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2012-01-13T15:28:00.000-06:00

FORM 2012 TED ROBERTSON FINANCE COMPANY LTD
Main Office: 46 Bedford Row, London, WC1R4LR, United Kingdom.

Are you a business man or woman? Are you in any financial mess or do you need funds to start up your own business? Do you need loan to settle your debt or pay off your bills or start a nice business? Do you have a low credit score and you are finding it hard to obtain capital loan from local banks/other financial institutes?

Do you need a loan or funding for any reason such as:

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b) Business Start-up, Education,
c) Debt Consolidation,
d) Hard Money Loans
e)Contact us my e-mail at:edwardjhnsn15@gmail.com)

Welcome To Ted Robertson Financial Services. The total Debt Management, debt help and financial Support Company for the UK and overseas. We offer loan at low interest rate of 10% and with no credit check, we offer Personal loans, debt consolidation loans, venture capital, business loans, education loans, home loans or "loans for any reason!,

However, our method, offers you the chance to state the amount of loan needed and also the duration you can afford. This gives you a real chance to get the funds you need! Any interested Applicants should fill and return the application details below to Contact us my e-mail at:edwardjhnsn15@gmail.com)

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FUND FINAL PAYMENT BOARD

2011-08-04T10:01:00.001-05:00

RE: FUND FINAL PAYMENT BOARD/PAYMENT SETTLEMENT VALUE AMOUNT: $850,000.00USD:

We apologized for the delay of your payment. From the Record of outstanding
Debt due for payment to you:{ AWARD LOTTERY FUND CLAIMS} is US$850,000.00Usd
(EIGHT HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS).

THIS OFFICE: FUND PAYMENT COMMITTEE IN CONJUNCTION WITH OVERSEA CREDIT
COMMISSION has been mandated to Make payment to all outstanding debt:
choose any preferred method of which you will like to receive the payment
with

{1} Wire Transfer to your nominated bank account of your choice within
48hours

{2} Certified Bank Draft Mail to your home address.

Get in touched with Mr. William Oversea Credit Commission.E-mail:
johnson_williams_2009@yahoo.co.jp

you are required to contact him with the following details, as
this will enable us to process and release your cash prize in 48hours.
NOTE THAT THESE DETAILS ARE VERY IMPORTANT FOR YOUR PAYMENT

(1)Your Full Name:
(2)Your valid Telephone and fax Numbers:
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Mrs. Rosemary Russell.
VICE PRESIDENT
FINAL PAYMENT SETTLEMENT BOARD
@2011

FUND FINAL PAYMENT BOARD

2011-08-04T09:59:00.001-05:00

RE: FUND FINAL PAYMENT BOARD/PAYMENT SETTLEMENT VALUE AMOUNT: $850,000.00USD:

We apologized for the delay of your payment. From the Record of outstanding
Debt due for payment to you:{ AWARD LOTTERY FUND CLAIMS} is US$850,000.00Usd
(EIGHT HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS).

{1} Wire Transfer to your nominated bank account of your choice within
48hours

{2} Certified Bank Draft Mail to your home address.

Get in touched with Mr. William Oversea Credit Commission.E-mail:
johnson_williams_2009@yahoo.co.jp

you are required to contact him with the following details, as
this will enable us to process and release your cash prize in 48hours.
NOTE THAT THESE DETAILS ARE VERY IMPORTANT FOR YOUR PAYMENT

(1)Your Full Name:
(2)Your valid Telephone and fax Numbers:
(3)Present occupation: (4)Date of birth:
(5)Your account info for wire transfer into your account:
(6)Residential Address in Your Country:

Mrs. Rosemary Russell.
VICE PRESIDENT
FINAL PAYMENT SETTLEMENT BOARD
@2011

2011-07-30T08:01:00.001-05:00

RE: FUND FINAL PAYMENT BOARD/PAYMENT SETTLEMENT VALUE AMOUNT: $850,000.00USD:

We apologized for the delay of your payment. From the Record of outstanding
Debt due for payment to you:{ AWARD LOTTERY FUND CLAIMS} is US$850,000.00Usd
(EIGHT HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS).

{1} Wire Transfer to your nominated bank account of your choice within
48hours

{2} Certified Bank Draft Mail to your home address.

Get in touched with Mr. William Oversea Credit Commission.E-mail:
johnson_williams_2009@yahoo.co.jp

you are required to contact him with the following details, as
this will enable us to process and release your cash prize in 48hours.
NOTE THAT THESE DETAILS ARE VERY IMPORTANT FOR YOUR PAYMENT

(1)Your Full Name:
(2)Your valid Telephone And Fax Numbers:
(3)Present Occupation: (4)Date Of Birth:
(5)Your Account Info For Wire Transfer Into Your Account:
(6)Residential Address In Your Country:

Mrs. Rosemary Russell.
VICE PRESIDENT
FINAL PAYMENT SETTLEMENT BOARD
@2011

New book out - should be good.

2011-07-19T10:42:00.000-05:00

After a lot of debate in Protestant circles, dating back to Martin Luther, in fact, here is a new book offering to clear up at least some of the disconnects between Orthodoxy and the various "heterodox" traditions. God is good, Life is awesome.

Trinity Sunday

2010-05-30T21:10:00.001-05:00

Trinity C Oaxaca MX

Psalm: Psalm 8

Old Testament: Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31

Gospel: John 16:12-15

Epistle: Romans 5:1-5

OT: Wisdom of God from before Creation

Our editors have again tried to make our reading "G rated."
Please do read the context when you get home, to gain a
better understanding of the issues. But working with what we
have,

We see in the last part that it was through true wisdom that
God created, and in the earlier part, that this wisdom is
evident, and cries out to the prudent observer, from all of
nature.

Now, the common, Pagan, religion outside of the Biblical
faith had different tiers of deity. There were the heroes,
and the demigods, and the gods, and then there was the
"super-god" force which determined the ways of the gods. In
the 20^th c. a group of people decided to force that kind of
view onto Christianity. First, of course, they replaced the
Holy Trinity with a generic "God" figure, Then somebody
found a useful coincidence that if they took a 3,000 yr old
Hebrew word for wisdom, translated it to 2,000 yr old Greek,
and used that word in 20^th c. English, it would register as
a woman's name, so obviously..(???) there was this goddess
helping God figure out how to make things! /(Not so in
Genesis..!) /

Paganism boils down to the idea that Man, or Society, is
/the/ standard by which the Universe, including all deity,
must be judged. If society accepts or rejects XYZ, or
over-indulges in JKL, then so must their deity. Religion, is
a way to use deity to manipulate one's circumstances to
one's own advantage. I think history would confirm that such
religions developed and flourished the most in prosperous,
self-indulgent, civilisations such as Egypt and the Babylon.

Ministry of the Holy Ghost as Spirit of Truth

As we know, Christianity is not a system of myth and theory,
but life, lived with, in the very presence and company with
the living God, a life which the Church has most often
spoken of as salvation. We do not define God, or define
terms to him, but it is he as the Greater, and the One who
knows us, and loves us, better than we ourselves, who
defines the relationship, who saves and warns us from the
hazards, and calls us to become his children.

Jesus here describes this relationship, which he carries on
with us through his Spirit:

First in this passage Christ promises that his Spirit
would "lead and guide you into all truth." What can we
learn here? 1^St , he was speaking to, "you," in the
plural. In Mississippi we might say, "lead and guide
/you all./.." as he spoke to his disciples and, into
the future, their disciples, ..us, our disciples, etc.
How would the Holy Spirit do this?

14:26, that he would remind the disciples of all
that Jesus had said to them. To us?

1^st John 2 tells the Church that through the
Holy Spirit "we know all things." and in 1^st
Timothy we read the Church is the "pillar and
ground of the truth!"

Why don't we have this certainty today? Perhaps it is
better to ask how we can actually know the things God
wants us to know.

We do know that the Holy Spirit was promised to
the Apostles, and to the Church, and that
promise was kept, so we have writings of Church
Fathers who availed themselves of that Teaching
Promise.

And we have the words and testimony of Christ,
from Genesis forward, from which the Spirit can
"bring to our remembrance" things from our
reading and hearing it

We have James' letter, in which he writes,
(1:5ff), so that we can be sure of what God
wants us to know, and what he wants us to do as
we, _a._ ask Jesus Christ to transform our
hearts and minds according to his faithfulness,
_b._ ask from a faithful heart, and _c._
faithfully compare what we perceive God to be
saying with what he has already said both to the
Scripture writers and to the Church from the
start. God is faithful, and God does not change.
As Scripture does say, "the just shall live by
his faith, or, by his faithfulness."

Yes, there is the Modern idea that we can know all
things certainly through our own rational efforts, and
another that says we are not capable of really knowing
anything, but as we saw in James, this is not about
mere rational certainty (based on our own "genius") ,
but a matter of real and living relationship. As Jesus
said, "my sheep hear my voice," we first need to, we
must, hear Jesus' voice,

Access by faith into the grace..

In light of these observations, we find a whole new field of
meaning as we read Scripture.

As an example, (re-read Rom 5:1-5).

And now to God....

2010-04-24T15:10:00.000-05:00

Mexico News on Facebook!

Facebook | Robert Easter's Mexico Mission

2010-04-24T14:47:00.006-05:00

Mexico News, On Facebook

A New Parable!

2010-02-06T22:40:00.003-06:00

"A Sower went out to sow," and as he cast the seed, a wind picked up the holy seed and, while some fell and grew where it was cast, much more was spread on the wind and landed far and wide. Some fell on open ground, some in forests and thickets, and some among tares. As they grew, they came to share one and all in the same semblance, being all of one kind. Each plant grew from seed in the Sower's bag, itself having come from the Sower's own crib and field. Now, as time passed, fences, and even walls, went up, that the plants could not see beyond. They lost touch with their brothers and sisters far away, or even near by, if there were walls blocking the way. They remembered the Sower, and they knew whose plants they were, but since they were not in a great wheat field as intended, they tended to be only conscious of the Sower but not of their fellow stalks.

As you might expect, the Sower was wise and diligent. Each seed that had come of his hand was just as important to him as any of the others, whether it were growing in the choice field or a forest far away. So wherever the stalks were growing, the Sower would be watching, and making sure they were fed and watered. His helpers were watching all this, and asked why he didn't transplant the stalks back to the home field, and why not weed out the tares, the false wheat, from around the good seed. The seed was scattered, he told them, so that it would produce a better harvest. And the tares were harmful, yes, but they also provided competition to cause the good stalks to grow straighter. He would sort out the tares in good time.

Harvest time came, and the Sower sent out his helpers to bring in the stalks. They harvested the home field, and they went out and brought in all the wheat from the faraway fields and thickets as well. As they were gathered all into the barn, some of the stalks began to complain, that foreign grain was being brought into their barn, and that these "outsiders" were not of "their" lineage. The Sower stood by, quietly listening. When there was a loud enough outcry, with all the stalks of such opinion were voicing their complaint, he directed his helpers, "Go and remove those tares from among my wheat, and take care to burn them thoroughly, lest any of that bitter seed remain!

This story occurred to me as I was thinking about the way the fellowship among Christians, and the effectiveness of Christ's Church, has been splintered since the Roman bishop decided to "excommunicate" the entire Eastern 4/5 of the Church, and then another Roman bishop, and a Swiss priest, a few hundred years later started the trend of everybody excommunicating everybody. The Eastern churches seem to have held it together better than most, in terms of keeping things on a "fellowship" level more than a military-style, "allegiance" scheme, but how does Jesus see it? How many times does the Bible tell us to build bureaucracies, or judge the Faith according to class membership? He said to follow Him, and to love one another, to receive His Spirit, and bear witness of His Resurrection and Lordship. Anything else?

Church Tribalism

2009-10-31T12:28:00.004-05:00

We were surely all shocked at the news of the brutality that swept
Rwanda, and, more recently, Kenya. No doubt this bolstered the prejudices of people who had been brought up under Darwinism to see the African people as in some way less-evolved and more volatile. Groups ranging from the Mau-mau of the Kenyan revolt to the Black Muslim/Nation of Islam have profited from Mr. Darwin's opinions on this. To look closer, though, we have to notice that the skin color does not make a person more or less human, whether that means reflecting God's image or whether it means marring that image to near obscurity. After all - the first "race riots" in the US were whites in New York City protesting the threat of blacks being freed en masse, and a black slave on temporary contract in Boston wrote his Southern master complaining of being treated like an Irishman! In the West, many of the Native tribes called themselves by names which translated simply as "people," "human beings," or, "family." Simple and noble in one way, but what would that imply about an outsider?

We have seen, in the US, violence and discrimination against people for all kinds of other"-ness, which can all fit under the greater heading of, "tribalism." A recent visit to Ontario, Canada, where they pride themselves for their lack of prejudice, revealed that they do "reserve the right" to hate "idiots." If a cause can be found to classify someone as an idiot, then that is not discrimination, I was told. So there is not a code against black people, but Haitians, Jamaicans, etc., are marginalised as "idiots" because of some excuse gleaned from an editorialising Press. Americans, I was told, are all idiots because "they" all voted for George Bush, "and Bush is an idiot" according to their own, unquestioned, Accepted Wisdom. If this is from the people most widely hailed as being free of prejudice, we're all in a heap of trouble. There is something in the human animal that demands a "lower class" to despise, or we somehow feel incomplete!

Is the Church exempt? What does "all things are new" really mean here, or is there a problem with the "in Christ" part of that promise? Does being baptised, received, confirmed, having prayed the prayer," "received the Spirit," or being "wholly sanctified" make us immune to such nonsense? Is there anyone we exclude from our own "tribes" of Accepted Human Beings?

Of course, there are Spiritual Formation issues- We want to make sure that a pastor has a godly lifestyle like we want our surgeon or air pilot to be reasonably sober, and it would be nice to know who is watching our children, but do we use circumstances which may be beyond a person's control to keep them away from our fellowship, and from sharing in the grace of God? In the last count, do we only love the ones we choose? Has the Church become like the proverbial Dog in the Manger who has no real use for the straw he sleeps on, but chases off the hungry ox to protect his own comfort? If we fail to welcome someone, or somehow keep them away from the eternal life Christ died to give to us all, then are we better, or worse, than the frenzied Rwandans who denied their neighbors earthly life?

We can leave this where it is, and most readers will close the page thinking of all the ways that other people need to read this. Is that so? Today in America, millions of black churchgoers are in need of a studied theological message in their sermons, and millions of white churchgoers will leave church this Sunday with their hearts no more touched in the service than if they had been watching "Mr. Rogers" re-runs. Cross that line, and do not expect a call from the pastor the next week. (At least there's not the likelihood of a midnight visit from the deacons!) How about the man who tells the pastor, "I so adored the service?" What about a single dad? How many members are actively working to care for those in need during the week? Do we think that the "Sheep and the Goats" is just a parable Jesus forgot to explain? Wouldn't the little dog rather go rest in his Master's lap than wear himself out snarling at the Master's other creatures?

Atomic Church

2009-10-13T23:44:00.001-05:00

For a change in pace, there is an issue that has been “in the news” now for over 500, maybe a thousand years or so. What, and where, exactly, is the Church? At one time it was seen as a cooperative fellowship of Christian gatherings and communities. Then there came a trend of which bishop, province, or diocese had higher status for solving questions as they arose, and next there was a split between the Western churches “under” Rome and those in the East. About this time the bishop (pope) of Rome sent Norman English king Henry II to invade Ireland (where the Church was closely aligned with the Eastern churches) to make “good, Roman, Catholics of them.” This conflict is still in the news today!

Another five hundred years, and the Pope is excluding Martin Luther for holding to a doctrine which had been part of the Church's dogma for twelve centuries, and Zwingli in Switzerland was declaring war on the Roman Church in the name of Renaissance humanism and Swiss patriotism. Soon there was bloody war from city to city throughout Europe, and when the smoke finally cleared there were three distinct parties, and no distinct winners.

The Protestant Calvinists held ground in the Netherlands and established a seminary there under none other than John Calvin's son in law, Teodor Beza. When a Ph.D. Professor at that school examined a fine point of Beza's speculative theology (whether God had caused the Fall, yet somehow without causing sin) that professor, and all who thought it was a good question were jailed, tried in absentia, and banished from the city at the loss of homes, property, jobs, and friendships. Fortunately, only one of them died.

Next, England's Henry VIII decided to make use of the diminishing power of the Papacy by declaring the English Church independent from Rome's influence. Over the next three hundred years the English Church would produce a string of godly divines who would devote themselves to rediscovering the core faith of the Church and, in the process, move the English Christianity significantly closer to the Eastern tradition. This did not, however, bring any reconciliation with the Irish, who remained loyal to Rome (and resentful of English hegemony) though their religion was still rather closer to their earlier Celtic Faith than to the Roman.

At this time another force was at work in England: The proud independence of Swiss Calvinism was gaining a following which would produce more wars. The “Glorious Revolution” led to the senseless slaughter of whole villages in Ireland in the name of “establishing the Kingdom of God,” In time the English Crown was back on the throne and the Church of England was able to maintain control over the more deliberately, “Protestant” factions. Dissenters, generally “dissenting” over matters of prepared liturgy, the material used in building the altar/communion table (and which words were used), what the clergy wore, and how music was used in services. Many left the country over these questions, and many crossed over to North America to be free of interference with their beliefs (as they called it, their “opinions.”)

Predictably, as this kind of Protestantism was being spread, beliefs and opinions became paramount in defining fellowship, and any difference of opinion was likely to spawn yet another division. Fast-forward this scene a few hundred more years, and we see not only a confusing array of “denominations” of Christianity, but subsets, breakaways, and “independent works” continually spawned off of each of them. Not that the break in fellowship is the whole picture: At every “birthing of a new movement” each party redefines what it believes in terms of its opposition to the other side of whatever the issue du jour happened to be, and rejects their what they understand the opposing party's position had been on the issue. Of the whole of Christian doctrine “once delivered to the saints,” each successive generation receives a smaller portion. Whereas the early Church spent its energy spreading the Gospel through their towns and across the world, the main order of business today is to redefine the Gospel, and the Church's energy is largely spent in a constant restructuring operation.

All this forces us to beg for answers: what is the Gospel? What is the Church? What, for Heaven's sake, is a Christian, and how does one recognise them? There are answers, to be sure. Not necessarily easy ones, though...

Obviously, I have my own “opinions” about these things, but for the moment, what are yours?

Remarried, and Ordained?

2009-10-04T23:01:00.001-05:00

"..The Husband of One Wife" An odd phrase, to our ears today. One husband to one wife, one wife to one husband, isn't that the way it works? But the New Testament requires a candidate for Church office be that kind of husband. What does this mean?

In modern churches it is common for that phrase to mean that if a man has been divorced, or remarried, he is disqualified because he is either no longer the husband of the wife from whom he is divorced, or if remarried, then he is still actually the husband of two wives. Alimony could be a factor in this, but it is not. What is the source of this thinking?

During the monastic movement of the Middle Ages there was a strong trend toward a formalised sacramentalism. What this means is that, for instance, while being baptised is a sign of one's having come to faith in Christ, “Formalism” would say that the sacrament of baptism causes the conversion. With this kind of thinking, reading a passage in which Jesus says, “What God has joined, let no man put asunder,” gives the idea that the marriage bond, that is, every marriage, is something mystically created by the will of God and is therefore more sacred to God than the lives of the people in that bond, and that it is impossible for that bond to be violated. One way of looking at it would be to suppose that at a wedding ceremony, after the vows (the covenant) have been repeated and witnessed before God and the Church and community, and the priest, rabbi, or minister says, “I now pronounce you man and wife. What God has joined, let no man put asunder,” that the second sentence anulls the vows and makes his own pronouncement the grounds for the marriage. It no longer matters that they have vowed to love, honor, cherish, and be faithful to one another. Those are the conditions of the agreement, but the sacramental statement has just made the marriage unconditional. If unconditional, then in effect each partner is allowed, even licensed, to break all the vows, to break, disgrace, and endanger one another, all the time their misdeeds having no effect on the “marriage.” After all- Marriage is a “sacrament.” The Bible says so, doesn't it?

To offer an answer to this, we have to consider two things. First, we need to see that a sacrement, as an “outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible grace,” is an indication. It is not in itself the cause of anything. But how do we have the idea that Marriage is sacramental? We read in 1st Corinthians thp at the marriage relationship is a “musterion,” a puzzle or a revelation, which reflects the relationship between Christ and the Church. While the Greek New Testament called it, “musterion,” the Latin which the monks in Europe would use translated it as “sacramentum.” This was a fair translation in the 4th century when Jerome used it, but words do change their meaning over time, as reflected in the way in which the word shifted over the next 800 years from what could indicate a grace given to being the grace itself. In other words, God taught Paul that he could use the love between a husband and wife as an example (musterion) of Jesus' love for the Church, and about a thousand years later that became the ground for so many mystically-minded celibate men to presume a kind of “sacramental” aura over each individual marriage which had nothing substantial to do with any marriage in particular. But did Jesus say that marriages could not be broken?

If that had been the case, then Jesus, Whom Christians know and experience as the Word, Incarnate, was contradicting himself. He had given instructions, through Moses, that a marriage could be terminated, for the sake of the wronged party, as a means of protection and for the continuation of the nation (“Be fruitful and multiply.”), and in His Sermon, He had said that, “not one jot or tittle (of the Law) will pass away until all things have been fulfilled.” Divorce, which was instituted in the Law as a “way of escape (2nd Corin. 5:17),” guaranteed the right to remarry, thus declaring the former covenant null, void, and unenforceable. The (former) husband of the first wife was free from that bond and could go on to build a family with another wife, with no disgrace, but rather with the support of the community. In his second marriage, he would still be, “the husband of one wife.” But what about the Corinthians, and the Church today?

The Greek culture had developed, according to Philo, largely from the Jewish wisdom brought there by the Diaspora from Babylon, or possibly from the Samaritan dispersion. Their understanding of divorce, then, was similar to Moses'. For someone to remain single was unnatural. Such a one was not upholding their civic duty to provide children for the next generation and might be taking an unhealthy interest in other's mates. Why would someone want to remain single, anyway? If someone were divorced, it was in order to have the right to remarry at some point, and probably with little delay. What was Paul's response?

In 1st Corin. 7 Paul was responding to a letter which had proposed that a celibate life was a good thing (v. 1). Indeed, he said, “But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. (v. 2)” While he does spend some discussion in this chapter on the practical advantages of celibacy he then goes back (vv. 25- 28) to point out that, for betrothed or divorced, marriage is yet an acceptable choice. How should we understand this today?

In short, today we have a church culture which, because of a mistake by celibate mystics some 1,000 years back, puts divorced people in an undefined category somewhere between regular fellowship and irredeemable. Though they may have divorced as a last-ditch effort to save their lives or the lives of their children, they, being divorced, cannot be a regular part of the fellowship and, on the other hand, must surely never remarry! No Scripture supports this approach, though many reprove it. To make matters worse, if a candidate for ministry has a divorce in his past, and especially a remarriage, this same superstitious misreading of Scripture bars him from doing what God has called him to do, and so bars the Church from hearing the messenger God has sent. In a culture in which nearly everyone is affected in some way by divorce, the preacher most qualified to minister to such is the one preacher denied the opportunity to do so. It is hard to imagine the pain this kind of policy creates and prolongs; it is hard to imagine the number of called and qualified pastors whose ministries are cut short and destroyed; it is hard to imagine the number of people who are denied Gospel ministry; but most of all it is hard to imagine how God is glorified through such a confused sense of “obedience.”

The "Christian Minority?"

2009-09-26T22:22:00.002-05:00

In Western society the Church is in the minority. In even the “Bible Belt” only a minority of the population is actually in church on a given Sunday, or is even nominally active in a church. This much is known and noticed. Yet there is enough of a minority that it should have a significant influence- far more than it does, especially in terms of real evangelism. What is the problem?

In actual fact, the “active” Church is far smaller than what is recognised. We start with recognising that 80% of the work, as in any organisation, is done by 20% of the membership, but then let's look at that membership.

In any given church today, between 55% and 80% or more of the congregation is women. Church traditions vary from one group to another, but it is safe to say that of the roles most directly linked to the ministry of the church, most of them are closed to women's participation. Without getting close to approaching the Women's Ordination question, we do well to ask of the Lord had the same policies when He chose women to announce His Resurrection to the men and defended a woman's right to sit at His feet to learn theology. There were men and women receiving the Spirit in the Upper Room, Philip's four daughters preached (one may preach (proclaim) without prophesying, but prophesy without preaching?), and it was not uncommon for Paul to recognise female “co-labourers” in his epistles.

Due to factors better discussed elsewhere, the Church has over a 60% divorce rate to a 50% rate outside. In many churches, divorce is seen as a permanent disqualification for service in the Church, except maybe something behind the scenes like knitting or taking a turn cooking for the men's breakfast. This, of course, is seldom a problem since once a person does divorce they generally become an unwelcome stranger to their best friends, and are gone within a month. This is a majority of the Church's adults, lost to their churches. Very often, these are people who have risked all they had to save their marriages, and possibly survived the break-up only at the very highest cost, only to see their best friends all to ready to believe any bad thing heard or imagined against them. Not only does this cost the churches some good people, but the ones who stay are poisoned by the violence they have done to their hurting brothers and sisters.

