Life as a Response

In some sense, everything we do is a response. Even when we seem to be initiating something, we are still responding to the environment around us. In addition, every action we take is in some measure a response to everything that we have experienced before.

When we encounter the presence of God in a significant way, our lives cannot help but change because that incredible experience becomes part of the basis for all of our future responses. When we can get immersed in His love, then our responses in life become more Christ-like because of the experience of His love becomes such a powerful force in determining our responses.

Worldviews anyone?

We each have a worldview that determines how we interpret and understand the things that happen. Some people see the hand of God in events while others see karma and yet others see the mechanisms of evolution in the same events. It is all dependent on one's worldview.

My problem is that the word itself - worldview - leads us to examine the world to develop our view of it. For Christians, that means studying scripture to see what it says about the world around us. I think that's wrong. What we need to do is get a clear understanding, a knowledge of God firmly built inside of us. It is only as we understand and know God that we gain the perspective we need to clearly understand creation. Certainly, Bible study will be part of the process, but it is first and foremost to know God. Then, when we have a right knowledge of Him, we will be able to properly understand the scriptures that tell us about the world around us.

Loving God

Why is it that we can't love God (who we can't see) unless we love others (who we can see)?

Maybe, it is because both actions, loving God & loving others are the results of the same prior event - our experience of the love of God. It is that knowing how greatly we are loved that causes us to love God in return and sets us free to love others without any conditions or manipulation.

Maybe God gives us this physical evidence of our love (loving others) because we can so easily deceive ourselves into thinking we are loving God even if we aren't.

The Centrality of the Love of the Father

Everything in the Christian life must begin with a deep & profound understanding of the love of God for us individually. It all comes out of the love of the Father. If you miss that, then everything else you do as a Christian will be built on the wrong foundation.

Theory Versus Practice

We all want to be a servant - until we are treated like one.
We all want to be fools for Christ - until we look foolish.
We all want to be humble - until our pride gets hurt.

Thy Kingdom Come

I wonder what it means in the Lord's prayer when it says, "Your kingdom come." In this phrase, the verb is an imperative or a command. We often think of this phrase as a petition spoken by us to God, i.e. "God, please bring Your kingdom." What if instead it is intended to be a command spoken by us, ordering the Kingdom itself to be manifested? Or maybe we are speaking to the created order, demanding that it all come into agreement with the kingdom of God? Either way, there is a huge difference in our understanding of the power we have and how the Christian life should be lived based on how we decide to understand this phrase. Is it a polite request or a forceful demand? There is room in the Greek for both options.

God's Leading

How often have you heard that God leads us through circumstances? Does that really make sense? This is not to say that God does not use circumstances, but it seems like circumstances in themselves, are not good sign posts of the Lord's leading. Think of what would have happened if Paul had followed God's leading through circumstances.

Emotional Healing

One of those paradoxes in life is that the best healer of emotional wounds is God. However, those same emotional hurts are also the very things that keep us from approaching God for healing. Someone who has been abused and rejected will be afraid of further rejection. A person who has been deeply shamed will experience an even greater sense of shame just thinking about approaching God.

The cure for this is the slow process of coming to terms with Who God really is. Most of our fear of approaching Him comes from the underlying belief that He will hurt us in some way. When we begin to discover that "a bruised reed He will not break" then we are able to trust Him, even just a tiny bit, with our deepest wounds and find healing from them.

Pharisees

I am troubled by the realization that as a seminary graduate I am more qualified to be a Pharisee than the average Christian. Perhaps one of the errors of the Pharisees was their over-emphasis on obedience. Their emphasis on the Law allowed them to lose sight of the Law Giver.

Obedience without relationship breeds legalism. True relationship without obedience is not possible.

The Bible

Many of us consider the Bible to be the word of God. However, we often ignore those passages that we can't accept or don't understand for one reason or another. Those who call the Bible just a nice book and then treat it that way are being more honest and faithful in their understanding of it than we are.

Holiness

Holiness is important. We are told in the Bible to be holy because God is holy. What is critical in holiness, however, is the heart motivation, not the behavior. If we have hearts that are fully in love with God, then we will walk in holiness simply because that is what we want to do. On the other hand, if we seek to walk in holiness apart from love, it will only lead us into the dry desert of legalism. Such a situation soon saps the grace completely out of our faith and our walk with God becomes a self-energized effort at obtaining His approval, not the loving response of one who is already approved.