Monday, March 28, 2011
On Controversy
Well, so, this isn't really a prepared post, but I feel like putting something new out here.
So most of you have probably seen the flak that came in on the denominations post. I told mya about it and she was thrilled, haha. People getting worked up means that people care, right?
Well, regardless, debate isn't the purpose of this blog and a lot of the comments are people taking out their frustration on the nearest target. So I guess I should consider removing anonymous comments... ugh I don't want to... In the meantime, I'll moderate 'em.
Please pray for Libya, just help the people over there. And smaller stuff - the District Blitz is coming up in Duluth soon and I'm getting pumped. Thousands of believers will be there and it should be a lot of fun. It's in Duluth on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, all of you guys should try and get up there. Pray for great results and reaching people. If any of you guys will be there you should hit me up.
I should do a post soon on gay marriage, I'll try to get around to it. Also abortion is probably important.
So most of you have probably seen the flak that came in on the denominations post. I told mya about it and she was thrilled, haha. People getting worked up means that people care, right?
Well, regardless, debate isn't the purpose of this blog and a lot of the comments are people taking out their frustration on the nearest target. So I guess I should consider removing anonymous comments... ugh I don't want to... In the meantime, I'll moderate 'em.
Please pray for Libya, just help the people over there. And smaller stuff - the District Blitz is coming up in Duluth soon and I'm getting pumped. Thousands of believers will be there and it should be a lot of fun. It's in Duluth on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, all of you guys should try and get up there. Pray for great results and reaching people. If any of you guys will be there you should hit me up.
I should do a post soon on gay marriage, I'll try to get around to it. Also abortion is probably important.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Denominations
When I tell people that I am Christian, or when they ask me and recieve an affirmative, the most common thing that is immedietly spun back at me is "What denomination are you".
And I always just answer "Evangelical" (cause they ALL know what that is, right?) but inside my head I'm rolling my eyes.
Did I ask what denomination you are? Do you really think that it matters what denomination I am? Yes, there can be some marked differences. And Protestant and Catholicism are practically different faiths. But the idea of there being dozens of different types of Protestant bugs me a little.
The thing about there being so many different denominations is that it's all human error. I don't think that God wants us to be splintered into dozens of different factions, often bickering over bible details that probably none of us understand correctly anyway. In John 17, Jesus prays for future believers. 17:20 - "I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be as one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.. that they may be as one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me."
Funny, I didn't see "may they all bicker over what interpretation they find best." I believe that all that is important is that we all try to follow God and his wishes as best as we can, loving him and believing in him always.
Obviously, there are unavoidable points of contention. Calvinists believe that God knows the future, most or many non-Calvinists don't. Catholics worship the Virgin Mary, which is just not ok as it specifically states in the Bible to "have no idols beside me". I don't like the idea of worshipping a human. And then we have the wackos like the Westboro Baptist Church, who are deeply decieved into believeing that they are following God's will.
When we faction, we give the world the idea that we don't know what we are doing and that Christianity is a divided faith. That's very counterproductive.
Continue prayers to Japan, please. Historically, Japan has been a very resistive country to the Message and hopefully this disaster will open their hearts.
Thanks to Haley Larsen for helping to inspire this post.
And I always just answer "Evangelical" (cause they ALL know what that is, right?) but inside my head I'm rolling my eyes.
Did I ask what denomination you are? Do you really think that it matters what denomination I am? Yes, there can be some marked differences. And Protestant and Catholicism are practically different faiths. But the idea of there being dozens of different types of Protestant bugs me a little.
The thing about there being so many different denominations is that it's all human error. I don't think that God wants us to be splintered into dozens of different factions, often bickering over bible details that probably none of us understand correctly anyway. In John 17, Jesus prays for future believers. 17:20 - "I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be as one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.. that they may be as one as we are one: I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me."
Funny, I didn't see "may they all bicker over what interpretation they find best." I believe that all that is important is that we all try to follow God and his wishes as best as we can, loving him and believing in him always.