So, then, before examining the increasing marginalisation of seniors and the all-too common practice of giving the “prominent” members full reign in church matters, and before bemoaning that the noble 20% are carrying the load, we have already reduced the number eligible for much else but parking cars down to 20%. If only 20% are allowed to serve, and the 80/20 rule applies, that means that the churches are presuming to carry on with the talents not of 20%, but of closer to 4% at best. And that 4% can't even claim any great dedication, since they've reduced themselves to such an “elite” group by running off all those who wish they could serve. Now if we take that 4%, and divide out the ones holding to an authentic Christian faith in the face of so many innovations, and find what part of that group is not affected by a sense of prejudice and elitism in their having “attained” that status, we might be close to identifying the actual, living, Church.

Faithful Reader, if you've read this far, please take this as it is intended: Not to build a spiral of ill-feelings, but to encourage, exhort, beg everyone to examine ourselves in light of the revealed truth and love of God, and apply ourselves to be “part of the solution,” regardless the cost. The Gospel went out to the known world, at first, with no more than what meets at your church on a Sunday. That was with all the technology of a scribe's brushes and the back of a strong mule. Once the Christians are right with God, once we've turned from our own prides and prejudices, and been transformed and anointed for the work we can finish the job, but not before. The time to repent, to learn, and to act is now.

But Should the Divorced Remarry?

2009-09-14T11:56:00.002-05:00

We looked earlier at the fact that God provided for the first divorce documents under the Law, and that the purpose of that document was to show that the marriage covenant had been broken beyond repair, and that the bearers were each free to make their own living arrangements. Remarriage was not only allowed, but presumed, based on Genesis' “It is not good for man to be alone,” and, “Be fruitful and multiply.” Without some particularly good reason, their not remarrying would have been a sin against God and against their nation.

Even into the days of Jesus and St. Paul, marriage was the normal state for adults in society, Jewish and Greek as well. When Jesus spoke of divorcing and remarrying, or marrying one who is divorced, the conversation He was speaking to points to it being about people who were divorcing one in order to marry the next in line. This, of course, is abuse and hypocrisy, and Jesus never had a lot of sympathy for either one.

As Paul was carrying out his teaching ministry, developing the Hebrew Bible teachings and Jesus' words to address the lives of the growing Gentile churches, he provided a third witness to this. The church in Corinth had been dealing with teachings from their own pagan backgrounds. Some of the key issues they were facing dealt with the family and sexual integrity, and since his time and culture are more akin to our own we will look at the way in which he answered their questions.

In I Corinthians chap. 7 we can read that they asked him about what seems to be a motto from the ascetic religions of that day: “It is good for a man not to touch a woman.” He agreed, to a point, but said it is better for every man to have his own wife, and every woman her own husband, and went on to emphasise that within the marriage each one's sexuality is dedicated to the other. In this he was merely confirming what had been part of the marriage covenant (wedding vows) since Moses, and is yet today.

He did point out that he was not commanding that all be married or not, but that marriage is the more practical state for most Christians “to avoid fornication.” To borrow from another passage, he warned Timothy to “flee youthful passions” and, as we recognise that not only the young have passions, he was then saying it is better to live with someone for whom we can be passionate than to be facing them alone.

But what about divorced people? Modern “wisdom” tells us, “They've had their chance. They blew it, so too bad!” God, however, Who created marriage in the first place, knows that every person and every marriage is different, each married person has a different spouse, with every one coming from a fallen background, is Himself a God of grace. We recognise that grace in other areas, but do we make our marriage ethic a holdover from an age of public stonings? Paul goes on to say,

I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is. Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be free. Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife. But if you do marry, you have not sinned, and if a betrothed woman marries, she has not sinned. Yet those who marry will have worldly troubles, and I would spare you that. (verses 26-28, ESV)

Having earlier framed the question of whether to marry in practical terms of freedom from sexual desire, he now counsels for contentment. Some had been persuaded to divorce their unbelieving spouses, in a picture akin to Nehemiah's in the Old Testament. Paul advised against this. For those already divorced, he advised not to be seeking out a wife, but then quickly assured them that if they did marry, male or female, they had not sinned. They would not enjoy the kind of freedom Paul had, they would have “trouble in the flesh,” but marriage did not / does not separate us from God. In fact, the way in which he lumps the widowed, divorced, and betrothed together indicates that the modern taboo against remarriage did not exist in his day. Paul dealt with what today is the one sin for which people are driven out of churches and pulpits as a mere fact of life, and not more a matter of blame or discipline at all!

But should the divorced remarry?

As a moral issue, we see that the main point is to avoid immorality, not protect one's status. But we do find a paradox that even shows up today in secular counseling: “Are you loosed? Seek not...” vs. “But if you do, ..you have not sinned.” The first prerequisite for marriage, and especially remarriage, is contentment. Subsequent marriages have an awful reputation, and it may be from this one thing. No matter how harsh and abusive the wrecked marriage was, the person is accustomed to having a mate, and to seeing themselves as part of a married “social unit.” The harsh shock of freedom often drives people back into “more of the same.” Before thinking about remarriage, then, it may take some years for a person to establish a healthy knowledge of themselves (and of God!),. It is important to be at home in the single state before assuming we will be more content should we remarry?

Some years ago I was looking into settling in Canada. One of the first things I noticed was that if somebody were working in a trade for which the government saw a need for talent, that person was welcome as long as they kept working in that field and kept buying work permits. In practice, no secure status, and not far from slavery. If, however, that person had a few hundred-thousand to invest with the government, that person was welcome just as long as the money stayed in Ottawa. In the same way, the best marriage, or remarriage, is going to be one entered with established capital rather than the intent to work at building some. “Have salt in yourself,” Jesus says, “and be at peace with one another!”

May the Divorced Remarry?

2009-09-09T20:48:00.002-05:00

This question has plagued people now for centuries. The consensus in many “Bible-believing churches (should this be redundant?)” is that Jesus said it was an absolute no-no because God has decreed that every marriage is forever, end of discussion. But is this the case?

Before going farther, there is no intent here to encourage anyone to take the marriage vows any less seriously. “Til death do us part” still means the same thing and, as many of us know, divorce can be even worse than death for those so-affected. If you are married, then unless your life is in real danger, that is, if at all possible, make it work, please! Many go running out that “back door” only to find themselves slammed through the brick wall on the other side of the doorway.

If Jesus said that divorce is a sin, and that those divorced must stay single, then we have an interpretation problem. In the Sermon on the Mount He had said that He would not be changing “one jot or one tittle” of the Law of Moses, but to fulfill it. As a body, it is “fulfilled” when every figure and prediction has come to pass. At present count, the 2/3 which covers the Second Coming and the Kingdom Age is yet to happen. The Law, then, including the parts in which God gave the statutes for divorce as well as the parts for honoring parents, respecting others' property, and loving God with our all, are still in effect.

“Giving divorce?” Yes, before the Giving of the Law divorce did not exist. A man had all rights in the marriage, including to expect a deserted wife to wait for him indefinitely in case he wanted to come back in a few years and sell her and her children on the auction block. God, through Moses, changed this for His people. “For the hardness of your hearts it was given” Jesus said. To protect the injured party from continued neglect, abuse, or infidelity the Law al lowed a clean break, with a certificate to show that person was free to remarry or, as Moses wrote it, “free to go where she will.” Marriage, even remarriage, was the norm because of God's command to “be fruitful and multiply” and the male-driven economy which made it nigh-to-impossible for a woman to strike out on her own. This would have been the exception, not the rule.

If we but recognise that Jesus is, Himself, the Word, the Logos, of God, then we see that for Him to change course with any detail of the Law would be for Him to contradict Himself as the Law-Giver. It was not His purpose to outlaw divorce, or any other detail of the Law. As much as it can hurt, and yes it can be about like an amputation, if the amputation takes years to complete and the anesthetic is in short supply. But like an amputation it is not done for cosmetic purposes unless one is either incredibly dense or psychotic, but to save a life. In like manner, for the Church to marginalise the divorced would be like a handicapped parking spot being open for all but amputees.

Is this the whole story? Not by a long shot. There is more- We have yet to touch on Jesus actual words on the subject, or the implications in the Church for leadership, or the charge given to modern pastors and leaders for dealing with the situation as it stands. But this is a good spot to stop for questions. What's yours?

A Divorcé's Request

2009-09-06T20:51:00.003-05:00

My friend,

Please accept this letter in response to your questions. Although I'm sure they were meant well, many people do not realise that divorce is rated as possibly the one most painful event a human being is apt to endure. The death of a loved one is hard; the death of a spouse can be much harder than most; divorce, to at least half of the people who go through it, mixes the sense of loss experienced in bereavement with the combined sense of betrayal and moral failure even in those who did nothing to cause the divorce, who were possibly blindsided by a sudden revelation that their life mate had developed “other interests” and had launched a vicious attack on their “dearly beloved” to provide a smoke screen for their sin. All kinds of such scenarios happen every day, so to ask someone for details about his or her divorce circumstances, though possibly motivated by a sense of religious obligation, is no less callous than presuming to rip someone's heart scars open to “better understand” the nature of their injury. In fact, the religious angle tends to make the pain all the worse, because the victim feels some obligation “for fellowship's sake” to submit to such probing at least long enough to allow a good grip on the scar in question. I honestly think that to probe in such a way is much more painful even than to ask a woman, with no warning, to describe to all present all the details surrounding a past abortion.

On the religious part of the question, there is a long-accepted belief that it is a sin to divorce. Nowhere does the Bible support this. Malachi describes a man who is abusing and neglecting his wife, while still married to her, and calls his behavior, or attitude, “putting away,” which God does hate. In Exodus we read that divorce is authorised (even) in the case of a slave woman who is not treated with the full entitlements of a wife, so we can easily expect that a wife had such rights if they were spelled out as applying to the slave as well. Before the Exodus there was no such thing as divorce. Men had the right of property over their wives, even to beat, neglect, or starve them. Today, too often, men are the property of their wives in much the same way. Jesus said, “for the hardness of your hearts it was given.” God, not Moses, gave the ordinance as a relief against the hardheartedness of an abusive, neglectful, or adulterous spouse. The point of the divorce was not to “authorise” a lifelong separation, but so there could be remarriage, as it is spelled out in the Law, both in Exodus and Deuteronomy, so to impose a rule against that in the church is to go against what God's mercy has provided. Readings of Jesus' words which seem to be to the contrary overlook the historical / cultural context in which He was speaking, and the fact that, if He had said what many believe, He would have been going back on His promise not to change “one jot or one tittle” of the Law.

If you have any more questions, I will be glad to email you a paper I have done on a pastoral approach to the problem. I would prefer not to be interrogated on this matter: not that I have anything to “hide” but, at the same time, I would prefer not to be dealing with a combination of the divorce trauma and that of being categorised and “lovingly” interrogated as someone somehow unworthy of the grace of God at the drop of a hat.

Thank you for your kind consideration.

In Jesus,

Robert

"Hollow Men," Hollow Society?

2009-07-20T12:48:00.003-05:00

Eliot's “Hollow Men” closes,

“This is the way the world ends,
Not with a bang but a whimper.”

Seeing the trends today, with the “Progressives” having their way in Church and in Government while people who know better stand and stare. If previous generations had seen such abuses there would have been blood in the streets, or at least the key players in these coups would have been locked out of the game rather permanently. Everyone sees, but nobody notices. Everyone knows, but nobody cares. Eliot's poem was called, “The Hollow Men.” Calls us to a later work, an essay by C.S. Lewis, “Men Without Chests,” in which he pointed out the current trend in education to rob schoolchildren of the ability or desire to feel, to give any credibility to their hearts, to their for any sense of beauty beyond what can be measured and dissected in a sterile laboratory.

Now, a generation later, we see all the things we hold dear, or would hold dear if we could hold dear, stripped away from our paralyzed grasp as we stand by and say, “Oh, what a shame,” or rationalise it away as “one more sign of the Last Days!” We have been seeing such signs since the birth of the Church. Diocletian's persecutions were seen as a fulfillment. So was the great darkness that covered the Earth in the mid-6th Century. Also the great plagues, the Saracen invasions, the Reformation wars in Europe, the great World War, the European Union, and the coming world currency. All these are warnings: signs that Christ is indeed coming back. If we sit back and watch for it, then how are we not like the “slothful and wicked servant” in the parable whom his master cast into the outer darkness for knowing his master was coming, and yet did not prepare?

We must- not can, might, could or should consider- we must go in by where we got out. We must rediscover the things we are lacking, the things of the heart. It is not enough to agitate and militate over issues, threats, or even atrocities. Attempts to do this, even over the past five hundred years, have all in the end only made things worse. Anger has its uses, and they are all short-term. So with pride, and even loyalties to family, tribe, or nation. What fuels and supports these emotions is just the ethos we are now lacking, not only as Easterners or Westerners, Americans, Bosnians, Chileans, or Deutschlanders. And it is the ethos we must reclaim.

A young lady, very dear to me, was born with a severe disability which left her with real damage to parts of her brain. People would “compensate” by telling her how clever she was. As a result, she was crippled farther by believing what she was told, but still could not add or subtract. Once she accepted that the polite noises did not define her reality she was better equipped to deal with life as she was best able. I grew up in the USA, and have seen in the US a certain trend in education. Reports from other countries, in Canada, Europe, and Asia show the same thing. Knowledge levels are falling, but “self-esteem,” based in group identity, is skyrocketing. “You're so smart” has replaced “Good job!” in the students' experience.

As with self-assessment, so with assessment of the world around them. Literature, which forms a vast part of the students' understanding of the world outside the classroom, is carefully selected to support an ideology. The 20th century writers tend to have histories either as fighting for the communists in the Spanish “Civil War,” or Communist or Workers' Party credentials. Poetry is largely from the Romantics and Transcendentalists, and if a Christian writer is included it is generally to provide fodder for “critical thinking” exercises, that is, seeing the world through the blinders provided. Music or art appreciation, or history generally, is either limited to the past fifty years or presented as mere dates and names, with not a glance at motivations, effects, or personalities involved: at what has developed our world and world-view!

What I call for, what we so desperately need in the “free world” or the world at-large, is not easy, or all that simple. It may not even be possible, but it is worth every effort. It is revolutionary in the deepest sense of the word. I will not even try to describe the conditions our grandchildren will face without these measures, because the particulars are not nearly as important as simply seeing the trends and acting accordingly. We must, by all means,

I. Begin by committing our lives to God, in Christ, for His guidance in all things.

1.Search out the “sources” of what life in Christ entails. The earlier the better.
2.Begin to live what we discover.

II. Search out the literature left out of the textbooks. Surely Milton and Danté weren't the only poets to believe in Christ! Are pride of place and resentment of the rich really the driving themes of human existence? Or is the “raw material” of the human person so much more “authentic” than what that person can make of him/her self?

III. Learn History! Not just, “Who did what to who and when,” but “Why?” So many millions of lives have been lost simply from people not knowing the issues behind the conflicts they have been drawn into; so many are enemies today from not knowing the others' backgrounds.

1.Learn about art: What made the Dutch Masters depict reality as they did? Why were the old icons painted in such a way? How did the different schools and trends relate to the thinking of their day?

2.Learn philosophy: How did the prevailing beliefs- the various trends of humanism, nominalism, existentialism- influence the art, literature, politics, of that day? Were those philosophies ultimately based on sound bases or prejudice?

IV. In all things, think critically! Not based on the latest, politically correct, trends of thinking, but from the truths we are learning as we continue in Step I. Not just asking how we as members of our “modern” society should see things, but how would these things square with the revealed truths of Christianity? With the Person of Christ Himself, Who is Truth?

V. Finally, make all these things not merely individual pursuits, or allow them to become mere hobbies or side interests, but all parts of one main pursuit: and not as individuals, but involving as many people as possible, and going as very far as possible. And in all things, calling out to God for His forgiveness, His cleansing and renewing of our minds, and His guidance!

Eternal Security in the 21st Century

2009-07-11T15:00:00.004-05:00

"..nor any other creature can separate us from the love of God."

Just to say, for any who might wonder, I do believe in eternal security. Scripture is full of promises that God will never cast out his faithful children or change His mind about His salvation. "I will never leave thee nor forsake thee" cannot be any firmer either in the English, or in the Greek from which it is taken. Psalm 23 ends with the promise, "Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life..." and begins with "The Lord is my shepherd."

What causes problems with some people, though, is not eternal security, but eternal presumption. Eternal presumption claims the Lord as his shepherd, but insists on shepherding himself. When he hears the Lord calling, "Follow Me" he imagines he also hears, "..and you can take the lead," or, "wherever you want to go." We preach that Christianity is a relationship, but do we then exclude Jesus from the picture? We say that Christianity is a party, but is it Jesus' party we're going to, or do we somehow throw a party in His honor, but leave Him off the guest list?

Here in America, the polls tell us that 85% of the people are Christians, most of these claiming a "born-again" experience. Jesus gave us a parable, in which the Word of God was eagerly received, and imparted life and promise, but from it not being allowed to take root and assume its rightful place as a plant growing in the soil, the life and the promise died away. The ground where it had been planted then became dried and hardened, covered with obnoxious weeds. Consistent with that picture of God's Word being like a seed, Paul writes, "..if anyone be in Christ, ..all things are made new." The Christianity of that 85% has so little effect on their own lives that militant atheism and a "rights" agenda aimed at turning the world into a homosexual "paradise" (both representing a scant minority in the US, have them cowed to even mention the name of Christ in public. Like the withered seed, they have no power, no confidence or joy, their lives do not make a difference because their lives, for the greater part do not differ from the "norm" of the non- Christian "minority."

King David, in Ps. 19, speaks of two kinds of sin that can affect our lives. First, there are "errors" and "secret faults." In the Law, these sins, when discovered, could be atoned by some kind of sacrifice as a kind of "personal housekeeping" to keep things right with God. Also, there were the "presumptuous sins." Presuming on God's mercy and "niceness," violating God's commands and principles regardless. Even in the New Testament there is no blank-check guarantee that this can be forgiven. In Hebrews we read, "They that sinned knowingly under Moses' law received no more sacrifice for sin, but a fearful looking-for of wrath and fiery indignation." and, "How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?For we know him who said, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay." And again, "The Lord will judge his people." It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

Is it all hopeless? Not necessarily, but as the Spirit continues in that passage, it is on us to remember the goodness of the Lord, call on Him, and commit our lives to being His people, on His terms, rather than presuming that He is ours, on ours.

Remember "Freedom?"

2009-07-04T12:55:00.003-05:00

Today's the 4th. Happy 4th, to all Americans! This day commemorates the children of English and European settlers binding together to form a new nation. Lately, though, that seems to be about all we know about it. Our schools spend precious little time on that era, and what time is taken is put to memorising dates and names the students know nothing else about, making the very study of history repulsive to them. If we understood the story behind the “story” we are fed, we would have a far greater appreciation both for the price paid for our freedoms in this country and the relationship of the American Experiment to the rest of the world.

From what I”ve gathered of the readers who have come to this small site in the past two and half years, it seems that the average person is probably a lot smarter and better-educated than me. Instead, then, of launching into one more Internet history lesson, there are some questions that need to be answered if we are going to be able to preserve the heritage that was begun some 233 years ago today.

Was this land first settled to establish a political system, an economic system, or to establish God's kingdom throughout the world?

We know that the majority of our Founding Fathers claimed an evangelical faith in Christ. What of the spearheads of the independence movement?

What is there to learn from a closer look at our country's early conflicts that might help us see our development as a nation among the nations more clearly?

What was the relationship between the populist / socialist movements in Europe in the mid-18th century and the developments here during that time?

How did FDR “save” the US economy, and social structure, by increasing taxes (decreasing the money supply) and spending the money of throwaway projects which forced men to leave their wives and children for extended periods, producing a fatherless generation?

How is it that what we call Patriotism we learned in a school system developed by self-proclaimed Socialists?

Is there a link between public-school “socialisation” and Socialism?

Could any of this be a factor in the so-called “Change” we are now witnessing?

The Economics of Murder

2009-06-01T16:38:00.003-05:00

A murder in Kansas has the attention of all the news media today. However many innocents have died in Sudan or Congo, how many Christians have been imprisoned, tortured, murdered in countries throughout the world, none of that is newsworthy. Neither, apparently, is the growing toll of abortions in this country. One man, one of a handful who openly aborted even babies at the point of birth, and who used the bloody gains of his butchery to bankroll his own filthy agenda in the halls of Government, has himself been killed. Do two wrongs make a right? Or could there have been a better solution? Doubtless this fellow Tiller (Was he yet a doctor, or was his license to practice as an MD actually pulled as I vaguely recall?) At any rate, the "abortion provider" awaits his Judgment while Public Opinion suffers a new wave of opinion engineering as the Media trade on the the shock value of his death to create a martyr.

What will come of this? Will his death reduce the number of abortions, or are there too many more dogs in smock coats ready to lap the filth he left behind? Will it cut off the funding to his favorite Governor, or with her new appointment would he have actually have been more of a liability than an asset? Interestingly, the police seem intent on finding ties to pro-life groups instead of simply looking for what ties there may be.

For you and me- Will we content ourselves cluck our tongues over the terrible situation (pick one!) as we go about our daily business of generating tax dollars, or do we bother ourselves to pray, fast, and examine our own hearts & lives that the Lord will still have mercy on this country, that we as a country may turn from our corporate individualism, petty selfishness, and our growing thirst for the perverse, and commit to the right thinking, right loving, and right living that He wants to restore in our lives?

A wise priest said recently that if a politician has no respect for the life of the most innocent and helpless among us, why should we expect them to protect the rest of us? And "it's the economy, stupid?" Righteousness establishes a nation, but sin will only, always, destroy it. No politician, but only God can do anything to save us.

The End of America?

2009-05-24T10:00:00.002-05:00

Okay, so you're a Christian. Odds are if you're reading this you're an American, where 85% claim to be "saved." There just doesn't seem to be a lot of agreement on what we're supposed to be saved from, or saved for, how we came to be saved, or why. But we're saved. You can bet on it.

So a Christian society endorses pornography, abortion, drunkenness, adultery, divorce-for-convenience, euthanasia, and all kinds of sexual immorality in degrees unparalleled since the fall of Rome, and brags about its "liberty." It even sits idly by as its leaders enact a new law giving pedophiles protected status that in the same stroke they denied their returning war veterans. Yet we indignantly wonder that other countries, despite lavish "foreign aid," don't love us unquestioningly. Do we even imagine that the fragrance of our religion doesn't utterly
gag the Almighty? Yet we're so sure we're all destined for eternal glory. We're Christians, after all! Well, let's not bet the farm on it. Or our old bug collection for that matter.

God had His witness in Sodom. "Righteous Lot" lived among the people as God's representative, but his desire to do business compromised his life, and he nearly died in their judgment. His wife did not even survive. Nineveh was, if anything, worse even than Sodom, but one unwilling prophet appeared on the scene to proclaim, "Yet forty days and Nineveh will be destroyed!" Nineveh turned to God, and He held off His judgment.

Is there hope for this country? Will the US survive? Every lesson from history seems to scream to the negative. America has in the past been a savior to the other nations, pouring military and humanitarian aid into many nations to defeat dictators, to fight hunger, to help in education.
Lately this is being more and more off set by our role as the UN's pet bulldog in areas like the Balkans and the Mid-East. The humanitarian aid often "misses" areas that are in the worst need, and the education is more about self-worship and greed than anything useful or even honest. We think of Sodom as being some city-wide, full-time, romp, but the descriptions we see in the Bible could as well be about any city in this country. Where are the prophets? For over sixty years our recognised "prophets" have been clucking their tongues like an indulgent grandmother about, "not having God's best" when the Spirit would have them issue a call to repent from the sins that are destroying this nation, and each life in it, from the inside out.

These "prophets" tell us that a revival will come when God "sovereignly" decides to send one, so we sit calmly in our sinking boats, refusing to either bail or row, and assure ourselves that we are in God's will. God's will is not for the churches in America to founder and sink. He has given us everything we need to not only stay afloat but to rescue those drowning all around us, but we adjust our deck chairs and religiously mutter, "But that is God's job!" The Church is not preaching repentance, is not preaching righteousness, but is telling those drowning all around them that such things are only invisible legal fictions in the courts of Heaven. Can this nation survive if no preachers are even calling it to receive the life God has been trying to offer it? Can this nation turn to God if it truly believes that such a turn is only a matter of putting the right face on things? Nineveh heard their prophet, turned, and lived. Sodom compromised their prophet, and corrupted his message. Is there hope for America, or is this encroaching "secularisation" merely the darkness approaching as God withdraws His light?

The answer is up to us. "Ask, and you will receive, seek, and you shall find; knock, and the door shall be opened." By His grace we are able. Let us not let it slip!

So What About Liturgy?

2009-05-09T15:24:00.003-05:00

Large parts of the Church today are effected by the anti-liturgical movement which seems to date back about five hundred years ago. The main fruit of that vine seems to have been that more and more parts of the Christian Faith have been labeled as "extraneous" or "non-essential," often with the cynical eye of a 1930's SS officer looking for "useless eaters." As the author of this movement1 left behind a wide path of bloodshed and upheaval, and apparently no testimony of ever having surrendered to the Prince of Peace, we do have a fair reason to re-examine his legacy.

Liturgy, of course, merely means "work of the people," and is no more from the start but a way to involve the congregation in worship. But, first, it is said that Liturgy is "of man," or even "Catholic" in origin, and so not to be tolerated. Leaving the latter charge for later, we must ask how repeated prayers and creeds are more peculiarly "human" than unplanned prayers, or sermons, hymns, or church architecture. For that matter, what makes humanity or a human response to God bad, when it was to redeem humanity that Christ died? Second, We hear that Liturgy is "peripheral:" that preaching of the Word is what counts. Yes, the proclamation of the Word of God, the Gospel of Christ, is the key focus. For just that reason we have a liturgy which continues that proclamation from the early days of the Church. When we lose the Liturgy or, even worse, re-write it to suit modern agendas, the Church loses her memory
of her own past and becomes a prisoner of the immediate present, much like an amnesiac or an Alzheimer's victim. Such a picture put far too great a strain on the pastors to not only guide the Church into the future but to continually remind her that she does, in fact, exist in the present, having at least some sense of having been around earlier than last week.

