  How many of us would have taken the next few days off to recuperate, expecting a little more sympathy too?
            The apostles were arrested and put in prison, then brought out and beaten.  What did they do? Then they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name, Acts 5:41.  Rejoicing at being beaten?  That certainly wouldn’t be my natural reaction.
            Stephen was stoned for what he preached and what did he do as he lay dying?  And as they were stoning Stephen, he called out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep, Acts 7:59-60.  Impossible, you think, to forgive your murderers, but not for Stephen, a man “full of grace” Acts 6:8.
            Aquila and Priscilla were run out of Rome, forced to leave their home because of persecution.  What did they do?  They set up shop in Corinth and offered Paul a place to stay for as long as he needed (Acts 18:1-3).  Me? I probably would have pleaded a need for time to get organized and put my life back together before I put my home in the upheaval of a long term guest.
            Paul and Silas were beaten and thrown into prison.  What was their reaction?  About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, Acts 16:24.  They were aware that “others were listening to them.”  I’m not sure I would have been aware of anything but my own aches and pains, and completely unconcerned about what others were going through.
            And what did David do immediately after his child died?  Then David arose from the earth and washed and anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he went into the house of the LORD and worshiped, 2 Sam 12:20.  At this most horrible time for any parent, David worshipped.  Is it really surprising?  Job did the same thing, and he had lost all his children.  Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped, Job 1:20. 
            It seems that the natural reaction for a true child of God who undergoes any sort of trial is to turn to his Father, to serve, to worship, to pray, to sing, even to forgive.  I am usually more interested in my own welfare than anyone else’s.  I tend to forget anything spiritual and concentrate on my own physical or emotional pain as if it were the most important thing there is.  Is that what a Christian should do?  These people tell me otherwise, and I could have found many more examples. 
            Truly I have a long way to go, but this maybe I can remember:  If I have become a new creature, then what is “natural” about me, including my reactions, should have changed too.
 
Now the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them, because they are spiritually judged. But he that is spiritual judges all things, and he himself is judged of no man, 1 Cor 2:14,15. 
 
Dene Ward