{"id":1410,"date":"2018-10-21T06:31:03","date_gmt":"2018-10-21T06:31:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/?p=1410"},"modified":"2018-10-22T05:25:26","modified_gmt":"2018-10-22T05:25:26","slug":"why-no-thank-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/why-no-thank-you\/","title":{"rendered":"WHY NO \u201cTHANK YOU\u201d?"},"content":{"rendered":"<iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.podbean.com\/media\/player\/mpsi6-9b71e1?from=shortcode&amp;width=100%25&amp;height=100&amp;share=1&amp;fonts=Helvetica&amp;auto=0&amp;download=1&amp;skin=1&amp;resource=episode%3Dmpsi6-9b71e1&amp;domain=com&amp;btn-skin=107&amp;rtl=0\" width=\"100%\" height=\"100px\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe>\n<p>Late one afternoon I was walking out of my parish church in Chicago. I was chagrined to see a forlorn-looking man coming toward me. He was a drifter. I\u2019m sure he had a tale of woe to tell me to get a few dollars. I was anxious to get home. I decided to give him $5.00 and send him off.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat can I do for you?\u201d I asked. \u201cI\u2019m hoping that you can help a fella on his way to Tennessee to see his sick daughter. I\u2019m heading down to the bus station and\u2026\u201d \u201cYes, yes,\u201d I said, cutting him off. \u201cWell I am in a bit of a rush. Here\u2019s $5.00. That\u2019s all I can do for you today.\u201d The man took the money. He looked at it without saying a word. He turned and headed for the street. Then he stopped and turned toward me. <em><strong>\u201cI guess you think I\u2019m supposed to say, \u2018Thank you\u2019,<\/strong><\/em>\u201d he said. <em><strong>\u201cWell, now that you mention it,\u201d I said, \u201ca little gratitude would be nice.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><strong>\u201cWell, I\u2019m not going to thank you. You want to know why?\u201d he sneered.<\/strong> <\/em>\u201cWhy?\u201d I asked. <em><strong>\u201cBecause you\u2019re a Christian. You\u2019re not helping me because you want to. You have to help me because He (pointing to the sky) told you to help me!\u201d<\/strong> <\/em>He turned and left. I stood there angry. But by the time I got home it finally hit me. This guy was right. <strong>I was cornered by my faith. I really had no choice. I had no options. I was a Chosen One.<\/strong>\u00a0B<strong>To be a Christian is to be a Chosen One.<\/strong>\u00a0<em>Boy Scouts build <\/em>camp fires<em>. Girl Scouts sell cookies. Soldiers fight wars. Country club members pay dues. Citizens pay taxes. Christians help beggars.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Listen to what Jesus says to us: \u201cIt was not you who chose me, but I chose you to go and produce fruit, fruit that will last\u201d (John 15:16). I chose you! I chose you! <em><strong>That\u2019s our problem as Christians. We didn\u2019t choose Jesus. He chose us. And worst of all, He chose us for a Mission, to go and bear fruit that will last<\/strong><\/em> \u2013 to give $5.00 to drifters, to feed the poor and the hungry, to turn the other cheek, to walk the extra mile. Oh, there\u2019s an initial feeling of being flattered, to have Jesus look at us and say, \u201cYou have not chosen me. I have chosen you.\u201d But the flattery fades. We\u2019re angry, or at least we\u2019re annoyed, because down deep, we know we\u2019re boxed in.<\/p>\n<p><em>We can bow out, and many people do. We can say, \u201cNo thanks. You may have chosen me, but I don\u2019t choose you. Thanks, but no thanks.\u201d There\u2019s a certain honesty to that. Worse though is to keep the label, \u201cCHRISTIAN\u201d, then choose to do or say things that make Jesus ashamed of us.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Late one afternoon I was walking out of my parish church in Chicago. I was chagrined to see a forlorn-looking man coming toward me. He was a drifter. I\u2019m sure he had a tale of woe to tell me to get a few dollars. I was anxious to get home. I decided to give him [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1411,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"qubely_global_settings":"","qubely_interactions":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"qubely_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"ocean-thumb-m":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"ocean-thumb-ml":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"ocean-thumb-l":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"qubely_landscape":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"qubely_portrait":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",290,174,false],"qubely_thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you.jpg",140,84,false],"rpwe-thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/wy-no-thanks-you-45x45.jpg",45,45,true]},"qubely_author":{"display_name":"Medard Laz","author_link":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/author\/medlaz\/"},"qubely_comment":0,"qubely_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/category\/daily-treats\/\" rel=\"category tag\">Daily Treats<\/a>","qubely_excerpt":"Late one afternoon I was walking out of my parish church in Chicago. I was chagrined to see a forlorn-looking man coming toward me. He was a drifter. I\u2019m sure he had a tale of woe to tell me to get a few dollars. I was anxious to get home. I decided to give him&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1410"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.treatsforthesoul.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}