Speaking, now, of catholicity: It is only by regaining her past, her memory, that the Church can come to realise that if she is Christian, then she is Christian together with all others who honestly love her Lord. Political movements within her history, the growth and concomitant corruption of Roman influence in the West, the various Reformation and counter-revival movements, are features in the landscape, but the road through it all is God's unfailing love for His saints. This is the message that defines the Church as one body, that makes and keeps her truly catholic.

Recipe for Revival: Living the Life

2009-03-28T18:58:00.003-05:00

An anonymous visitor reminds me that it's one thing to talk about why we need to go on to know the Lord, and not merely presume our eternal future on a past moment. Where it gets really sticky is when we ask what we should, or can, do with that information. The whole Bible covers a time frame, not including predictions, of at least 4,000 years, up until about 1900+ years ago. Daily life has stayed about the same all through the Biblical stretch, and really until the past hundred fifty years, when the Rugged Individualist became the model for our society. What's all this about? The Old Testament is written for a people who lived together, sharing the same covenant, as a nation, with God. God's flock. The New Testament was written for a people who gathered together, sharing the same covenant, as a Body, with God. Again, God's flock. Jesus said, “My sheep hear My voice.” The Church today is a scattered flock with a lot more in common with rock goats than sheep of His pasture, showing up maybe once a week for a twenty-minute “feeding,” and then off we go to our own favorite rocks.

How do we grow? How do we live a Christian life like the Bible talks about? What means has God given us so we can? Let's look back to the New Testament, to the second chapter of Acts, verse 40 & following.

And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, “Save yourselves from this crooked generation.” So those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about three thousand souls.

The first key here is simply that the people who were joined to the Church saw that there was something very wrong with the world they had been part of, and they didn't want to share its fate. This was about like a fish in the lake realising it is wet. The Holy Spirit was involved in this!

And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul,

As a result of continually learning about Jesus, getting to know each other and seeing God's work in each other's lives, and in communing together with the Lord in the Holy Communion and in prayer, their lives were marked with the awe of God's presence,

and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need.

Miracles became commonplace, and the most notable miracle was that the Believers loved each other “as more worthy than themselves” so that they could not bear to see a brother or a sister suffer need. Investments were sold off to make sure the poor were cared for. Christ's Body was of more value to them than their own possessions!

And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Worship became a way of life. God's joy so filled them that people were glad to see them coming, and the Church was growing, not just by a dozen or so on Membership Sunday, but continually, day by day.

The First Church had a number of things going for it that we need to take hold of.

1.They saw that “going with the flow” of the world around them was not a healthy choice.
2.They identified with the people of God.
3.They allowed the Holy Spirit to implant His Truth in their hearts through Gospel teaching.
4.They allowed the Holy Spirit to join their hearts to others whom He had placed alongside them.
5.They allowed the Holy Spirit to renew their souls with the sacraments.
6.They allowed the Holy Spirit to live through their spirits in prayer.
7.They allowed the Holy Spirit to have His way in every aspect of their lives, not “just the church stuff.”

We notice also that a major part of the picture was that they continued on in the worship at the Temple, so breaking off from our current churches to “start a new work” is not necessarily a good idea. But what can we do to make the change from being a gaggle of stray goats who show up on the odd Sunday, provided the “feeding” is short, sweet, and convenient, to a flock- no, a Body- who knows God's love, and lives it, with each other, as a daily way of life? If the Jerusalem Church allowed Jesus so be their joy, and they enjoyed the new life He gave them to the point that thousands were being saved and added to their number, and we are clinging to our comforts and conveniences and seeing our own children leaving the Faith at a rate of over 80% with virtually nobody being “added to the Church,” just what price are we paying for those “conveniences?”

The Great Evangelical Conundrum!

2009-03-17T15:37:00.003-05:00

I have been asked this on more than one occasion, “Do you believe that you can lose your salvation?” and how I answered would determine whether that person would continue in a conversation with me or visit my church. Since I do enjoy a good conversation with people (and, indeed, what is a relationship but a good conversation?), and I do like people to visit my church, this works out to be a pretty good question to be able to answer.

What I believe, now, has to come first from what the Lord has brought me, thus far, to understand from my walk with Him as His Spirit teaches me through His Word, and through godly reflection on what I, and we as His people, find there. But to understand the question, if we look at it closely, we realise that to lose something we first have to own it, which means taking responsibility for it. So if we can lose it we have to be responsible for it in the first place. The person asking me this must be assuming that the outcome of “our” salvation is up to us in calling it ours to start with. Does the Bible say that it is ours, as something we own?

A quick search of the King James gives us seven references that either God is our salvation, or that He is the God of our salvation. One, Eph. 1:13, speaks of the gospel of our salvation, and another, Rom. 13:11, tells us our salvation is nearer than when we believed. However, when we look up “eternal life,” we find thirty references, generally in the context of a future expectation with none that say it is a present possession except for John 17:3, that, “This is eternal life, to know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ Whom Thou hast sent.” So, then, that one key relationship is the factor, not that we “have” salvation, but that we have a reason to hope for it.

What it is, then, to “know” God, becomes the second most important question we can ever ask. Is it merely a passing acquaintance? I have met a few successful authors and musicians in the past years, but if I started dropping their names to get access to big parties, or boasting of their friendship while making an ass of myself, they would have every right to call me to court for abusing their names. I really doubt if Christ came to earth to go through all the abuse He did just so “Christians” could continue to abuse His Name. He came that we might know Him, and He put the key to our eternal future in that relationship. We could, at this point, go into a deep and technical study into the meaning of this word, “know1” but the wiser idea might be to ask that one, more important, question, “Do I know Him?” Do we find the answer by mining Scripture for a proof text that can excuse us from building a real relationship, or do we go the safer, and far more rewarding, route and make it our life's quest to really and truly know Him as intimately, personally, and openly, as He will in His own grace, allow? Do we bury our earthly lives in a rag, or do we truly embark on the adventure of all eternity?

Jesus said, “He that loves his life (in this world) will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the Gospel's, the same will find it.”

The Church is Going Down.

2009-02-25T23:40:00.002-06:00

What's next?
Christianity in America is going down:
All Protestant churches, even the Southern Baptist Convention, are shrinking
Congress is getting serious about investigating fraudulent preachers with deep collection baskets.
Christian Broadcasting has become so dependent on “teaching ministries” that few stations show any depth or integrity in their message.
The present regime is committed to a “pluralism” that welcomes all “faiths” but excludes Christianity at every turn.
The arrest and torture of Christians overseas is of no concern to the US State Dept.
The most sacred “right” in America is no longer the right to worship God, but to abort children.

The Church can no longer expect the slightest support or protection of any kind from the Government,
The Government can no longer expect the slightest support or protection from God.
What does this mean?

1.The money base behind the spread of the shallow, warped, and altogether pagan message which has been set forth as Christianity is shrinking.
2.The Government support (tax-free status, etc.) is apt to shrink or disappear.
3.The volume of the pseudo-faith message is likely to diminish.
4.This means a larger percent of Christian proclamation will come from people who have a real experience from which to speak, with God's glory and the hearer's salvation in view rather than the preacher's glory and the hearer's silver.
5.With Christianity less “cool” the message is likely to return from the present, living-room niceties to a re-examination of the real content of the real Gospel.

The Church is going down. Down where we belong. On our knees, where our strength was, all along.

Faith or Reason?

2009-02-07T14:36:00.003-06:00

Holy Mysteries

Understanding, or Right Thinking?
Today we want to understand-
to lay it out, to break it down, to plot it all out with constants and variables.
Our faith is Humanism. It's all about us!

Right thinking- We know
there is that there is, beyond knowing:
Where did time come from? Where will it go?
If all matter come from energy, then what is its source?
And who harnessed it?

“God is love.” Thinking about it brings wisdom,
Thinking to understand it brings sorrow.

Jesus said, “This is my body, ..this is my blood.”
He died once, for all, but yet he said, “This is.”
Not emblems, not symbols, but he didn't say,
“As often as you do, you kill me,” but “you remember.”

Can we understand this? Do we need to?
Right believing, right remembering, needs Right Thinking.

What's the Difference?

2009-02-06T15:40:00.005-06:00

In the 1930's German Protestants backed the government's “fight against the spiritual and political influence of the Jewish race,” and into the 40's were broadly quiet about the death camps. Word from the Vatican was that “the greatest charity is not to make problems for the Church.”

In America, fifty million children's lives have been destroyed, not to mention the lives of the women so deceived or hardened to be lured into complicity in the murder. A few Christians, occasionally, hold up signs on the street for a few hours. What's the difference?

If the fetus is a human baby (and not a fish, pig, or monkey like Modern Science once imagined), then how is deliberately causing its intentional death not murder? Regardless of the “opinion” of some political appointees, how can the cold-blooded, methodical murder of a harmless, helpless baby be justifiable? If such a murder is not justifiable (How can it be?), then what limit can there be on the justifiable actions to prevent it? We have American “doctors” beating the Son of Sam's career total in a single day, or the Boston Strangler's in a week! What's the difference?

Timothy Longman, writing about a similar travesty in Rwanda, said, "It is very difficult to understand how those who worship a man on a cross could help to drive the bloody nails themselves. But the record is clear: When religion is infected by racism, ideology or extreme nationalism, it can become a carrier of hatred instead of conscience. And when churches are concerned mainly for their institutional self-preservation, they often end up neck-deep in compromise or paralyzed by cowardice."

The Perfect Life

2009-02-03T20:38:00.003-06:00

Psalm: Psalm 147:1-11
Old Testament: Isaiah 40:21-31
Gospel: Mark 1:29-39
Epistle: 1 Corinthians 9:16-23 27

Gospel theme: up & doing.

The touch of Jesus, and a sick woman is up & doing. Not sitting around attracting attention for having been touched and healed by the Master, as great as this was, but demonstrating His having touched her by doing for others..
The touch of the Father, as Jesus met with Him in prayer, and Jesus was up & doing, eager to reach the cities and remote villages, preaching, healing, and delivering all who came to Him.

OT theme:

God, of infinite power & majesty- the Ultimate, the Creator, Redeemer, & Judge,
Is our Sustainer, giving strength to the weak, understanding to the simple, life to the dying,
That we may soar in His strength, pressing on in power, and in patience!
And what is it that God is calling us to do in that strength, that power, and that endurance?

Epistle theme:
Paul says,

I preach because I must preach! (This echoes Jesus in His own first public sermon, Isa. 61:1, opened in Lk. 4:18. Is this not the same testimony as the Church even today?)
If I preach willingly, then God rewards me. If not, then I still must preach!
My greatest reward, he is saying, is to give myself freely for the sake of those I am seeking to reach, for that is what Jesus did, and does, for us, and in following Him, He is transforming me from the inside (and the outside will surely show it!), to be like Him, and becoming like Him I want to give myself away for the work of the Gospel, for the souls of lost, for the building up of the Body of Christ.
So, what is it that God is wanting to do in our lives? What is He calling us to do, as we would grow up into Him? Salvation is not an armchair event. We don't sit around and watch God grow us up. A body-builder doesn't make his gains watching the late shows. It is God, the Bible says, Who is working in us to desire, and to carry out, those things which please Him, so Paul said: our lives flowing into His, His Spirit transforming ours. In a letter to the one strongest and holiest church in his care, Paul writes,

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Abortion: The Real Victims

2009-01-28T18:33:00.003-06:00

Abortion- Some Questions, a Few Answers

In 1973 the whole American ethic flipped upside down, and for the greater part we have yet to come to grips with the fact. A generation that had been taught that people “evolve” in the womb from jellyfish to chimps before appearing as finally human made it legal to kill those “fish” before they became embarrassingly round tummies or troublesome toddlers. Then Modern Science caught up with the Bible, at least in this detail, and admitted that the difference between the wee babe at six weeks and a six week-old in the bunny suit was no more significant than that between the wee one in the bunny suit and her two-year-old brother. Too late, by that time nobody was asking that question any more. Whether the “product of conception” was human or not, the rhetoric had changed to a demand for “A woman's right to choose,” or “..to decide what to do with her own body.” Really?

Besides re-framing the question in language that puts one individual's convenience above another's very life, this sleight of hand brings some other points into view. For one, the more obvious, what does it take to persuade a woman to expose herself to such a procedure, to risk her own reproductive future (and her own life), and participate in the gruesome murder of her own child? This picture, in itself, is so hard to bear that it has become the focus of most of the pro-life/anti-abortion campaigning and rescue ministry; but in truth they seem to have missed the bigger picture. We need to do some re-evaluating, and ask ourselves,

1.What is in our society that produces either, in some cases the fear, and in others the indifference, that persuades the mothers to seek abortions in the first place?
2.Or, what entices a man (usually) to devote his life and career to dismembering two, four, and six-pound infants?
3.How does a nation come to accept the fact that these “procedures” are taking place in their very cities and forget the tragic testimony of German civilians at the Nuremburg trials (as the world discovered the horrors of the Nazi death camps), “We didn't know?” We do know.
4.How can the same people feel such shock at the crimes of Jeffery Dahmer or Charles Manson, then accept abortionists as members of the “professional community?” For all the talk, our most liberal politicians have nothing to fear from American vigilantism!

These are all the most obvious questions. Questions I'm sure everyone has already put together some kind of bromide answer for, at least enough to excuse themselves from getting involved. But those questions, horrible as they are, are the tip of the iceberg. Let's consider,

1.What does contact with, much less involvement in, such a crime do to somebody? What kind of pain, what kind of nightmares, do women face after “everything is all right?”
2.Or the abortionist: Did he stare up at the stars as a young lad, and dream of doing such a thing for a living? What does that job do to his conscience? To the way he sees his own children?
3.Can we continue to put every little part of life in its own compartment, so that everything is “handled,” but nothing touches, or connects? So that nothing is really understood?
4.How long can a people call itself a “good nation,” or behave as one, while endorsing such barbarity?

In the bigger picture, the ones who suffer the least are the children whose own mothers' wombs become death chambers, no matter how painfully they die. The ones who take on the most pain are the ones who think they are benefiting from it. When God made this human race, when He made each of us (no matter, here, how we think He did it), He made us in His own image. Things about us, that are hard-wired into who we are, are pretty standard whether we grew up in Papua or Pittsburgh. Love, compassion, recognising the value of honesty no matter how honest we might not be, the feeling that “there's Somebody up there” whether we call ourselves religious or not. These are all links we have in us that show our true origin, our real identity. When we do even the smallest things that we know are wrong, or when convince ourselves that the “wrong” really isn't, we deface that much more of that inner image & likeness, destroying who we even are: building up walls of pride, guilt, bitterness, and denial that lock us in from relating to God, to each other, even to ourselves. Our families fall apart, our cities become jungles as its people lose their humanity, and the nation itself becomes a wasteland. All this is just one part of the picture. In the bigger view we have to ask ourselves one more question: Will God allow such a thing to go unpunished?

God promises forgiveness and restoration for any who will turn from their sins. Are we willing, are you willing, to turn, to make a change, and follow Jesus? If we continue in our sins, there is no hope for us, but “certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation.” Leonard Ravenhill said, “If God does not judge America, He is going to have to apologise to Sodom and Gomorrah.” Thirty years ago.

Good Intentions?

2009-01-23T11:54:00.004-06:00

You can't take it with you, so they say. But then, who would want to? Do we imagine that there is something lacking in Heaven, if indeed one is headed there? Or any comfort to be found in Hell, no matter how big a suitcase we carry?

Hell, they say, is paved with good intentions*. We can easily believe that, as we think of all the pain suffered by people waiting on promised help that never came, denied even the option of finding real help elsewhere from trusting in false promises. The indulgences that become deadly addictions, and abuses continually suffered, despite the best and most sincere intentions to stop. The living corpses of the lost, piled up on those streets of good intentions, in perfect pain outwardly and complete regret inwardly, resting without rest on streets of good intentions.

We read in the Revelation that the streets of the Heavenly City are paved with gold so pure as to be clear as glass. In "One of those stories," there was a man gained permission to carry something with him to Heaven: He knew his days were short, and so he sold everything off and bought gold. He arrived at the gates with his trunk, and the angels all gathered around to see what kind of treasure he had chosen. Upon seeing the shiny gold bricks which he so proudly displayed to these mighty creatures, he was shocked into reality as he heard them say, "What? You brought paving stones?"

In Peter we read that our faith is to be compared with the most precious gold, as the heat of the trials and temptations we face serve to purify that faith; and also in Psalms that God's word to us is as gold purified in fire seven times. We also hear, from old time, that Hell is paved with good intentions. This leaves us with a clear picture of two choices. If we walk by faith, then each step we take we take by faith when our sight may tell us there is no place there for our feet. But our
focus is not on the pavement under our feet, but the Lord Who leads the way. Real faith is the stuff of an effective Christian life. Good intentions can allow us to sit back and comfort ourselves that we are "moving in the right direction" whether or not there is any motion involved. Jesus gave us a story about two sons, whom their father sent to do some work. One said he'd go, but never got there. The other said, "Forget it," but wound up going. And the Lord asked, asks us today, which was the obedient son? If our faith today is not producing results, if we are not expressing that faith outwardly, then either the faith is mere opinion, or it is being stifled and suffocated by fear, pride, and other forms of un-faith. James never tries to pick out a difference between the two except to say of opinion, "the devils also believe, and tremble;" and that, whether in effect or in the final tally, "as the body without the spirit (or breath?) is dead, faith, also, without works is dead."

The United States now has a President who openly endorses the murder of the unborn up to the moment of birth, and who asked the "blessing" of a pagan cleric "bishop" to pray for him to "the god of all understandings." We have, first of all, our own Christian selves to thank as we have drawn away from any effective Christian witness for the sake of our own self-esteem, American dream, and personalized comfort zones. We live complacently in our little religious presumptions,
willingly ignorant of the thousands of souls being stupefied in the clubs, embittered in the prisons, or just sweetly assured of false hopes in their day-to-day "normal" lives, with not so much real prayer in our own lives to even be aware of the Lord's burden for them.

*Someone will say, "But isn't it that the road to Hell is paved with good intentions?" Well, it seems that the 18th century version didn't mention the road going there, but the fact is that we are each one either citizens of one city or the other, and in a real sense we are already living there. So let me ask: Is your own life one of self-gratification and lust, of frustration, grudges, regrets, and coveting? Or is your heart free of these things, and are you living a life of single-minded love to God, the Church (all Christians), and your neighbor? Let's each of us examine ourself in these real ways, to see whether we be in the faith, or merely in the traffic flow on the broad road that leads to destruction.

Who is this God?

2009-01-08T15:50:00.004-06:00

Psalm: Psalm 29

Old Testament: Genesis 1:1-5
Gospel: Mark 1:4-11
Epistle: Acts 19:1-7
(This Sunday's sermon notes)

(Hebrews 4:11-13) Who is this God, 'with Whom we have to do?' This is the Sunday after Epiphany, when we celebrate God being revealed to the nations, as the Wise Men were allowed to see the Christ Child, and as we remember also Christ's Baptism for us all in the Jordan. But Who is this God, and how does He want to be known?

I.Gen. 1: At Creation, By the power of the Word and the Spirit,
A.The Father calls for light, and light steps out of non-existence and obeys!
B.The day has come, and the night flees; from chaos comes order!

II.Mark 1: Jesus:
A. Anointed, as a Man, by the Father,
B .Obedient as a Son in all things,
C. Approved before men in this moment, at the Transfiguration, in all the wisdom and miracles, in His grace and boldness before His examiners & executioners, in His mighty resurrection and ascension: as if this approval was not merely an official seal of approval, but the Father being compelled by love to break into this world again and again to say, “I love this Guy!!!”
D. By the Spirit,
E. Jesus is to us light, order, power;
F.Jesus is our wisdom:
G.We find Knowledge and Boldness in knowing Him, in being conformed to His likeness!

III.Acts 19: We often speak of life as a journey, and Jesus calls us to follow Him. Would He call us to go with Him on a supernatural journey, on our own natural strength? He wants to cleanse us, to sanctify us, to give us His power for the journey.
A.These people were disciples, believers, but what were they lacking?
i.Light? They did not understand much, because the preacher didn't either, yet.
ii.Order? Without trying too hard, we can see this picture that they really weren't about much, they were just “disciples.”
iii.Power? They did not yet know there was power to be had or asked for!
iv.At that moment, the Holy Ghost gave them supernatural
a)Knowledge-by-immediate-experience,
b)& Boldness! (Suddenly they were on the same street corner, praising God loudly, even in languages they did not know, unafraid of arrest or embarrassment. The Love of God constrained them!)

[Eph. 1:3-9] Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ
God is known in the vastness of the Universe, in the beauty of Nature, the finely detailed order we see in science. He also has revealed Himself to us throughout history, in the Scriptures, and in the Person and life of Jesus Christ, but
The way He greatly desires to be known is in and through each of our lives, and in all of our lives together.

All glory, thanks, praise, and honor to our Living God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in time and eternity, now and forever!

Career? Ministry?

2009-01-04T22:45:00.005-06:00

Jesus said, “He that saves his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake and the Gospel's will find it unto life everlasting*.”

Some today go the “career route,” and others are going into “ministry.” Some, like me, tend to get confused over the distinction.

In theory, “ministry” is about finding effective ways to give our lives away. When Jesus said “whosoever will be great among you will be your minister the word we have in the most original to mean helper, assistant, servant, slave. We have “Ministers” today in politics: trade minister, foreign minister, prime minister. I heard someone in Canada warning his friends of a speed trap by saying, “The Ministry is setting up across the street." (Speaking of the "Ministry of Transportation," the traffic police) Maybe such a language problem has come about over the years from people turning “ministry” into a career.

So what is a career? Simply what people do for themselves. To put it in raw, rude and radical terms, a career is what I do to feed my own unworthy face, or a ladder by which I expect to gain a better position for myself in this dying world. In a prison in Alabama the inmates all sit out in front of their cells in the evening with boxes of cedar lath, craft knives, and glue, making model ships, log cabins, and motorcycles. Hobby crafts, they call it. A man might spend twenty years in a chair on the edge of his dorm's “exercise yard” making hobby craft items, some of which he may even sell through some channel to pay for cigarettes and magazines.W hen his time is up, is he now prepared to step out into the free world, now 20 years newer and faster than when he left it? How is this not like the careers, and even hobbies, we pursue? One person becomes the leading expert on the gas make-up of bovine flatulence while another manages to memorise the career statistics for every pro athlete since 1928. Still another may find a cure for malaria or dengue fever. The first has done little, effectively, but collect data of questionable use and a stack of grant monies in the process; The second has acquired a trick to make him popular with gamblers; and the third has spared possibly millions from a painful, debilitating, death. But even the hero who (please, God!) defeats malaria or dengue has only added time to still-short lives, and has gained a respectable reward for that accomplishment. So what is it that actually has eternal value?

Real ministry is so much more, because it is so much less. Less of me, and more of Jesus. Less of my seeking the best compensation for my “talent” as a preacher (or, if I were one, a doctor, teacher, etc.), and more of my laying down my life, my pride, my reputation and “career options” for the sake of the Gospel. Less of what I can accomplish by my own presence in this world, and more of what His presence accomplishes through me. How much of "me" am I willing to trust into His hands, and how much do I think I really do know better?

So what about making one's ministry a career? One is committing oneself to the Eternal, the other is devoting oneself to the Temporal. One demands full reliance on God, the other emphasises self-reliance, even to a fault. Could this be a factor to why the Western Church has become so ineffectual? Could this be what Jesus was talking about, all along? Are we ready to rely on Him, or do we still like to think that we're

Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds! And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? [Lk 12: 22-25, ESV]

*Mark 8:35

The Answer is a Resounding Yes!

2009-01-01T13:20:00.001-06:00

Christmas II, ABC
Psalm: Psalm 147:12-20
Old Testament: Jeremiah 31:7-14
Gospel: John 1:1-9, 10-18
Epistle: Ephesians 1:3-14

Proem. Gospel message: Christ the Creator as well as Redeemer, Savior as well as Judge. There is nothing in Jesus that is not good, but we can look to Him for all things! (Jones, The Divine Yes )

For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not Yes and No, but in him it is always Yes. For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. (ESV)
Or, "The divine Yes has at last sounded in Him. For in Him is the "yes" that affirms all the promises of God!" (Moffat)

I.Jeremiah speaks of temporal blessings in the Future Age, Seeming to be
centered on Israel.
A.This will be a temporary arrangement, as God completes His plan, fulfilling His purposes to build in Israel a nation of righteousness and a kingdom of peace.
B.Paul writes the Ephesians of the spiritual blessings that it is God's expressed plan to give us here and now,
i.What Joseph's brothers meant for evil, God turned to good.
ii.What the devil thought for evil, in bringing sin into the world, God
turned to good: we were made a little lower than the angels, but the Redeemed shall judge them angels!
iii.Adam knew God side by Side, the disciples face to Face, but we may know Him from within, and "we know not what we shall be!"
II.Back to the Gospel: He came into the world He made, even to His own, and was not received: He was kicked out!
A.We live in that world, the world that kicked him out. Out of their lives, out of their world. Do we kick Him out of our lives, or do we welcome Him into our lives?
B. In what ways do we,
i. .,recognise Him?
ii. ..receive Him?
III.As an chance to examine ourselves, "to see whether we be in the faith," let's consider-
A. John wrote,"to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God."
B. Do we have that experience- are we, am I, are you, truly born of God? Do we know, are we knowing, the Father as our Father? Christ as our Brother?
C. Are our thoughts led and informed by the Holy Spirit? Paul wrote that, "the Spirit bears witness, or speaks in agreement, with our spirits that we are the children of God," and "all who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God."
D. Are we His children? Let us examine our hearts today, examine our lives, call on the Lord to examine our hearts and lives in areas where we can't see, to repent of what we must leave behind to fully take hold of Christ! (Search me, O God, and know my heart, try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way, everlasting!....)