Obviously, there are unavoidable points of contention. Calvinists believe that God knows the future, most or many non-Calvinists don't. Catholics worship the Virgin Mary, which is just not ok as it specifically states in the Bible to "have no idols beside me". I don't like the idea of worshipping a human. And then we have the wackos like the Westboro Baptist Church, who are deeply decieved into believeing that they are following God's will.
When we faction, we give the world the idea that we don't know what we are doing and that Christianity is a divided faith. That's very counterproductive.
Continue prayers to Japan, please. Historically, Japan has been a very resistive country to the Message and hopefully this disaster will open their hearts.
Thanks to Haley Larsen for helping to inspire this post.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
The presence of evil
One of the most common questions that my atheist friends ask me is "If there is a God, then why do bad things happen?" I can hardly blame them - after all, I spend a fair amount of time asking myself that. It's one of the most fundamental questions about our religion and probably the one that I have the most difficulty answering. So these are my thoughts - written down so they're easier to keep track of.
I believe that bad things happen for three reasons:
"The Lord saw how great man's wickedness on the Earth had come, and that every inclination of his heart was towards evil" - Genesis 6:5 reveals how evil man can become. The weakness of humanity. Well, the reality is that God gave us as humans free will. God didn't and doesn't just want us to be little automaton minions that walk around high stepping and saying "praise God" in a repetitive monotone. He GAVE us choices because he wants us to be able to love him of our own choices. And as terrible as it is, the fact is that humanity is weak. All humans sin. I sin, you sin, we all sin. God knows that and it's a sacfricie he's willing to make for free will - after all, you can't only have the benefits and be rid of the negatives of something like free thought. So as long as humans have the ability to think and make decisions of their own, they will always make bad decisions. They will always sin. And so there will always be the repercussions of that sin (say, World War II? Hitler messed up...)
And finally, Satan DOES exist. Often we forget that and blame God for everything. But remember, Satan hates humanity. He wants to see us fail, so he strives to tempt us and fill us with resentment.
A good place to look in the Bible to go along with this post is the book of Habakkuk. The whole book kinda goes along with this so I'll just put down his "first complaint" - something that we may feel at times.
"How long, O lord, must I call for help,
but you do not listen?
Or cry out to you, "Violence!"
but you do not save?
Why do you make me look at injustice?
Why do you tolerate wrong?
Destruction and violence are before me;
there is strife, and conflict abounds.
Therefore the law is paralyzed,
and justice never prevails.
The wicked hem in the righteous,
so that justice is perverted.
I'm including an excerpt below by CS Lewis, from a devotional of his that I have.
Stay strong in your times of struggle this week, for you have a mighty God.
- Bradley
I believe that bad things happen for three reasons:
- It's part of God's plan
- The weakness/sins of humanity
- The presence of Satan
"The Lord saw how great man's wickedness on the Earth had come, and that every inclination of his heart was towards evil" - Genesis 6:5 reveals how evil man can become. The weakness of humanity. Well, the reality is that God gave us as humans free will. God didn't and doesn't just want us to be little automaton minions that walk around high stepping and saying "praise God" in a repetitive monotone. He GAVE us choices because he wants us to be able to love him of our own choices. And as terrible as it is, the fact is that humanity is weak. All humans sin. I sin, you sin, we all sin. God knows that and it's a sacfricie he's willing to make for free will - after all, you can't only have the benefits and be rid of the negatives of something like free thought. So as long as humans have the ability to think and make decisions of their own, they will always make bad decisions. They will always sin. And so there will always be the repercussions of that sin (say, World War II? Hitler messed up...)
And finally, Satan DOES exist. Often we forget that and blame God for everything. But remember, Satan hates humanity. He wants to see us fail, so he strives to tempt us and fill us with resentment.
A good place to look in the Bible to go along with this post is the book of Habakkuk. The whole book kinda goes along with this so I'll just put down his "first complaint" - something that we may feel at times.
"How long, O lord, must I call for help,
but you do not listen?
Or cry out to you, "Violence!"
but you do not save?
Why do you make me look at injustice?
