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Wednesday, November 11, 2009

The Wicked Day in Which We Live!

I went to a restaurant last Sunday after church with my family and our friend. As we entered the business I noticed a man who also was eating there, who had on a t-shirt that any normal person would consider vulgar. I politely requested to speak with the manager and informed him that the shirt was offensive and that he had many options including asking the man to turn the shirt inside out etc. Now this man had to walk right by our table and we had to see his crude shirt as did the other 100 or so patrons of the buffet. Apparently the manager had said nothing and I was outraged at this man's wickedness to wear such a piece of clothing in public. Now the person that spends his/her time watching HBO filth every day will surely think that I am too fanatical in how I respond in these situations. But how much do we listen to, how much do we take, before we open our mouths and rebuke sin?
My friend had already said something to the man, who for description sake was about 6 ft. 3 inches and probably close to 300 pounds. The man shrugged it off and went back to his table. I could feel the adrenaline start to flow as I knew the guy would come by again. I attempted to give him a tract and told him that he needed it, he muttered a derogatory response and continued on. I decided to approach him as he started to sit down and I rebuked him for being filthy and having a lack of character. He proceeded to shout cuss words at me and to threaten me. I decided at that point to call 911 and inform them that I was at the local restaurant and that I was being threatened. I returned to my table and a moment later the manager approached the vulgar man and offered him some free meal tickets to use in the future. I was appalled! Here HE was wearing a t-shirt that would not have been "accepted" thirty years ago in a public place and I was now the bad guy for rebuking him! I stated to the manager that If he knew Christ and possessed the Holy Ghost, he would understand what was wrong with Mr. Vulgar. He began to get upset and he gave me a liberal opinion of Christianity, but his anger flared when I told him that he knew as much about the Bible as he did how to manage a restaurant (we had a few problems nearly every time we had eaten there in the past). In the meantime, my wife began dealing with a "woman preacher" that did not like how I dealt with the man and she insisted that "to rebuke him was not how to win him to Jesus!" The only thing is, I was not out to win Mr. Vulgar to Jesus, I was there to rebuke him for being indecent!
Well, the police appeared and Lori and I were escorted out of the restaurant as some of the employees taunted a little bit and others suddenly got a tough-guy demeanor. The officer told my wife that there was nothing we could do about the man's apparel because it did not include cuss words on it. He also got upset when I declined to give him my personal information. (I told him that if I was not being arrested, I would give him nothing!)
Well, since I had about a half hour to kill as the rest of my family and my friend ate steaks and salad, I decided to go out in front of the business and preach the gospel. I was not being antagonistic, but it was certainly a good way to spend the time, so Lori and I went out to the sidewalk. They called the police again and two more officers joined the first one. It was the typical confrontation with law enforcement as all the employees that came out to watch joined the other bystanders from the busline that just finished eating, and they all heard the gospel. The officer was again appalled that I would not give them him my name and address etc. as I informed them about my right to preach, while quoting a few Supreme Court rulings to them. Soon, the family was done and shortly after, we left.
Are you prepared to be the bad guy? Interesting that this just happened days after completing my last blog that had to do with this exact thing. While I will not re-hash last weeks comments, I do want to remind the brethren that opportunities to stand for Christ and for righteousness and against sin and wickedness abound in our day! Let us all be a voice for righteousness in this time that is full of iniquity! Stop the seeker-sensitive mentality and rebuke sin and the sinner! If they repent, praise God! If they do not, praise God! But warn! Reprove! Rebuke!

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