Hot-tempered people must pay the penalty. If you rescue them once, you will have to do it again. ( Proverbs 19:19)Do it again. If I could do it again, what would I do differently?
First of all I would probably not become a preacher. It has brought me nothing but problems. I have given my life to the Lord and he has thrown it back into my teeth.
Second, if I were the kind of fool that would become a preacher (2 Corinthians 11:23), I would go to school and get all of my schooling in advance, rather than as I went along.
Third, I would save more. I really thought that the Lord would take care of me like he said when I got older. But he hasn’t and we are just about destitute. It would be nice to have some money at the end of my life so that we didn’t have to live in government housing. Some dignity would be nice.
Fourth, I would not make the mistakes I made in thinking that the Lord needed me in certain places. I would be a lot more judicious in where I went to pastor and wouldn’t think that the Lord needed me there when he obviously didn’t.
There are a lot of things I would do differently. But there are things I would do the same. I would try my best to convince Ella to be my wife. It would be hard because I would not be the little Church of Christ guy she married. That would be hard on her.
I would also make far more use of my music instead of being in some stupid church that didn’t believe that instrumental music was according to God’s plan, that only sinners used instrumental music. That was foolish for me, and I would not do it again.
On the other hand, if I had to be in the Church of Christ, as I probably would, since my parents were that, I would do what I could and leave when I could leave.
I don’t know that the scripture above really works, but I used it anyway.
I do know that my life in the Lord has somewhat been wasted and now that I am old, I am almost destitute. The Lord has hung me out to dry.
Yet I continue. Why? I am not sure. I teach class, am involved in the worship services, write for the church, do hospitality ministry, am totally involved in this little local church. Yet God has not rewarded me or shown me any of the blessings he promised. We live on less than $1000 a month combined retirement and disability. I really am kind of pathetic as one person said.
On the other hand, who else will I serve? Where else will I go. It is he who has the words of eternal life. So I am stuck, kind of like the apostles in John 6.
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