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This is a bit more perplexed than one might introductory suspect. While being rejected for Christ does end in eternal rewards – there are tightly specified qualifications for eligibility to such trophies. I want to begin by retracing my steps on this issue.
“Count the Cost”
I started out seeking God … battered and bleeding. The wounds were internal – but real – and life was exiting through them. I decisive to read the Bible for myself – and was soon intrigued by a good deal of affirmations … and confronted by others. For example, when speaking to potential adherents, Jesus used this illustration: “Which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not original sit down and count the cost? … Otherwise, when … not competent to finish, all who observe it start out to ridicule …” (Lk 14:28-30). Elsewhere He said, “A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been totally trained, will be like his teacher” (Lk 6:40). I soon realized that portion of “the cost” was, “you will be hated by all nations on account of My Name” (Mt 24:9) … and there was no guarantee my fate would be better than His. Indeed, I will have to suppose His. Boy, … what an encouragement.
God’s Enemies and God’s Enemy
The call? “Come to Me” (Mt 11:28) … and be ready to pick up God’s enemies. That last part was not too … exciting. I already had a great deal of enemies. And if I cooperated with Him, I would still be Caucasian, American, male, young, and portion of a “Christian country” espousing capitalism. So, let’s see, … that’s already a few billion oppositions – give or take a few million. “Jealousy is as cruel as the grave” (SS 8:6). But, as I continued reading, I came across … God Himself was my “natural” enemy! In fact, He topped the list … with no aim of being supplanted by some underling. So, “the choice” became – retain God as enemy Number 1 … or cooperate with Him – and pick up His enemies. “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more they may do. But I will warn you whom to fear: fear the One who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into Hell. Yes, I tell you, fear Him!” (Lk 12:4,5).
After submitting to sane reality, it seemed reasonable to investigate this rejection matter more fully. The bedrock is in all likelihood in the Sermon on the Mount. “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil versus you falsely on account of Me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great” (Mt 5:11,12). This is a conditional promise.
Condition 1: “Falsely”
The innuendo is that one may be insulted and persecuted … truly. Unfortunately, that may constitute the bulk of the humane resistance I have incurred over the years. “By no means let any of you suffer as a murderer, or thief, or evildoer, or a troublesome meddler (lit. ‘one who oversees others’ affairs’)“ (1Pet 4:15). “For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience?” (1Pet 2:20). This rhetorical question is an emphatic literary device in Koine Greek. The answer is, “None.”
Condition 2: “On Account of Me”
… not, “on account of me” – little “m.” But troubles “on account of Me” will be recompensed beyond any mortal’s capacity to now comprehend. One prerequisite though, is one must be known … as a follower of Christ. That requires a lot of degree of former verbalization. A sole dedication to “lifestyle evangelism” will not suffice. While our behavings are to be consistent with His Word, they are not meant to replace it. How may outsiders recognise what they are seeing – if they do not recognise the injunctions behind the behaviors? “For whoever is penitent of Me and My words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will likewise be penitent of him when He comes in the glory of His Father with His holy angels” (Mk 8:38).
In new relationships, I want my Christianity known as early as possible for various reasons. First, if left hidden, acquaintances have said, or done things, that later embarrassed them – after learning I was a Christian. This has damaged relationships – not in me … but in them. Second, by making my Christianity known early, the platform is set for the kinship to carry on on terms I prefer – whether it becomes “hot” or “cold” (Rev 3:16). Third, if a kinship does degenerate – there’s a better probability it will be worthwhile. “If you do what is right, and suffer for it … this finds favor with God … If you ought to suffer for the sake of righteousness – blessed” (1Pet 2:20 and 3:14).
