Author: James Butler

One Tax Free Notion under God

Paying the Imperial Tax to Caesar

13 Later they sent some of the Pharisees and Herodians to Jesus to catch him in his words. 14 They came to him and said, “Teacher, we know that you are a man of integrity. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are; but you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. Is it right to pay the imperial tax[b] to Caesar or not? 15 Should we pay or shouldn’t we?”

But Jesus knew their hypocrisy. “Why are you trying to trap me?” he asked. “Bring me a denarius and let me look at it.” 16 They brought the coin, and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”

“Caesar’s,” they replied.

17 Then Jesus said to them, “Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”

And they were amazed at him. – Mark 12:13-17

-Pastor Jim

Sunday School Party Animals

My Texan Sunday School teacher was a Democrat who managed to work the Party’s platform into of every lesson to captive Baptist seminarians. Democrats ruled Texas for 100 years, voting last for Jimmy Carter in 1976. After all, “Jesus rode into Jerusalem, not on an elephant, but a donkey!” Another ancient and frequent visitor was an old geezer member of the “Temperance Movement,” spouting the evils of any alcohol. Looking back, I wish I would have listened more to the geezer but found a another Sunday class. You may say, “Jim, God could still use that teacher.” Yes, God even used the jawbone of an ass to slay the Philistines. Ergo, I know, Samson was a proto-Democrat? Don’t get me started.

How Texas Voted

I arrived in seminary in January of 1981, with the Democrats stinging from their defeat to Ronald Reagan. As I consider separation of church and state, I remember my old teacher and his taking liberty to mold young seminarians in the ideal that God was a Southern Democrat.

Republicans and Democrats need not worship together like the feuding Hatfields and the McCoys. Let us beat our political swords into bowls to catch the new rain of God’s Spirit to a thirsty world. In this we can find common ground.

-Pastor Jim

Emperor Worship

St. Peter addressed Simon Magus who attempted to convert the laying on of hands into a “for profit” (first mistyped “for prophet”, which would fit) enterprise:

20 Peter answered: “May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! 21 You have no part or share in this ministry, because your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord in the hope that he may forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. 23 For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.” – Acts 8:20-23

Three false doctrines bow before the dais of emperor worship: 1. God wants you to be wealthy, 2. The wealthy politician is truly blessed by God, 3. The politician is god. Prosperity preachers serve as priests at this altar dispensing sacraments of “dough” and the “fruit of the wallet.”

The first Beatitude of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount did not teach, “Blessed are the winners, for they shall never hang with losers.” Rather Jesus taught, “Blessed are the poor in spirit,  for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Mt. 5:3).

You may say, “Pastor Jim, are you a flaming Lib?” No, I am neither Republican nor Democrat. Vote your conscience. I am pro “First Commandment, “Thou shalt have no other God’s before me” (Ex 20:3), which includes politicians and megachurch pastors in Texas.

You may say, “Pastor Jim, are you a flaming Lib?” No, I am neither Republican nor Democrat. Vote your conscience. I am pro “First Commandment, “Thou shalt have no other God’s before me” (Ex 20:3), which includes politicians and megachurch pastors in Texas.

Be Blessed,

-Pastor Jim

Bulldozers for Christ

Like a Good Neighbor. There was a large white middle class church out of parking in a booming Dallas/Ft. Worth area. Older small homes of minorities landlocked the church. The church pastor and board became possessed with a plan: eliminate the houses around the church to expand the blacktop. So the plan was launched to bulldoze the homes of the Hispanic neighbors and replace them with good, Christian pavement, all the while singing, “We are Standing on Holy Ground.” “Surely, those people know we are expanding the Kingdom of God.” Meanwhile, the historic memory of the departed neighbors was buried under a fresh grave vault of hot asphalt. “Blessed are the parking attendants, for they shall be garbed in florescent green.” How was this church a neighbor to its community? [Based on at true story. Stock bulldozer image and not actual home involved.]

Sample Church Parking

Bulldozers for Christ – “Prepare ye the way of the Lord”! The church’s bulldozers were legal and financial before the real thing arrived. For some church leaders I’ve known, “bulldozer” would be an improvement.

Don’t ask me which church this was lest they shun me again from their fabulous annual “All Church Parking Lot Potluck and Hymn Sing.”

-Pastor Jim