Cox’s Army

There were times when we had company and multiple dishes of food were ready for the table, my mother would say that we had enough food to feed Cox’s Army. I had a vague idea that the army wasn’t military and the name was created early in the twentieth century, but until I did a bit of research, I had no idea who Cox was and why he had an army.

Protests are not new to America, though few have been as successful as the civil rights movement.  Some, such as the Haymarket in Chicago, which “deeply polarized attitudes separating business and working class people in late 19th-century Chicago” turned violent.

This research was precipitated not only by the ‘Occupy’ groups making headlines, but an article about misery displayed in an index. Why do we focus on these miseries?

That question made me think of being content – sometimes it’s not good:

And Joshua said, Alas, O Lord GOD, wherefore hast thou at all brought this people over Jordan, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us? would to God we had been content, and dwelt on the other side Jordan! (Joshua 7:7 KJV)

The Israelites were not to be content on the other side of Jordan, but were supposed to follow God’s instructions.  They had not done so. God told Joshua why they had failed:

Up, sanctify the people, and say, Sanctify yourselves against to morrow: for thus saith the LORD God of Israel, There is an accursed thing in the midst of thee, O Israel: thou canst not stand before thine enemies, until ye take away the accursed thing from among you. (Joshua 7:13 KJV)

For Paul, who was following God’s will for his life, being content came naturally:

Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content. (Philippians 4:11 KJV)

That certainly did not mean accepting things as they were, for he was among those listed in Acts 17 who were turning the world upside down. But he did it in words of truth, not impeding the work of those around him.  He did it in prison, not escaping, but using his bonds as an example to others.

He did it in letters, to churches and to individuals, exhorting them to follow Christ’s example through good and bad:

I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. (Philippians 4:12 KJV)

Paul was more concerned with a man’s soul and relationship to God than to physical situations.  He had been introduced to – and had followed – Christ’s instructions:

And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do. (Acts 9:6 KJV)

There he had learned what he continued to teach:

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. (Philippians 4:13 KJV)

Are we capable of turning the current world upside down without harming others? What changes should be employed, and why?