"130," God said.

"May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain the gift of God with money." -Peter

Last night I was the Bob the Lifeless Blob basking in the blue glow of the TV. As I flipped (my finger was still working) I landed on a "Christian" channel preaching the "Good News." It was bad, really really bad. So bad in fact that I decided I'd call in and ask what in the world were they thinking.

The host of the show was saying that Prophet Billy Smith had prophecied that there was a significance to the number 130, and it was just a word from God and because it was a word of God it needed to be obeyed. From there they popped up on the screen opportunities to obey this command from God via Joe Blow via the host.

I notice that it's always a good idea not to actually film the dude having the prophecy. It's good to have him seperated by a third party, because it might cause people to doubt if they saw the process. I can see him with pencil in hand, scratching his head, slapping gum, picking his nose, and finally righting down a number. "Yep, that's it 130! God told me 130!" "130 what Billy?" "Dollars of course!"

So after introducing this magical number, the host went on to explain all the intricacies of biblical prophecy with the idea that none of it makes any sense. He explained with examples from Leviticus. I was thinking that was a good place to start. But he said that the key is that we take hold of the prophecy by wrapping it in obedience, because then it would become our own personal "battle seed of victory."

He went on to say (with an actual picture of someone writing a check in the background!) that people could obey this prophecy by giving $50, $130, or $1,300 gifts. Other than thinking that this guys idea might serve me well in support raising (j/k), I was thinking how the number 50 got in there. His argument would probably be that it was also a word of God, since God has obviously revealed that if we are bad with numbers, the default was simply to go with $50. Step asside logic, enter madness!

Well I didn't really want to rant and rave this morning. I just wanted to ask the question, "Do I ever do the same thing?" Unfortunately, as I've been thinking about it, I do it all the time. I may not go to all the trouble to do an in depth analysis of biblical prophecy. But I do often think that if I do this thing for God, he'll give me victory.

The tomfoolery of it all is befuddling (I've been waiting to write this sentence). Why I think God is my lucky charm is head-scratching and gum-smacking sort of stuff. Why I think that if I obey, God will make my life peachy and get with the program, my program, is pretty sad. I often think that God is like a waiter waiting on my order. He's not!

OK, so some of you are wondering how my conversation went when I called into the station. It was a little dissappointing. I met a real person just doing his job. I asked him if he knew what was being preached on the station: silence. I asked him if he knew it was totally unbiblical: silence. I asked him if he got calls like this a lot: he said he did. Then I just told him that I felt I needed to talk to somebody about it and he said he understood.

It was really sad, because here I realized I was calling in to express my righteous indignation and was being met with patient silence. It's almost like God was answering the phone for this station. My indignation was slowly turning to shame as this guy showed patience, composure and even empathy. I don't know if he knew that the finger I was pointing at them was slowly being pointed in my direction, but it was, and like Simon in the story out of acts, I was patiently being reminded that things of God can't be purchased.

Just a thought from Bob the Lifeless Blob (In case you're wondering, this is not really the way I think about myself. And as my wife expressed the other day, most of my blogs seem to be centered around my struggles with sin. Sorry about that, when I'm sanctified a bit more, maybe I can write about prophecy (tongue firmly planted in cheek)).