Jack Pelham

So many stop far short
Of what Jesus had in mind.

They are not listening.

Why the drive to “grow this city?”

Is it because it makes us better people? Does it make us more honest or honorable or loving?

No. It’s because it creates a bigger market in which to make money. And while money is a necessity, it is surely not the proper priority in life. Yet it ranks far too high. And so goes the drive to “grow this city”, while you’ll probably never hear of any initiative aimed at growing our character.

It’s the rare human who decides
That he is unwilling both to
Believe or to assert
Anything that is untrue.

Some never really learn to love Truth.
They keep their guard up
For fear that Truth
Might tell them things
They are still unwilling to hear.

Even though Truth has saved them
A million times,
They still will not trust her in
All matters.

Even when that woman tells the truth,
She’s lying somehow.

It is her raison d’être for now—
Until her bluff is called and
She becomes the roommate of Satan
In that eternal fire,
The existence of which she is not now
Willing to admit.

Not only can the smart person
Anticipate the logical implications
Of a proposition without being told,
But he or she can also understand
The authority and importance of the logic.

Freedom is always attacked
By tyrants and scoundrels
Who have their own uses for mankind.

Even the hypocrite can preach against hypocrisy.

Just because you heard the sermon
And found it convicting
Does not mean that
At the end of the day,
You will do well to
Be like the preacher.

Today’s the day we’d rather not think about,
For if we did, we’d have to face the fact
That there is wickedness here
That far surpasses the vengeance
Of some foreign enemy.

IN BRIEF: I plan to start teaching Reality-Based Thinking courses and seminars with live-or-later online offerings, starting later this Fall (2022) or in early 2023. Also, I may begin sometime this Fall taking on local students for beginning guitar, for voice, and possibly for beginning clarinet and trombone.