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Apples of Gold
Radio Script for August 6, 2010
“It’s Hard to Come in Contact and Still Be the Same”
Hello, I’m Doug Apple…with Apples of Gold.
“I was playing church.”
That’s what she said, sharing her testimony with a live audience.
She was talking about a time when she was only 12 years old, in 1950 North Carolina.
Yes, you might say she was just a kid, but she already understood that there was real Christianity and “play” Christianity, and that hers was the “play” kind.
Her family went to a rambunctious church where there was jumping and shouting. Well she would jump and shout along with them . . . during the service. But then she would come back home and be rebellious. She would talk back, she said. She wouldn’t do the dishes or bring the clothes in off the line.
“I didn’t want to do anything,” she said, and finally her mom said, “I am sick of you going down to that church and playing with God.”
Now remember, this was long before video games and cell phones and iPods. So one day while at home, with nothing better to do, they decided to go out back and just for fun, create their own little mock church service.
She and her sister made up the congregation, and their brother was the pastor. He put on some glasses to fit the part, and they sat there on the bottom step, which was their church pew.
Well he was preachin’ away, and like the pastor of their church might do, he said, “I want you to jump up and shout Jesus three times!”
This doesn’t sound like a good story, does it? Kids mocking their pastor and fellow church members.
And to top it off, throwing the name Jesus around loosely.
Acts 15:26 says that men have “risked their lives” for the name of Jesus Christ, and these kids were tossing it around in vain.
Acts 19:17 says that the name of the Lord Jesus was magnified and held in high honor.
Come on, Christian, can you feel the Spirit stirring within you as you hear about the Lord Jesus?
First John 3:23 commands us to believe in the name of God’s Son, Jesus Christ.
John 20:31 says that by believing we have life through His name.
First Corinthians 6:11 says we are “justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Acts 2:38 says to repent and be baptized “in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins…”
Second Thessalonians 1:12 indicates that the name of our Lord Jesus should be glorified in us.
In Acts 3:6 Peter said, “In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk.”
That name of Jesus is a dangerous name. The early church was commanded and ordered not to speak at all in that name.
But what did they do? They couldn’t keep it to themselves! Instead of being quiet, they spoke and preached boldly in the name of Jesus.
Colossians 3:17 says to “do all in the name of the Lord Jesus…”
This is not a name you toy with. This is a name that is different than any other name.
Philippians 2 says, “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
That is the truth and the power and the glory of the name of Jesus!
And yet there were those kids, toying around with it, treating it like a game, shouting it out like “touchdown” or “bingo.”
Her brother said, “Jump up and shout Jesus three times!” So she jumped up and shouted it out to the best of her acting ability, one time, then two times.
While sharing her testimony she paused for a moment and said, “Let me tell you something. It’s hard to come in contact with Jesus and still be the same.”
“I don’t care who you are,” she said. “You can be the chiefest of sinners, but you will never be the same.”
Then she went back to her story, “When I jumped up the third time, something got a hold of me, and I couldn’t sit back down.”
Her sister thought she had taken the mocking to a new level, so she ran inside and said, “Mama, Shirley Ann is out there playing with the Lord.”
So her mother went to the door and looked outside, and Shirley said, “She saw me shouting and dancing all over the back yard, tears just running down my face, and she said, ‘She ain’t playing this time.”
And that is the testimony of the great Gospel singer Shirley Caesar, who has now been a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ for 60 years.
Yes, it’s hard to come in contact with Jesus and still be the same.
Comments?
E-mail me: dougapple@wave94.com.
May God bless you today! With Apples of Gold…I’m Doug Apple.
(close with audio of Shirley Caesar testifying during the song “I Remember Mama.”)
© 2010 The Arrow’s Tip
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(Proverbs 25:11 – “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.”)
Why “The Arrow’s Tip”? Each morning, after diligently seeking the Lord, I write Apples of Gold. Then before I release it to the public I pray one final prayer, “Lord, send forth your arrows.” I envision Apples of Gold as arrows, tips dipped in the river of the water of life that flows from the throne of God (Rev. 22:1), sailing toward the hearts and minds of men and women around the world.
Doug Apple
General Manager - Wave 94
Christian Radio for Tallahassee
PO Box 4105
Tallahassee, FL 32315
(850) 926-8000
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