March 14, 2008

I believe the prosperity gospel has allowed people to substitute sharing in peoples' burdens by telling them to get "faith" so their burdens will go away.  We no longer know how to be involved in peoples' lives and hurt with them because we are so busy expecting God to perform some type of intervention.

I don't get it when people say Jesus or God called me to ____ whatever.  Are they trying to prove they have a special audience with God?  It must be nice to have God speak to them so "they" know exactly what to do to make God happy in their lives.  I think people on the whole absorb these things with only the left side of their brain.  They do not question if God truly speaks today because inside they are either hearing or hoping to hear God's voice also.

February 2, 2008

I have figured out a way to explain the humanity and the deity of Christ.  As far as the "man" goes, the flesh that embodied Jesus Christ was not in eternity.  His "flesh" side consisted of the skin cells, hair, and other parts of his body formed in the womb of Mary by the Holy Spirit.  The body of Christ was created.  

I don't believe this is heresy.  Jesus Christ was truly God and truly man.  However, he did not have the same nature of man because a man was not the father of the child in Mary's womb.  If we say the physical body of Christ was eternal, then flesh would be considered before time was created by God.  This is inconsistent with the story of creation.  Everything that exists on this earth had a starting point and God pre-existed before it.  Therefore, the body structure of Jesus Christ was created by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Paul refers to Christ as the second Adam in the sense that his act brought forgiveness to many.  We have a man who is not participating in the original sin.  In my mind, he's just like Adam before the fall.  He only knows good and only desires to serve God to the fullest.  When God created the first Adam, he was perfect because a perfect God can only create perfect beings.  The body and man-nature of Jesus Christ was perfect because he was created by God.  However, Jesus Christ was not only a mere man, but he possessed the very nature of God right side by side with a man nature, and although the man nature had not sin, it was nonetheless still truly man.   

God created himself  a body that did not exist prior to creation, in the form of Jesus Christ.  That body had a man nature and was without sin because it was created by a perfect God.  God in his essence came down and dwelt among us in a sinless body.  We say that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  In the sense of eternity, we're talking about the essence of Christ.

A man had to pay the price for the act of rebellion against God at the garden.  That man was the man nature created by the Holy Spirit in the womb of Mary.  He was perfect and without sin and obedient to God as Adam was obedient to God before the fall.  

The man Christ was the perfect sacrifice on the cross because he was without sin.  He died and was raised from the grave by God in the same body as he was when on this earth.  His body was transformed beyond the potential of sin and glorified in heaven when presented before the Father.  We know he came back after being presented before the Father and was recognized as he had been on this earth before he died.  He did tell Mary not to touch him before his glorification.  But there is no explanation scripture to tell us precisely why he could not be touched by a human before he was glorified.  Paul does tell us later of the promise of a glorified body.  

This is why we have to hope in him and the testimony to which he testifies.  He has gone before us as a man and has been approved by God through the resurrection.  Our hope is in the acceptance that God has shown to him.  He is the first born of many, spiritually, in a glorified body.  I cannot see anything wrong with distinguishing the ethical body that got used to incarnate himself on this earth from the very essence of God who dwelt in that body.  

January 28, 2008

Is God sovereign or deterministic?  I do not believe a sovereign God has to be deterministic.  A God who upholds and sustains his creation does not have to be a controlling God.  I think there is a distinction between God's will and what he decrees.

God decreed or spoke the earth and the laws governing it into existence.  But to speak the laws of nature into existence and then control each event on the earth as a deterministic God would do is to wonder why God even created the laws of nature.

God gave man free will and because God issued that for man, that decree is perfect.  You cannot have man being controlled by a deterministic God if that same God has issued a command/privilege/granted man free will. 

The argument is God is perfect in all he does, and if he decides man to be free, that gift of freedom is perfect.

Preachers have said if God wants all men to be saved, all men would be saved.  This is an argument of either/or.  In this argument, there is no granting of a third option.  I believe the third option is that God does not have to apologize for man's self-determined nature.  Those who teach limited atonement are basing their argument on an either/or God.  God has to be either sovereign/deterministic and man must be subject to a deterministic God.