“Rejoice and Be Glad …”
This too is somewhat … complicated. When thinking soberly, I want humans to say, “Yes” to God. Paul told King Agrippa (after having his sanity challenged), “I would pray to God … all who listen me … might become such as I am, except for these chains” (Ac 26:29). And altho Paul had told some gospel-rejecting Jews, “you … judge yourselves despicable of eternal life” (Ac 13:46) – he still experienced “great sorrow and unceasing grief” in his heart and could pray himself “accursed” if that could result in his countrymen’s salvation (Ro 9:1-5). He wanted every one to say, “Yes” to God. Jesus once looked upon “a great multitude and felt compassionateness for them because they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Mk 6:34). He took the occupation – and to be rejected as the Shepherd does not fetch joy. He takes “no pleasure in the death of the wicked” (Ezk 18;23 and 32). So, … upon what grounds may one “rejoice, and be glad” when rejected on account of Christ?
First, a negative reaction … is better than no reaction. One time, a fellow at a Gospel Mission I staffed became rather hostile. In the heated exchange, I said, “I have more hope for you than most people coming through here – at least you are reacting!” The conflict ended because – he didn’t recognise what to say. We know “God did not send the Son into the world to damn the world (it’s already damned) but that the world will have to be saved through Him” (Jn 3:17). I do not believe any spiritual interchange I have with any person is “an accident” … even you – right now. I trust God to fetch each person “in” – sometime before his/her last breath. I do not care when, where, … or how. Has God brought me into one’s realm … for further and added judgment? His “mercy triumphs over judgment” (Ja 2:13). He stages these “visits” … and I am glad – at least in the long run.
Second, from a self-centered view, such opposition “is a sign of destruction for them, but of salvation” … for me (Ph 1:28). Persecution, on account of Him, is an proof of salvation. “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Ro 8:16). Such understood interventions by God without delay brings about rejoicing … even if one is in prison, beaten, and in chains (Ac 16:25). By the way, “a sign of destruction” is not “assigned to destruction.”
I guess it all comes down to one word: hope. I hope in our Redeemer … as Redeemer. And if He may redeem me, He may redeem anybody. He is plundering Satan’s house (Mk 3:27)..
First Strike
There is another way to approach this. The world may reject me on account of Christ, but I … rejected it first. And it must be disturb with me. After all, I am a betrayer. I once willingly reclined in it, and partook of it is offerings – but have now turned versus it. I attack it is untrue hopes, it is empty promises, and announce it incapable of delivering substantive purpose. Should I suppose no retaliation? But, the world is reacting … as I acted with the introductory strike. The chorus to my song, “The World” (Oct, 1981), says:
“World, don’t bother rejecting me – ’cause I’ve already rejected you.
As God opens my eyes – exposin’ each of your lies,
I keep findin’ – myself sayin’- to you, ‘World, we’re through!’”
Conclusion
Because we seek to gain humans by our work and witness – rejection is oftentimes startling, hard to grasp – and hard to rejoice about. Often, it is without doubt or question “on account of Me” (Mt 5:11) … but not always. An exact assessment may not come until the Judgment. A key factor is … the troublemaker’s rue motives. It will be interesting to see if attacks from carnal Christians … end in eternal rewards. If so, galore of the Christian ministries I have been in – may prove “gold mines.” So, the bottom-line? “If anybody suffers as a Christian, let him not feel ashamed, but in that name let him glorify God” (1Pet 4:15-16). God, … help us qualify.