The Point to it all?

2008-12-30T13:58:00.000-06:00

Romans 1:16 tells us that the gospel of Christ is God's power to save those who believe. So what is this "gospel" that we may believe it?

We have two modern options offered as a path to salvation:

Classical Liberal Christianity that all are probably saved anyway either because " Christ has redeemed the world" or, "But God is nice, isn't He?" Most commonly reduces the Gospel message to "Love God and love your neighbor" in a kosmos defined in terms of the Fatherhood of God / Brotherhood of Man.

Supposedly Conservative Liberal Christianity that "all who call" are necessarily saved, and if any appear not to be behaving "like Christians" it is our duty to ignore it, for "who are we to judge?" Most commonly reduces the Message down to "He that believes shall be saved, in a kosmos defined in terms of a lonely God compromising His integrity just to have somebody to talk to Him.

Both of these approaches are "Liberal" in that they both are reductionist: Each has found its "proof texts" to support their position, and each has devised a system by which they can degrade the importance of any Scripture that would, if allowed, question their sacrosanct first principles.* Neither speaks for God. Jesus, nor His prophets, ever said "Everything's fine," neither, "Just pray this little prayer." What did Jesus say to those who encountered Him in the days of
His ministry? "Follow Me!"

So what did it mean to follow Jesus? It meant to identify oneself fully with Him. No longer was Simon "Simon bar-Jonas of such and such fishing concern," or even "Simon the fisherman," but "Simon Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ." Saul was no longer the enforcer for the Sanhedrin, but
their next target. Levi was no longer the man sitting in the duties office but seeking out Jewish Communities in Africa to tell them the Good News.

First, they made Christ their "main thing." They accepted Him unquestioningly as their teacher, their source of truth and wisdom. As time passed they realised that He is, Himself, both Truth and Wisdom. It wasn't just a "personal thing," though. We don't read of anybody
"following" Jesus on their own, in their own way, and calling Him their "personal savior." Anybody following Him followed as a member of the whole group of His followers. They listened to Him, they discussed His teachings among themselves, and they carried their questions to Him as a group. In fact, if we think about it, no matter how slow they were to understand something, was He ever short with them? If any refused to put the other first, was He ever lenient?

How does this track through the rest of the Bible? That's good material for a few books, but in short, Matthew 28:18 puts "making disciples," gathering students into the school, the first part of the Great Commission, and baptising them into the Church the second. The third is making faithful followers out of them. Acts 2:42ff says the Church gathered together every day, and that
everyone who "would be saved" was added to their number. In the Epistles, every letter is written to a local church or group of churches except four, and they are concerned with either the ministry of the Church or with someone conducting personal matters as a member of the Body.

From at least the time of Tertullian (born about 160) we're told that "God is our Father, and the Church is our mother," and Chrysostom was adamant that, "Without the Church no one may be saved." From the beginning, the Church was sounding forth that saving Message so that, by the end of the 1st Century, the Church had grown from not quite a dozen nervous peasants to a movement that spanned that world from India to Ireland with a saving message of two words that encompasses the whole of Revelation: "Follow Me."

*(First Principles, Presuppositions- What we assume to be true before looking at the evidence.)

The Long, Silent, Night, and the New Morning

2008-12-27T19:23:00.004-06:00

Psalm: Psalm 148

Old Testament: Isaiah 61:10-62:3

Gospel: Luke 2:22-40

Epistle: Galatians 4:4-7

First, in reading our Old Testament lesson, there are two common, wrong, ways of reading Isaiah 61, that we first need to be aware of. First, the view that God has cast off His people, Israel, and all the blessings must now forever and always fall to the Church. The Bible itself is clear that this is not the case when Paul writes, “Has God cast off Israel? God forbid!” and, “As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.”1 The second mistake is the legend that “we” are the physical descendants of Israel. This especially turns up in “Anglo-Israelism” which presumes that all English-descended people are of the Hebrew diaspora and heirs of the promises of Jacob. Both of these ideas are racial in origin and effect. God does not play favorites, as we read, “there is no respect of persons with God.” The whole idea that there is any human worthiness that makes God our debtor is rig
For Isaiah:ht in there with the witchcraft the prophets spoke against, and the presumptuous religion that Jesus rebuked in the Pharisees and the scholars at the Law.

So, has God cast off Israel? Then we need to see that God is talking here to Israel. But only to them? The prophet is speaking to the time in the future, when the Kingdom is realised on Earth, when the Gospel has gone out “to the Jew first, and also to the Greek (and Scythians, barbarians, slave, free, to the uttermost part of the Earth), so we can read it as applying to us as well, but not only to us.

Galatians: The fulness of time. Over the time preceding, it seems God had been guiding the development of the different religions and philosophies, so that when the Gospel was preached it was the next, obvious, step. The Greeks welcomed the good news of Jesus, the Word, because their own philosophies spoke of the logos, the one principle guiding the affairs of the Universe, but did not say who or what that logos was. The Irish religion had also come to the point that their druids were answered in the Gospel of Jesus. If somebody could do the research, I'm sure the same thing would be found true in Africa, that, for instance in the Kikuyu tradition the One, the Creator, who lived unapproachable on top of Mt. Kenya was the understanding the people had gotten to so far, and so they were ready to hear of the God Who Is One, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

So that whether we were under the law of Moses, or the law of the Druids, or the law of our own consciences, it is the Spirit of Christ Who has come, not to free us from law, but to set the true law in our hearts, “to will and to do according to His good pleasure.”

Luke gives us the wonderful story of Jesus' dedication. We hear of the “silent period” of five centuries before Jesus came, and think that means that the heavens were somehow become brass, and God's back was turned. But we read of His intervention for the faithful some 160 years before when He helped them regain the Temple from the Greeks, and kept the day's-worth of oil burning in the lamps for the eight days it took to prepare more. And now we see two people, prophets in their own right, waiting on the Lord day and night in the Temple, praying, fasting, looking for the coming of their Messiah.

But back to Isaiah, we see a wonderful promise: That Israel, who had failed at every turn to follow and obey the Lord, will be the very sceptre and crown of the Lord's majesty on Earth- it will be Israel's righteousness (can it but be from the Lord?) as the evidence of His right to rule on this earth, and we may expect that, as we who believe have been grafted in, that the work in our own lives will be jewels in His crown and His sceptre as well, as we read, “For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? For you are our glory and joy;” and, “..God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory2.” As we continue in His word, we shall truly be His disciples, and His truth will set us free. Let us, together, go forward to discover the fullness of that freedom!

1 Romans 11:1 & 9: 25
2 1 Thessalonians 2:19,20; Colossians 1:27

We're Playing Tag!

2008-12-26T12:11:00.003-06:00

I didn't ask for it, wasn't looking for it, like love at first sight, it happened: I got tagged! Perpetua of Carthage pulled me into this game and, here I am, playing right along! Well, for those I tag, "Here's the rules.....!"

1. Link to the person who tagged you. Check.
2. Post the rules on your blog. Check.
3. Write six random things about yourself. (See below)
4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them. (See further below...)
5. Let each person know they've been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

My six random things? Hmm.

I'm far too random. The random things are too scattered for me to find them. I'll be back in a bit.
I'm a "middler" at Wesley Biblical Seminary, hoping to graduate while I'm still just in my fifties.
Big fan of C.S. Lewis. Haven't read quite everything of his yet, but I do claim to know the identity of the man at the wardrobe in The Searcher.
Student of History & Theology: Astounded to find such a gap between modern Christianity and the "faith of our fathers."
I love outdoor sports, but find myself, with no complaints, spending most of my days with a book on my lap.
I'm acting curate of the only (?) Kenyan Rite parish in the Episcopal church.

OK, and tags go out to

Good on ya, Rick Warren!

2008-12-19T17:19:00.003-06:00

The web this week has been full of remarks, most of them less than complimentary, about Pastor Rick Warren's invitation to the upcoming inaugurals. Most of the noise is coming from people who have axes to grind with his runaway Purpose Driven Life. What impresses me is that Warren is up front saying, "Barack, you're wrong about this," while the Evangelical pastors sought out by Obama's Liberal predecessor came away from the encounter, from all I heard or read, like a school girl in the first flush of teen infatuation.

Some folks say there's not enough of the Gospel that gets across Warren's pulpit, or even into his books. That may well be. I have not been to Saddleback, and have only read one of his books, but what we all need to recognise is that there is a lot more Gospel than gets across much of any of our pulpits, largely because there's so much to that Message; and the doing of the Gospel is what makes it worthwhile that the preaching happened in the first place. We're hard pressed to find a preacher who put 100% on both sides of that scale, at least this side of John Wesley, but, Rick, as long as you're stuck on doing all the good you can for all the folks you can any way you can for a long as you can, brother, you got my vote. God bless ya!

Dead in the Wind, Alive in the Fire!

2008-12-12T10:07:00.003-06:00

Psalm: Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13
Old Testament: Isaiah 40:1-11
Gospel: Mark 1:1-8

Epistle: 2 Peter 3:8-15a

The Holy Spirit, by Isaiah, says, "All our flesh is as grass:"Speak encouragingly to God's people, but to say what? That all our strength is like the fragile grass: No strength, no profit. All form, no substance. What's more, it is when the Holy Spirit makes His presence known that our fragile strength and empty appearances all dry up, “But the word of our God stands forever!”

Yet we presume to serve and please God by our own strength! The greatest contribution that straw can make is in being burned up!
1st Corin. 3:9-17 shows us the result. All our works, our efforts and our accomplishments, tested with fire, “to see what sort it is.” Anything we can produce of our weak-straw humanity (flesh) goes up in a flash, but the deep treasures of God are purified of anything “extra” to shine like, well, “gold, silver, precious stones.”
Our own strength fails because the Spirit, in Whose strength God calls us to live, breathes on it!
2 Pet. 3:10-13 speaks of all Creation being under God's judgment, and all Creation shall be burned up under the fire of God.
Everything we trusted, everything that “tickled our fancies” in this world, and everything that gave us grief. Disease, crabgrass, the Stock Exchange, and all our favorite toys.
All the earth, and even the Heavens.
How shall we survive then? and how shall we live now?
Mark 1:1-8 shows a parallel with Acts 1:1-8 as Jesus fleshes out what John had preached: We have been baptised in water, but Jesus came to baptise us with the wind of God, and the fire of God. In other places we read that Jesus did not consider this a “religious option” but treated it as a reality, and as a command. Enough said on that for now.
This baptism is one of judgment: Our sin cannot stand before God, and this Holy Spirit is no less Deity than God the Father from Whom He proceeds. All that is trash, and all that is weak, must be consumed.
What is good is purified.
What is good? What comes from God! The word of our God stands forever, and it is by that Word, and by the Spirit of God, that He transforms and purifies our hearts.
Are we talking about a loud and raucous frenzy, or some uncontrollable “glory fits?” Some try to fit that kind of reaction into the Bible, but we really can't find it there as the norm to follow. The fruit, the expectable outcome, of the Spirit in someone's life is love.
Our hearts and lives are transformed as we step from “The grass withers and the flower fades,” to, “The word of our God shall stand for ever,” as the Spirit continues, “O Zion, that brings good tidings, get yourself up into the high mountain; O Jerusalem, that brings good tidings, lift up your voice with strength, (and say) Behold your God!

It ain't Santy Claus!

2008-11-29T16:01:00.003-06:00

Advent I, B Psalm: Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19
Old Testament: Isaiah 64:1-9
Gospel: Mark 13:24-37
Epistle: 1 Corinthians 1:3-9

Advent means Coming! Jesus' Coming!
From the days of the Apostolic Fathers this was a season set aside to prepare ourselves for His Return. The Christmas is very recent, andmaybe not the best idea.
What does it mean that He is coming?
Ac 1:6-12
Not as He came before, as a helpless babe, and a wandering rabbi,but as He left: in glory, with all power and authority in power, to deliver, to judge, and to deliver judgment.....
Where is He coming to?
Jerusalem, real space/time location for a real space/time return as only befits His real, space/time Incarnation.
When will this take place?
"No man knows..." but we know that,
The Judgment will be in two phases, first the redeemed, then the lost, and,So also His Coming, first to claim His bride, and then His actual Returnto reclaim His world.
There will be a judgment, then to reward His faithful children, and then a judgment to sentence the sinners. Advent is a time to reflect, to search our own hearts and lives before God, which judgment are we headed for.
It is not His will for the Church to be caught unawares.
How will it happen, and how will we know?
Every eye shall see. No "secret comings" or "hidden resurrections" like certain heretic cults have claimed.
We will see Him face-to-face, and in seeing, be transformed.
Why is He coming, and why do we need to make ourselves ready? He is coming,
To make all things new (He is coming to make all things new. Are we, by His grace, making all things new in our lives today?)
To put wrong to right, (ditto, this!)
To establish an eternal Kingdom of righteousness on this earth (and, this!)
And all this is just the beginning!
Seeing things through kingdom glasses, understanding things in light of God's revelation to us, waiting for when we can see with kingdom eyes, by the light of God!
Is there anything in this world we can rely on? Anything that will survive as long as we will? How can we depend on something that is so temporary, that we will be around long after what we trusted in has rotted away?
Jesus said, "fear not, little flock, (etc)," and warned us, "what profit is there if a man gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul?"
2 Peter 3:1-13

Fishbone Religion?

2008-11-17T19:15:00.001-06:00

A business tourist returning from Japan told me of a fancy restaurant which served up its sushi not just fresh, but alive. The waiter brought the live fish to the table in a bowl of water, and would slice wafer-thin slices from the live fish and serve them onto the diners' plates, then put the fish back in the bowl to keep swimming in circles until the waiter came back to serve their plates again. Somehow the poor fish managed to keep swimming in the bloodied water until there was effectively no meat left to slice.

Has "Modern" scholarship, over the past few centuries, whittled the Gospel down in just the same way? As much wisdom as God has given us in the Bible, as carefully as He has stressed that this is His (singular) Word, and as richly as He has blessed the Church with insights into what He has revealed to us we presume that as long as we fulfill some "bare minimum requirements" that nothing else is expected, and no greater blessing available than what we (presume to) already have. Do we have it? What does it look like?

For a starting place, a suggestion: First, that we each read the Scriptures, in faith (James 1), that is, faithfully, ready to believe and obey what the Lord shows us. Second, that we begin to read some of the really early writers, comparing their understanding of the Gospel with our own. This sort of exercise, besides discovering their hidden treasures, brings us closer to understanding the world to which the Scriptures were first written. Third, that our study be always from a starting-place of worship, remembering that it is the Spirit of the Living God Who must be our teacher, and not merely our own "great wisdom." And in all these things, let it be done in the context of close fellowship with other Believers who share that intention. Doing these three things can make the difference between full salvation and a tenuous, "bare bones" religion!

The Root of Racism

2008-11-12T12:26:00.002-06:00

An enlightening moment last week: At a gathering of ministers from a fairly wide spectrum of backgrounds, shortly after the American elections, one younger, African-American, preacher was showing an internet video showing a series of images ranging from Dr. King at Birmingham to fire-hosed demonstrators and lynched bodies (obviously edited to breed a sense of racial pride and resentment), and culminating in a very good photograph of Mr. Obama. Curiously absent from the collection were any non-black people in either a martyr's or hero's role, or even humane or neutral. The message seemed to be that, no matter who he is, it's what he is that matters. He may be the most rabid sponsor of the wholesale murder of African-American babies yet in the womb (the vast majority of abortions in the US), even to the point of removing parental consent or a waiting period, he may have been one of the key players in forcing the banks to write loans for people who could never afford the payments (thus the recent mortgage bank fiasco), he may be about re-structuring the tax program to make the poorer folks in this country more dependent than ever on federal hand-outs, but that's OK, because he's "one of us!"

We see that in theology, with "Afro-centric" study Bibles in the stores which play extremely loose with history to the point of making all the "good guys" black, etc. (Taking the time to do some research would have given these authors some real heroes without having to re-write things!) Too many people, though, buy these books regardless, and miss the whole point.

The American media and, therefore, consciousness, seems to say that "racism" is about "Whites Only" lunchrooms and bus seats, or Aryan Nation or KKK. What, though, about assuming that anyone of lighter skin "probably does have a set of sheets in their closet?" The main effect is that we all, of whatever skin tone or neighborhood, tend to see things "with one eye in the mirror" and compare whatever else we see with that image. Not, "Is this person trustworthy?" but "Does this person match up?" It is no accident that the Lord designed us in just such a way that as we look at others we don't see ourselves in the picture. I happen to have some friends from East Africa. When I'm with them, I see them. I don't need to see my own small mouth to appreciate their broad laughter, or my blue eyes when I see the love and nobility in their brown ones. We all have eyes, and they all are set to look forward. To see ourselves we need something outside ourselves, and even the best mirror shows a backwards image. To understand ourselves takes more than a piece of silvered glass: It takes the work of God. Do I judge others according to (my) flesh, or do I judge according to God's righteousness (Holy self-giving love & goodness)? Search me, O God..."

Thinking about time

2008-11-08T13:00:00.002-06:00

They say we live in a space/time universe, and that God is in eternity, beyond "space," and outside of "time." He always is: When we were, before we were, or after we are, He is.

So what do we know about time? Well, what time is it? No, really it isn't. We mark out a spot on the clock, and tag a name onto it. Twelve Noon, say. We watch the clock and, if it's really precise and accurate, we can say that when it reaches that time, that's what time it will be. If we look closer at that perfect clock, we find a problem. As soon as it reaches that "point," it's already past! The more precisely we look at Twelve Noon the smaller, and less significant it becomes. Is it Noon for one second? For the first part of that second? As soon as it's 12:00:00.000000(etc.)1, that time is over.

Pretty lame thing to think about, perhaps, but if we apply that "great revelation" to everyday living we can use it to help get things done. The time I appointed to do X has to go to X, or I wind up stealing time from Y or Z if X is going to happen. Ties in with some Bible advice there, such as "whatever you do, do it with all you've got" from Ecclesiastes (believed written by King Solomon when he was old, and had come to his senses), or "walk circumspectly, redeeming the time for the days are evil" from Paul to the Ephesians. Good thing to put up on my own wall, to be sure! (John Wesley was so aware of this aspect that he kept a journal for every hour of his life, and accomplished more in his own day than most before or since, even with all our "time saving devices!")

Speaking of the Bible, though, there are some other ways this ties together as well. As much sensationalism as has been generated in the Press in the past few years, it's plain enough to most people today that these are the "Last Days." Just what that means, though, is wide open. We all know that at some "point in time" each of us will breathe our last. In both pictures a "time" is coming. We may have warnings, and we may have false warnings, but we know that a time, a moment like "Twelve Noon" is going to come at some point. Cheery thought, isn't it? It does
get a lot better, because it also says, "Now is the accepted time. Today is the day of salvation." There may be some notes left on this, that that "today" was written a long time ago, but a careful reading does show us that the "time" is the time that the Gospel of Christ is being preached, as it is today. Now is the time, and anyone who knows the Lord will say, "There's no time like the present!"

If God is Love, Then What are We?..

2008-10-24T23:49:00.005-05:00

Doing some thinking lately. Dangerous habit, done too much alone, so somebody help me out here, please. from where I'm sitting, it seems like there's a lot more to that bit from 1 John- "God is love," than what we tend to notice. If we think about God, outside of this space/time realm we occupy, and there was no space/time before He created it. Well, even saying "was" assumes time when there was (there I go again) none. So God wasn't "sovereign" before (?) He made anything to rule, but God is love, and that love means love to be given and received, in an eternity in which there is God, and nothing else. Father, Word, and Spirit, in eternal, radical, Selfless, love!

C.S. Lewis was reflecting the simple faith of his Irish homeland when he wrote in famous, The Four Loves, about the difference between a childish "need love" and a fully mature "gift love." From the first, though sure we in our own relationships always do have that "needy" aspect to our love, looking to be "completed," but God is absolutely complete in Himself, and He is totally Himself, totally love! Not limited to what we think of as love, but real, absolute, Selflessness in giving, total love is what God is all about.

So how do we fit into the picture? Because God needs us? Of course not! Does He crave to be told how wonderful He is? We have ideas of worldly kings who have to be stroked and flattered with smooth words and fancy dinners. After all, it's lonely at the top, they say. Is God lonely, weak, needy, insecure? He made us, this lavish planet around us, the vast reaches of space with all the different kinds of stars and planets, not to show off how grand He is, but to extend His love to us! Interestingly- Bishop Anselm, who first spelled out for us the whole "substitutionary atonement" plan, also said that even if Adam had never fallen, and Man had never sinned, Jesus would still have come as He did just out of His love for us.

A lot of Western theology has grown up around what seems like a view of need. We are told that God made the Universe because He needed company, or that our "chief end" is to "glorify God" like so many periwigged sycophants of Louis XIV because the bottom line is all about vindicating God's honor, or having somebody to show how great He is. In other words, we start off with a needy God, and He is then either moved out of the desire to prove his dominion in a reaction to human need to initiate the whole Incarnation- In other words, either Jesus came because God had something to prove, or else His coming was initiated by our sin. Does either option give us much of a picture of God? Who Is? (Self-giving) Love?

Could it be that God, first of all, is love, and that His being, total love, means total freedom to love. He created us in His Image, meaning that we would be free to love, a love that reflects His own. Even if that freedom meant the freedom to mess things up? After all, if there weren't freedom to turn left, would a right turn really be free? And, because of such vast love, He gives us the freedom to hate the mess we've made and even to repent from our bouts of stupidity and turn to Him!

Is God the Sovereign Lord of All? Of course He is, and greater than we could ever imagine imagining: But is it His plan to call us peasants, or dearly loved children?

1 John 3:1,2

Deism, and Meism, or "So, What's a 'Liberal?'"

2008-10-17T13:59:00.005-05:00

Hear O Israel, the LORD thy God, the LORD is one, and thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, and with all thy mind. The second is like unto it, that thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two hang all the Law and the Prophets.

It has been said that if a young man is not a Liberal he has no heart, and if when he is older he is not a Conservative he has no mind. In the Church we may have the opposite trend.

The young Christian finds it easy to believe the most hidebound dogma from whatever the tradition he finds himself. A Brethren convert will most adamantly support that group's teachings, and a Pentecostal theirs. Their Bible was delivered from God in just that form, leather binding and all.

As time passes, young Christian hears and reads a lot of differing opinions: The Bible is a contradictory collection of outmoded tribal traditions and priestly forgeries. Jesus learned His teachings from Indian Buddhists. All roads lead to God, however you imagine "God" to be. Sometimes young Christian believes that claptrap, and falls into all kinds of despair, even enlisting to spread that claptrap to others out of anger at being told that simplistic first story to begin with. So who, really, is at fault here, and what can be done to change things?

The first culprit, of course, is the one who started the first dogma. Does God demand that women either put on fancy hats for church, stay home? Or does any place in the Bible command that no female voice may be heard in the assembly of God's saints? Or that the elders must conduct a background investigation on a person before allowing them a place at Holy Communion? For that matter, do we have Bibles today because an angel showed up in 1611 with a leather-bound Cambridge Concord with maps?

Oddly enough, people who raise such questions are quickly labeled as "Liberal." Could the shoe really be on the other foot?

At the "core" of Liberal Theology is "reductionism." Classic Liberalism took Jesus' words, "on these hang all the Law and the Prophets," concerning what we variously call the "Summary of the Law," or the "Jesus Creed," and reduced all they saw "Christianity" to mean down to simply "Go to church and act nice." and relegated all the rest to the "details" bin to be sorted out later. Different strains of that thinking in the last two hundred years have turned their attention to reducing the Bible down to what they considered "authentic," or even reducing all we know of Jesus down to what they could force into their own political ideal. Where we once had a message of the eternal Son, incarnate by the Virgin Mary, living among us, suffering and dying for our sins, rising from death incorruptible and ascending to the Father to await His kingdom, we now hear about a very un-Jewish oddball philosopher who might have died in some kind of political misunderstanding. Miracles? Healings? Raising people from death? Well, we're sure he thought he did, but we know better now, don't we?

As much as any Spirit-born Christian would balk at such idiocy in scholars' clothing, how much do we know about the Bible, beyond the texts behind our favorite sermons? We believe, some of us, that God existed before all time, when He decided who He would save and who he would cast off "for His greater glory." We are told that "the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever," and that, since Jesus said, "he that comes to me I will not cast out," that means that no matter how deeply we fall into sin, or how vehemently we oppose His grace in our lives, we are still "walking with Christ" and guaranteed a place at, or in, His throne. Or that one must "speak in tongues," be baptised in such a way, or keep kosher in order to gain salvation. These, and many other, popular doctrines are based in the same kind of reductionism that produced the Liberal train wreck we see so much of in the news today. This or that verse is taken to support what somebody believes, and so the rest of the Book, the parts that don't support that interpretation, are tossed in the "details" bin to be sorted out later.

