Oh, You're One of THEM

Before I tell my story of the day, I have to thank those of you who left a comment on my entry yesterday letting me know that I do have AT LEAST three readers. Now I can rest easy. :-)

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Darcy's Bible class at PCA has been given an assignment to take notes in the worship service at least once over the next three weeks and turn said notes in for a grade. The idea is to help these fifth graders become familiar with the process of note-taking, to prepare them for the jump to Middle School next year; a side benefit is these same fifth graders will be more active participants in the corporate worship setting, which is always a good thing.

This is the kind of thing that Darcy seizes in both of her teeth and runs with . . . she LOVES notes. But, perfectionist that she is, she's not content to scribble two or three words of a thought and then just move on (so clearly she has her work cut out for her!); no, she wants to write the entire thought or sentence down--which isn't necessarily a bad thing as it makes for more thorough retention, but unless she has superhuman memorization skills or a lightning fast writing ability of which I am unaware, there's no way she can get down everything Randy says in a sermon.

She chose to complete her assignment today, and when we got home she took out her notebook to show me her notes. Today's sermon was #2 in a series based on the text in Romans 14 that says, "Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters." And among many examples Randy cited, he used a visual demonstration to remind the church how we sometimes fall into the trap of not "bearing with one another" if our opinions or preferences happen to clash. He had two of our brothers come to the stage and gave each a sign: One said "DEM" and one said "GOP." A great example, I have to say; I know I certainly grew up in a church setting where being in the "wrong" political party got you branded for life.

So Randy went on to ask, "How many of you have ever heard the statement, 'You can't be a Christian and a democrat'"? (Gotta be honest--I'm not sure where the question mark goes in the above sentence and frankly, that bugs me.) I observed that a gentleman seated in front of me shook his head vigorously, and I saw others doing the same. And yep, I can remember hearing that as I was growing up. (Not by my parents, by the way.) Then Randy said, "Have you ever heard the statement, 'You can't be a Christian and a Republican'"? (Ditto this question mark. I'm just sayin'.) He went on to list a host of other "issues" that have divided the church through the years: eat in the building/don't eat in the building; Bible class/no Bible class; women passing the collection plate/women staying as far away from those little silver plates as they can get; one cup/many cups . . . oh, we all know the list goes on and on. All issues about which the Bible is "silent" and are therefore disputable.

If you want to hear the rest of the sermon, get the CD. But the point is, Darcy did a really good job of writing down Scripture citations, and she also made a point of differentiating between what was straight from the Bible and what came out of Randy's mouth. In fact, she very helpfully drew little arrows with the words "Preacher talking" when she wasn't copying Scripture. But this is the first thing I saw when she unfolded her piece of paper:

Title of Sermon - A Message to the Weak: Don't Condemn a Servant of Christ
Romans 14 - "Why do you judge your brother? Why do you look down on your brother? . . .
(Little Arrow, Preacher Talking) "You can't be a Christian and a Democrat."

What?!?!?!?!?!?! I said, "Darcy, that's not what your dad said!" In fact, that's pretty much the opposite of what he said!" We got a good laugh out of it and I was able to help her recall the context in which her dad made that statement, but all I could think was, "What in the world would her TEACHER have said if she'd seen it?" Perish the thought!