There is a church in Columbia, SC near the seminary I attended which has one of those bulletin boards out front to list service times, special events, sermon subjects, and so on. For several years there was one other thing on that bulletin board, one of those little "sentence sermons" that we see so often. It said, "The same Bible that says BELIEVE also says BEHAVE." I do not know if there were any significance to the fact that it was located so near to all us seminary students; perhaps someone figured we would need it more than anyone. At any rate, it was there, and for a long time: "The same Bible that says believe also says behave."

Now, here we are in the midst of Lent, that unique time in the church year when we are called to actually examine how we behave. We look into a spiritual m…