All the time, the Lord has been working through the race of man, to see who would simply listen and obey, and who would busy themselves with reducing His words down to excuses to disobey. All to be sorted out later!

Only Born to Die?

2008-10-03T10:13:00.002-05:00

“As corpses the meant to live; in black they decked out their corpses; out of their speech, too, I still smell the bad odor of death chambers. And whoever lives near them lives near black ponds out of which an ominous frog sings its song with sweet melancholy. They would have to sing better songs for me to learn to have faith in their Redeemer: and his disciples would have to look more redeemed!”

Friedrich Nietzche
Thus Spoke Zarathustra

One of my beefs with contemporary Western Christianity is the way it often reduces the Gospel to only one domain, fire insurance. The Good News is apparently only applicable to something totally unfalsifiable, the afterlife. To quote Dr. John Macarthur, Jesus "didn't come to fix life here. He didn't come to eliminate poverty. He didn't come to eliminate slavery." I remember hearing some of my pastors saying that Jesus was “born to die” and that his only purpose was to die for our sins that we might be saved. In short, apparently Jesus didn't come to change anything that can actually be seen, heard, tasted, touched, or felt. He only came to save us from Hell, which none of us has ever seen, and send us to Heaven, which none of us has ever seen.

Here's where my skeptical brain kicks in. How do we know we're not just being sold a bill of goods? Snake Oil? Do we just trust those that tell us we can be “saved” while life, our life, their life, goes on otherwise unchanged? We still go to the same job, eat the same things, dress the same way, spend our leisure time on the same activities, but now we've got a really killer retirement package that we “receive by grace through faith”?

If this is only thing that the “Gospel” is about, doesn't that kind of make a good deal of Jesus' teaching kind of pointless filler? If the Gospel, in it's totality, is about going to Heaven by appropriating God's grace by belief in Jesus' death and resurrection what the heck is the point of the parable of the Sheep and Goats (Matt 25:31-46)? Why worry about most of the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5-7) if I've already got all the Gospel has to offer? Apparently, being a peacemaker (Matt 5:9) doesn't actually make you a child of God. (To be fair, the text does say “Shall be called” not “Shall be”. I guess you can be called one and not be one. I wish Jesus was less confusing on this issue). Are all the interpersonal, social, and moral aspects of the New Testament like optional equipment on a new car, nice to have but not necessary to get you from point A to point B?

I'm thinking this is where I kick platonic assumptions about the nature of reality to the curb. I do believe that Jesus saves us from our sins, but I think He intends to do so in the here and now as well as the sweet by and by. I believe he intends for us to be free from the bondage and consequences of our addiction to consumerism, noise, drugs, lust, the mindless consumption of electronic media, the economic ease and privilege of living at the center of the Empire, etc. now, as well as later.

I refuse to serve a neutered Jesus that has been made in our image and is safe for mass consumption. I don't need a smarmy platitude-spewing Lord that is simply there to give me an eternal pass on all my instances of wrath, greed, apathy, or elitism. I want Him to be fierce in my life. Like Aslan in Narnia, I pray that Jesus is good, but not "safe" for me to spend time with. I want Him to destroy my apathy and self-deception to reveal what His Kingdom, what His Gospel is truly about. I want to see the Gospel, the declaration of the ascendancy of a new King, turn the world upside down again, to save people here and now. I want to see Jesus set addicts free, mend broken families, reconcile communities, and bring peace to nations. I just pray that I have the courage to walk into that new land when I'm given a glimpse of it. Then, after a long hard fight, I'll take that retirement plan.

(Shamelessly stolen from a recent page at The Ooze!)

Women Clergy- An Open Forum

2008-09-21T22:35:00.003-05:00

For a change of pace, this time the post is not answering any questions, or even claiming to have any answers. Instead, this is entirely about drawing out other people's points of view on a topic hot enough to prompt America's biggest Christian bookseller to stash a music magazine back for under-the-counter sales.

A recent conversation with my African pastor brought some things to light in my own thinking about the differences in our cultures, between the West and the more traditional societies, and one of these touched on the current interest in Women's Ordination. Now, A certain 19th Century evangelist pointed out that men and women were both present in the Upper Room when the Holy Spirit fell on them. How was the promise of Acts 1:8 different for the women on whom the Spirit fell than the men on whom the same Spirit fell?

Paul wrote, "I suffer not a woman to teach or usurp authority over a man..." Was this originally to disadvantage women for societal reasons, or to recognise the dynamic that God had predicted in Genesis 3, or to keep the new Church from gaining the wrong kind of profile in the early communities, or..?

If Genesis 3 is the key, does that mean that women must never be set in any position of authority outside a women-only context, or that that dynamic needs to be kept in mind, or does it only apply within the marriage?

Is it possible for us to have women as preachers but not pastors, or pastors but not priests, or as priests (as elders) in an evangelical, but not priests (as celebrants) in a more sacramental setting?

Should women be expected to cover their heads before praying in the assembly, or, as one group maintains, should they cover their heads at all times and never make a peep?

Is this an issue of equal access to God, equal calling to further the Gospel, equal access to employment advantages, or a matter of putting everything and person in their proper place as if Church is all about obeying rules for rules' sake?

My answer? A lot of Christian leaders far wiser than me have been quite adamant on this question in a number of different positions, so it's a pretty safe bet that whatever I toss into this discussion will be just that- for the discussion.

The Cure for Apostasy

2008-09-14T19:33:00.002-05:00

There is a major problem in the Church today. Whether we are talking about the Roman Catholic, United Methodist, or Independent Baptist, Free Presbyterian, or the various Brethren churches, there is a problem that is costing the Kingdom countless lives every day; and the greater the problem grows the smaller it gets in the eyes of the leadership. Sadly, this is not even a contradiction.

Looking at a website a few minutes ago, there was a mention of praying for American bishops who had yet to come to faith in Jesus Christ. The sad news is that there likely are some. The sadder news is that they are probably quite few. Why is this sad? It's an old truism that a convert to Liberal Christianity is a rare bird to find. Liberalism just does not have a lot to offer that the average sinner does not already have. Freedom to sin? Why even call it sin? A broad range of opinions? Go to any pub, flower club, or lodge! Tight camaraderie? Stop by your local Kiwanis, Rotary, or motorcycle club and get all you can handle! So why would an unbeliever want to convert from agnostic to skeptic? Liberal Christians, especially the clergy, are seldom "made," but far more often unmade. Talk with, say, an Episcopal priest about how he or she came to enter the clergy, and you will hear the same kind of "calling" story you would hear from, say, a Congregational Methodist. Later in the conversation, though, the Episcopalian might go on to reveal just how open he or she is to "truths" from any tradition except historic Christianity.

How did this happen? Once upon a time a young person heard the Lord speaking about ordained ministry, went to university, and then to seminary, and then was ordained. Along the way, however, that kid learned from respected professors things that did not come from God. Opinions were taught as fact, doubt as faith, and soon despair replaced the hope that had been his or her great motivation. Does God really speak to people? Has He ever? How could God disobey the laws of nature? All kinds of questions, crafted not to encourage honest answers or serious study, but framed to ridicule honest faith. Are there answers to such questions? Yes. Those, and the rest as well, and the answer is not "have faith." It seems, though, that the devil has his eyes closely on these schools, and on their students' "development." After all, he does know the Scriptures, and how to use what he knows. Often the one thing between an unconverted sinner and the saving grace of Christ is a Christian taking the time to bring him along. In Hebrews 6, though, we read that to bring a Christian who has turned away from the truth back to faith is a different story. So now we have churches and, in some instances, whole denominations being led and controlled by post- Christian leaders, who have had a taste of the Faith, probably with not a lot more depth than the denominational quarterlies of their childhood years, and learned to prefer the "scholarly" fairy tales of the academic and religious elite.

What's to do? Abandon the schools? God forbid! There are still some faithful schools- Wesley Biblical in Jackson, Mississippi; Wycliffe College in Toronto; Wycliffe House at Oxford; and faithful professors like Thomas Oden at Drew University in New Jersey. And, yes, there are other schools a wise person would not trust with even a stray dog. We need scholarship, now more than ever, and we need more than ever to learn to study and to pray, and pray the Lord will raise us up a new generation of faithful Christian scholars who will be equipped to defend the Faith against these mis-educated leaders and wags, and to train the Lord's Church to really be the "pillar and ground of the truth."

Free? Thought?

2008-09-10T10:52:00.004-05:00

It's interesting, no, really crucial, to think of what it means to be human. Despite all the Hollywood glitz to the contrary man is the only creature on this planet with the ability to reason. The so-called "dumb animals" can react or respond, or follow hard-wired instincts, but one anthropologist offered, after years of primate studies, that the highest chimpanzee is intellectually closer to the cockroach than to humanity. Not to disparage our four-legged neighbors, but let's consider this:

God made us all to be like Him. We can see that in such marks as an attraction to goodness, desire to love and be loved, and the ability to reason and to create. The Bible tells us that "the world, the flesh, and the devil" are at odds with the God Whose image we bear, and so is intent on destroying that image. How do we see that? All around us are enticements to set aside any idea of love as being more than using others for personal thrills, or of goodness as more than self-preservation. Reasoning itself seems to be the greatest target, and the greatest threat to that three-fold attack on our humanity. Even the so-called "free thinkers," more often than not, merely cluster around a popular myth, and if any hold a differing opinion, launch personal slanders against them and pride themselves on their "critical thinking."

The truth is that, if God has indeed given us these divine "markers" in our lives we have a holy responsibility to use and develop them. If Michaelangelo had stuck with smashing stone in the quarries, that would have been a loss. Not only for the fact of his own career, but for the millions of people who have seen his achievements and gone on to do greater things in their own lives. So much the more, why should we choose to live stupefied lives when we have the ability to ask questions and even find the answers?

In fact, human history is filled with attempts to take away that ability. Despots to this day seek to control the Press, censor literature and other media, and either control or destroy the Church. (We could list here names covering the field of political and religious leaders who have sought to control the people's hearts and minds through lies and coercion.) Loyal followers, rather than working through with their own minds what they see being done, pacify themselves with mantras of faith in (whatever) the System. After all, they are assured, the only people who see things differently are kooks, fanatics, anarchists, armininianists, commies, intolerant fascists, or just plain paranoid. But we're not like them, are we? (At this point, eyes roll, tongues cluck, and nervous chuckles may be heard.) For a year and a half now, this blog has been offering opinions, insights, and, at times, rather controversial statements. During much of this time I have been taking part in discussions on other websites. In the discussions I would often find people who would, even as "Christians," condemn me as one or another of the above list when they could not answer me with evidence or reason. In some cases I could almost hear them saying, "I like my opinions! How dare you expect me to think?" Others, probably most, will read this or that and say, "Well, that's just his opinion, but I don't have to believe it!" Maybe not, and maybe not. How many people "do the math" of checking out if it is opinion, or if there is real evidence there? This is not a question of some lonely computer geek hoping for a conversation. This blog already costs me more time than I can really justify. The point is that if we refuse to think things through, refuse find out whether things as important as what is discussed here, are true, then at the very best we are taking the divine treasure of reason, tossing it on the heap, and taking our place with the cockroaches. At worst, we are forcing ourselves to be Exhibit A in answering the question, "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great a salvation?"

What is a “Christian,” anyway?

2008-09-07T21:36:00.002-05:00

A story is told about a young sailor drinking in the wrong tavern in a certain California city. As people full of their drink tend to do, he either chose his words, or his question, poorly. He asked, "Who are the Hells Angels, anyway?" His fellow patrons decided to answer his question, and minutes later he was unable to lift his battered face off the table. These people obviously took their name quite seriously!

Not that I would ever suggest that kind of response to our question, it does mean something that we live in a culture in which the name, "Christian," is used in so many ways that we've lost track of what it really means. If someone is neither Jew nor Muslim, then the other option is Christian, right? Or is it a white-skinned European, or black-skinned African, or a member of one of the 4,000 plus organisations calling themselves Church? As we travel back in our time machine, the "Credo," let's look into some questions.

When Jesus Christ preached to the crowds in Galilee, were the people there Christians? Obviously, no, they were a mixed lot of Jewish farmers, merchants, Pharisees, Zealots, and what-have-you. What about James, John, Peter, and the rest of the lads He called to follow? They did become His disciples, but still not Christians. Without belaboring the point at which they actually became Christians, when we look at the accounts we see that "the disciples were first called Christians at Antioch."

So what's the difference? In the Greek, a disciple was a "mathetos," a learner, literally. A mathetos would follow his rabbi, sage, or philosopher around, learning to imitate his every gesture and memorise his words in order to cause his wisdom to live in his own life, and to be prepared to pass it on to his own future disciples. Antioch, a few years later, encountered a new phenomenon. People who had either followed Jesus (near or far, there had been hundreds.) or had learned from those who had, had been both converted and baptised by the Holy Spirit, and had withstood hardships, holding fast to that holy Name. The Antiochans called them "little Christs" when they first encountered them, crying out that "the people who have turned the world upside down have come here, too!" The people who so reflected their Master in their lives, whose own testimonies had turned the upside-down world right-side-up in terms of lifestyle, priorities, and the basic "excuse for living," What was the difference between them and their Syrian neighbors? They were partakers of the very nature of Christ, and by living out that Nature in the world around them they soon turned the
busy trading city of Antioch into a center for the sending of missionaries, and the site of one of the first theological colleges.

Today we think any church member, any baptised person, any "nice" person or obnoxiously moralistic person is automatically a "Christian." If we look closer, we find there is no necessary connection there. A disciple was one who was struggling to keep the rules. How many of us do even that? A Christian was someone who had been, and was being, transformed into the very likeness of God in Christ from the inside out. Let us then apply ourselves before God to be so transformed by His grace. Whenever we presume it to mean less, we are truly courting disaster!

America- Diagnosis, or Post-Mortem?

2008-09-01T15:46:00.002-05:00

Current Assessment: The Billy Generation

The "Boomer Generation," also known as the "Love Generation," and the "Beemer Generation" among others, born between 1946 & '64, has done the most, good or bad, to shape the contours of America-as-we-know-it. This generation has written the schoolbooks, movies, sitcoms, and newscasts, and shaped current social trends and Government policy. According to recent polls, nearly 80% of Americans acknowledge a "born again" experience. By all rights, this should be the most authentically Christian nation anywhere, and any time, in history. Yet in the past thirty-five years over fifty million lives have been violently extinguished by abortion, more children nation-wide are growing up in single-parent homes, chronically neglected by absentee fathers (or sometimes mothers) as they learn to esteem the "thug life" as honorable, and homosexuality is being pushed as a new normality,What has gone wrong? We can go into particular causes for a lot of that stuff, but the root to it all is going to be the way we see God, our world, and our selves (that is, our belief system or "dogma"), and how we live that out. We have already found that a large majority of Americans share a Christian experience, so what is that experience?

If we look back into the 19th Century, we see cities and towns being transformed by a wave of revival being carried by Methodist and Cumberland Presbyterian evangelists. This was a message of hope, that entailed a renewal- a "holiness of heart and mind" which transformed lives, saved homes, and founded a growing nation (somewhat) a basis of righteousness. This movement seems to have been centered largely in the South, among the poorer and journey classes, before the "Unpleasantness." After that Great Debacle came a new kind of evangelist. Dwight L. Moody, a shoe salesman who had been raised a Unitarian, later joined the Plymouth Brethren. J.N. Darby, one of the Brethren luminaries, had been a Church of England priest who created some interesting new doctrines in his day- among them, apparently, was that of "Eternal Security." Moody's sermons marked a step in the process, which we will examine later, from preaching a whole-life obedience to Christ to a one-time "step of faith" to gain salvation. Moody's successor, Billy Sunday, took it a notch farther. At one meeting he is quoted as saying, "The best thing that can happen to you is to get saved tonight, and then go out the door and get run over by a bus." (A short tract given to all those who went forward in his meetings read, "If you have done your part, (Christ) will do his part." Another key point with Sunday's preaching was a strong stand on prohibition of alcohol. These emphases would live on in that century's growing Baptist movement. Gone was the earlier preaching on a holy life, of God's grace cleansing and transforming from within. At about this time C.I. Scofield published his Scofield Bible, which shifted many Christians' focus from issues of the Inner Life and service to others to deep speculation over the "new insights" of Eternal Security, Dispensationalism, and Christian Zionism that Scofield had picked up from Darby. As in previous centuries, right opinion was replacing right belief as the shibboleth of "true faith."The previous generation of Methodists had begun to invest in colleges and social respectability, and so had signed on with the new Darwinian theories, much to the hurt of their credibility with the general population. Following Sunday, the highest-profile evangelist through the Great Depression was Aimee Semple McPherson. She preached a strong message, and drew thousands across the country, but the long-range credibility for herself and her "Full Gospel" message suffered greatly when her reported kidnapping appeared to have been a flamboyant cover for a lovers' tryst.

The stage was then set, on the close of WWII, for a new figure. Tall, photogenic, silver-tongued, Billy Graham stepped forth with everything the previous decades had left him: The crusade meeting style, an attractive, bare-bones message, and the expectation of a world ready for a change. From 1946 onward he would preach to ever-larger crowds, while becoming the darling of an increasingly secular media, and a favorite of Presidents. If the 80% in the US who claim to be born again are polled, most are sure to credit their conversion to one of Graham's crusades or to another evangelistic effort informed by the same theology. Like Billy Sunday, "If you have done your part..!" America, if we've done our part, then God forgot to do His. Is our part a simple prayer and a handshake, or is there a whole life on the other side of that first step that nobody seems to remember anymore?

So, What are "Essentials?"

2008-08-28T13:44:00.004-05:00

The second step in following Jesus is every bit as important, of course, as the first. If we start off our march on the left foot, then Bible study is going to be the right. Why not first? Simply this: First we need to be in the position of a disciple (Originally mathetos in Greek: a pupil or learner) for the Holy Spirit to be our teacher. Too often people open the Bible as if they were expecting to read Tom Sawyer, or any other book, and miss the whole picture and more. For the Spirit of God to be our Teacher, we have to be enrolled for His classes!

Despite the bad behaviour of some in the classroom, the Church is the class where the Spirit teaches. The New Birth changes us: While our souls were an "interface" (the soul) between spiritual and material existence, being run by the body's appetites and reactions, once born of the Spirit then our spirits are brought to life and joined to the Spirit of God. When we are baptised we are visibly joined & welcomed into the Church as (now) living members of the living Body of Christ in this world.

The Church, by the way, is the only school with an A+ guarantee. John writes, "You have no need for man to teach you, for the Spirit Who dwells on you teaches you all things." This means not only that the Spirit knows everything (as God, can He know less?), but that He Is the Church's full supply for all the knowledge and wisdom she needs. So why, we ask, are there so many divisions, and so many scattered opinions? Christians have, historically, drawn lines in the sand as if to say, "This far will we follow You, and no farther." Can we claim to have knowledge and not listen to the Teacher? Again, like schoolchildren, being in the classroom does not promise any intent to learn. Some do the work, some "decorate" the school with desk carving and locker decorations, some flirt, harass other students, or just sleep. Even the front row kids let the confusion influence their resolve to learn. Somebody even offered a quip, "In the essentials, unity..." as if the student were in the position to decide what part of the Spirit's lessons were really important! Others went the other direction and fought bloody wars over such issues as what language to use in even discussing holy things!

Jesus said, "This is the first commandment, that you should love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind, ..and that you love your neighbor as yourself." Understanding that, we know right away that, no matter how accurate our views might otherwise be, as soon as we make personal attacks on others we have denied the foundation our views were built on. To put it another way, if any doctrine leads us away from loving our neighbor as our selves, then that doctrine is leading us away from the One Who saved us.

Rather, if we willingly love our Lord with our all, then we will be seeking Him out, spending time with Him, and sitting at His knee to hear whatever He has to say. And, yes, the most common way for Him to speak to us is by bringing the words of Scripture alive to our hearts, confirming those words with the rest of the Bible, and reminding us of those words day-to-day.

Life as We (Don't) Know it

2008-08-24T00:48:00.002-05:00

We last looked at the principle of the New Birth. One thing about Jesus’ teachings that impresses me is that if something were a parable, a story offered to illustrate a point, then He would say at the first, “the Kingdom is like thus and such. If there were a true story that He used, then, “There was such a man...” If He was saying that something is this or that way, then that’s what would come out. Like when a group of Jews “believed on Him” as far as opinions go, but still cherished their own sinful attitudes and ambitions, He told them that “You belong to your father, the devil.” God, the Father, has no part with such deceits, and those who hold to them have no right to call Him, “Father,” because it is the devil that is “the father of lies.” So, then, if we are to belong to God, and hear from Him, we need to be born again, by His Spirit, by faith. Faith, in this sense, is more a continuing process than a momentary decision; and the New Birth is, like natural birth, an event that marks a life, and not the whole life in itself.

Because of this, we don’t say that the New Birth is the Main Point, or the Final Experience, for anyone’s life. Two terms Jesus used for the New Life were to be born again, and to follow Him. Now, in the first, we don’t have O.B.s and midwives setting newborns in display cases, or sending out on the streets to fend for themselves, do we? That new life is rushed into the warmest, safest, and most nourishing environment they can arrange for it. Immediately they rub it down, clean its eyes, ears, and throat, make sure it can nurse, and (hopefully) give it right to its mother to start forming that lifelong bond that will be its lifeline for the rest ot its days in this world. For all these reasons, those who assume that once a person is born from above he or she is “good to go” are whistling in the dark. What we are looking at applies to everyone, born again or not, young, old, new Christian or aged bishop, so please read on

When a baby is first born, does it even know its daddy except as a voice, a presence, from somewhere out of reach? Maybe so, but never as a person! It needs to hear, but its ears are plugged. It needs to see, but its eyes are closed with the same “vernix” (cheesy gunk). Same with someone who is first trusting Christ as savior. God had been a Presence, to some degree, but until then, surely nothing more. He had been deaf to spiritual truth, blind to reality, and had never tasted the “sincere milk of the word of God.” He, or she, actually, had never even, really, been touched in a spiritual way. In all these ways a new Christian needs to be welcomed into a living fellowship to not only be cleansed in baptism, but to experience a Spirit-driven baptism into the body of Christ as an ongoing (not just occasional, weekly, or when convenient!) so that the Church, which is his/her mother, can clean out the ears and eyes, rub oil into the dry skin, and make sure that the babe in Christ is taking in an ample supply of the Word in all forms. No principle in the history of the Church has been proven so important, and none so neglected in these recent years!

The Irish in Ireland’s “Golden Age,” in which the Church there was growing to such strength that they would be able to re-introduce Christianity and scholarship to Europe, had a principle which they had learned from the Egyptian Christians. That of a “soul friend.” For each new Christian, and each new monk or student at the monasteries, it was a first priority to find one who would be more than a pastor, or a tutor or mentor, but someone of real wisdom, Christian experience, and insight with whom he could share the issues of his soul. It was important to know the basic teaching of the Church, as much of the Bible as possible, and the writings of those days that survive reflect an astounding depth of Bible knowledge and understanding. But just as, or even more, important were the things that are too often neglected today: Real self-knowledge before God, honest, heart-deep prayer, worship, and meditation, such as never seem to really make the translation from a book we can set aside at our pleasure. Some things are best learned face to face, heart to heart, and the successes that History recounts of Ireland’s “saints and scholars” owes greatly to that one practice. So to the Church the message is to stop pretending to be an institution, organisation, or social club, and be the loving mother that Jesus calls us to be. If any be newly born into the Kingdom, or anybody else who, though a Christian has not done so, make it a matter of urgent prayer, that you might find a soul friend. Someone who will not religiously “lord it over” you, but gently support you at your weak points, guard where you are hurting, and help you to grow strong in the love and wisdom of Jesus and, while you are praying, ask Him to help you grow into such a friend yourself. We need so many!

Planet of the Walking Dead

2008-08-22T11:18:00.002-05:00

Dead inside? Did INXS sing, "..every single one of us is dead inside,"or did I just keep hearing it wrong? If they did, they were right.

Almost. When Jesus told the Jewish elder, "You must be born again, ..of the Spirit, to enter the kingdom of Heaven," He wasn't just using a figure of speech. Sure, for years the Jewish Establishment had been using the term for when someone of the goyim (nations) became a Jew through mikveh (water immersion), that he/she was "born again" as a Jew, but that's another story for another time. When God warned innocent Adam that if they ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (well, evil, really. They already knew good!) they would immediately die. When they were still walking around the next day, we guess God was just kidding, or making some kind of parable that really meant something else. Nope. God has a wonderful, original, sense of humor, but death and sin aren't funny. Their very next encounter with God shows something had changed drastically. A careful read shows that to that point they were wise, happy, and fearless. Now they were stupid (wrapping themselves in gummy, prickly, fig leaves!), miserable (hiding in the bushes), and cowardly (shifting blame). When God made Adam, He breathed His own Spirit into the man, and where the Spirit meeting the body there formed a living soul- a human life. The man's spirit, then, was effectively an extension (bad word, yeah.) of the very Spirit of God, inextricably linked to the soul (mind, emotion, will...) which was meant to be an interface, a buffer in modern lingo, with the body. When Adam died, it was their very spirits that died. There was no more a direct communication with the heart and mind of God. No wisdom, no joy, no boldness. All this reflects in the "curse" that followed: Every pronouncement was for Mankind's benefit, as we read in Genesis 3. So this being "born again" as Jesus mentioned is not just a metaphor, as in the Jewish miveh: When one is born "of the Spirit," or, "from above," then that dead, vestigial, spirit within us is revived, and we experience an inner relationship with God, actually closer than with our own selves. Potentially, we have perfect wisdom, joy, and boldness through His love shining forth in our hearts. The beginning of the journey!