A deterministic God controls every minute detail.  How do you love a God freely if your desire to love is chosen by him to love him?  If God chooses us to salvation by an act other than our free will or self-deterministic nature, then we have not freely chosen, therefore we are not free.

January 23, 2008

A lot of people like the scripture of Paul that says, "I can do all thing through Christ who strengthens me."  But they often leave out the last part of the verse.  Paul says further that "I have learned to live without and I have learned to live with plenty."  He is referring to material things.  Paul makes the statement that he can be content in any situation because of Christ and the reality of what He's done which strengthens him.

January 8, 2008

The Bible makes it very clear that sin and its effects (sickness and disease) will reign on this earth until Christ returns.  Even Christ did not eradicate sin completely from the earth when he was here.  When people profess that God will heal them because they have enough faith, they contribute to a false security in the ability of man.  Man will not conquer sin and its effects.

Christians should beware of any organization which professes a utopia in this world and that includes the word of faith movement.

The other thing this belief system attributes to is a lack of volunteerism.  People are less likely to get involved when they believe the answer can be sending in money or just professing something to be.  This brings an attitude of laziness when one believes that all the power to accomplish the goal is within yourself in the way you think.  Why help a brother in need financially when you can just tell him to believe for the finances he needs?  This lets you off the hook from giving of your own money when you tell him to believe for money from God.

November 30, 2007

The very fact you know everything has a plan begs the question 'how do you know nothing is of chance.'  A lot of Christians accept or express this philosophy when it comes to God.  They use Jeremiah's scripture "God's ways are not your ways" to make God and humanity a mystery.  God is actually telling Israel about His specific future plans for them as they were being carried away to Babylonian captivity.  God was encouraging them after they broke His covenant and letting them know He would provide for their inability to keep His covenant.

November 19, 2007

The difference between a theist and atheist is, the latter ascribes awe to the universe's effects,  while the former ascribes awe to the personality behind the effects.  

October 18, 2007

I am a metaphor by my representation of the God who created me.  A metaphor is not exactly the same as what it represents.  I have the ability to love and so does my God.  I have the ability to show and desire justice for the poor.  My God desires justice for the poor.  However, I am not able to perfectly love as my God can.  Justice in our society is not based on a perfect absolute.  Our love for people closest to us is based on conditions no matter how deep our love.  So being a metaphor means I represent a reality other than what I am.  Yes, I exist, but I only exist as a representative of the God who is perfect in ways I only reflect metaphorically.

October 16, 2007

Last night PBS and Nova had a show on the incredible body.  The subject was the heart and the transplanting of hearts, which is called harvesting, and all that pertains to why people have heart transplants.

They showed a medical team, called the harvest team because they get the donated organ and bring it to the receiver.  I found it fascinating all the expense and undertakings spent on harvesting a heart from a car accident victim on the other side of the country.  

The team work was incredible, how just as the heart arrived to the receiver, the patient was ready to be implanted with the heart.  When they put the heart in, it had to be jump-started with an electronic shock because once the heart stopped, it can't beat on its own.  The heart, once cut from the donor, will not be any good after 4 hours.  It is put on ice and transported across the country and placed in the transplantee with just enough time to spare.

How interesting it was to watch all this fuss over an organ which cannot live outside the human body, and yet a fetus can live outside the body.  The fetus is called an "organ" and yet is not attributed with life.  A heart is an organ and it gets special treatment for its capacity to sustain life.  A fetus is life into itself living, and is not granted the special treatment of a heart.  Maybe we should start having harvesting life from the womb on donor cards.  We go to great lengths to harvest organs for those who are dying, and yet we cannot see the value in life becoming.  

Sept. 9, 2007

Determinism means God is the one who controls every event.  Some say we cannot respond to God's grace without Him first giving us a gift of faith.  This makes you totally at the mercy of God giving you this faith and somehow after you have received it, you must be able to know when it was given.

