Title:- Blue Frog Pie
Proverbs 17:22 A merry heart does good, like medicine,
Now it goes without saying that “Like one who takes away a garment in cold weather, And like vinegar on soda, is one who sings songs to a heavy heart.” (Proverbs 25:20) We would all agree that someone who would act like that is extremely thoughtless and exceptionally offensive! Yet I feel we are very rarely in danger of committing such a 'faux pas' as singing songs to a heavy heart, for Christians, on the whole, are not marked by the world as being the 'the happy bunch'. Except that is, the much maligned and looked down the nose at 'happy clappy’ type of Christians, you know, the ones that live in ‘never-never land’ and not the real world like you and me! Ha! Who do those silly, happy clappy, strange and wappy, unreal folk think they are? Surely, the Chrsitian should be marked by a profound seriousness? Yes, a seriousness of demeanour that is marked by pious misery. Especially if he's a minister.
You know, unfortunately, there is the Celtic part of me that isn't really content unless it is miserable! Yes, there is a part of me that isn't happy unless it has got something to worry about. Now is that bizarre or what! Because of this, I find a song entitled, 'The Happy Song' by the British Christian band 'Delirious' to be really challenging. I mean challenged in a quite annoyed kind of way, because a part of me is exceptionally offended about the exuberance that this song tries to instigate. Shame on me though! For something very Celtic in me, something very reserved and broody, something cynical and happy to be miserable, rebels and sneers from a haughty vantage point within my spirit upon such a preposterous attempt at a stirring of exuberant emotion. I’m not too worried though, because we all know that a really happy Christian is as rare as 'blue frog pie.' Think about that. It’s the truth and it’s very sad isn’t it?
This brooding melancholy, this satanic cynicism, this damp and critical mess of restrictive emotionaly viscerol fat lining the belly of our spiritual life must be gotten rid of, must be lipo-suctioned out and flushed away down some surgical drain somewhere! We must let a living and righteous hypocrisy begin to poke and stir jubilance from its deep slumber within us and force the dampness in our souls to be actively danced away and friends, even Baptists must do this! Indeed, we must all let our mornings begin with such shouts of joy that they roll back all the glooming clouds that gather so early on our doctrinally correct, rightfully reformed, conservatized and evangelized, oh so unhappy horizons! Go on, shock the neighbours today! Open the windows, take a couple of 'lung-fulls' of air and force yourself to sing some lyrics from the happy song:
I want to shout it out from every rooftop scene
For I know that God is for me not against me
Oh I could sing unending songs of how you saved my soul
Oh how could dance a thousand miles because of you're great love
Oh every body dance!
It’s time to get the neighbors complaining friends and listen to them telling the police that they “Just can't stand it anymore, all that laughing, all that singing, all that earth shaking, wall vibrating, frivolous dancing. Who do those Christians think they are being so blinkin' happy!”
Unless we spike everyones morning coffee with a tab of Ecstacy, it’s almost impossible to believe it can happen isn’t it? However, why not ask God for faith and vision to believe and act in this way and then, imagine every seminary president and principal, hands raised, boogying down in their study, praising God! Stomping around like 'gooduns'. Imagine what their lessons and discourse would be like after that! Imagine every Christian graveside becoming a graduation event of raucous rejoicing, every pastor refusing to wear black ever again, ripping off white collars of captivity and burning all their 'Des O'Conner' cardigans, banning Jesus sandals and painting their toenails red, whilst leaping like leviathans and bouncing like behemoths, rolling around with such outrageous laughter, that with their giggle machines, now overflowing with such heavenly hilarity, that they can hardly speak with happiness because Jesus, Jesus! Yes, Jesus truly is become their realized Savior, their inseparable friend, their Almighty 'mate' and they know in truth that they are working with Him and He with them, both singing and bringing in His eternal harvest. After all, He did say, “I have called you friends.” Imagine that! “I have called you friends.”
Imagine a happiness that is rooted deeply in the overwhelming experiential knowledge of God as our true friend! Would that make you sing? Would that make you happy, make you merry, make you shout, make you sing and make you dance? I think it should.
Religious people hate making merry, but I tell you friend, spiritual people cannot live without merry making. so let me ask you: Are you sick of church, sick of a denominationally and doctrinally correct Jesus and longing for a slice of blue frog pie? Then start making a merry heart; YES MAKE ONE! Go on, take your medicine today and get the neighbors banging on the wall! Be happy right now beloved of Jesus, be happy!
Today, choose singing, choose shouting, choose dancing, choose happiness, choose LIFE!
Listen:- Happy are the people whose God is the LORD! Psalm 144:15
Pray:- Lord let Your blessedness arise in me and o’er flow my lips in praise and smiles; miles and miles of smiles! O Sovereign Savior, dancing King, teach me to make war with Your joy and so conquer all my darkness with rooted and well practiced happiness. Amen and Hallelujah!
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