Why do you tolerate wrong?
Destruction and violence are before me;
there is strife, and conflict abounds.
Therefore the law is paralyzed,
and justice never prevails.
The wicked hem in the righteous,
so that justice is perverted.
I'm including an excerpt below by CS Lewis, from a devotional of his that I have.
FEBRUARY 19
Fixed Laws of Nature and Freedom of Will
We can, perhaps, conceive of a world in which God corrected the results of this abuse of free will by His creatures at every moment: so that a wooden beam became soft as grass when it was used as a weapon, and the air refused to obey me if I attempted to set up in it the sound-waves that carry lies or insults. But such a world would be one in which wrong actions were impossible, and in which, therefore, freedom of the will would be void; nay, if the principle were carried out to its logical conclusion, evil thoughts would be impossible, for the cerebral matter which we use in thinking would refuse its task when we attempted to frame them. All matter in the neighbourhood of a wicked man would be liable to undergo unpredictable alterations. That God can and does, on occasions, modify the behaviour of matter and produce what we call miracles, is pan of Christian faith; but the very conception of a common, and therefore stable, world, demands that these occasions should be extremely rare. In a game of chess you can make certain arbitrary concessions to your opponent, which stand to the ordinary rules of the game as miracles stand to the laws of nature. You can deprive yourself of a castle, or allow the other man sometimes to take back a move made inadvertently. But if you conceded everything that at any moment happened to suit him—if all his moves were revocable and if all your pieces disappeared whenever their position on the board was not to his liking—then you could not have a game at all. So it is with the life of souls in a world; fixed laws, consequences unfolding by causal necessity, the whole natural order, are at once limits within which their common life is confined and also the sole condition under which any such life is possible. Try to exclude the possibility of suffering which the order of nature and the existence of free wills involve, and you find that you have excluded life itself.
—from The Problem of Pain
Stay strong in your times of struggle this week, for you have a mighty God.
- Bradley
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Applying our faith to our lives
Why don't we practice Christianity outside of the church building?
You know exactly what I'm saying. Many people, myself included, are great Christians inside the Church. We sing the songs loudly and ask our questions about God, participate in the discussions and appear to be great Christians. Yet for many of these people, the vast majority of our friends would never know that we are Christian. We swear and cheat on schoolwork and we act often with harshness to those around us, judging our peers with impunity. Why is this?
The biggest problem with the idea of practicing Christianity is that people are lazy. It's far easier to revert back to our old ways once we walk out the Church doors than actually apply them to our lives. I think that that is one thing that youth leaders (for sure the ones at my church) struggle with the most. No matter what they teach, no matter the lesson every Sunday, if it doesn't stick then it is irrelevant. And the leaders can't make it stick, that has to fall to us. I guess that that is why I created this blog. I felt that I just wasn't doing enough with my faith outside of church. This way, even if I can't change anyone else, at least I will change myself and hopefully my faith as well.
In addition to being lazy, the main barrier to our faith is that it's just not cool. Especially in the culture of us teenagers, the ideas being promoted often including smoking, drinking and sex, the ideas of religion just aren't meant to be shared with our friends. Of course, this depends on your friend group and what clique you happen to align yourself with.
Finally, many of us don't WANT God in our lives. We are perfectly happy exactly where we are and we want nothing to change. We have some fear that if we allow God to take control, if we give Him the reins, the God will transform our perfect life. He may ask us to sell our possessions and give to the poor. We may have to devote our time to him. We would have to give up sinning. I am one of this category - I know the things that I need to change, but I continue to do them anyway. But this has to change. In Genesis 2, God commands Abraham to leave his country, home and friends, and set out to a new land. In return, Abraham is promised the blessing and protection of God. And we all know the story of Jonah, who made a slightly less wise decision in regard to obeying God.
The key to being strong in your faith as a Christian is, I believe, getting over the "lukewarm" stage. At Wayzata Evangelical Free, the youth saw a video by Francis Chan on this very subject (and Josh did a great job speaking about it in the congregation. Live so that others can tell you are a Christian. Wooddale needs to work on this I've heard, as do all churches. That't the benefit of a smaller church - a closer community means a closer connection with God, often times.
