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Beautiful Feet and Good News


How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” (Romans 10:14-15 

      I know people who can’t talk to anyone without a gospel presentation. I’m not one of those people. I agree: it’s vital. There’s no more important message, but I have a huge problem with sales, and to me it is a sales presentation, and I have a huge problem with lecturing – I can’t not lecture or debate. In my opinion, there is not a worse person you could ask to share the good news. Even those who want to believe will run away. If you want to hear the good news, I have lots of friends who can tell you, and many of them will even keep it simple and get it right. 
          When I read a passage like today’s, I feel guilty and maybe a little jealous. I’d like to have beautiful feet. I’d like to be someone that others cheer when they see coming.
          “Oh, if you’d just…” someone will say.
           Yes, “if I will just…become someone I am not.”
           “Oh no, I didn’t mean that, I mean just be sweet, kind, nice, gentle, polite…. Let the real you shine through.”
          Excuse me while I laugh. As I have noted to others before, my mother was nice. I’m not like her (but I am becoming more so.
         Do you know whose pen originally wrote the words about beautiful feet? Isaiah. Some of what he wrote is uplifting. Other things he wrote condemned Israel and the surrounding nations. He was not all sweetness and light. A few other notable curmudgeons come to mind: Elisha, John the Baptist, Brother Jerome, and Jesus Christ. What? Jesus was loving, gentle, humble, etc. He also made a whip with which to clear the Temple, called sin a sin, and pronounced woes on the towns of Israel. He forgave sin, but He also told people not to sin again. He spoke in parables, specifically so some people wouldn’t understand even if they listened. 
          Those who bring good news are beautiful. Even their feet, all covered with dust and other stuff we won’t mention and abused by long, hard travel are beautiful. Sometimes, the good news isn’t pretty. It doesn’t look nice, it doesn’t smell good, and it’s the last thing we want to hear. That doesn’t mean it’s not good. I’d love to be sweetness and light, but I’d rather be true and present good news, not nice news.

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