The Confused Church

Sixteen Tons is a song written by Merle Travis in 1946 . Johnny Cash covered it in 1987. The song talks about the difficult life of coal miner and how the coal mining companies rigged the system so that the miners were paid in currency that could only be used at the Company store. So the miners got deeper and deeper into debt and essentially became slaves of the Company. The chorus ended with “Saint Peter don’t you call me ‘cause I can’t go, I owe my soul to the Company store.”

There is an often subtle but intense pressure that our jobs can put on us to comprise what we believe and there are those in our churches that encourage us to go along with it. How should a Christian respond? We will talk about it this weekend!