You know, a lot of this reminds me of a certain situation I had with a lug nut on a trailer.
The lug nuts you see on semi-trailers are different from the ones on your car. It's a sort of duplex arrangement with a flange on the bottom, threads on top of that, and a second nut that fits over the first. It holds two tires on nicely, and allows you to either remove only one wheel, or both, as necessary.
I had been picking up a load when I noticed that I had a lug nut that was loose. I still had twelve good ones on the wheel, but the reality was I needed to get this one fixed. Why take a chance?
There was a shop on site, and the wrench and I tried to get it to snug up. No go. It was stripped on the inside, which meant that while we could secure the outer wheel, the inner one wasn't going to grip. We'd get a nice cosmetic fix, but that was about it.
I made my run, then took it back to the yard. We had a new guy who was doing our tires, working with someone who was actually very good at tire and wheel work. I told him what was going on.
"No problem!" he said, grabbing an air wrench. A moment later, he had it locked onto the outer nut, and he was pounding away at it. It was turning, turning, turning....
"No, wait," I said. "We tried that at the customer's..."
"Hey, I got it! No sweat! See? I can feel it gripping..."
But it was turning, turning, turning....
Finally, I had enough. "Stop. Just STOP."
He set the air wrench down for a moment, and I tried to explain to him that we had done just what he was doing.
"Look, I can get this," he answered, putting the socket back over the nut.
"Dammit, would you just stop, you damned BUTTMUNCH! YOU ARE GOING TO WRECK IT! STOP WHAT YOU ARE DOING!"
He put the wrench back down.
"Look," I said, "right now, you have about two hours of work, and a five dollar fix. You've either got a stripped nut holding the inner wheel on, or you have a stripped out stud. One of these must be replaced. Continuing to spin the nut on the wheel does nothing except rub metal to metal, and ultimately, you could damage the drum. At that point, it's no longer two hours and five bucks to fix. It's the better part of the day, and anywhere from fifty bucks to $1,200, depending on the damage you do. Stop."
Buttmunch was not happy with me. He took the air wrench back into the shop and tossed it back into the corner where we stored it, then went off to sulk like a whiny little kid. Two weeks later, he still wasn't talking to me.
Another driver told me, "You know, he's pretty mad at you."
"Too bad," I shot back. "I shouldn't have to tell him his job. And if he's going to pout like a little kid when someone tells him he's wrong, he's in the wrong business."
This was with the old job. For all I know, that same trailer still has one funky lug nut on the left rear duals. If the CHP pulls it in for a Level One, someone's going to be in a world of hurt.
That's kind of where I see things with Kathy. We keep telling her, "Look, most of us at one point or another were Christians. We have read the Bible cover to cover. We know all of this. What are you showing us that is any different than what we saw Sunday after Sunday? What is any different that what we heard? What evidence was presented that drew you to Christianity? Why do you choose to believe?"
Instead of telling us what it is she truly believes, (if she believes anything at all), instead of dealing with the question at hand, she decides she will tell us what we need to hear, ignoring the reality that we have already heard it ad nauseum. It's a particularly condescending attitude, which tells me that she's really not interested in converting anyone; she just grooves on hearing herself talk.
Sad, actually. There's a lot to be discussed when it comes to Theology. I have yet to really read a good argument regarding sanctification, as one example, (probably because so many people think that "sactimony" is synonymous with it), and would not have minded a thorough discussion of it. When I think of Christians on this board, I'm reminded of Kelly and Kittynh, (why is it the women believers on this board tend to be more the real deal than a lot of the men?), and can see that the works of both women fall well within that field. Considering that Kittynh has helped quite literally multitudes with her service, and Kelly has led a courageous fight for the lost, (and both have served with extraordinary humility), I would think that Kathy and others would view this as a challenge and take it up. I would think they would actually desire an opportunity to help out, and would look for opportunities to discuss how sanctification enables a believer to serve.
Finella, (who is deeply missed), was another one whose faith led her into some interesting places, and whose views on this would have been welcome. I've found myself missing a lot of the believers who came here over time, and have now left us.
Then again, we had Billiefan, and 1inChrist, both of whom, like Kathy, wanted nothing more than to preach. They grooved on their own voices, when, if I remember my Theology, it's actually supposed to be God speaking through the believer. What we get instead is believers speaking for God.
So, Huntster and Kathy don't like our questions? No problem. They create a new one for us and answer it, ignoring the question that was asked. It's not a neat sidestep, but it's a sidestep. Whatever floats your boat, I guess. Heaven forbid that we should ask why or how it serves God's purpose to cast those who do not accept Christ -- or cannot accept Him -- into eternal punishment. (And why "eternal"? Why not a few years of difficulty, instead of for the remainder of God's existence in a Lake of Fire? How is that even close to being just?)
Years ago, I had a neighbor who was a graduate of Loma Linda University, a practicing MD. He and I would have wonderful conversations about Religion, Politics, Art, you name it. He and his wife moved to Reno, so he could work with AIDS patients, and try to help find new treatments for them, and try to provide some comfort to people who were suffering. I know a pastor who moved off to Cambodia so he could teach kids to read and write. He's right now got a pump surgically implanted in his hip, pumping powerful antibiotics into his system, just so he can stay alive, the result of an infection. He's back in the states to see if he can get more funding, then he's back to Cambodia.
I have a friend who's an ex-Marine, and a trucker. He's supposed to be retired, but he's spending a lot of time serving at Loaves and Fishes in downtown Sacramento, feeding the homeless. I know a Christian woman who's very good at not only helping people find home loans, but she's been trying to contribute what she can to homeless shelters in the area.
See, I don't have to ask about sanctification when I see this sort of activity. These people believe, and their actions follow. They don't spend a lot of time preaching. They're too busy. (Sort of like Kittynh and Kelly.)
If those were the only examples I had to follow, I'd still be in Church. But they weren't. In fact, the sort of person I have just described is such a minority, you can show them as being mathematically inevitable. Those are the types of people I wanted to be around, but if you hang with that sort of person, you're marginalized by the Church. You're a kook. You're a fanatic, or worse, a liberal.
So who fits in? I can't help but think that Kathy and Huntster would fit right in with just about any church I've attended in the past 25 years. They'd be welcomed, and in a few months, they'd be in leadership. And people like those I just described would be pushed off to the side.
It saddens me. Because, clearly, Kathy is smart enough to know how to fight. She won't fight fair, but she fights. She's more interested in looking good to her friends at Firestream or at Church rather than actually doing anything substantive. Hell, even her old man won't show up anymore, which tells me more than I want to know.
She had a chance to make a real difference. She could have been a solid contributor to this board. Kathy, and only Kathy, chose otherwise. It's her loss, not ours.