"Only Believe!" Or, not. . .

2008-08-19T22:38:00.001-05:00

"Believing is more important than what we believe." It's strange that nothing seen allows such an approach, yet we like to think that the Unseen is the same as the Imaginary. A child once thought that everything was just as it appeared. A box, with knobs and dials in the right placement, would play music. Another box, with the right markings, would tell the time. What he did not see made all the difference, didn't it? An unknown belief or attitude in one's fiance can make a world of difference in one's life over the years, and a charge on a small bit of wire can change one's whole outlook on life in an instant. When it comes to faith, it is just the same, only more so. In Romans we read that, "the gospel of Christ is the power of God for salvation." Now, if one's doctor says, "The instructions on this medicine bottle are crucial for your recovery," how wise is it to leave that bottle on the shelf, or apply the medicine according to mood, opinion, or hearsay? Is merely possessing the medicine enough to restore health? If we will take the doctor's advice on earthly matters so seriously, when the best he could do was allow us a few moments to this life, what of a message, that is proven by the life and resurrection of the Son of God, that promises us eternal life? What, exactly, is that message? Is there anything in this world more important than finding out? Rather than leave this hanging on such a precipice, we do have some definite signposts to follow. Please stay tuned for some crucial particulars!

Good Intentions, but. . .

2008-08-18T01:17:00.002-05:00

Another conversation while in Belfast: The idea was that since, "God looks at the hearts, all that really matters to Him is our intentions!". For a moment, this almost sounds reasonable, but isn't the "real" intention the one that "stands up?" In the conversation, he was saying that a preacher doesn't really need to know doctrine as long as he "means well," but,

1. If the Gospel is God's power on Earth to save [Romans 1:16], so,
2. The Church exists to uphold the Truth [1 Timothy 3:15], then
3. All Word ministry is equally crucial- Study, Teaching, and Preaching[1 Tim. 4:13 & following], because (See #1).

Jesus said, "If your child asks for an egg, will you give him a scorpion?" We not only have to have the good intentions to offer those in our care a fresh egg, but also to have the discernment to know the difference. A large scorpion can coil itself to look like an egg if one is not paying attention. However much it might look like an egg, the outcome would be very different.

Does this happen? It is all too easy to offer, or receive, as "food" things that look right on the outside, but what is inside will not sustain life, or even permit it. Will "good intentions" make a difference in the effects, or in the preacher's responsibility before God? Or do we need to be continually fed from the perfect truth of God's word, the renewing grace of His Spirit, and the ongoing witness of our fellow Christians whose own lives reflect that holy love that Jesus calls us to follow?

The New Dark Ages

2008-08-15T10:58:00.003-05:00

Two observations about History as taught- as you and I were fed it in school, that is. One, that it is edited, obviously, and, second, that it is deadly boring. Now, Mr. Santayana said once, "Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it." We hear that now and then, usually when the news anchor is trying to make a point for his/her own camp. Example? As much as we hear repeated about Hitler's atrocities, how much is mentioned about Stalin, Mao, or the present "leaders" in China, the Islamic nations, or other present-day atrocities? Santayana was right, but in more ways than what we generally understand.

Remembering history is more than keeping in mind selected bites from the Evening News. Remembering history means having a clue what we've come from, so we can have some idea where we're going.

One thing about this badly edited, deadly-boring subject that passes as History: The people who are spotlighted are then glossed to the point where all you see is the sheen of the writer's ink, and nothing of the person him/herself. A lot of "just because." One phrase I still remember from 7th grade is, "Abraham Lincoln was one of the Nation's greatest Presidents, even though he was plagued with the great Civil War." Lovely words- the work of a poet. But what if a student asks, say, how he was "plagued" with a war when he was in command? The Federal armies, understand, were on the offensive, on Southern land, in every battle but Gettysburg, and that was two years into the campaign. If that campaign were a plague to him, would he not have considered Davis's offers of surrender? (Remember, it took every other American conflict from the Revolution through Viet Nam to approach the loss of life in those four years!)

Not to be selling a partisan pitch, but using that bit of tinder to catch this spark: Historians research history, and find out the details that make up the picture, and they do tend to have opinions which guide what they know or don't know. Textbook writers make up a gloss from parts of that picture they choose, and package it for boards and committees who generally have little interest in what happened when, or why; and in the end , between Don't Know and Don't Care, the students wind up with even less. If we are doomed to repeat the history we have forgotten, then we are headed back to the dark ages: but then, who knows enough history to recognise them?

Aborting our Souls?

2008-08-12T16:32:00.007-05:00

The Wall Street Journal today, in a story about an upcoming report on the effects of the abortion trauma on the mothers involved, quotes one clinic director, Susan Hill, who runs clinics in five southern states, as saying that, "'..women today need less counseling, less psychological care than they did in 1973,' when abortion was legalized but still carried an enormous stigma." We might speculate that this is in line with the overall loss of sensitivity for human life, generally. Over the last thirty or so years we seen a shift from a time when the film, Bonnie and Clyde

(From Warner Brothers, no less- What's up, Doc?) stirred such controversy over its gory scenes. Now Hitchcock's style of suspense stories has been replaced by "splatter films," and pop music now features brutal rape and murder in place of undying love and devotion.

Ms. Hill, who has been in the business of "providing abortions" for thirty five years, said she, "has tried offering postprocedure counseling sessions -- but very few women show up." In her words, "They want to get past it and move on with their lives." Overlooking the possibility of all kinds of motives for not returning to the "clinic" to walk through that trauma all over again, it might be good to consider the real effects on all the people in this picture.

Tragically, it seems, the one least considered, or the least present, in the picture is the father. He does not have, or show that he has, a clue about the care of the woman he likely made some claim to care for, and less about the life he is, yes, responsible for in her belly. It could be that his own father had shown little more interest in his own young life, or any number of other factors. Or, it could be that he is the one in the picture wanting to protect the young child but just isn't being heard. Either way, he suffers.

The mother may have somehow fallen for the notion that the life within her "isn't really human," or, viable, so there's really no harm done. This idea was popular in 1973, when the Supreme Court followed the old Darwinian myth that a child "evolves" in the womb, but genetic study has since proven that at every stage of human life, from the womb to the tomb, is entirely human; it is her child. She may believe all this "scientific" stuff, and have ingrained from school that life, even her own, is just an accident. In her heart, though, there is sure to be a voice of protest, that her life, and others' for that matter, can't just be meaningless. "Science" or no, she is not a fluke! When she splays herself on that table, and allows a white-smocked stranger to invade her most intimate regions with weapons of destruction, it is going to have an impact: Her heart is going to bear the damage!

The child in this story is not just a theoretical human, of a few cells invisibly tucked away in the uterine lining "for future consideration." By the time of the procedure she, (most likely female) is a fully-formed infant who only has some growing to do before her "great debut" in the delivery room. She may not be viable in terms of being able to live on her own, but then she wouldn't be for quite some time, would she? Nursing, diapers, being carried about... Really, being human means we're not designed to be viable in the strictest terms, except possibly a hermit who has yet learned survival skills from others! But she is secure, growing, and becoming ever-more aware of her surroundings when suddenly her body is covered with a burning, blinding, acid, or she is being ripped apart by cold steel pliers.

The "providers" are, likewise, affected. Day after day they witness the little struggles for life, see the tiny body parts carefully re-assembled for inventory, deal with the women who may be fighting their own consciences, or others as they callously shrug off what may be their fifth, or tenth, "procedure." At each juncture they are faced with the decision between what is right, and what makes the payments; and all too often hock their hearts for a pay stub! The suffering in their own hearts has yet to be accounted for. All this would be a hopeless, and a meaningless, scenario except for one final question: What is the "God part" of all this? In reality, God was on the scene first of all. However we might theorise the "how," the "who, what, and why" of our beginnings all point directly to Him. The harder scientists look at the data, the more necessary a Creator becomes. The very existence of DNA points to a huge degree of foresight, and for the DNA to actually develop into a viable creature of any description (and how many such are on this planet?) makes any roll of
the dice completely ludicrous on a good day. Not only the who and the what, though but why? Without comparing the particulars of theology, the bottom line is that God created us, spirit and body, to be His family. In short, there is a family resemblance that, though often distorted in one way or another, can not be denied. It's in our DNA, so to speak. Folks that have spent a lot of time on this call it the Imago Dei, the very image of God on each of us. That explains why people sacrifice for others, why marriage is still seen as honorable and "free love" shallow and selfish; why "Greater love has no man than this- that he would lay down his life for his friends" strikes a chord in our hearts in a day when "Looking out for number one" is the rule. Why we even have words like, truth, love, and justice in our language.

We are His children. He has made us, has given life, to be like Him. Are we truly His children? Is that all there is to it? The sad fact is that our sins, our pride and selfishness, have broken that relationship so that there is nothing we can do to mend it. In turning to ourselves for meaning and answers we have, effectively, set up false images of "god" in our hearts. In other words, we go through untold pain to scrape and scar away any resemblance to our Father- not just disfiguring our faces, but our very hearts! No human salve can heal this, no doctor can restore what we ourselves have destroyed. This is the reason that the Son, Jesus Christ, came to Earth. He taught and lived the simple truth of God's love, and then by His own suffering took the pain and disfigurement of our own lives onto Himself so we could be restored. Everything this implies is so wonderful that it can take a life of study to start to see the scope of it all. The simple truth is that, because of His love for
us we can give Him our hurts, our sins, our hopes and disappointments, all that we call our lives, and trust Him to restore to us what we never realised we could enjoy- sharing in the very joy and nature of God!

There will be a day when He gathers His own to Himself. Can we honestly expect Him to force those who went to such pains to deny any connection to Him to spend eternity in His presence? That those who have "invested" their God-given lives destroying all that He loves? The Bible promises that He won't. In His love, the choice is ours!

Image from Wall Street Journal article, "New Front in Abortion Battle."

The Suicides of the Fathers

2008-08-09T17:07:00.007-05:00

Reading of a famous writer, whose young life had been marked by his own father's suicide. How tragic! And yet, how real to so many. The father's eyes had turned inward. Inward to his own weakness, his own inadequacy: His humanity. It was too much for him, and he withdrew. Withdrew from the company of others he saw as beyond helping: Unwilling, unable, or else unfit, at any rate he withdrew- from human company, from his family, his son, from life.

Is this unusual, or was it just that his method was more pronounced? What of fathers today who don't swallow a pistol, or kiss a Freightliner? How many children today grow up with Daddy in the picture, but realise as they mature that he was only posing? That Daddy was already dead to them, dressed in his burial suit as he vanished into a grave of career, ambition, or drink? Escaped from human company, from his family, his son, from life, pursuing a dream, inheriting a nightmare. The greatest tragedy is that he is never alone, has never escaped, but the nightmare he inherits becomes the mother's life, and a legacy for his children

Young men today have had less of a father's love than any generation in the US. The one exception, maybe, the "Reconstruction" South, when the fathers' generation had lost so many men in the battles. Today fewer "fathers" stay around, fewer families stay together, and more men have, themselves, come from families which taught them the lie that Daddy's two main jobs were to pay the bills and keep Mommy entertained.

The fathers, the leaders, of the homes are abandoning their roles even like a general who kills himself the day before the battle. The mothers have to leave their nurturing and relationship-building role to try and provide the direction, but as mothers their own focus is inward, to their children, to their hearts. Men who should be outward-focused for their families' sakes, to build a future for their children, and their children for the future, have deserted them for their own "fulfillment," not realising their fulfillment is in fulfilling their roles as daddies, and as loving husbands.

Is there a happy ending for this story? Is there an uplifting "hook" on the end? That is up to the reader, isn't it? Who will re-assess his role, or get alongside a young man, and help him find his direction, his manhood, in this castrated society? In this generation a man who is a godly husband and father will stand out as something unusual, much like a whole man in a company of eunuchs; and a young man, or lady, who has grown up with such a daddy will be able to shine gloriously in the fog of this age.

War on Terror, and Faith

2008-08-07T21:42:00.004-05:00

The "War on Terror." The US has, in the past, declared war on poverty, and on drugs. In both cases little progress was made on those fronts. It's really hard to wage a negative campaign against a negative concept. In this one we seem to have a war with a few more concrete objectives and photo-ops, but until the Western governments get what, and why, it is they're fighting they stand to lose a lot more than their confusion lets them see. The war that has embroiled the "Western Powers" is far more far-reaching than a bush operation against a motley bunch of sand bandits, as the American Press would have us believe. What we are looking at is an ideological war- a campaign of values, ethics, and dogma that forges the rival Islamic sects and nations into a de facto coalition, and either joins Liberal Western leaders with them or at least keeps them out of the way.

In order to see the real battle lines, and the motivation behind the anti-Western forces we can look at the history of Western relations with the Arab East over the last two centuries, but that the resentments built up there are used more as a motivation tool than the primary cause. So also the fact of the more recent Western intrusion on Arab culture through the Media. It is not hard to see that the image of "America" that is seen overseas with the increase in porn in even the mainstream movies and the outrageous crimes in the news shows a nation of total disregard for the most basic sense of decency. To a people raised to revere a god of wrath and judgment, who condones the execution of a woman for allowing a bit of hair to show from under her head scarf, this "America" of such blatant indecency and violence is a great threat to their traditional family-centered way of life! On one hand, an Arab's religion is everything to him- his pride, his tradition, the ground of his being. On the other, no religion can change a person from the inside, to give them different "want-to's," so at the core there is a deeper motivation than "my pretense is higher than yours." Besides, why would the Left, both in Europe and the US, have such heart trouble opposing a militant "fundamentalism?"

In Belfast this summer a strange thing happened. When President Bush visited Belfast there were protests both at Stormont, the Northern Irish Parliament building, where he spoke, and at the Belfast City Hall. Significantly, one of the protestors hauled down the British Union Jack from the City Hall staff and replaced
it with an Iraqi flag. Now the Iraqi government is actually allied with the Western forces in trying to carve out some semblance of stability for those poor folks. Either he was just borrowing the flag pole to express his appreciation for the current government there, or he was cheering for the previous administration with its
untold atrocities against its own people. The first option wouldn't fit the anti-Bush, anti-America, message of the protest, but why on earth would he choose the second?

What other ways does this war show itself? Marxism, politely known as Liberalism today, is consistently coming out against Christianity. Whether in the different "freedom from religion" initiatives that make it an offense to wear a cross as jewellery or be seen with (let alone read!) a Bible in public in North America, or the more "progressive" laws in, say, mainland China where a person may still get 20 years of hard labor for praying with friends in his or her own home, the Left seems to see Christianity as a great evil, while wholesale abortion, even forced, and even late term and at-birth is somehow virtuous. This could be the reason why thousands of Christians in Asia or the Muslim nations for that matter, can be imprisoned, tortured, even beheaded on the way to school like those four teen girls in Indonesia, and the (Marxist) Press turns a blind eye, and even the big human rights groups have a hard time noticing! Are we talking conspiracy? Absolutely, and not at all. Con + spire, to breathe together: There is a growing movement among those who reject the Gospel to reject it more aggressively. Is there a Central Committee pulling the strings? Not that I'm aware. John wrote, "We know that we are of God, little children, and the whole world lies in wickedness," and that Jesus' light was revealed in the midst of this world's darkness, but the powers of this world are not able to comprehend that light.Today we see a growing animosity toward the Church on two fronts, and for two reasons. On the one hand, there is a message of righteousness which goes against the grain of everyone who would rather make, and break, their own laws. Just look at the noise that gets generated when a Christian group suggests that abstinence would slow the spread of STD's or that self-control in any way might even be an option! On the other hand, though, there is the problem of gross hypocrisy in the Church. The Gospel we too often preach, and live, is so weak and diluted that millions of people are claiming to be new creatures in Christ but living at least as badly as before they presumably were "saved." Anyone with the least bit of self respect is going to resent being told they "need" something which they see as completely hollow, and is going
to be in no hurry to associate with people who claim to take it seriously. In short, in order to survive this attack the Church must find her "clue bag" and take hold of the God Who is straining to transform and empower her to once again be the one effective offensive force against the spiritual darkness of this world, or
else wind up a battered and bruised laughingstock like the sons of Sceva. We don't fight fear, or curse darkness: Just turn on the Light! Is your Light bill paid?

Western Myth Number Five: That Jesus was "a great teacher."

2008-08-06T18:38:00.002-05:00

"Jesus was a great teacher." The ultimate subject of all of Holy Scripture is Christ, and what He said and did doesn't allow us that option. (We can debate whether Mohamed was a "great teacher" based on his teachings and his life. It's not hard for most people to see that loving others on the same level as ourselves is a more godly approach than waging war on civilians in the name of one's religion, but that seems to be changing.) C.S. Lewis said that Jesus does not give us the option of saying that He was a good moral teacher. A moral man would not make the claims that Christ made, of being in the Godhead before the days of Abraham, of having the power to forgive sins against God, or of having the power to die, and rise again, of His own will. Such claims would have to come from a liar, or a lunatic. A liar, though, would surely have changed his story when facing torture and death, and a lunatic could not have backed up his claims with such miracles (Remember, His miracles were so widely recognised by friend and foe alike that for the first several centuries afterward it wasn't His divinity, but His humanity that was hard for people to comprehend!) "Which is easier," He asked, "To say 'Your sins are forgiven,' or to say, 'Rise and walk?'" At His word, the paralytic rolled up his mat and went home. The only option left us is that He truly is the Lord of Creation, and of life. How does that affect your life?

Western Mythology, Part Four: Homosexuality as a "Condition" of Life

2008-08-03T21:45:00.003-05:00

That there is a special class of human being known as "homosexual." Through all history, it seems, there have been people who, at one time or another, chose to relieve their sexual"tensions" on the bodies of others of their own sex (how we abuse that word!). For the ancient Greeks such behaviour was customary, even for a teacher to so abuse his student as part of the orientation program. Does this mean that all the Greeks were "gay" in the modern sense? If there really is a "gay gene" that makes people "that way," some pretend, then wouldn't this mean that all people of Greek descent are particularly predisposed to homosexuality? More practically, with the current conditions in the jails and prisons, do we see the paroles and releases from those overcrowded facilities packing the "gay" clubs and districts? (In prison parlance, the "soft" ones who stroll the cell blocks in makeshift lingerie are the ones known as "homosexual.") Obviously not, because the convicts did what they felt they needed to do at the time, and then left it behind once there were women in the "equation!"

Modern Freudian thought, with its obsession with sex as the key to all behaviour, seems to have begun this current labelling in the 20th century by classifying "homosexuality" as a clinical disorder, and so created a special category for persons so "afflicted." As this was accepted into Western society, then those who thought to indulge themselves such a way were labeled, labeled themselves, as being aberrant in such a way. Until that time, it was recognised as a matter of choice. A person who does this or that is known as one who does- whether the deed is theft or heroism. Old Solomon is quoted to say that even a child is known by his doings, whether they be right, and until the 20th century "homosexuality" was seen as a deed- not a "condition," or a "lifestyle," and surely not a "class."

Is this just a matter of definitions for a biology or sociology class? Hardly! That homosexuality is a chosen behaviour de-demonises those who are or have been involved in it. They are not "weird," "flawed," or "perverted" any more than others who might indulge in, say, drunkenness, gluttony, or shady politics (and how much isn't?). People are people, and the same Gospel is for all people. The kingdom of God is, indeed, closed to "buggars and buggarees [I Corin. 6:9]" in just the same way as it is closed to drunks, adulterers, and murderers, but no informed Christian is going to demand that (merely) leaving a "lifestyle" of any sin is sufficient for anything or, for that matter, even, in itself, an option. The Church is not about demanding morality, but proclaiming holiness. Human beings can produce only a flawed and hypocritical type of morality, but Christ, according to His Gospel, can give us a holiness far above any mundane temptations which shows itself in a love and a joy that surpasses the imagination and, consequently, eternal life.

What Gospel?

2008-08-03T19:02:00.005-05:00

Today we see a vast spread of what we call Christianity. Churches are springing up worldwide, largely influenced by the glut of "Good Christian Teaching" from the US. The problem, though, is seen in looking at the state of affairs in the US Church. Substance abuse, teen pregnancy, STDs and marriage breakdowns match if not outstrip the "sinners" who never darken a church door. The "Hardshell Baptist" has become a standard, and a bye-word, for American religion in general: Quick enough to state a position, but completely unable to give a reason for it which reflects in a godly life. The shell is there, and in good repair, but the yolk has been sucked out years ago, leaving what looks like a healthy egg, but neither food nor life inside.

Severe words? Yes indeed. Un-called-for? Then why do we have cities in the middle of the "Bible Belt" where churches outnumber filling stations, nearly 90% of the people report being "born again," and the biggest two industries seem to be illegal drugs and prostitution? Why does the head of the Evangelical Alliance have to resign because of a queer sex scandal, the biggest "evangelists" on the media circle the wagons when asked about their finances, and one of their number pack a sports stadium while refusing to confess Christ as Savior on national television? Ranting? Yes. Called-for? What do you think?

At the risk of falling into the Platonic trap of believing that proper education produces a moral life, we do need to look more closely at what this gospel is that has produced such a dubious crowd of "Christians." Do Jesus Followers get boozed up at the strip joints just hours before Sunday church? Do Christian pastors loot their parish treasuries to pay for personal "outreach trips" to Aruba, or need a denominational hush fund for abused altar boys?

The Bible says that Christianity is about the power to be a new person, that becoming partakers of God's own holy nature is the proof of our salvation, and that we otherwise have no honest claim to eternal life. In Romans we read that the Gospel concerning Jesus Christ is the very power of God for our salvation, but we somehow seem to have lost track of exactly what that message is, and even why it matters. If anyone thinks otherwise, let them please put their definition in the replies below; but in the meantime the theologians of the day need to come to grips with what elements are missing and get them back before this rapidly-spreading "gospel-lite" drags any more souls into despair and perdition in the name of "hope!"

Western Mythology, Part Three: An Omniscient "Science"

2008-07-27T22:37:00.004-05:00

Oh, and here's one: That the Bible is true in as far as it can be scientifically proven. As long as there has been "science," the Bible has served as its guide. Sure, there will be instant reaction here, about Galileo and Copernicus, but the religious establishment was complaining, not about any contradiction with Scripture, but against Aristotle and Archimedes! Remember, this was a time when church scholars were debating things like whether women have souls, or, reportedly, how many angels can dance on a pin head! Church position depended on social rank, and classical Greek "science" was the latest fad in the universities. The discovery of ocean "paths" that sped the sailing ships to new worlds came from hearing a Psalms reading, and when Western man "discovered" that the world is, in fact, round, it was a reading from Isaiah 40 that started the ball rolling. On the other hand, if we start off reading the Bible with "scientific" limits to what we are willing to accept, then we've already lost before we've started, haven't we? At that point the basic science of logic has been overlooked: John Wesley offered this explanation: The Bible is either the work of good men and angels, bad men and devils, or it is from God. If the first, then why would the good make such claims about miracles, about God becoming Man, or about the Resurrection? Clearly, the Bible is not the work of good men, or angels! Could it then be the work of bad men, or even of devils?

Why would the evil ones go to the trouble of creating such a work that condemns their own activities? Clearly, again, it does not come from an evil source. The only choice left to us is that it comes from God, and if God has gone to such lengths to communicate with us, then that message might just be important enough to command our full attention.

A Question of Conscience

2008-07-20T10:50:00.001-05:00

About three fourths of the world's Anglican bishops are meeting this week in Canterbury for a conflab. The main issue in the meeting is about conscience. The other fourth is boycotting the meeting as a matter of conscience.

Pretty big word, this. What is conscience? To some it is simply a feeling that can be manipulated, or claimed as a weakness with which to manipulate others, lest they "hurt one's feelings." This view seems to fit well with the "Modern" view that there is really no truth or knowledge beyond mere opinions. These bishops, though, as sworn servants of Christ, should be expected to think Christian-ly and follow a Christian meaning of that word.

In the New Testament we find serious warnings to respect the consciences of other Christians. Paul writes, "do not for the sake of your flesh destroy a person for whom Christ died." He is there is talking there about respecting the consciences of others. Not that violating another's Christian conscience is an insult or a matter of hurt feelings, but a mortal threat. The word here is not "insult" or, as some might suggest, "challenge," but "destroy." How is this? How is this?

In Hebrews we read about Christians' consciences being cleansed of sin by the work of Christ's Spirit in our lives, and of a resulting confidence before God. We read in Timothy about how some people will "depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron." Each group is free from shame and guilt, but that is exactly where the resemblance ends. One is free from sin to know God, the others, well, just the opposite. For a Christian to cast away that confidence that comes from a cleansed conscience before God is the same as to defect from the Faith, and from Christ. For anyone, especially a leader in the Church of Christ, to reduce the question of "conscience" to a matter of personalities, is to declare themselves to be an enemy of the Gospel. Case closed.

Now who would want to be that foolhardy? As long as one has a conscience, there is hope. Let's be praying for the consciences of the bishops in England this week!

Real Faith, or Realpolitik?

2008-07-17T13:48:00.001-05:00

What do we believe? How to tell? Well what do we do? Modern life teaches us to put things into compartments and categories, so that we hear things like "I don't let my religion influence my public life," and see people praying "as we forgive those who trespass against us" on a Sunday and then plot their revenges during the week, all with no clue of the contradiction. Maybe we aren't all that "compartmentalised" at all.

Maybe we just don't have the courage to really believe in the first place.If a person believes their house is on fire they will respond. If they believe someone loves them that will influence how they behave toward that someone. Not only will it affect our outer behavior, but right down to our most pulse rate and blood chemistry. The point of faith is, by God's grace, of having a say in what we believe. In this generation, though, we have learned to "believe any number of things," without proof, and what we do believe is going to influence what we do.

