One of the most important things to teach your children, and to remind them and yourself daily, is that life is hard. The root of anger, and bitterness, and frustration, and just an overall bad attitude, is to expect it not be hard, as if the difficulties in life are somehow just a bug and not a feature. In one of the great understatements of history, Jesus said, “In this world you will have trouble.” Some translations use the word tribulations, and in the Greek it means, properly, pressure (what constricts or rubs together), used of a narrow place that “hems someone in”; tribulation, especially internal pressure that causes someone to feel confined (restricted, “without options”). Yeah, that sums it up pretty well. God said to Adam and Eve that life in a fallen world would be full of painful toil by the sweat of our brow, with constant thorns and thistles. In other words, life is hard! For Christians, however, hard is good. (more…)
As distressing as this over-hyped COVID-19 pandemic has been (a real threat to only a very definable fraction of 1% of the population), there have been some silver linings. One is that I’m questioning things I would have never questioned pre-COVID, and that’s a very good thing. Many of those questions are directed at modern medicine, and medical establishment, which has become for me a quintessential living example of the fall of man described in Genesis 3. Satan’s temptation to Eve was simple: God is a liar, and if you eat of the tree “your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” With one bite we became beings who think we get to determine our own reality, a very God-like capability. The problem, of course, is that Satan is a liar. The bigger problem,is that people believe him, just as Eve did. (more…)
Our pastor last Sunday preached on one of the most profound Psalms in the Psalter, the first one, that which serves as the gateway to all the rest. Psalm 1 starts with the words, “Blessed is the man who . . . ” The writer starts with the negative, that this blessed man does not walk, stand, or sit, in the counsel, way, or seat, of the wicked, sinners, or scoffers. The point is clear, this person does not get comfortable in the company of the God-less, does not think as they think, or live as they live. Then he contrasts this way with what makes this man blessed, he delights “in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.” The question becomes, who defines our reality, God or man. There is no in between. (more…)
In my previous post I related how a sermon by our pastor on Psalm 115 inspired me to write about God verses idols. There is something else about this Psalm that after more than four decades as a follower of Christ has proved to be the very essence of my faith, and it is found in these three verses in the middle of the Psalm:
9 All you Israelites, trust in the Lord— he is their help and shield. 10 House of Aaron, trust in the Lord— he is their help and shield. 11 You who fear him, trust in the Lord— he is their help and shield.
A perfectly biblical three times, trust in the Lord! The context, God verses idols, and the claims of the nations (v.2) that God is MIA, is what makes these exhortations so powerful. If we don’t trust in the Lord, what or who do we trust? The older I get, and the more I learn, the more significant I realize how important it is to always consider the alternative. I call this in a phrase, the consideration of the alternative. As I argued previously, there is no Switzerland, no metaphysical or spiritual neutrality. We have to believe, or trust (the biblical Greek word translated faith), in something or someone. People don’t give up belief or trust without religion, they just place it somewhere else. (more…)
On Sunday Our pastor preached on Psalm 115 in a service we actually attended in person, praise the Lord! It was a powerful sermon on a profound Psalm that addresses our everyday experience in the 21st century. The first verse sets the tone:
Not to us, Lord, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness.
More on this in a moment. The context is the nations and their idols who think that Israel’s God, our God, is MIA, missing in action. Oh, but he certainly is not! The writer compares God for Israel, and us, to the useless idols of the nations: (more…)
I came across this video at the The Ten Minute Bible Hour of the proprietor, Matt Whitman, giving his de-conversion, and back, story, and at the end of the short video he critiques the now common deconstruction stories, as I discussed in my last post. Growing up a Christian he thought he had this whole Christian thing nailed down, until he didn’t. Around the age of 29 having moved away from his faith, he made an incredible discovery: Christianity wasn’t about him! He did something radical in response to his doubt: he actually read the Bible! From the beginning. At about the six minute mark he describes the discovery that brought him back:
The plot of the bible can’t be the improvement of people’s behavior, and the increased accuracy of people’s thinking about God. It’s gotta be the story of God redeeming things that are broken and messed up, creation, people, everything. That’s a completely different religion.
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