American Spectators Enemies List Ebook
Written with the same acerbic wit and infectious humor that has made P. J. O’Rourke one of the most popular political satirists of all time, The Enemies List will keep you howling and his foes scowling. From Noam Chomsky to Yoko Ono, from Peter, Paul, and Mary (yes, they’re still alive) to all the humans who think quartz crystals heal herpes, from Ralph Nader to the entire country of Sweden, P. J. O’Rourke has formulated a roster of the most useless, politically disgraceful, and downright ludicrous persons around. Although a rating scheme of S=Silly, VS=Very Silly, SML=Shirley MacLaine was in the end cast aside, the distinguishing feature of the cluster of dunces staged here is silliness, not political subversion. The Enemies List started out as an article in the American Spectator and, as readers contributed their own suggestions, quickly grew into a hilarious and slashing commentary on politicians and celebrities alike. Now they have been named, we just need to figure out what to do with them. “To say that P. J. O’Rourke is amusive is like saying that the Rocky Mountains are scenic – precise but insufficient.” – Chicago Tribune
From Library JournalThe ghosts of Joe McCarthy and Richard Nixon live on through political humorist O’Rourke’s compilation of his New Enemies list. Debuting in 1989 in the conservative per month American Spectator, it has since appeared annually. Readers of the magazine responded to the list by gleefully sending in their own campaigners of persons and organizations deemed too “politically correct.” Thus, feminists, liberals, any elected Democrat at any level, respective organizations (including the American Library Association), celebrities, TV talking heads, and the like are skewered here. Funny as the columns and reader remarks are (even to liberals), in book form it’s a one-joke, redundant whine. If your library doesn’t have anything by O’Rourke and doesn’t carry American Spectator, buy this; otherwise, save the cash and interlibrary loan the magazine. Better yet, buy a lot of of O’Rourke’s former books.?Pamela R. Daubenspeck, Warren-Trumbull Cty. P.L., Ohio
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From BooklistIf words were resources, O’Rourke would is worthy of a Sierra Club recycling award: he cross-merchandises his work more assiduously than Disney sells cartoon tie-ins or the NBA markets warm-up jackets. Much of this latest slim volume wasn’t even written by O’Rourke: two thirds of the book comprises of annual compilations of readers’ responses to O’Rourke’s July_ 1989 “Call for a New McCarthyism” in the American Spectator. In addition to brief introductions to and remarks on readers’ snarling put-downs of every one to the left of Edmund Burke–yes, Virginia, ALA is someone’s enemy here, as are oddities like safe sex, sushi, and Augustine of Hippo!–O’Rourke contributes the initial article (republished in Give War a Chance [1993]), “100 Reasons Why Jimmy Carter Was a Better President Than Bill Clinton” (included in Age and Guile Beat Youth, Innocence, and a Bad Haircut ), a list of “enemies” within the Clinton White House (from the July ’93 American Spectator), and “Why I Am a Conservative in the First Place” (from the July 13^-27, 1995, Rolling Stone). Hardly new news, but O’Rourke fans who don’t subscribe to the American Spectator will surely clamor for copies. Mary Carroll
American Spectators Enemies List Ebook Picture
American Spectators Enemies List Ebook Picture
American Spectators Enemies List Ebook Picture
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Most helpful client reviews
20 of 27 persons found the following review helpful.
 not his best
By Orrin C. Judd
The American Spectator is sadly gone now (what’s left of it is called the American Prowler), a victim of it is own overzealous pursuit of President Clinton and its
dalliance with the loathsome David Brock. But some of the best writers on the Right once wrote in it is pages, amongst them P. J. O’Rourke. Mr. O’Rourke is one of
those writers who entertains us ofttimes sufficient that he may be forgiven for cashing in once in awhile, which is fortunate, because this is only hardly a book. It starts with
a very amusive column, A Call for a New McCarthyism (American Spectator, July 1989), in which he calls for a new blacklist. Unlike the McCarthy era list though :
“The distinguishing feature of this cluster of dunces is not subversion but silliness.” And rather than barring these dunces from working and attempting to hush up their
views, he has the more diabolical idea of exposing them and their ideas to the harsh light of day :
[T]he worst punishment for dupes, pink-wieners, and dialectical immaterialists might be a kind of reverse blacklist. We don’t prevent them
from writing, speaking, performing, and other than as supposed or expected being their frequent botheration selves. Instead, we hang on their each word, beg them
to work, drag them onto all available TV and radio chat shows, and write hundreds of fawning newspaper and magazine articles with regards to their
terrifi swellness. In other words, we subject them to the monstrous, gross, and irreversible late-twentieth-century phenomenon of Media
Overexposure so that a surfeited public rebels in disgust. This is the ‘Pia Zadora Treatment,’ and, for condemning persons to obscurity, it beats
the Smith Act hollow.