A Christian can be on fire for God, or lukewarm for God. God HATES the lukewarm behavior we sometimes adopt. Revelation 3:16 says "So, because you are lukewarm - neither hot nor cold - I am about to spit you out of my mouth." The Bible says that those "name only" Christians WILL be condemned to Hell. Going to church on Sundays and telling people you are a Christian is not enough. You have to live by the standards to reap the rewards. This blog is meant to help get me over MY lukewarmness as well as yours.
Well, I just wanted to get a post out on the blog so it wouldn't look so empty. More design editing/posting to follow. At the moment of this writing, I doubt a single person even knows about this blog, so I'll have to tell some people. I'm planning on posting at least once a week, minimum.
Finally, prayer request... Matt Honson's grandpa died recently so please continue to pray for him. I'm struggling with a few friendships but nothing major. Feel free to contact me with prayer requests.
You know exactly what I'm saying. Many people, myself included, are great Christians inside the Church. We sing the songs loudly and ask our questions about God, participate in the discussions and appear to be great Christians. Yet for many of these people, the vast majority of our friends would never know that we are Christian. We swear and cheat on schoolwork and we act often with harshness to those around us, judging our peers with impunity. Why is this?
The biggest problem with the idea of practicing Christianity is that people are lazy. It's far easier to revert back to our old ways once we walk out the Church doors than actually apply them to our lives. I think that that is one thing that youth leaders (for sure the ones at my church) struggle with the most. No matter what they teach, no matter the lesson every Sunday, if it doesn't stick then it is irrelevant. And the leaders can't make it stick, that has to fall to us. I guess that that is why I created this blog. I felt that I just wasn't doing enough with my faith outside of church. This way, even if I can't change anyone else, at least I will change myself and hopefully my faith as well.
In addition to being lazy, the main barrier to our faith is that it's just not cool. Especially in the culture of us teenagers, the ideas being promoted often including smoking, drinking and sex, the ideas of religion just aren't meant to be shared with our friends. Of course, this depends on your friend group and what clique you happen to align yourself with.
Finally, many of us don't WANT God in our lives. We are perfectly happy exactly where we are and we want nothing to change. We have some fear that if we allow God to take control, if we give Him the reins, the God will transform our perfect life. He may ask us to sell our possessions and give to the poor. We may have to devote our time to him. We would have to give up sinning. I am one of this category - I know the things that I need to change, but I continue to do them anyway. But this has to change. In Genesis 2, God commands Abraham to leave his country, home and friends, and set out to a new land. In return, Abraham is promised the blessing and protection of God. And we all know the story of Jonah, who made a slightly less wise decision in regard to obeying God.
The key to being strong in your faith as a Christian is, I believe, getting over the "lukewarm" stage. At Wayzata Evangelical Free, the youth saw a video by Francis Chan on this very subject (and Josh did a great job speaking about it in the congregation. Live so that others can tell you are a Christian. Wooddale needs to work on this I've heard, as do all churches. That't the benefit of a smaller church - a closer community means a closer connection with God, often times.
A Christian can be on fire for God, or lukewarm for God. God HATES the lukewarm behavior we sometimes adopt. Revelation 3:16 says "So, because you are lukewarm - neither hot nor cold - I am about to spit you out of my mouth." The Bible says that those "name only" Christians WILL be condemned to Hell. Going to church on Sundays and telling people you are a Christian is not enough. You have to live by the standards to reap the rewards. This blog is meant to help get me over MY lukewarmness as well as yours.
Well, I just wanted to get a post out on the blog so it wouldn't look so empty. More design editing/posting to follow. At the moment of this writing, I doubt a single person even knows about this blog, so I'll have to tell some people. I'm planning on posting at least once a week, minimum.
Finally, prayer request... Matt Honson's grandpa died recently so please continue to pray for him. I'm struggling with a few friendships but nothing major. Feel free to contact me with prayer requests.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)