The Front Lines

Often times spiritual warfare is compared to that of actual warfare. Each Christian can be involved in a variety of jobs wherever God happens to put them. Some are in support, some are in supplies, some are in leadership, and some are on ‘The Front Line”. Some may have a combination of these.

The front lines are generally considered wherever the fighting is the most fierce and where the enemy is most heavily concentrated. In China and other countries where freedom is limited some of the brethren are putting their very lives on the line by following Jesus Christ.

In the United States the front lines are not quite that harsh but fighting a spiritual battle can still take it’s toll. One place that has been suggested as being the front line is on video services such as You Tube. Because you put yourself out there and so many different people are in that community it can be an incredibly dramatic and stressful experience.

Some would have you believe that by leaving a ‘front line’ environment you are somehow weak, or wishy washy. I would argue that even troops are rotated in and out of battle to keep them fresh and morality high. As I have closed my You Tube account this week, not because of fighting non-believers but seeing other Christians lose their focus. I spent over a year on You Tube making videos and sharing my faith. Funny, I don’t remember signing a lifetime contract when I opened my account there, lol.

After removing my You Tube account it has been suggested that I am weak, a coward, spineless, lukewarm, wishy washy, you name it. I call it God rotating me out. Maybe some people have the endurance to fight the good fight for years at a time while others do not. Don’t insult your brothers and sisters for taking a break from battle, instead lift them up so that they can one day return to battle.

It’s been said that Christianity is one of the few armies that actually shoots it’s wounded. This is unfortunately a sad reality. We all struggle to serve the Lord with everything we have that we forget it is also our duty to fellowship and encourage out comrades. Don’t kick a horse when he is down. Lead him to water and let him drink and when he is ready he can get back in the race.

Christian Conduct

I was going to write a blog about Christian conduct but Romans 12 has it covered.

Romans 12

Living Sacrifices

1Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. 2Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
3For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. 4Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. 7If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; 8if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully.

Love

9Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. 11Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 13Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.
14Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. 15Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. 16Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.

17Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. 18If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. 19Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,”says the Lord. 20On the contrary:
“If your enemy is hungry, feed him;
if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.”21Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

You Tube is a reflection of a sick society

I have been on you tube for over a year now. It’s been an up and down experience, mostly down. On the surface it seems like a great idea. People can upload videos of just about anything and share them with the world. There’s just one problem. The world part. You see much of the world is sick and twisted.
There’s a movie out called “Untraceable”. In the movie a psychopath kidnaps people and puts them on a streaming live internet feed. The people are bound and contraptions are rigged so that depending on the number of viewers the page gets the faster the person dies. I’m afraid that isn’t too far from reality.
Most of the people who tune into You Tube, especially in the religion category, aren’t really there for any meaningful dialogue but to see drama and harass others. The big problem with You Tube is that anyone can join with only an email address and they can have as many accounts as they like without ever showing their faces. And while You Tube claims to have a terms of service agreement they rarely ever do anything to enforce it.
What you have is a chaotic mess of people threatening one another and members with no formal training in any one area putting up videos as if they have some sort of PHD in the subject.

Recently there has been a rather large drama unfolding regarding a ministry that is charged with having aberrant teachings but one quick look over a large portion of the so-called Christian videos there you will find that much of them contain aberrant teachings, heresy, and just a wide array of different opinions and beliefs. In fact if one is not well grounded in their faith they could actually find themselves questioning their faith.

In addition to these problems a large amount of the site has become pornographic in nature. Because the site has a large number of partners who actually get paid for views many of these partners have resorted to placing images of scantily clad women in order to get views, and sadly, it works.

I originally got on You Tube because I saw a large audience of unbelievers saying things about Christianity that just were not true. After I got there though I was shocked to find out that a large amount of people that called themselves Christians were far more hurtful than anything atheists could ever do. You see them fighting one another, making heretical statements, and acting very un-christ like. Even I fell into the trap. As I said you have to be very much on guard in such an atmosphere.

Sadly after over a year of being on You Tube and even closing my account and reopening it a couple of times I have decided that it is not the place for me. I wish the best to the Christians that remain there making videos. There are a handful of decent people and a ton more that are in need of some kind of help. Some Christians left that arena a long time ago to focus on newer mediums such as Stickam.
Maybe one day You Tube will get a better handle on it’s members and actually take action against those who violate the rules there but I doubt it. I think you tube is a good reflection of just how sick our world is getting. I hope as many people can be saved as possible but the selfish part of me wants Jesus to return and clean this mess up.

