Payday Someday # 4

Payday Someday # 4

Looking at him then, she doubtless, as is the custom with women until this day, put her hand on his forehead to see if he had fever. He had fever without doubt! He was set on fire of hell, even as is a wicked tongue (James. 3:6). Then, in a voice of our day, "What's the matter with you, Big Boy?" But, in the words of the Bible: "Why is thy spirit so sad, that thou eatest no bread?" (1 Kings 21:5). Then, with his mouth full of grouches, with his heart stubborn in rebellion against the commandment of God, he told her - his every word full of mopish petulance...

"Because I spake unto Naboth the Jezreelite, and said unto him, 'Give me thy vineyard for money, or else, if it pleases thee, I will give thee another vineyard for it: and he answered, 'I will not give thee my vineyard" (1 Kings 21:6).

Every word he said stung like a whip upon a naked back this wickedly unscrupulous woman who had never had any regard for the welfare of anyone who did not worship her god, Baal - who never had any conscientious regard for the rights of others, or for others who did not yield to her whimsical imperiousness.

Hear her derisive laugh as it rings out in the palace like the shrill cackle of a wild fowl that has returned to its nest and has found a serpent therein! With her tongue, sharp as a razor, she prods Ahab as an ox driver prods with sharp goad the ox which does not want to press his neck into the yoke, or as one whips with a rawhide a stubborn mule. With profuse and harsh laughter this old gay and gaudy guinea of satan derided this king of hers for a cowardly buffoon and sordid Jester. What hornet like sting in her sarcasm! What wolf mouth fierceness in her every reproach! What tiger fang cruelty in her expressed displeasure! What fury in the shrieking of her rebuke! What bitterness in the teasing taunts she hurled at him for his scrupulous timidity! Her bosom with anger was heaving! Her eyes were flashing with rage under the surge of hot anger that swept over her.

"Are you not the king of this country?" she chides bitingly, her sharp tongue like a butcher's blade. "Can you not command and have it done?" She scolds as a common village hag who has more noise than wisdom in her words. "Can you not seize and keep?" she cries with reproach. "I thought you told me you were king in these parts! And here you are crying like a baby and will not eat anything because you do not have courage to take a bit of land. You! Ha! Ha! Ha! You, king of Israel, allow yourself to be disobeyed and defied by a common clodhopper from the country. You are more courteous and considerate of him than you are of your queen! Shame on you! But you leave it to me! I will get the vineyard for you, and all that I require is that you ask no questions. Leave it to me, Ahab!"

And Jezebel, his wife, said unto him, "Dost thou now govern the kingdom of Israel? arise and eat bread" and let thine heart be merry. I will give thee the vineyard of Naboth for Jezreelite" (1 Kings 21:7).

Ahab knew Jezebel well enough to know that she would do her best, or her worst, to keep her wicked promise. So, as a turtle that has been sluggish in the cold winter's mud begins to move when the spring sunshine warms the mud, Ahab crawled out of the slime of his sulks - somewhat as a snake arouses and uncoils from winter sleep. Then Jezebel doubtless tickled him under the chin with here bejeweled fingers or kissed him peckingly on the cheek with her lips screwed in a tight knot, and said, "There now! Smile! And eat something. I will get thee the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite."

Now, let us ask, who can so inspire a man to noble purposes as a noble woman? And who can so thoroughly degrade a man as a wife of unworthy tendencies? Back of the statement, "And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him" (1 Kings 21:20). is the statement explaining both the other statements: "Whom Jezebel his wife stirred up." She was the polluted reservoir from which the streams of his own iniquity found mighty increase. She was the poisonous pocket from which his cruel fangs fed. She was the sulphurous pit wherein the fires of his own iniquity found fuel for intense burning. She was the devil's grindstone which furnished sharpening for his weapons of wickedness.

Search the pages of the Bible all you will; study all you please. And you will find one truth that stands out above some other truths. What is that truth? The truth that the spiritual life of a nation, city, town, school, church, or home never rises any higher than the spiritual life of women. When women sag morally and spiritually, man sag morally and spiritually. When women slump morally and spiritually, men slip morally and spiritually. When women take the downward road men travel with them. When women are lame morally and spiritually, men limp morally and spiritually. The degeneracy of womanhood helps the decay of manhood.

Yes - we ask again - who can do degrade a man as a woman of wicked tendencies and purposes? Is not a woman without spiritual religion and love of God in her heart like a rainbow without color - like a strong poisoned well from which the thirsty drink - like a heater stove whose heat is infection - like kissing lips spread with deadly poison?

What a tragedy when any woman thinks more of paint than purity, of vulgarity than virtue, of pearls than principles, of adornment with righteous adoration, of hose and hats than holiness, of dress than duty, of mirrors than manners! What a tragedy when any woman sacrifices decency on the altar of degradation - visualizing the slimy, the tawdry, the tinseled!

~Robert G. Lee~

(continued with # 5)