That’s finelooking amusive stuff, but then you read the list and realize that closely all of the folks on it–Gore Vidal, Tom Hayden, Angela Davis, Amy Carter, Susan
Sarandon, Mike Farrell, Tikkun, Garry Trudeau, the Sheen brothers, etc.–faded into obscurity on their own; they were so amazing they weren’t even worthy enemies.
Unfortunately though, this introductory essay was followed by six more installments (the last in November 1993) and a great deal of of these consist of not one thing more than
nominations from readers and Mr. O’Rourke’s remarks on their nominations. It all gets pretty tiresome.
But then just as you’re ready to toss the book on the trash heap, it’s redeemed by two final pieces that were seemingly tacked on at the end just to flesh the book out to
150 pages. The first, 100 Reasons Jimmy Carter Was a Better President Than Bill Clinton (American Spectator, September 1993), is very funny. The second, Why I
Am a Conservative in the First Place (Rolling Stone, July 13-27, 1995), is not only funny but likewise presents as good a defense of conservatism as you’ll find
anywhere these days. In light of it is title and the gist of the piece, it closely has to be read as a response to F. A. Hayek’s famous libertarian essay, Why I Am Not a
Conservative. Hayek, who seems to have perceive American conservatism not at all, wrote :
Let me now state what seems to me the decisive objection to any conservatism which deserves to be called such. It is that by it is very nature
it can not offer an substitute to the direction in which we are moving. It may succeed by it is resistance to current tendencies in decelerating down
undesirable developments, but, since it does not indicate another direction, it cannot prevent their continuance. It has, for this reason, without variation
been the fate of conservatism to be dragged along a path not of it is own choosing. The tug of war amid conservatives and progressives
may only affect the speed, not the direction, of contemporary developments. But, though there is a need for a “brake on the vehicle of progress,”
I personally cannot be content with merely helping to utilize the brake. What the liberal will have to ask, firstborn of all, is not how fast or how far
we will have to move, but where we will have to move. In fact, he is different much more from the collectivist radical of today than does the conservative.
While the last in general holds plainly a mild and moderate version of the prejudices of his time, the liberal today ought to more in a positive manner oppose
numerous of the basic conceptions which most conservatives percentage with the socialists.
Mr. O’Rourke on the other hand, even though often times characterized as a libertarian, accepts the conservative label and his definition of conservatism :
The aim of conservative politics is to defend the liberty of the person and–lest individualism run riot–insist upon person responsibility.
contains the all indispensable corollary to liberty, that the price of our freedom must be that we each take obligation for ourselves. Libertarianism’s major fault is
that it insists on the former but refuses the latter.
On balance, the firstborn and then the last two pieces make the collection marginally worthwhile. And Mr. O’Rourke does have to earn a living, so we’ll not begrudge
too much the filler in between.
GRADE : B-
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful.
 Every author writes one, I guess
By David G. Parkhurst
I am a big P.J. O’Rourke fan… his wit and level of penmanship stand him above his peers. However, unless you take pleasure in reading one hundred pages of names with the occasional cutting remark, I would skip this one. Of all his books, this is the only one I am not wildly enthusiastic about.
0 of 0 persons found the following review helpful.
 A better American Spectator feature than book subject
By A
P. J. O’Rourke is one of the best political satirists of this age. I not so long ago read the latest book to bear his name, though it was not completely written by him. “The Enemies List” started out as a spleen venting feature in The American Spectator assorted years ago. This book comprises of lists of persons or organizations who pose a threat to freedom and personal obligation as judged by P.J. and those who contributed. Reading the book was a chore. I finished it more as a testiment to finishing that which I start, than amusement and information. There are numerous chuckles in the book. If the reader is just learning regarding Mr. O’Rourke, I highly reccomend “Parliament of Whores,” as “The Enemies List” is more a tribute than pleasurable reading
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