If I say I live in a cause & effect universe and God does not stop me from sinning or God does not interfere with my actions, am I being arrogant?  How do we separate free will to sin from God's perfect plan for our lives?  

If I start a church and it grows to impressive numbers, does God have anything to do with it?  Some would use the verse in Acts 2:47 to say God is always in charge of the membership in church.  If this is the case then we have to assume one of two possibilities.  If every member or attendee is God adding to the church, then who is responsible when the attendance drops?  Is God responsible for the one attending your church who later steals money from members?  

If we are going to be consistent, some determining factor has to get credit if man is not allowed to be free to attend whatever church he wants.  I have heard preachers say it is not by accident but divine appointment you are in this church, usually followed by a warning to take some action while you're there.

Deists say God made the earth like a watchmaker:  once all the parts were in place, God, the watchmaker, wound it up and left it alone.  I do not agree with this belief because the Bible is an historical account of God's intervention in history.  

If I accept the Bible's claims, I must see it as God's intervention in history.  I see a middle ground between Deist and Determinism.  If God controls all events then ultimately He allows man to kill himself by the shear fact He is in control and does not stop it.  If however, He places the laws of nature in place and sustains them but allows man to move in those laws' consequences, He cannot be be held accountable since the laws of nature were made to operate in a perfect world.  

Man is operating in a world of laws meant to govern without the effects of sin.  James 1:17 tells us every perfect gift is from the "Father of lights" which means  the creator of the universe gave its physical laws.  If Satan is the cause of evil events and has so much influence over the laws of nature, he is essentially using the laws God created to taunt God's very creation.  

August 30, 2007

Questions about the book of Job:

Why does God play dice with a mortal man to see if he will succumb to the temptation to curse God? 
Also, does it not seem strange to give Satan charge of the diseases when God has created a world to operate within certain laws of physics?  
Someone asked if Satan had the power to control natural disasters on earth.  I remember telling him 'yes' with the stipulation of how permission was given in the book of Job, which  really only avoided the real question of why a holy God would allow such juvenile antics.

All my life I have been led to believe this book historically happened and this is how Christians get the idea to blame Satan for certain events.  The book of Job is a Hebrew poem, not to be taken literally or as historical fact.  It was written in the post-Babylonian exile area when the Jews were asking the questions of why would God allow the righteous to be forsaken.  It's like a parable in the New Testament where the Good Samaritan does not and more than likely did not exist.  Jesus was making an overall point, not trying to tell us of an historical event.
The events in Job never happened because it is a poem asking a larger point.  

August 30, 2007

I find it fascinating that we can apply arbitrary standards to God's plans and direction.  This attitude is becoming affluent to many church leaders who want something bad to say against "traditional" Christianity.  It is allowing the rights of humans to become mixed with the plans of God.  To think God leads people to believe differently toward Him is to say God has no particular standard or belief.  These people are not interested in adhering to anything even remotely like a standard.  It is more obvious in their teaching of "doctrine."  They will talk of the love of God all day long and at the same time "poo poo" the doctrine from which that love comes.  Jesus died for you but let's not get into the sin which put Him on the cross.  They consider that to be man's idea of doctrine and not God's concern.     

Nov. 11, 2007

The meaning of the word 'condescend' is to voluntarily come down in humiliation to teach, not the connotation the word has today.  If I am now able to understand the Bible with clarity because of my persistent study, I am to condescend to teach what I have learned.  This means I am to learn to associate with others who may not study as much or know as much.  I am to look for every opportunity to witness to the truth of God's Word no matter who I am around.  I am not to avoid a certain class of ideologies necessarily because of their ignorance in full biblical knowledge.  I am the one exercising pride when I avoid a group of people because they do not study as much as one should, but profess Jesus Christ as Deity.  

August 28, 2007

What are we acknowledging when ending our prayers in the name of Jesus? Jesus is the promised servant in Isaiah and the promised seed in Genesis. When you say "in Jesus" you are acknowledging God's promise achieved. "In Jesus' name amen" means to say God's promise of salvation has been completed, and we submit and pledge our lives to God's purpose.