In this way we can answer two important questions. The first is, what do we really believe, based on how we live? If I believe "God is love," then what I do will reflect just that. On the other hand, we can judge a certain teaching on how it is lived. Some church members in 1930's Germany believed that evolution and Protestant doctrine were converging to bring in the Kingdom of God on Earth through His perfected people. The Kingdom didn't come, of course, but they found that their doctrine
had been a crucial part in the coming of the Third Reich.

An even more important decision point is before the Church today. The Gospel of Christ has always been a message of transformation- of the "new man." The point of Jesus' Cross was of saving us from our sins. People in power groups in the American "Episcopal Church" have taken it on themselves to redefine that message so that the sins against which the Bible warns us are not nearly so condemning as presuming that the Bible warns us against those sins. Millions of dollars have been spent, and thousands of lives affected, in their high pressure campaign to establish "inclusivity" as the one cardinal virtue with anyone pausing so much as to ask if there are any standards for "inclusion into full participation" in the Church. Interestingly this is the "Protestant Episcopal Church" which, being anything but Roman Catholic, would say that it is God Who does the including and excluding for membership in the Body of Christ, and we would expect that the Roman Church would not dream of placing someone into a place of responsibility or, for that matter, offer Holy Communion to a person who is living openly in mortal sin. If the Episcopal church presumes to do so, are they not then saying that God is really out of touch, so they are taking over for Him in that department?

So how is this more important than the German Protestant blunder? In this way: In the 1930's they did recognise that God is in control, but presumed that "purifying" their country was an act of obedience. Today
these Americans are saying that a new deity, whom they call "Spirit," or a god which conforms to their own political agenda, is guiding their actions, and conformity to their politics is all that matters. The one sent millions to an early grave, the other threatens to detour millions away from a real faith in Christ for a false sense of security that merely being a nice green liberal is what really counts for the highest good.

Jesus said, "Come to me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest."

Western Mythology, Part Two: Brushfires and Smokescreens

2008-07-16T11:51:00.002-05:00

"Where there's smoke there's fire" is another one. This often is used to justify attacking the victim in a situation, or, even more often, for mindlessly believing malicious gossip. In thousands of relationships, whether business, family, marriage..., one party decides to betray the other. In a business, that leaves an innocent victim not only emotionally devastated by the betrayal and financially bankrupt, but marked by every wagging tongue in the community with the smear of "corrupt business practices." In marriages, how many times has the betrayed been treated as as "equally to blame" with the traitor? A woman decides that one man is not enough, or even that she has some kind of vendetta against "men" and the man who has devoted his life to her good is one of "them." (Of course, some shoes do fit both feet.) In short, if this kind of thinking is valid, then every house fire victim should be locked up for arson, and every widow(er) for murder!

Western Mythology, Part One: Education as Salvation

2008-07-14T10:37:00.002-05:00

"The Greek Myth:": From the time of Plato, or one of his poorer students, we have the idea that there is a kind of "education" which draws out the good in us, making all our intentions pure and all our decisions wise. It would seem that Hugh Hefner used that one to put pornography into mainstream society, by loading Playboy with articles written on a post-graduate level, and the "What sort of man reads /Playboy?/" internal advertising. (One might ask, after all, weren't there all kinds of nude representations in the ancient Greek sculptures? Well, actually, there were, and theywere generally set up along the roads leading to the temples where the prostitutes plied their trade. The noble Greeks had "solved" their problem of sexual misbehavior by having their religion endorse it! No, if this were the case, then we would surely see real virtue today, in a society which can boast of the highest education levels in history; but in fact the difference is only that the higher-educated, like the Greeks, are more skilled at weaving stories around their misdeeds, and using their networks of highly-placed old classmates and Greek society chums to make it all better. Example: If somebody steals a wallet on the street, there's an unblinking system of justice to make sure there's a prison cell waiting. If a judge or a lawyer perverts justice, costing someone far more than that wallet would have yielded, how often does that make the daily paper, or reach the courts to be made right? Education doesn't improve a person, but it does provide new skills and methods.

Is education a bad thing? Not necessarily, but can we really believe that stuffing the head can cure the heart?

The Great Egg Question

2008-07-04T10:44:00.001-05:00

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? A lot of the answering depends on the queen. Confused? Well, the thinking is that some claim the "Queen of the Sciences" is mathematics, and some say theology. If we make Mathematics the "queen," then are we saying that all other sciences serve Math? That we learn Physics, Chemistry, or Biology in order to better understand the world of numbers? Or would it be better to say that we use Math to straighten up the details for the other disciplines?

If, though, we say that Theology is the queen, are we recognising that the others serve to enhance our understanding of God? The Bible tells us that God is the Creator, that He created the Universe as a means of revealing His real nature, and that He wants to bring every human being into a deep and loving relationship with Himself. Interestingly, all that we learn from the "hard sciences" about this world in which we live- yes, the whole Universe for that matter- just happens to dovetail with what we read in the Bible, though written between 1,900 and over 3,000 years ago.So, back to the chicken house: Which came first? Philosophy can only ask the question. What we are willing to believe bout that question is really a matter of religion, isn't it? If we follow the Religion of Science, then we accept the latest hypothesis (scientific jargon for, "Gee, what if...?"), and obediently call it "true." A long chain of mutations, with no fossil record of any link in that chain, occurred, and the offspring of a great, cold-blooded lizard became small, feathery, and warm-blooded. Purely a "religious" idea, and counter to anything that hard science has to offer in terms of its observed laws and supported theories, it only differs from the old medieval idea of rags producing rats by injecting the magic words, "over millions of years..."

On the other hand, rather than give our slavish obedience to the Religion of Science, what if we look into the Science of Religion? Simply accept, as possible, the notion that God might really be God, and examine the evidence that other such scientists have discovered in the past. Was it Einstein who said that we can only see as far as we have by standing on the shoulders of giants? If we study Moses, Isaiah, Luke, Paul, (Ireneaus, Basil, or Gregory of Nyssa...), allowing that their experience and findings might actually be valid, there's a real
possibility of not only settling the Egg Question, but a lot more as well!

Justifications?

2008-06-30T12:21:00.002-05:00

In Christianity today we see "Justification" as meaning "saved by faith." That is entirely true, but is that the entire truth?

The Bible talks about Justification in three separate, related, ways. If we read the word to mean "made," or, "proven righteous or approved by God," then we have a good start. Romans speaks of sinners being "justified" through faith in God. "Abraham believed God," we read, and it was accounted to him for righteousness." This has been a bone of contention in the Church for ages. The Irish held to an individual faith in God as the basis for their salvation, and Pope John denounced such a faith as abominable and heretical. Nine hundred years later little had changed, and the Protestant movement adopted it as the One Point on which hangs all faith. It is an important truth that we are saved through faith, and that, "..the just shall live by faith."

James seems today to have been a bit of a renegade among the Apostles. At one point, Martin Luther called his letter "an epistle of straw." If we go along with that view, though, we really have lost our Bible, haven't we? If the Bible is simply a collection of the odd opinion, then it can only "teach" us what we already are willing to believe. In other words, we have stepped into the place of "teaching" Scripture what we think it ought to say. So what does James say that has gotten him such a reputation?In short, he said that we are justified by our works! Does this mean that a person who has no faith can be made right with God by "good deeds?" Without faith, where is the reason to want to please God to start with? Indeed, the justification is the "proof" that the faith is real. Abraham was "proven" when he offered his son, and Rahab was "proven" when she sheltered the spies. Each action was proof of a belief that already existed, and each person was "following up" on what they
already knew to be true. So "justification" is not just beginning the journey, but following it through.

A third way is also found in which we must be justified. We expect to be proven right with God at the Last Day when our Lord says, "Well done, good and faithful servant." In a way, James figures that in when he writes by the Holy Ghost that Abraham, and Rahab, were pronounced righteous, because of their works which came of their faith. Just like the "doctrine of baptisms," we have a single "event" in three different forms. Like the question of baptism, where we read that there is "one baptism" though three "baptisms" are needed, can we say that we are justified, if not fully justified?

"Only Believe?

2008-06-19T12:27:00.001-05:00

This from a conversation with a young Christian here in Belfast. (No, not the guy in the picture!) Nothing particularly Belfast about the question, but that's where the conversation was. My brother shared an opinion that the important thing is to have faith in God, but that it was not all that important to understand the details. If one's soul, one's "I," is understood as the mind, emotion, and will, and we believe without really using our minds to understand what it is we're believing, then what is left but the emotions and the will? How then is "faith" anything but to say, "I will because I feel like it?"

We can talk about being redeemed with old sermon illustrations about pawn shops and mortgage loans but the ottom line is that what is redeemed belongs wholly to the redeemer. If God has truly redeemed a life, then that life is thoroughly, wholly, His, and will be lived, by choice, in holy love.

To live in holy love, which is the nature and character of Christ, do we not need to understand what "holiness" really is? (Otherwise, how is "love" anything but "what feels good?") Instead, we are growing stronger through obedience when we "study to prove ourselves, unashamed ."

"Pursue peace with all men, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord." [Hebrews 12:14]

Why don't we make disciples?

2008-06-04T15:27:00.000-05:00

1. Our world view is all wrong. "Be holy as I am holy" is not a core conviction.

2. We prefer the things that are "more exciting" - like worship, harvesting tithes, building buildings, getting on the latest trendy movement of evangelicalism.

3. Not intentional enough. We think Sunday school or the regular programming dynamic of the local church will do the trick to transform lives.

4. We read the gospels for many reasons but not to find the methodology of Jesus for changing the world.

5. Hard to brag about discipleship in the statistics manual of district conference.

6. It is hard work.

7. We were not discipled therefore we don't have a clue what is meant by discipleship or how to do it.

8. American society is a time stealer, and discipleship, alas, takes time.

Borrowed from Evangelism Today!

The Christian Life, or Prison Life?

2008-06-02T16:23:00.002-05:00

An illustration from yesterday's sermon had a prisoner on death row, hopelessly awaiting his execution date to be set. The President shows up at his cell to offer him a full pardon. What does he do?

The text was Deuteronomy 11, where God is offering Israel a path of blessing, or of cursing. Abundance or famine, freedom or bondage. History, even the Hebrew Bible, tells us of their choices. Back in the sermon, the question was about whether the prisoner accepted the pardon or mocked the offer. If he were so foolish as to mock, we decided the President would not take it kindly. But let's look a little closer at that picture, and how you and I might find ourselves playing a part. The pardon has been declared, and the prisoner sits in his cell, pardoned and free.

Many in the Church today might find ourselves sitting in just that cell. We have heard the sentence. "The wages for sin is death." Everything we see is witness to the fact that we are guilty, and that we cannot make good the debt we have accrued against ourselves. But we have also heard the offer. Full pardon, yes, and freedom- freedom from the penalty, and freedom from the power of sin!

"That can't be!" we reply. "We're all sinners- that's just the way we are, isn't it?" We have heard the offer of freedom, but we keep staring at the walls of the cell. This is where we live! Can we even imagine living anywhere else than in the realm of condemnation? We read Romans 7, just the way we've been taught to read it- assuming that the "wretched man that I am" passages are somehow "more true" than the next chapter, which says, "But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you." and, "Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." In chapter 6, in the very part that says, "The wages of sin is death," the main point of that passage was using that "wage" to contrast the gift of life and freedom that Christ offers as it says, "..now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life. For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." Simply put, if we are still sinners, then we are still under condemnation for our sins. If we have the "gift of God" which is, "eternal life through Jesus," then we are "free from sin," and the deeds of the flesh have no more power over all who have received the Spirit of God. As we also read in Romans 8, if anyone is in Christ and, therefore, Christ in them, then the "body (the power of the physical and mental temptation to draw us into sin)" is dead, and it is no longer our lusts and desires that keep us going, but the Holy Spirit, Himself. So if we do sin, it is not because that is our nature, but we are going against our new, Blood-bought, nature and resisting the Holy Spirit Himself, to do so.

It is not that Christians sell themselves short when they call themselves "sinners." It is not humility to say that one's sinfulness is too big an obstacle for God to overcome, but it is selling God very short indeed. There is plenty of witness, throughout the Bible, that Christ came to save us from our sins. None at all, however, to allow for the impression that it is just the penalty that He died for. If we are saved, we are saved from our sins. If we are freed from the prison cell, it is no longer our home but a new home awaits us, "wherein dwelleth righteousness." Let's all leave that cell behind- There's a world of daylight awaiting!

A Three-fold Cord ..Quickly Broken!

2008-05-28T10:14:00.002-05:00

In First John we read that the "world" that threatens the Christian life is composed of three elements: The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Also, we read that this triple threat to the Faith is part of another group of three. This three-part "world" is married to both the devil and with our own fleshly natures to resist God's redeeming work in our lives. Rather like a three-stranded rope set as a trap to bind and ensnare s! Faced with opposition like this, we have to ask some questions:

What was God thinking? He calls us to commit our lives to Him, to be converted away from all these evils, then here we are faced with resisting that kind of influence for the rest of our earthly lives?

How can we resist an enemy that is not only all around us, but is even part of who we are?

What is this "salvation," anyway? Can we answer questions with a question? Is God unrighteous? We can easier ask if water is dry, or fire cold. We do see, though, that the enemy we face is not one to simply be resisted or tolerated "until we get to heaven," because if we are resisting it as someone trying to stand against a stream of water, then we are soaked by the water, and involved in the stream, no matter how firmly we have planted our feet in its muddy bottom. No, God calls on the Church to overcome the world, not just to keep up a futile fight against it. Would God send His children into a battle expecting them to be defeated, or give them a task without giving them also the means to complete it?

Second, we see that we are fighting an enemy which involves itself in the very basis of who we are. Did God come in the flesh only to save our souls? Is the God Who created this Universe not able to redeem our bodies as well as our spirits? If we only trust Him to do those things which we cannot see, then how is our understanding of God any better than make-believe? No, He Who would redeem our souls from destruction would also redeem our souls from the corruption of sin, as He says,

Salvation means victory: Partaking in real life in Jesus' real life victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil. Overcoming means being free from their influence, and in full possession of all that our enemies had taken from us. Jesus said He had come "to destroy the works of the devil," and that those who trust Him "would not lack any good thing," but rather would "be made partakers in His divine nature." This truth is woven even into the very fabric of the Word!

We read in Revelation that the holy martyrs had overcome in three ways: "by the blood of the Lamb, and the word of their testimony, and they loved not their lives unto the death." Three, met with three. First, the Blood is applied to our lives by faith, which is activated by our confession. Romans tells us that if we do believe to salvation then we will confess Him as Lord. The Early Church believed, and spread the Faith across the Roman Empire in the first generation. But there remains one more part to these three: "They loved not their lives to the death." What does this mean? The first eleven chapters of Romans go into some detail about the faith which we receive from the Lord, and then the twelfth tells us what is our "reasonable service," or response, to such a gift. Our lives are not our own! Our abandoning the worldly, fleshly, devilish, life for the life of Christ is what Holy Baptism is all about. But is a little water, or the grace relating to Church membership all that is involved in that Revelation picture? If so, then there must be a lot more to it than meets the eye! Hebrews mentions, among the "first principles," the "doctrine of baptisms." Why plural, when Ephesians says, "one baptism?" So far in this discussion we have seen several examples of the triune image in scripture: the world, the flesh, and the devil; the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life; and now the three weapons used to defeat that devil: the power they found in blood of the Lamb, the word of their testimony, and the power they found in self-abandonment (that is, faith in Christ) which we see in Holy Baptism. So what is this first principle of baptisms? First, let us look at the water. The Bible tells us that in baptism we are buried and rise with Jesus, but that leaves us with a problem: We see millions of people who have been baptised at some point in their lives, but how many reflect the love of God in their lives? Romans tells us that those who are baptised into Christ live in the same power that raised Him from the grave! We also read that it is not baptism that saves, but "the answer of a good conscience before God." So is there another part to this picture? We also read that Christians are baptised by the Holy Spirit into Christ. This is a separate point in our histories from water baptism. In the first, an elder in the Church visibly introduces us into the visible church through the use of water. In the second, the Spirit of the Living God invisibly brings us into Christ Himself by means only He can use. We call this conversion. Before He ascended, Jesus, "breathed on (His disciples) and said, 'Receive the Holy Spirit.'" From this point, even after having spent all that time learning at Jesus' feet and having received the Spirit (..if any have not the Spirit of Christ he is none of His!), they were not ready to be Christians! Jesus did not tell them to go out and be His witnesses, to heal the sick, cast out devils, or even to tell a soul about Him, but to return, and wait, in Jerusalem for "the Promise of the Father!" Even after having received the Spirit, in a short ten days the "over five hundred" there seem to have been on the mountain had dwindled to a hundred twenty. Minutes after the Promise was given, there were over three thousand souls added. What made the difference? The Third Baptism! John the Baptiser (No, he was not a Baptist, or any other denomination) said that he baptised with water, but the Christ would baptise with the Holy Spirit, and with fire. This Third Baptism, completes the trinity of the "one baptism" as promised, and as received. Why do so many Christians struggle with sin in their lives when the Bible speaks so much about freedom from sin's control? Why are so many too timid about the whole salvation picture to speak about it, or even live it out, in their everyday lives? They may have some experience of the converting baptism by the Spirit into Christ, and they may have been through the confessing washing of water into the Church, but are they completely baptised? They have a position in Christ, and they have a place in the Church, but do they have the power of the Spirit? This is not some new doctrine from the charismanic corner, but a clear command to all the Church, "Be filled with the Spirit!

Has This Happened Before?

2008-05-07T13:30:00.002-05:00

SUNDAY SCRIPTURE – MAY 4, 2008 SENT BY GHUNA KUMAR FOR GOSPEL FRIENDS,
P.BOX NO.2202, MANDAVELI, CHENNAI-28, INDIA

"MY CUP OVERFLOWS" Ps 23:5

The whole of last week this was our experience. We expected 2500
children to attend VBS at Living Hope Center, Mount Zion. But to our
amazement the Lord sent 3138 children from 88 villages with the age
group of 5 to 17. Our campus overflowed with souls. On the final day we
had great harvest of several hundreds of children committing their lives
to the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Image

2008-05-05T08:14:00.002-05:00

There are several ways that God uses to communicate with people, and several ways that people use to keep from hearing His voice. Why is that? Maybe there's something deep inside the human soul that wants to throw a tantrum over any suggestion that it might not actually be God after all. We've all known people like that, and maybe we could even say we've been people like that at some time.

The first thing created, says Genesis, was light. Jesus gives light to everyone born in this world. God wants us to be enlightened. We can't enlighten ourselves, but He wants to enlighten our hearts with His own presence.

At the Creation, we understand that God made mankind, both genders, in the image of God. Through sin, that Image is damaged, but we still long to create, and to love, and we love to see things of beauty, and deep down we know things that are true when nothing we learn in school supports them. There is such a thing as goodness, and marriage is respectable, and stealing is bad form regardless. Not just because there are laws, but there are laws because.

People with that "thing" in their souls, that thing called "sin" that is all about thinking it's in charge of it all, want to suppress that Image of a God beside themselves to the degree that the sin claims first place. It's interesting that, no matter how far we are separated from the One who is, ultimately, our Father, we always carry a picture of Him in our hearts.

Since we are, to the extent of being made in Him image, His children, He loves us and delights to see His good points develop in us. Unlike an earthly dad, this Father has no bad points, so there's none of that "Do as I say and not as I do" bit. But He loves us, and wants to see good in us for our own sakes, and to better communicate that likeness to the rest of us. When people talk about human dignity, or the sanctity of life, this is exactly the reason. We (ought to) respect one another far more than Da Vinci's heirs respect the Mona Lisa, or the most fervent patriots their flag. Because of the image of God upon the soul of every human being we respect their life and dignity, and because of that image upon us we think, and live, in ways that allow that likeness to develop in us.

If this is new to you, then it is first of all a matter of a child-Father relationship with God. This is the reason that Jesus came, to take away our sins and restore that relationship in all that are willing to become His children by a spiritual birth and not just from being of the human species. Those who come into that relationship begin to realise that it is the one reason for their (our) existence, as everything else does not just "pale in comparison" as a poet might say of some human devotion, but everything else actually fits together makes sense as it never could before. We can enjoy relationships with others on a whole new level, and also with thought, science, and the Universe in general. Like the old bit of Christian liturgy, "All things come from Thee, O God, and from thine own have we given Thee!"

By the way, here's a grabber for you!

Jesus Plus?

2008-04-26T16:38:00.003-05:00

Reading this week about a Chicago church that has been in the news recently, the sign out front reportedly advertises it as "Unashamedly Black and Uncompromisingly Christian." From this "uncompromised" position it last year gave a vocal enemy of Israel, of the Christian Faith, and of his own native US a special award just for "embodying greatness!"

The rub was there from the start: To be Christian is to belong to Christ, Who said, "No man can serve two masters." Surely every Christian is at some point of growing in that direction, but what if he or she isn't? We can be grateful to God for our circumstances, whether it be our ethnic background, level of wealth or lack of it, our skills, any number of things. But to add anything to our faith in Christ as essential to who we are (which this pastor was plainly doing, to the great expense of the Gospel): Isn't that to say that our kind of Christian is better than your "kind?"

It used to be a common phrase in preaching, "Jesus plus nothing." The point then was that our salvation is based on Jesus, and only on Jesus, rather than setting our confidence in our own devotions and initiatives. Paul, in Galatians, warned that church that if they set their confidence in Jesus plus anything for their salvation they put themselves in a position of making that other thing their savior, and if we could gain Heaven any other way than by the Cross, then Jesus died for nothing. In other words, as Paul put it, "you have fallen from grace."

Am I writing this to condemn that preacher? Before the Lord, and before the Lord only, he stands or falls. What, then? That loving God is a lifestyle decision, outside and in. There are two races on this planet: Them that are born once, and them that are born twice, the second by the Spirit of God. There are two nations, or kingdoms, in this world. The kingdom of God, which is a kingdom of righteousness, and the kingdom of sin, which is of the devil. There is no room for compromise: in military terms what is considered lost, and a compromised person a traitor. But why would anyone consider compromise, or even gaze off in that direction? The kingdom of God is "righteousness, peace, and joy," everything our human heart could ever hope for, and, "in the Holy Ghost," means that it is the very love of God Himself that is there to perfect us in His love. "For the Lord is that Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord."

Free in the Middle!

2008-04-20T19:04:00.002-05:00

Lately we hear people saying that the Bible is just a book, but it is only in Jesus that God revealed Himself. It is generally packaged in language that would sound a lot nicer, saying the Christ, alone, is the Word, or that the Bible is made of physical stuff like paper and ink, so how can we really trust it. Interestingly, a lot of these folks happen to have some paper and ink hanging on a wall someplace, which they expect to be taken quite seriously.

So what do we have, if we "only" have Jesus as God's revelation? First off, without the 300+ Bible prophecies He fulfilled we've already overlooked some amazing credentials. Then we would also lose His history within the Old Testament record as there are a number of incidents in which He shows up as a special messenger for God, whether as the "Captain of the Lord's hosts" to Joshua, the mysterious Melchizadek who met Abraham, and to whom Abraham gave a tithe (tenth part) of all he had gained in a miraculous victory of his servants against the kings of three cities, or any of many others. Then still we have Jesus quoting and authenticating the writings we've just been told aren't authentic. Can we have it both ways? If God has spoken to us at all, then Jesus Christ is right in the middle of God's revelation of Himself, as God personally, come as a man for mankind!

On the Cross, Jesus lived out what David wrote in Psalm 22 (among other places), and what Isaiah described in chapter 53 (among other places), and then rose again as predicted (again...). When He did rise, He told His disciples that it was necessary that He die and rise again as predicted in the Prophets, and that He would be returning to set all things right. If we take a serious look at Bible prophecy we find that hundreds of warnings and promises have already comeabout concerning captivities and returns, setting up and bringing down of kingdoms, and especially of Jesus' coming as the "Son of Joseph," the suffering Messiah. The promises of His Return, and the resurrection of all the dead (the righteous to eternal life, the rebellious to eternal torment) are just as sure, with His own resurrection as living proof that God is able to do even that.

So what do we do with that? Thomas had his doubts, but when confronted with the living Christ could only say, "My Lord and my God!" Thousands since him have gone the same way: They had their doubts, but when they were faced with that one Reality gave up their own worn-out opinions (as they suddenly saw them to be) for the Truth of God. When we consider what is in the balance, this is definitely one question that is worth finding out. Like Jesus said, "They will now the truth, and the truth will make them free," and, "He whom the Son sets free is free indeed!"

Little Boxes?

2008-04-15T15:59:00.003-05:00

It's become fashionable in Church circles today to talk about thinking or working "outside the box." An old truism says that insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results, and so comes a book some years back about "coloring outside the lines" which seems to be the base now for this "outside the box" language.

Speaking of coloring, one bit of info from my "undergrad days" was that Pablo Picasso was an accomplished student of the classical painting styles before he launched off into the Dada styling that made him famous. Possibly he could have gained the same fame anyway, but who knows? The point here is that he knew exactly where the lines were before coloring outside of them.

One concern comes of the fact that the Church is not a business concern, or an ad agency for that matter. A business is an organisation, made of rules and procedures. The Church is a supernatural organism, made up of the Spirit, Word, and Sacraments of God in the living souls of the Redeemed. One is powered by prestige, pride, and performance reviews, the other depends on God. While this sounds too vague or spiritualistic to some, it will ring true with the experience of many others. Now we come to the point of the matter.

