Strugr

It is much more significant than the female’s productions, which mostly consist of killing insects to the shrieking crescendo of ‘Kyrie Eleison’. The first act sets up the characters, the second act develops the plot, and the third act breaks out into abstract meter as the play evaporates from solid simplicity into a gaseous complexity.

The play is dedicated not only to the male and female, but also to the ‘Reformed Faith and Worship’ email list group, especially messages #7295 -7457 (with some exceptions, including but not limited to the first, the last and message 7393), which produced this statement:

I believe that agreement with the doctrines of the original Westminster Confession of Faith should be required of all elders and communicant members of the church.... I believe that anyone who unrepentantly and publicly disagrees with any of the doctrines of the original Westminster Confession of Faith, including implications of it like prohibition on use of Sabbath public transportation, should be barred from church office and communion, until such time as the person repents.

These people need to write a study Bible.

Barren Chairs: or The Repenting of Mr. and Mrs. R. Zartman

Characters:

RUBEN, a slightly balding man with a paunch HEIDI, a haggard woman in ratty houseshoes ZACK, a tall, dark, and handsome dog with shoulder muscles that ripple when he moves ZACK’s pastor, who parted ways with his former presbytery over a conjunction: is now a member of a single email list group, from which he is about to separate.

CURTAIN rises upon ZACK, vigilantly patrolling the front of the house, ever watchful for RUBEN and HEIDI’s safety.

RUBEN enters, carrying a large STICK, staggering to one side, his speech slightly slurred:

RUBEN: Zack, I can’t stand you WACK WACK –

(I forgot to mention that this play contains realistic portrayals of violence which might not be appropriate for young children)

Goes INSIDE

Voice of HEIDI, sounding from INSIDE like the death throes of an infirm horse: HAUUUUGHHHH HAUUUUUUGH. I love it when you hit the dog. Maybe he’ll die. HAUUUUUUGH HAUUUUUUUUUGH HAAUUUUUUUUGH.

Enter, ZACK’s pastor, carrying the WESTMINSTER CONFESSION:

ZACK’s pastor: In order to retain the purity of the church, builded together as an holy temple, established at Westminster, and to uphold the final nature of the Standards, I am the sole communicating member of the universal body. EXIT

Act 2

Zack is diligently patrolling the house, with a slight limp. He struggles manfully to uphold the security of

RUBEN and HEIDI.

Enter RUBEN, with the WESTMINSTER CONFESSION.

RUBEN: (beats his chest with the booklet) Ah me, ah me. I see now I had no authority to judge the matter! I ought not to have acted, before I brought my charges before the session. Moreover at the time of beating Zack I thought I was a member of (presbyterian denomination), but have since been informed my membership expired at 2:17 AM the previous morning, before I had time to renew my vows. Therefore I was not even acting as a representative of (presbyterian denomination), but merely as a private individual.

HEIDI, appears in ratty houseshoes, inserting her TEETH: Oh ZACK! I too repent. I have no liberty to impersonate a sick horse. If we are not to take God’s name in vain then how much more should we exercise restraint to-wards the animals, who served the writers of the Westminster Confession! I was abusing my legitimate sense of humor, laughing at Ruben’s jokes: a sense of humor is a gift of God, but being funny is a sin: Zack, do forgive me.

ZACK: The sorrow you express for your iniquity rejoices my heart. Your abject state of humbled to the dust repentance does not fall on deafened ears. We are instructed when a brother or sister repents of grievous error graciously to condescend, and overlook the matter. Therefore be assured that I will no longer remember the vicious way in which you assaulted me, striking my body with a stick, striking repeatedly and bruising my lower end: I will not call to mind the gross intoxicated state in which you lashed out at my righteous self: I will forbear to mention the heinous sounds that proceeded from your vile mouths, and the slanderous lies you, with the poison of asps upon your lips, spread about me to the people on this blog.

Act 3

RUBEN and HEIDI: But we did not repent of our slanderous lies.

We are not competent to judge if we have sinned in that:

that is a matter for the general assembly.

ZACK’s pastor: The Confession ought to be adhered to rigidly in all its processes and due and necessary consequences as the express intention of the Scriptures, with which no child of God can disagree and not make shipwreck of the faith:

but the considered judgments of (presbyterian denomination) ought not be taken with too great authority.

The one true church of Lesser 10B Camino Maninal will decide, according to its strict confessional status, whereby it is in fellowship with no one, if you have sinned.

I am that one true church.

Repent or be anathema!

RUBEN and HEIDI: (bewildered) but Zack said he would never mention it again.

ZACK’s pastor: You publicly oppose yourselves to demonstrated due and necessary logic of doctrines of the Westminster Confession?

You will receive a letter stating that you have been disciplined in a closed meeting of my session.

You have effectively been cut off from the body.

Of which you never were a part,

not being members of my church

which only is confessional.

RUBEN, HEIDI, ZACK, and ZACK’s pastor: We confess that we are not worthy

Not worthy to impugn the all-sufficiency

Or to insert a jot or change a tittle

Of any work of the Westminster General Assembly:

For they were given to the thorough furnishing of every worthy work.

ZACK’s pastor: As it is written, though I should speak with tongues of men and angels and have not full and public testimony to the inerrancy of every point of the Confession, I am nothing.

Ruben staggers off to the RIGHT, and Heidi shuffles off LEFT in her houseshoes, proving that their repentance was temporary and false (the wicked are like chaff which the wind driveth away), which ZACK suspected all along, though he graciously forgave them (the righteous shall be had in everlasting remembrance).

CURTAIN