I don’t think any of us would disagree that as people get to know us, they’re going to rather quickly learn your most common traits.  To this day, my guess is that my close friends really pretty quickly I have some strengths and some weaknesses.  Somewhere between those two points lies probably my greatest strength as well as my greatest weakness.  I am trying to think of the kindest way to put this so here’s how I would phrase one of my clearest cut tendencies – I tend to question authority.  I have all the days of my life.  Honest to goodness, I wish it wasn’t true for every single time aversion to authority helped me, it probably caused me trouble a dozen times.

            You’d think such a tendency would abate over time, after all, I’m quite a way from being a spring chicken but I haven’t seen any signs of my anti-authoritarianism waning, in the slightest.  Once, somebody from the organizing committee of the Mount Holly Springfest told us our church would be prevented from having a bouncy house on the front lawn.  Y’all, I just about went to war over that…nobody is gonna tell my church that they can’t do something on their front lawn.  Thankfully, a compromise was brokered but, honestly, I’m lucky I made it through that first year of ministry without a court summons if not a misdemeanor. 

            And, true to form, I spent a good many fruitless years arguing with others about the Bible.  And I probably wouldn’t have been on the side you expect.  While I didn’t study the topic in general, you’d be amazed at the number of things you hear about the Bible that are very wrong but also very easy to repeat.  And because I rejected the authority of Scripture, I had no problem whatsoever flouting it.  I mean, why bother following what some ancient writings of men recorded.  I wouldn’t take living advice from a Neanderthal why should I from someone just a few hundred years younger? 

            Needless to say, my attitude has changed…a lot.  Not only would I say to this day that the Scripture is supremely authoritative in my life, talking about it represents one of the most enjoyable aspects of my job. 

            What happened?  Well, that’s a rather long yarn, one that I’d be happy to spin for you some other day and not from the pulpit.  Suffice it to say that it took God doing a 180 on my life.  But the thing to really notice is that I was changed while the Scriptures, they didn’t change a thing.

            Which, if you think about it, is a desperately needed thing.  An anchor.  Something to navigate by.  Because if we think about it, we’re always in motion.  Right now, for example, even though it seems like you’re sitting there in your pew mostly motionless except to grab a Kleenex or pinch a rebellious child, you’re actually moving…quite fast.  You see, the earth moves at about 30 kilometers per second.  Which, in case you were wondering means you’re moving in one direction at about 67,000 miles per hour.  And, that’s not all.  For not only are you moving in an orbit around the sun, you’re also rotating on the Earth’s axis.  In some ways, you’re on a cosmic tilt-a-whirl and you don’t even know it.

            And it’s not just that.  When I was a kid, they made us watch a movie called, Koi-anna-scotsi which used motion capture photography to document changes to all number of things over time.  Motion and change are sometimes all we can count on, it’d seem. 

            It sure feels that way sometimes, doesn’t it?  Not so much that the earth is moving but rather that the goalposts are changing.  Without question, we’ve experienced more societal upheaval in the last 50 years than we’d likely realize.  If you wake up, read the news and think, “how the heck did this happen?” then you should be ecstatic that there is one thing that is constant.  That doesn’t change. 

            1 Peter 1:25 – “but the word of the Lord remains forever.” And this word is the good news that was preached to you.”

            Isaiah 40:8 – “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever.”

            Hebrews 13:8 – “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”

            The Bible makes clear that, in this world of constant change and motion, there is one thing most steady and most sure.  The Word of God.

            And yet, that’s the very thing that often gets quickly discredited or thrown aside in all matter of debates.  One of the primary reasons for this comes to us from history.  Now, for this next part, please know that I’m not talking about current politics.  When I say liberal or liberalism, I’m talking historically, not your next-door neighbor.