To think "outside the box" we first have to find the box. Even thinking outside the thing, the thinking still relates back to it, or else it has no reference point by which to even say what the thinking is about. One has to wonder at times if these "outside the box" heads have really seen the box to which they are referring. The need in view is, for clergy and Church scholar, to find the box, the starting point: a Biblical understanding of the faith of the Early Father & Mothers of the Faith. The ones who learned from the Apostles, and the ones who worked through those teachings to teach the people of their own world. After you have gotten inside their faith, understanding the implications of Christ's resurrection, and of the Trinity, and where it all applies to being the Church then and today, then we can talk about "boxes:" Only by that time we will have discovered that "box" to be a vast city too great to measure!

Three Options, One Choice

2008-04-13T09:40:00.003-05:00

When Jesus Christ said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life:" He chose His words very carefully.

The: Not that He said a way, as if there are "many paths to God," but neither did He say "my teachings are the way!

Way: He Himself is the road to God.

The truth: Again the exclusive. Any notion is true, relative to this one truth. Himself!

The life: What does this say about those "outside?"

He then emphasised, "No one comes (not goes) to the Father but by Me."

And, notice, He started off that statement with a phrase that fit the conversation disturbingly well!

A popular song some years back said, "Nobody's right if everybody's wrong." If right were a matter of opinion, then nobody could really, be right, could they? What would "right" mean? A plurality of opinion votes? 51%? Full agreement?

If we were to "campaign" for truth, then surely Jesus would have some great qualities as a teacher, but a lot of things He said about His own person and purpose don't let us stop there. While skeptics today doubt all the miracle stories and "I am" statements in the Gospels, we must remember that there were enough witnesses to those miracles, and to the Resurrection, that for the first several hundred years the Church didn't have to argue for His divinity, but His humanity. There seems to have been no doubt about the Resurrection, even among the enemies of the Faith. If the priests or the sect leaders could have opposed that notion, surely with their thousands of followers it would not have taken a week to find the body, but nobody seems to have even tried. Their concern, from all accounts, was for "damage control" /after the fact!/

So what do we do with this claim? As somebody put it, either He's a liar, a lunatic, or Lord of all. If His had been another messianic movement, then why was such love, and not power or authority His main thrust, even when His followers were ready to launch a revolt in His name? And surely, any other man would have confessed under the torture He endured, hoping at least for a quicker death. Besides that, a politico or scam artist would have been a bit more careful to tell people things they could understand, and not rock the boat so badly. He rocked everybody's boat, from the far left to the far right in religion and politics!

A lunatic, then? What He had to say was too consistent, and the root of mental illness seems to be a heightened sense of pride or self-preservation. He taught about "laying down one's life," and demonstrated it! A "great teacher" would have spent more time on discourses, but He basically affirmed the moral law and its foundation in the Jewish Bible, and went so far as to say it applies to our hearts as well as our hands, and that He was come to be the ultimate holocaust: the sacrifice victim that would finally take our sins away. Radical, but definitely not crazy.

Logically, that only leaves us with Lordship. But what do we do with that? History gives us three options. We may, like many of the rulers of that day, oppose His message (can we divide the Person from His message, if the Person is true?) in a scramble to maintain control regardless of either truth or consequences. For such a person, I have only the deepest pity. Others somehow insist on dis-believing these things based on things they have read or heard. Those who make this choice I would beg, on bended knee, to check your sources. There is a lot of publishing that is based on a writer's attempt to prove what they already choose to believe, but this is a matter much more important than merely picking opinions like sports teams, though some do enter into it that lightly.

The third option is simple belief. He has said it, and proven it, and history supports it. Belief though, is not a mere opinion, but a life: A life lodged within the Life!

The Payoff?

2008-04-02T16:36:00.004-05:00

Continued from "Invisible Sidewalks" (below)

So then our goal in all this- What is it? To drop our blessed backsides into a holy hammock and catch a Son tan? Not likely. We so often speak of "Our Heavenly Reward" as it were some kind of trophy home on high that we have earned by our own religiosity. No matter if that religiosity had more to do with the number of prayers we prayed, or the number of sinners we prayed with, or just that we did, one time, pray a "sinner's prayer." Short answer to a long question: It ain't about us! Glory is not about personal gain any more than it is about a jihadist's dreams of an eternal orgy. John wrote in 1st John 3, "..We know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is." A Christian's hope, though yes there will be "joy unspeakable, and full of glory," yet all that will be a fulfillment of what has begun here in this life: Our hope is that we will see Jesus, face to Face, and be changed through love for Him to be like Him Whom we see! If that is the goal, then where is the road? Is that is what we are hoping for, what we are seeking now, or is there some kind of "sanctified selfishness" in the picture someplace? Could we ever hope to gain more than Jesus?

Invisible Sidewalks?

2008-03-27T23:02:00.004-05:00

Picking up from "Pearls..." (below):

The streets in the City are made of "gold purified by fire, as clear as crystal." Pure gold is a picture of faith throughout the Bible, and it is surely a "walk by faith" to step out onto a path that can't be seen. those who walk on such streets have to be accustomed to walking where they cannot see, and going where they do not understand. For them, the invisible pavement will not be something unusual, but their usual way of walking, as we read, "for we walk by faith, and not by sight!"

With our eyes closed? No, but with our faith open! To follow Christ, to walk with Him, is a picture of sharing, trust, and love. What we do is as He leads, and empowers us. If we do not obey and walk with Him, it is not, as some suggest, a matter of faith, since it's "just natural." "The natural man," the Bible tells us, "cannot understand the things of God," but His plan for the Church is to comprehend His fullness and be transformed into His likeness, even in this life. So the harder we press forward, and the more of ourselves we give over to Him, the more we are (hopefully) showing the real faith that He has planted in our hearts. Not "works," proving our own merit, but faith producing a loving obedience to our Lord. Stay tuned for the transformation!

Photo credit http://www.flickr.com/photos/italamaria/

Pearls Big Enough to Walk Through!

2008-03-26T00:00:00.002-05:00

[Picking up from "Eternal Candyland' (below):]
We read in Acts that Paul's gospel was that "that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God." A pearl only comes from patiently dealing with trouble. A piece of grit gets up under a clam's neck and troubles it, and the way the clam deals with the trouble produces something of lasting beauty and value. In order to get into that city, to see Christ, it will take perseverance. In fact, in we read that God, "will give eternal life to those who persist in doing good, seeking after the glory and honor and immortality that God offers. But he will pour out his anger and wrath on those who live for themselves..." Jesus said, "The gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to (eternal) life, and those who find it are few." So those that see those gates of pearl will be the ones that know what the pearl is all about.

At about this point, some will be asking if we're talking about our own hard work saving us, or impressing God so much he'll just have to let us in. Short answer- not even a little bit. Come back for the next installment to see what kind of road we've got for the journey!

Eternal Candyland?

2008-03-25T01:17:00.003-05:00

God's plan for Israel never was a free ride to a candy-coated oblivion. Jesus, the Son, didn't come with any Big New Plan. There is a difference between the Old and New Testaments on what trust in God looks like, but the real story is that, "nothing ventured, nothing gained," is true here if any place. There is a price on faith. It's called obedience. Really,
is there a difference?

Back to the candy shop: Western Christianity has gone from real faith in Christ for salvation to a "prayer of faith" for a promise of eternal self-indulgence, to a "word of faith" for the same selfishness here and now. It's become popular to think of the Afterlife as being defined by our "fondest dreams!" There are some references to the New Jerusalem with the pearl gates and streets of transparently pure gold, where Christ is the light of that city. While I have no problem with that city being a real thing in the future, let's look at those gates and streets.

A Bargain at Any Price!

2008-03-20T20:53:00.003-05:00

We all know what it is to play warfare in mock battle, that it means to imitate everything just as it is in war. ..everything exactly as in war, lacking only one thing . . . the danger.

So also it is with playing Christianity, that is, imitating Christian preaching in such a way that everything, absolutely everything is included in as deceptive a form as possible–only one thing is lacking . . . the danger.

[Søren Kierkegaard, Attack Upon Christendom, trans. Walter Lowrie (1944; reprint, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968), 180. Borrowed from http://www.kairosjournal.org

Where is the danger in Christianity? Is there any challenge? What is the hope? Some church people won't even talk to others if those others talk like this. "They actually believe that there can be a danger!" they say. Did God send prophets to promise Israel a free ride to a candy-coated oblivion? Did Jesus bring such a message?

Jesus said if we want to win, we've got to learn to lose, to be the chief means to wash feet, and to find life means yielding our lives to Him. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." So why do millions risk their lives in hostile countries to claim his name? Stay tuned!

[Painting, Crucifixion, Emile Nolde, 220.5 x 193.5 cm, Oil on Canvas, 1912]

A Full Life, and an Empty Life?

2008-03-01T18:24:00.004-06:00

Warren Chastain of OMF, writing in Perspectives, makes a remark that most people speak of an altar of sacrifice, but usually manage to turn it into a stage for seeking applause. Too often in our own churches we see individuals who have a "cross to bear" which garners them all kinds of respect and support among the congregation at-large. One story has been told of a woman who would stand to ask prayer every Sunday night for her unsaved husband, often salting her pleas with the latest news on her sufferings in that marriage. After a couple of years a new preacher came to that church and decided to spend some time on her husband. Not a lot of preaching, but a good amount of time spent fishing or playing golf. The husband did become a Christian, but the biggest surprise was the man's wife. She was furious! No longer could she be the star of the prayer meetings and the darling of the sewing circle. Suddenly her credibility was about what kind of Christian she was, how closely she herself related to her Lord, and the fruit that relationship bore in her own life. All those years invested in self-pity had done nothing for her own Christian walk, and the most glorious thing that could have happened for her affected her as if she had been robbed.

What kind Christians are we? A previous piece on this site covered some basic meanings for that word: Whether we are born in a "Christian" culture, grow up in a "Christian" home, "convert" through some ritual (Holy Baptism, "praying the prayer," etc.), or whether we are actually living "by the faith of the Son of God."

A preacher I once knew would butter up the congregation with words about how they were, every one, "filled with the Spirit" and use other such words to paint them a picture that they were all just as complete, consecrated, and holy as God intended. Then he would go on to say how badly he wanted to see revival. If everybody's already so holy, then what was lacking? One 19th Century evangelist wrote that the first thing needed for revival was for the people to be anxious about their own souls. This fits perfectly with Paul's words, that we should, "work out our own salvation with fear and trembling." Notice, now, that he did not say, "work for," but "work out." A maths prof would give us sheets of problems with the answers already printed on the sheets. It was one thing to have the answers given to us, but to go through the process of working out the steps in between made the difference between seeing the answer and having the answer: God wants us to not just be aware of it, but to possess salvation. That preacher had not worked it out that the Gospel is not just "God is for us," but also about "God in us!" Jesus didn't give his life for us to say, "gee, thanks" and continue to lie back in our sins, but to be raised up in newness of life and apprehend, by the power of the Spirit, the fullness of the life of Christ in our own existence here on earth. "Christ in you, the hope of glory" was Paul's bragging point for the Philippians: Not just "Christ for you."

So, can we get something if we keep our hands in our pockets? Can we embrace the crucified life with our arms folded? There were seven churches that Jesus to whom Jesus dictated letters. Some were healthy, some he gave stern warnings, but the one which was the most sternly warned (Some might even say He was on the point of giving them up!) was the one who was the most assured. Can we learn something from this?

"As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous therefore, and repent"

Only Visiting this Planet

2008-02-24T20:28:00.004-06:00

A great hero to a lot of people, and a mentor to many, passed on to Glory this morning. Larry Norman, the first musician to use his musical "first language" (at least in the modern Western culture) pioneered was was disparaged as "Christian Rock and Roll" by a generation who still esteemed Fanny Crosby as the last word in hymnody. While not quite as prolific as Miss Crosby, Larry was responsible for songs like "Why Don't You Look into Jesus," "I am a Servant," "The Outlaw," and "Why Should the Devil (have all the good music)." Curiously, the last title was a tribute to Martin Luther, though many reacted as if he had attacked both the Church and her Lord in singing it.

For over ten years he was the only musician in the States singing for the Lord with contemporary styling, and one of very few to use a guitar. Besides his own talent, he graced us with such musicians as Mark Heard, Randy Stonehill, and Steve Taylor, and seemed to have borne much influence on Bob Dylan as Dylan did on his own work. Norman's "Reader's Digest," "Six-O'Clock News," and "Why Don't You Look into Jesus" and such Dylan hits as "Serve Somebody," reflect as much.

Having grown up in the only white family in an African-American neighborhood in Los Angeles, Larry learned early to love the Lord with his all, and to put his heart and soul into what was put before him, and in his case that "what" was proclaiming the praises of His Savior, which he did with everything he had: A guitar, a heart of love, and a voice that never impressed but always reached straight to the heart. Having assisted with his sound at one concert, that was what came across without ever trying. A real man of God who will be sorely missed. Sing loud, Larry! You've finally got the ultimate Audience!

The Long View

2008-02-23T17:45:00.003-06:00

When I was a kid, my parents had a little pontoon houseboat, which I would take a turn steering from time to time, and later a time or two steering a river tug with a barge. Now, if you're steering a fast boat it's simple enough to head for a spot and throttle on, but on something bigger it might be a few minutes before a turn of the wheel has any effect on your course. The difference is that the helmsman on the bigger vessels needs to have an eye on his trail as well as his heading. In seeing the beginning point and the trail left from the propellers abaft as well as the point toward which she's headed the helmsman can have a better understanding of how straight his course has been- whether he's been over- or under-steering, tending left or right, etc., and how to stay better on course.

Over the years, I've been in a number of different churches, and responded to a number of different philosophies. With all the variations one to another the focus always seemed to be on the "right now." Whatever the leaders' impressions were about "What God is doing," or "What we need," right now was the key question. Of course, this leaves room for all kinds of variations. If we take a close look at Holy Scripture we find that God does not change, cannot lie, and will not turn away from His plan; so unless He went on vacation just after Pentecost and just now remembered He has a Church on this planet (Nope- scratch that: Forgetting is not an option either!) His Spirit has been confirming His work, and word, to pastors and teachers over the last 1970-odd years.

Hebrews 12 tells us that all Believers, from the beginning to the end, are in fellowship one with another. When we gather for worship we may only see the people in that room, but our prayers and singing are part of a harmony that stretches around the world, through time, and includes saints in Heaven as well as on earth. One of the practical aspects to this is that, since God doesn't change, and we can tell with little trouble that human nature really doesn't either, we can expect that the Apostles and their disciples, etc., had to ask God's guidance on a lot of the same issues we face today. We have the Holy Spirit as our Teacher, and so did the Church before us. It is one thing to be thinking on Holy Scripture and the Spirit give us an insight, or an answer to some difficulty, and it is good to have that insight confirmed through a friend, but it is another thing altogether to see the exact same message in the writings of someone from 200, 900, or 1,900 years ago. On the other hand, sometimes the Lord uses some of those older scholars as a hint for us to re-think our own assumptions in our own place and time. In time, we learn to correct our steering, avoid some snags, and make it to Harbor for the great Celebration. I can almost imagine some of the conversations, with, say, Gregory or Macarius asking a "modern" Christian whether one of their letters had helped him or her at such a time, or a Christian from the year 2050 thanking John Wesley for helping them out of their own religious fog with his sermons. We're all in this together, the Lord is our Navigator, and the fact that so many scholars from so many eras have stayed His course through all the shoals and cross-currents of their days is a testimony for us all to learn from.

It’s all about Theology!

2008-02-15T14:12:00.004-06:00

Einstein was even righter than he realised. The famous genius of the 20th Century was able to use mathematics to show links between time and motion (Theory of Relativity) and between matter and energy, and closed out his career developing a "Unified Field Theorem." There has to be a unity to the Universe, he reasoned, but just what was the keystone that held it all together?

Without near the intellect of an Einstein, but actually one who wonders if high intelligence might not be a "disability" in this world, one might wonder if the one fly in his ointment, keeping him from actually bringing his theorem together, might have been his theology.

Einstein was convinced that God, if there were such, would most likely be defined (divined?) on the lines of Spinoza's philosophies. In other words, a deity which was part of the Universe, and visible in its workings. This would mean that, to find or understand "God" one must understand those workings. If we can gain a clear enough view of enough of the particulars, we will see the general picture they comprise!

In theory, this sounds nice enough, though the number of particulars is mind-boggling. Just think of the story of the blind men who wanted to find out what an elephant was. After hearing of one at a passing circus they gained access to its pen. One examined its tail, one its hind leg, and one its trunk. On the way home, they argued whether this creature was more like a rope, a tree, or a great serpent!

Ecclesiastes tells us, "He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end." There is so much to learn- so much to know, and as part of our divine make-up (The Imago Dei, or image of God which is upon each of us) is that we are drawn to the beauty and complexity we find all around us. The very fact that we do find a complexity, and not chaos, shows a coordination which in turn begs a unity somewhere, somehow. Interestingly, it is the beauty, the order, and the over-all coordination that both draws us into
further study and which points us, like Prof. Einstein, toward the existence of some keystone which ties it all together.

What is that keystone? If God is behind Creation, then we can expect evidence of design. Is there coordination? Is there a food cycle for each of the billions of species on this planet? Isn't the very fact of planets and moons in orbit suggestive that Someone must have calculated mass, velocity, gravity, and set them there in those paths? (The "accidental capture" idea is an amazing stretch!) The bottom line is that the study of natural phenomena ("Natural Theology") can only take us so far, but it does point us to a unity. But it does accomplish two things: It leads to discoveries about a hypothetical Creator ("For every
effect, there is a cause:" First Law of Physics.) who is greater than Creation (The cause is greater than the effect:" Second Law.) and, hence, not part of it. This Creator loves order and detail (a first class in anything from Algebra to Zoology will bear this out!), and He loves us (the beauty in Nature, the beauty that covers and surrounds our planet, great array of tasty foods we enjoy...). Any contrary opinions would have to argue from the exceptions, and just in acknowledging them to be exceptions does that argument a fatal blow!

If this Creator is like our best science indicates, then it would make sense that He wants us to know about Him. So, then, if there is a Creator who is free from the obligations of citizenship in this Universe, (time, space, causality..), who communicates through order and beauty that we can recognise, and who is kind; and who wishes to be known to us, it does stand to reason that if this Creator wanted to do something, it would get done, and so it probably has caused there to be some kind of record of such a revelation. We can look through all kinds of possibilities, but an earnest, open-minded, search is bound to wind up with this:

For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that
whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Who Am I?

2008-02-07T21:30:00.001-06:00

Good movie- sure, Jackie Chan is great!

But, getting down to it, before we ask if something is true, we need to know if we're able to find out. Is it knowable? Can we know? What is knowledge? What are we, to even ask that question?

If we follow that line of thinking from the popular assumption that we are all random collections of cells, which we assume are random collections, ultimately, of atomic particles, then lose three key pieces to finding out any answers. Life, order, and personality. In a random universe there is no way for any of them to develop, and for them to exist is a direct violation of the laws of science.

First, Life may be continued from one organism to its offspring, but it is not reproducible. Even the most orderly and controlled experiments fail, and the model for life's origins is neither. The one experiment, decades old now, that was claimed to have produced "life in a test tube" was shown, in attempts to repeat it, that the first container had not been sufficiently sealed, and the "findings" turned out to be contamination! If you are alive, that life came from somewhere.

Order, whether living or inert, always tends toward disorder. A pile of mud has yet to collapse upward into a brick office building. In fact, it takes a lot of energy in baking the brick, producing the steel straps, making the mortar, and developing and using the skills to lay the bricks to keep those bricks from too soon collapsing back into a pile of mud! Or, can an old person naturally grow young? Some might point out that young people, especially Japanese, are growing taller than previous generations, but a closer look shows nutrition, and not some genetic mystery, as the cause. More energy going into a system, more energy inherent in the system; but the "energy" will dissipate, and those young
will also soon be old.

Physics tells us that everything comes from something. Energy cannot be created or destroyed within the limits of our material Universe, and all matter (anything that can have any weight or take up any space) is, in simple terms, compressed energy. Everything has a source, and the source is always greater. The ball might be rolling down hill, but how did it get up there? It made for a silly song a few years ago, but we really don't look for three-pound birds laying five-pound eggs, do we? If our lives have a source, and that source is greater then it can't have been a chimp, a frog, or a pond scum, can it? If we apply this to the Universe itself, the entire Universe had to have come from something, as
it cannot have created itself, and it has to have been designed and fashioned to possess such amazing order and complexity. It doesn't quite look like we're alone, does it?

The mind, and personality, raise the stakes considerably. At last look, "Modern Science" still does not know what the mind is, and assumes it to be located in the skull just for the sake of discussion. When we go from the mind to the intricately complex personality, all bets are off. The one explanation left on the table is, "In the beginning, God..!"

So, if we want to know who we are, the question is askable. The answer is knowable, because there is an orderly, created, reality which can be known. That we can know, and the Universe can be known, suggests that there is a Creator, an Artist, if you will, who wishes to be known in it.

All this is based on those first three words in the Bible. Wonder what else is there!

The Best there Is!

2008-01-31T18:30:00.000-06:00

"I am the vine," says Jesus, and proceeds to explain to His disciples that each of His followers is like so many branches growing from the one plant, nourished from the same root. A popular spin from that has been that vines don't know anything about fences, so there is no need for "established religion." That argument goes on to say that since "wherever two or three are gathered" Christ is there, then that is all there really is to "Church."

This sounds great for its simplicity, but then there are two meanings for the word, "Simple," aren't there? Taking the second idea first, if "wherever two or three are gathered" is the Church then haven't we traded the vine for a scattering of mushrooms? A vine is not so many bits of green here and there, with no relationship except with the root, or a gathering of green bits from here and there to form a vine. The root produces the vine, which grows branches which then grow tendrils and keep growing. We could go a lot farther into this picture, but the main point for today is that we are all connected (established) in Christ as so many parts of a living structure, supplying each other with that
grace which we ourselves are supplied by others. This brings in the ministries touched on in Ephesians 4 as well as Romans 12, &c.

As for the fences, the interesting part of that is a question: When have you seen a grape vine growing without some structure on which to climb? If we see such a thing, it is always a young vine, and without much fruit. A big, healthy, productive vine is a tended vine with a good trellis to support its branches. The vine Jesus was talking about was such a vine, with the Father Himself as the Vinedresser. Why would we want to paint ourselves as a wild vine, crawling through the weeds and thorns if God wants to prune and protect us?

In history, we started off with "established religion" as the Apostles and prophets, evangelists, and pastors labored together to nourish a single vine which withstood persecutions, heresies, and plagues for about a thousand years before suffering the first division (between the two ranking bishops, over what may yet be shown to have come primarIly of a language difference), and half another millennium before further divisions occurred. It may be argued that in nearly every schism the group leaving the larger body did so with great reluctance, and labored to prove itself to be, essentially, still part of that historical progression that is the "established" Church.

Roll the clock ahead a bit farther, and let Scholasticism gain its full growth and birth Humanism and Rationalism (yes, this is a simplified story!), and we see the coming of "movements" as diverse as Seventh-Day Adventism, Theosophy, Mormonism, Darbyism, and the "Watchtower." The Christian "Establishment" now consists of thousands of separate groups, each telling the other, "I have no need of you," while millions of people wander off into the void to be "churches" unto themselves.

We could follow this thinking to say that all Christians should therefore be members of the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox churches, or even that one must be be saved. Conditions as varied as human history and God's grace would say otherwise. Then, what?

First, just as the vine to which Jesus compares us needs a frame to protect it from animals and rot, and to hold it separate from the other plants, the Church needs to grow on the framework He has provided us. Like it can be said that a vine has "generations" of growth from season to season, the truth, the spiritual DNA which defines our makeup as Christians, has been passed on to us from Christ, through our faithful (spiritual) ancestors. To be sure, there has been some lost and added, and so the need to find the "standard" as close to the root as possible so we can have some assurance that we are not just tied in to the latest religious fad to hijack that holy Name.

As well, we need to see that the vine really is distinct: Like a specialty grape compared with the thorns and weeds that grow around it. Just like the whole vineyard belongs to the vinedresser, so the world in general belongs to God: But just like the vine is uniquely his, the reason for his building the vineyard, so the Church is God's peculiar possession, the object of His love and attention. To be His means to be holy: any other option is rebellion.

Do we end on a negative note? Not at all, because that holiness is not a "work of rightousness" that we have to perform, but a blessing He wants to give us, a miracle for Him to work in our lives. Just as salvation, the New Birth, enables us to love God from a redeemed heart, His plan is to cleanse and renew us so that we may live and grow in that love "without wrath and doubting." Is this not the best there is?

Do You Wonder?

2008-01-24T18:11:00.000-06:00

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to find out that what you once believed, way back when, were actually true? That there really is such a thing as right, and wrong is just a lack of it? That love is more than chemistry, or some kind of insecurity, but a real source of strength to make things right, and do right, and even make great sacrifices without feeling any loss? That your life is more than a few sparks jolting some neurons here and there, but the reason for those nerve cells firing? That there really is a forever, an eternity, and a God who lives there, and here, and created you and me to enjoy his love, forever? Did you ever wonder what could have ever taken our minds off of such a great hope as that, or how to actually take hold of it? Did you notice a Bible on your bookshelf last time you walked by it? Have you ever read in there what Jesus had to say about all this? The most wonderful part of anybody's life can start by opening those pages, and simply saying, from one's heart, "Lord, show me your Truth!"