Walking Dead or Walking Wounded?

Over the holidays I stumbled upon a series that Netflix thought I would like: The Walking Dead (zombie alert, don't click if you're a siss..er... faint of heart). I like science fiction, especially when it flirts so shamelessly with reality that it makes you forget the event you're watching isn't occurring just outside your front door. It's the potential of its veracity that evokes the fight or flight mechanism we all share. I scared the scoobies out of myself watching the first season and as providence would have it, there was a season two marathon on AMC the very next day. Alone on the top of a hill, wind making the nekkid crepe myrtle branches rub on the vinyl siding, I sat transfixed in a sort of HDTV induced sensory overload. You should picture me in my recliner with my Winchester across my lap, eyes wide open and mind on high alert. I didn't really have my rifle across my lap but I kept thinking about getting it. I didn't only because I didn't want to stop watching long enough. OK, I am exaggerating but only to demonstrate to you just how involved I got in this series.

This is a well written program. It absolutely follows an age old formula but manages to make it work. It also poses some great ethical and moral questions. (Yes, Virginia, there is a difference between ethics and morals. Ethics are absolutes and morals are arrived at by consensus of opinion by the majority.) I don't really want to go into the details of the series because I don't want to spoil the program if you're like me, a little twisted, and might want to watch it. If you've seen the movie 28 Days Later, it is very similar. Besides, this isn't a review of the program. If this was meant to be a review I would give it thumbs up, five stars and a big heck yeah! What I mean to write about is the difference between being one of the walking dead and one of the walking wounded, a question posed by the series in the season two finale.

I have been doing a lot of thinking about what differentiates the walking dead and the walking wounded and decided that time is the only thing that distinguishes the two. The walking wounded are the walking dead. They just haven't ripened yet. The second important question the program asks is what kind of person are you? Are you one that sees the walking dead as walking wounded and want to cure them? Or are you one who sees them as one more way you might become infected with their incurable disease; dead already and a threat to your safety? Do the wounded get put down before they have ripened or do you wait and hope that they won't ripen before a cure is found?

What kind of girl am I? I wasn't having you picture me with my rifle across my lap for dramatic effect. If you're wounded you're dead. If you're going to try and take me or anyone else with you, you're going to suffer from some lead poisoning. I am going to survive you and your contagions. I am going to make certain the ones I love are going to survive you and I wouldn't have a sleepless moment for pulling the trigger in order to protect them or me.

Then I began to think about sin and how we are all enslaved to it. Some of us, by God's grace, will be set free from the law of sin and death through faith in Christ. As I considered my response to a television program and my response to knowing that real people, people whom I love, will slip into a Christless eternity, I would have to confess to there being a huge disparity between the two reactions. I'd have no problem defending someone I love from an outside threat, the inside threat they face is more important and I am afraid at times to warn them. I am afraid to pull out my high-powered doctrine gun and dispense the gospel to them. It might not be the right time or place. I may not have the right to speak of the things of God because of my sinful behavior, I don't want to seem offensive, I want to be more winsome, the list goes on and on.

It's really easy for me to listen to be critical of other Christians. I expect sinners to act like sinners and I expect Christians to be different. How is it that I missed those expectations for myself? I have to stop watching television. It's too convicting.

Character Flaws, Sin and Remediation

I have been thinking about my last post in which I offered to talk about how having a job has shown or magnified my character flaws. Before I do though, I want to distinguish between character flaws and sin. My character flaws predispose me to sin in certain areas more readily than in others. Indulging in my character flaws is sinful. Entertaining the idea of indulging my character flaws is sinful. They are the weaknesses in me where my flesh makes itself known by screaming, "You know you want to!!" Too often I hear Christians lamenting that they "make mistakes" or are victims of their genetic make-up and intimate that they should, therefore, be excused from culpability for being prone to certain activities. Our cultural dependence on a medical model to define our behavior has given many what they see as a plausible excuse for sin. I don't see that caveat in the Word. For Christians, the Word is always our standard. It is the standard by which all will be j

Fear Down, Hope and Peace to Go!

Last night I had the honor and privilege to present some information to the women of my church. I cannot begin to tell you how much I love and appreciate them. The seminar I did was on fear. God is clever and He had me present the information to them because I needed it. It's not that I don't want to study things for my own benefit and growth, but whenever I do a topical study to teach it, I see how badly I needed it and how much more I have to repent of than I realized. Sometimes you don't know what you don't know. That's a topic I want to return to in another post. I want to talk about the ladies for a moment. They are an incredibly loving group of women. Women who seek God and are teachable. They have gone out of their way to include me and love on me, which speaks volumes of their characters because I am not all that lovable. I am not being self-deprecating here. I am a mix of endearing and maddening qualities like anyone else. What I am telling you is

Super Church a song for the Emergent-sy

In the early 70s I was in a youth choir at my church. Our youth pastor was a musician and his way of connecting with us as a group was through the choir and music. Somehow there was an affiliation between him and The Continental Singers, New Hope and Jeremiah People. He was worked with Moishe Rosen of Jews for Jesus too, I think. Are any of these names familiar to you? Though I remember the church fondly I was a profoundly lost and troubled young woman during my years there. That and time have muddled the memories quite a bit. Today I was digging through some old paperwork and one of the books to the musical we did. It's Getting Late For the Great Planet Earth, a folk rock oratorio by Cam Floria. Yes, that's right. Cam Floria put Hal Lindsey to music. There's a lot to laugh about and some to groan about but as I was looking through the songs and remembering, I found this little ditty and I only wish I could sing it for you. Just remember that this is circa 1972 and even th

rambling rosemarie

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