Nice, very nice.

Brad




At 01/02/2004 on Friday, you wrote:
>Hey, Family.
>
>You might remember me mentioning that I'm scheduled to preach on 13 January.
>I was planning on doing an involved study on how "Everything Old is New
>Again", but after thinking about it I thought it might be better to do
>something simple but unusual.  To get back to basics in an unusual way since
>it will be a jaded audience of all preachers. So I thought I'd do a little
>one-man drama where I walk into the room (maybe dressed in a white robe) and
>start speaking to the congregation as if it is one person.  Let me know if
>you think this can be pulled off or if it's too strange.  Smile.  So imagine
>I walk into the room in my white robe, sit down at a table facing the
>congregation and say...
>
>"Hello, my friend!  I'm glad you made it back from your trip before sunset
>and could come to see me.  Too bad you weren't here yesterday.  What a time
>you missed!  I invited that young rabbi for a meal...You know, the one that
>does all those amazing things but is so strange, so I planned to find out
>the truth about him or put him in his place, once and for all.
>
>So, he shows up at my door with a group of his friends including a woman of
>all things.  That woman that has the reputation for bringing a good time
>with her, if you know what I mean.  But who am I to turn them away?  So I
>invite them in and could they eat!  They were eating me out of house and
>home I tell you.  And all the time the Rabbi is talking to me about his
>father.  Why I couldn't get a word in. ...His father this, his father that,
>and that I could have his father for my father.  That I could have GOD for
>my father!!
>
>Imagine the madness!   Ha!  He should have known MY father.  Then he could
>find out...But you know, in a strange way, it was as if he did.  It was like
>he did know...It was like he knew all about me...imagine...Imagine to really
>have GOD as our father and to start all new...all new...
>
>Ah, but it's madness!  Madness.  So I told him so, told him straight out to
>take his sinner friends and go...
>
>Nicodemus!  Nicodemus, come back...It's dark, Nicodemus...Where are you
>going?  It's too late!  It's too late!
>
>(Reading from John 3:1 thru 18)
>
>Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews;
>this man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi, we know that You
>have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs that You do
>unless God is with him." Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I
>say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God."
>Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot
>enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born, can he?" Jesus
>answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the
>Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the
>flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be
>amazed that I said to you, `You must be born again.' The wind blows where it
>wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not know where it comes from and
>where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit." Nicodemus said
>to Him, "How can these things be?" Jesus answered and said to him, "Are you
>the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things? Truly, truly, I
>say to you, we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen, and
>you do not accept our testimony. If I told you earthly things and you do not
>believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? No one has
>ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man. As
>Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man
>be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life. For
>God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever
>believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not
>send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be
>saved through Him. He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not
>believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of
>the only begotten Son of God."