The Parable of the Talents … again

You’re asking yourself, is Hearth never going to get away from the parable of the talents?

Apparently not.

So.  I was volunteering away at church yesterday and talking to an older lady as we prepared the communion trays for service.  She was excited, telling me how wonderful the intern program is.  She and her husband had gone through the program together, even though he wasn’t someone who liked to read or write.  (You have to do quite a bit of reading in this program).   She was telling me *how excited* she was about one of the teaching sessions, because prior to that session she hadn’t known that the Bible was true.  (She was 75 when she made that realization).

-blinks-

Now, I know that there are plenty of people who *don’t believe* that the Bible is true, or the Word of God.  But I’d never heard of someone who grew up in the church (even in a mainline denomination) who just thought the book was a book of pretty stories.   Seventy five years of life and no one had ever told her that this thing was real.

This makes me want to jump up and scream.  I’m not talking about some teenybopper today who hasn’t been raised with any knowledge of the truth.  I’m talking about a much older lady who went through school when the Bible was taught in school, who grew up in a church, who wanted to do the good thing.  WHAT THE .. ARE WE CHRISTIANS DOING?

Look.  I *like* theological arguments.  They’re fun.  But while those of us who have educations and faith are arguing amongst ourselves about how many angels can stand on the head of a pin, there are people out there – in our towns, in our neighborhoods – who don’t have the first idea that God is real, or that anyone they know is willing to build a life around His reality.

We’re hoarding.  Hoarding knowledge, hoarding love, hoarding truth.  It’s wrong, it’s shameful, and it must stop.  We’ve *got* to come out of our Christian closet and confess the name of Jesus.  We’ve *got* to talk about basing our lives on the Word of God.  Everyone else talks about their lives, their faiths, their walks… but we don’t.  Don’t want to ruffle feathers.

For my whole life, I thought that the people around me, at least the “decent” people around me, had heard about this God guy and – if they’d refused Him – had refused Him from some choice at least.

But there are so many who have only heard about Him in passing.  And they’re going to die without Him.

I have been given *so much*… what am I doing with it?