Posted by acb on November 03rd 2005 to
Society Did anyone see this program last night? If you didn’t, you really missed Christians being represented in a interesting way. Trading Spouses is a show that takes two families, and the wives swap families for a period of time. The two families, as usual, couldn’t be more different.
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From Fox’s web site:
D’AMICO-FLISHER FAMILY
Jeanne is a specialist in hypnotherapy and uses this valuable tool to help people reconstruct their lives, Chris works with astrology to help clients find their true life’s purpose. Chris believes that astrology provides people with their personal owner’s manual and can aid them in career and relationship decisions. He is also a writer and a mandala artist who has used his experiences in life and loss to guide others through similar challenges.
PERRIN FAMILY
The Perrin family has always been a very close family and the unexpected pregnancy of Ashley brought them some rocky times but it was God and their faith that kept them close as they welcomed the birth of Abigail into the Perrin home. Abigail is now considered the heart of the household. They consider themselves Christians in a sense that they believe in God and they believe that Jesus gave his life for all of us. Marguerite is a firm believer that God loves everyone unconditionally and does not like any alternatives brought into her life or her family’s life.
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The events that unfold when the wives enter the other family’s house are very eye-opening to say the least. One is closed to other people’s ideas and beliefs, the other is open and respects others. One screams and shouts in anger when someone doesn’t believe the same things she does, the other listens intently. One got up and left during a celebration having nothing to do with religion, the other held hands and prayed when the family did. Which one do you think was positive and understanding? Surprisingly, it WASN’T the Christian. Isn’t that odd? Someone that thinks they are following God to the letter, and yet they represent God by acting like that.
Let me ask you a question. Who do you think we’re supposed to witness to?
Matthew9:9 As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.
10While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and “sinners” came and ate with him and his disciples. 11When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and ’sinners’?”
12On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 13But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Luke 7:33 For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ 34The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and “sinners.” ‘ 35But wisdom is proved right by all her children.”
Now, I know that you read the Bible and read about those nasty Scribes and Pharisees. The law mattered more to them than loving and giving to others.
Luke 11:37 Now when He had spoken, a Pharisee asked Him to have lunch with him; and He went in, and reclined at the table.
38When the Pharisee saw it, he was surprised that He had not first ceremonially washed before the meal.
39But the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and of the platter; but inside of you, you are full of robbery and wickedness.
40″You foolish ones, did not He who made the outside make the inside also?
41″But give that which is within as charity, and then all things are clean for you.
42″But woe to you Pharisees! For you pay tithe of mint and rue and every kind of garden herb, and yet disregard justice and the love of God; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others.
Have we turned into the Scribes and the Pharisees of the 21st century? It seems to me that when I see a Christian on television, it’s always about no. It’s always about what they can’t do, instead of what they can do. Have we forgotten that we follow the living God?
The episode will conclude next Wednesday at 8 CST. Watch today’s church-going Christian fight the battle of good and evil for all of us…by shutting the doors on her home to all who don’t believe like she does. I’ll leave with the same verses I referenced earlier in the week, because I just don’t think anyone has read this part of the Bible.
Luke 14:12 And He also went on to say to the one who had invited Him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, otherwise they may also invite you in return and that will be your repayment.
13″But when you give a reception, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind,
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