I Was Stuck On Stupid.

My mother did not tell me that story until I was much older.  I had no idea what was going on outside of the limited capacity any teenage boy can muster.  I did not know what Jesus himself had told my mother, so how could I care?   


What I did know was that I was terribly frustrated.  I wanted to be a good person.  I took no joy in harming others.  I was by nature empathetic.  At the same time I was naturally inclined to act in the most selfish manner available.  None of that made sense to me. 

The culture where I had grown up told me that good people obeyed the ten commandments.  I had no problem during my early teens with things like murder, adultery or worshiping grave images, but some of the lesser crimes on that list seemed unavoidable. 

The people at my church told me that Jesus had an important part to play in my well being and that he had died in my place.  Some well-meaning bozo showed me a place in The Bible where Jesus said I would obey his commandments if I loved him.  (John 14:15 and 23, perhaps.)  No matter how hard I tried, I could not follow his simple instructions. 

Like Bre'r Rabbit, I'd already stuck myself to this particular tar baby and there was no way of letting go.  I found it impossible to improve my performance and equally impossible to ignore my dilemma.  This thing was impossible to understand but equally impossible to ignore.  I was absolutely unable to avoid a handful of meaningless activities that, according to this Jesus, demonstrated my ingratitude for what he had done for me. 

How could any good person behave like that? 

Something had to give.  Nothing would.