August 27, 2007

The movie Evan Almighty is a silly idea of Noah and the Flood. The teaching of the Bible on the Flood is man had gotten so far away from God in wickedness, he was to be destroyed. The account of the Flood tells us more about the history of man than just his tendency toward sin. We have a general idea of the changed environment of the earth, of man's lifespan; never mind that the ark and its measurements were the first example of any watercraft of that size of its time.

But the movie turns the whole event into a humorous myth of only symbolic meaning. Forget the historical evidence of reality of thousands of people dying for rebelling against a holy God.

It is amazing how we as Christians want to fit in with our current world. We use movies like this to separate those who are too serious about the teachings in the Bible and those the world can trust to be their friends.

August 27, 2007

I found myself in the doctor's office about to have my heart x-rayed. The suspicion was a possible enlarged heart. As I stood there, I thought about dying and the reality that I really would not die at all but actually just transfer into the presence of God. Of course there was some fear or anxiety with the thought of dying, but I have to admit there was a little excitement. I thought about who I was going to see. I would see the very God/man, JESUS, who walked the earth. He would be as Thomas had seen him. I would be able to see those very real scars in his hands myself. This is the reality and promise of the resurrection. We will leave these bodies down here for a while and will be reunited with them later. But I will still be aware of my surroundings. I will never really die. For a moment I did not fear death because of the hope of him waiting on the other side. This must have been somewhat like what Stephen experienced as he saw Christ sitting at the right hand of God while being stoned. I did not see anything, but had the assurance of victory over death.

August 15, 2007

Man's tension is seeking a known good in a world of wrong.

Without guidance, he ends up destroying what is right in order to explain what is wrong.

August 15, 2007

Does God determine every single event in the universe? If He does, this raises some real thorny questions one must answer. Why will one person's life be spared and not the other? Why will one person be healed and not the other?

These days, you hear from the pulpit a lot about God's destiny and divine will for your life. God has a special plan for your life and if you will just seek Him, it will be shown to you.

The problem with this special plan is what about now? Here you are listening to someone telling you to believe God to show you your way and suddenly you realize by default, you're not in God's plan.

You may be married and suddenly you can ask if this is the one God meant for you to marry. What is happening is, you are being told to find a plan from God and really a plan has already been made. Who gave this person the right to say you are not in God's plan now? You may have raised children and put them through college and what are you to do now?

This is a form of manipulation to appeal to your sense of wanting to do right, especially if you are in a church and acknowledge a God to whom you have pledged an allegiance.

You find this a lot in the TV evangelists when they ask for money. They say give what's on your heart or whatever God speaks to you about. This is putting you in the situation of proving God would speak to you personally. If you do not give something, you cannot possibly be spiritual. Crowd mentality is real and anyone can succumb to it.

July 19, 2007

Having to assume/believe in the historical authenticity of the Bible, physically written by men and yet claiming to be God's communique to man, is a total act of trust. Unless one comes as a child, he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.

Man's intellect grows on assumptions fed to him through knowledge and experiences.

God has compiled His testimony in such a way as to appeal to the reason of man and to demand trust from the reason of man. By accepting the Bible as what it claims to be, you are putting your entire life and trust in the assumption of men from antiquity claiming to have seen the Christ raised from the dead.

If your eternal life is based on this assumption, you had better make sure the claims these men make are cogent with the reality you live in. After a while of studying the Bible, you understand man could not produce such a consistent discourse through the time in which the Bible was written. You begin to see your trust is not in the hands of men who physically wrote the Bible but in the God they claim. Assuming something is true is done every day. Having adequate reasons for your assumptions is quite another matter.

June 27, 2007

People are trying to credit God with these acts {i.e. hurricane Katrina} against sin when sin has already been taken care of at the cross. To say sin is the reason for a particular event or condition of a country is to forget that sin will be judged by God in the future.