I believe the Bible to be a progressive revelation that should be read like a novel. A novel is a love story that is best understood if read in sequence from beginning to end. Some readers believe the Bible’s words and their syllables should be taken literally.
I doubt that any readers of this blog hold the Bible in such high regard. Most of us tend to be like Joyce. If confronted with the story that God told Joshua to commit genocide she declares flatly that she doesn’t believe it.
The 
Bible starts with the simple assertion that in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. So some readers accept the notion that God created everything in only six days. They are inclined to believe that the God of the Bible knows everything, can do anything, is everywhere and is filled with grace as the final judge. Thus, if all this be true, the Bible’s God may be considered the Greatest Genius of all geniuses.
Let me confess that I do not have the benefit of formal theological training so I may have developed some unusual theological concepts.
At the last Men’s Fellowship at CMC, a brother who has the training that I lack said to me with a smile that he prefers to call me an Old Genius, not an Old Fool. I laughed with him.
As I read the Bible I understand that its Genius-like God is filled with an indescribable grace and sometimes does what appears to me to be foolish mistakes.
The Genius of the Bible created a man and woman in his/her image. They, and we, being in the image of a Genius who does foolish things, do likewise. So, I will continue to joyously claim Old Fool as a moniker and unashamedly add the moniker of Old Genius as my friend suggests.
I began the Ode to The Fool by assuming myself to be a king in whose court there is a FOOL. I describe him in the words that follow:
In my court is one
better than I,
braver than I,
more affectionate than I,
more humorous than I,
and in wisdom, wiser than I.
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About Martin Lehman
I was born 92 years ago, the son of a Mennonite pastor and organic gardener in Franklin County, Pennsylvania. At age 10 I was baptized as a member of the Marion Mennonite Church. I own the "Old Fool" moniker because I want to walk the Jesus Way even though the world and much of the church takes me as a fool for doing so. In my life I have moved from being a young conservative to an elderly radical. I tell that story in My Faith Journey posted on my website.
Well I have learned the meaning of a new word “moniker”!!!:-) I love and connect with your writings just like I did many years ago while I was in P.R. !!! You seemed “ahead of your time” with masive writing (Programed Instruckion) I thought many be David Powell and I were “ahead of our time” as we took training while on furlow at Chicagos’s Moody Bible Institut but than I saw some of what you had done!!!!!:-) So keep writing brother!!! “You not dead yet”!!! 🙂
David Helmuth.
Yes, I think a humble “genius” fits you well. And, as always, you are a man of wisdom. The difference between wisdom and knowledge is this: Knowledge is understanding that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing better than to put a tomato into a fruit salad. Keep up your writing.
I, of course, always took that name, The old fool, which you gave yourself as a highly opposite word for what you really are–the humble genius!