What Did God Do On The Eighth Day?

What Did God Do On The Eighth Day?

A Bible Study by Jack Kelley

By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done. (Genesis 2:2-3)

These two verses are much different from those describing the preceding days in the creation account. All of them included the phrase “it was evening and it was morning, day … “. Not so for the seventh day. Also the Hebrew word translated rested is Shabath (pronounced sha-BAT). We get sabbath from this word. It appears 71 times in the Bible, and 47 of those times it’s translated “cease”. It only means rest 11 times.

Read the rest here

 

Groundhog Day

TBS routinely runs the movie “Groundhog Day” starring Bill Murray and this weekend I got caught up watching it again. I don’t know if many people realize the biblical message that I see in the movie so let me relate my thoughts.

If you haven’t seen the movie or don’t remember it too well it is about a weatherman named Phil who isn’t a particularly nice guy. He has to go to a small town and do a report on the festivities surrounding Groundhog day and he’s not very enthusiastic about. He is accompanied by his producer and a cameraman who he is equally unpleasant and rude to.

Every person that he runs across in the town he behaves selfishly and uncaring and goes about his day until he finally goes to bed and wakes up only to discover that he is repeating the same day again. At first he is amazed at his predicament and even tries to manipulate events in the day to try and force his own desired outcome. When he realizes that he is powerless to make any real changes he even tries to kill himself only to wake up having to repeat the day again.

Finally when he realizes what a nasty person he has been and admits his own failings does he actually start to experience change. He even begins doing things to better himself and helping others in the town.

I see this story from our own sinful nature to our salvation. The moment when we realize what wretches we are to repentance and finally becoming a new person in Jesus Christ do we really experience change.

In the movie when Phil realizes that he could either go on being the person that he is or truly turn away from his old ways do we begin to see fruit from him. In one scene he ’saves’ a boy falling from a tree because he knows he is going to fall. In another scene he saves a man from choking and finally in another scene he realizes that a homeless man will die.
He tries everything to save the homeless man from death to no avail until finally he decides just to feed the man and make his last day just a little better. We cannot stop people from dying but we can share with them our faith, just as Phil did when he changed and became charitable and loving towards others.
In fact in one scene he runs up to a guy and shows him so much love that the guy runs off because he is so taken back by it. Just as we share our faith and love and people turn from us, even those we know.
It isn’t until finally in the movie that he gets the love interest of the producer to love him back that he finally starts a new day.

I believe that each and every day we wake up we are getting another chance to repeat the day and do things right. Salvation, sharing the gospel message, charity, kindness to others and being a good Christian example. I’m not saying that unbelievers cannot behave in this manner but the deeper spiritual lesson is that the only way we can truly be saved and enter into God’s kingdom is by repenting and turning from sin and receiving Jesus Christ. The charity, kindness, etc. are the ways that God would want us to act and would be the fruit of our salvation.

The Sabbath

I became involved in a discussion today regarding the Sabbath and whether or not we should still honor the Sabbath since it is one of the ten commandments. We know that the commandments are still valid because in Matthew Jesus said he did not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it.

In the creation week outlined in Genesis God used the 7 day week that we still have on our calendar today despite the fact it has no astronomical meaning. Think about it, a 24 hour day is the result of the Earth turning, a year is the completion of a trip of the Earth around the sun.

On the seventh day God rested from his work and the command is that we rest from our work and honor God by recognizing the Sabbath day. The very purpose of this was a direct mirror of what our plan for salvation is. The salvation message is right there in the 7 day week. The days of creation are representative of the work that God does in us when we attain salvation. We are formless and void and we see the light through God’s word and we are baptized by the holy spirit and we begin to bear fruit.

So the question for some is whether or not we should still observe the Sabbath today? We are made in God’s image. God gave us the 7 day week to pattern after for ourselves. The bible is all about God’s promise to man and his message of salvation and the one who would come and free us from bondage to sin.

