Before Popeye

“The Home of Popeye” is how Chester, IL, describes itself, and with good reason: it was the home of Elzie Segar, the cartoonist who first drew Popeye.

It’s also the home of The Chester First United Methodist Church, a delightful congregation it was my honor to serve. But that’s another story — okay, a whole bunch of other stories, and they’re all good — for another time.

Today let’s notice that it really wasn’t Popeye who first expressed the attitude, “I yam what I yam.”

Long before Popeye, there was this —

I am what I am
— St. Paul, 1st Corinthians 15:10

— St. Paul wrote that long before Elzie or Popeye came along, and he carefully framed it.

Let’s pick up right there tomorrow.

Meanwhile, may you and I be able to say both honestly and humbly, I am what I am.