As a direct result of sin we were put under the law. In order to be right with god it was necessary to obey the 10 commandments and attain salvation through works. When Jesus came he bought us with his blood at the cross and not only freed us from sin but from the law. Because of the work of Jesus Christ we can now rest in him. Since nothing we can do gets us salvation and we cannot measure up to the law we need Jesus Christ as the way , the truth, and the life.

We all fall short of God’s holiness because keeping these laws is impossible. Jesus took this burden from us and by repenting and having faith and trust in him he becomes our sabbath in which we can now rest and honoring the Sabbath means following and honoring Jesus Christ. So now we don’t simply refrain from our work one day a week but we rest on the work that Jesus Christ has done. Our works are simply a result of our salvation, a byproduct of the light we now have within us.

So the question as to whether or not we still honor the Sabbath is yes, in that Jesus Christ is our Sabbath. In fact he is our everything.

Make today that day

Ever hear the term that “Today is the first day of the rest of your life”? It’s funny yet true. Science has a specific set of rules as to what it will accept as the basis for understanding how things work. In the realm of God things work through faith and through faith comes understanding. We are truly receptacles for God. God is a trinity. We are made in God’s image and are not a trinity of sorts such as God but we can receive Jesus and be guided by the Holy spirit and repair our relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
The best scientific evidence you can have is through the receiving of Jesus Christ. Through prayer, the study of his word you will have truth revealed to you. If you want this truth and this revelation it will require faith on your part to get there. Not a scientific experiment with a test tube in a lab but the method in which God prescribed.

It was a lack of faith and disobedience in which Adam did not want to follow God’s plan but wanted to be God himself. All of the pride and anger you see in the world is a direct result of this.

If you are truly a truth-seeker and want the revelation that God has described then you have to do it his way. That means setting aside your pride and having faith in him and his word and only then will you get the truth revealed in you.

Make today that day you start your walk with Jesus Christ.

God of the gaps

One of the arguments involving science and God is that science has pushed the idea of of God so far back that there are now merely gaps that science has not yet answered but will relegating Christians to fill the gaps by saying “God did it”.

I would argue that many of the supposed gaps were merely a lack of scientific knowledge on the part of some Christians who mistakenly ascribed non-biblical explanations for the natural world. One such argument would be the “Flat Earth” argument in that the bible is said to describe the Earth as being flat.
Although I personally question the origins of the flat earth stance for this article I will say that even if Christians once held this belief the idea that the Earth is flat is not scriptural.

The bible makes several references to the Earth being round and even arguably spherical. But that isn’t really my point to debate that point in this article. My point is that God was never in a gap to begin with. God created all things. Our understanding of how things function do not disprove the idea of God but give us an even greater awe for such a creator through our understanding of how things around us work.

The Big Bang theory was only introduced in the last century and some seemed to accept this theory reluctantly because of the fact that is did support the idea that the Universe as we know it did have a starting point, as the bible stated, “In the beginning”.

Other points from science is that life started in the sea and that man is a relative newcomer to the scene in contrast to the rest of the species seem to also agree. Mind you I’m not arguing for or against any theory here, only that the idea that God has been reduced to gaps is unfounded.

Other suggestions that the bible describes the sun moving as opposed to the Earth being the actual object that moves also discredit the bible yet when I look at my morning newspaper it tells me what time sunrise and sunset will be. Shouldn’t it have a more accurate description or is it written more simplistically from our Earth-based perspective.

Another commenter here on the blog made a remark about hand-washing when the Old testament makes it clear.

There really is only one gap and it is for unbelievers, that God is the maker of all things and provided a bridge over that gap that man has fallen into. That gap filler is Jesus Christ.

What really happened in the middle east?

What Really Happened In The Middle East

Here’s a You Tube video that does a very good job outlining the current middle East conflict. It’s too bad it does not go all the way back to the Old Testament but it does cover some modern questions.

”Metanoeo”

The Bible was originally recorded in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek — but not in the working language of Jesus’ day, which was Latin.

The reason, I believe, is that Latin, like English, was a notoriously imprecise language. To the ancients, Latin was the language of business, Greek the language of philosophy and humanity, and Hebrew the language of God.
There is also a saying in our modern world to the effect that English is the language of business, French the language of love and Spanish the language of God. That reflects the areas in which those languages are the most descriptive.

Read the entire article by Jack Kinsella here.