Holy Roman Gods, Batman

Let's take a trip in the way back machine to the Roman Empire and look at three dudes.

First, Augustus. He started out as Gaius Octavius Thurinus, and later was named Gaius Julius Caesar. 27BC is where the title Augustus comes in -- a title which subsequent emperors were also given. Go look up a list of Roman emperors. It's interesting to see all the man-glorifying crap that was slapped on the end of their names. The Augustus title is not a political title, but a religious one. It stood for authority over humanity and nature, meaning something like "the illustrious one" or "the revered one". He also used the title "divi filius" for himself quite often, meaning "the son of a god". On top of that, he allowed worship of himself as a living god. When Augustus died, he was deified like Julius.

Second, Tiberius, the next emperor. Like his predecessor, he was given the same title Augustus, but he didn't go around flaunting divine titles and he refused to be worshiped as a living god. He didn't care much for temples dedicated to him either, but he did allow one to be built in Smyrna. Tiberius was very unpopular by the time of his death, and the senate refused to vote him divine honors.

Third, Caligula, who had the phrase "Let there be one Lord, one King". Of course, it seems he thought that "one" should be him. He appeared in public dressed as various Roman gods, referred to himself as a god when meeting with politicians, presented himself as a god to the public, replaced the heads of various Roman gods on statues replaced with his own, and encouraged people to worship him as a living god, Neos Helios -- the New Sun. Got pride?

Now, this phrase "divi filius" is not the same as "dei filius" -- "divus" seems to be lesser than the "deus" used for Roman gods like Jupiter and Mars. Dei filius is what the early Christians used for Jesus -- the divine Son of God, who is the same "stuff" as God. In other words, God in the flesh.

So, given this little history lesson, I find two things worthy of mention.

First, I find it curious that when Jesus was walking around on the earth, the emperor at the time, Tiberius, refused to be worshiped as a living god. In contrast, Jesus accepted worship from people, from the wise men who came to visit him as a toddler to after his resurrection. The emperor before and the emperor after didn't, but this one did. Curious, indeed.

Second, it seems that the claims of the early Christians could certainly piss off some leadership. Here, with Augustus, Caligula, and beyond, you have men born into wealth and power who say either "I'm a god" or "I'm a son of a god", encourage temples to be built to them, encourage worship of themselves, and so on. All the while you have Jesus' followers saying that there is one God who became flesh in the person of Jesus Christ, born poor in a no name town to a teenage girl. On top of that, the title they use for him puts him above all, including deified emperors and greater "gods" like Jupiter.

There's quite a difference between a man trying to be God and God becoming a man. The former sends one to hell, and the latter saves many from it. I'll take door number two, Jesus.

John And Jesus

Around the time of Jesus' ministry on earth, students of a particular teacher would serve them. If they lived today, they'd get their Starbucks, pick up their dry cleaning, and wash their car. There, however, was one job they would not touch with a ten foot pole -- untie the teacher's sandals and was his feet. That job was left for the lowest of slaves.

Enter John the baptizer, who says that he is preparing the way for the Lord and told people to bear fruit that lines up with repentance from sin, rather than relying on their ancestry to be right with God. Some people think he might be the messiah, the savior, the one promised in prophecy that people were expectantly waiting for.

What does John say to this? "I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire." (Luke 3:16) So John says that there is someone coming, and he is not worthy to untie his sandals, the job relegated to the lowest of slaves in that culture. The one to come must be great, indeed.

That one is Jesus. So what does Jesus say about John? "I tell you, among those born of women none is greater than John." (Luke 7:28a) So, by Jesus' description, John the baptizer is the greatest man that has ever lived. Yet, John is not worthy to untie Jesus' sandals.

Now fast forward a bit to the Last Supper. What does Jesus do? He washes the feet of his disciples. He does the job of the lowest of slaves, yet he is the one who is much greater than the greatest person that ever lived. Why? Mark records Jesus saying to his disciples "You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Mark 10:42b-45)

So to be great, those who follow Christ must not be great as those in the world attempt to demonstrate greatness, but rather as Jesus demonstrates greatness -- through serving others in humility. The first glorifies a man; the second glorifies God, and Jesus is all about glorifying God.

For the one who does this and belongs to Jesus, it's good news, as "the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than [John]." (Luke 7:28b) The lowest in Jesus' kingdom is greater than the greatest person who ever lived. That's awesome.

So how does one get into the kingdom then? How does one belong to Jesus? How does one find the ability to live a life for God and others instead of a life for self? He doesn't do it through his own strength, that's for sure. He does it through the power of God's Spirit in him -- the result of a transformed heart, mind, and life.

As Jesus told Nicodemus, "I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." (John 3:3). Make no mistake, a man cannot brag that it was his own decision to "become born again" -- rather, it is God doing the transforming work in a person's life, for "the wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." (John 3:8)

So what do you do if you are not a born again believer in Jesus Christ who has had his heart of stone replaced with a heart of flesh that wants to live and die for God? Agree with God that you are in fact a sinner with no hope of saving yourself, and then turn from your sin to Jesus, who paid the price for your sin so that you don't have to. Ask him to save you. He doesn't say "no" to that.

Let's recap:

- John the baptizer is the greatest guy who ever lived
- If you're in God's kingdom, you're greater than John
- Jesus, bringer of the kingdom, was the ultimate example of a servant leader
- We're supposed to be like Jesus
- The only way to be like Jesus is to be born again
- The only way to be born again is to repent and trust Jesus for salvation

See, the external is not enough. Jesus helps fix the problem at the core -- our hearts, the internal. Jesus gives us a heart for God, a heart for him. If you don't have that, you might just be externally religious, looking good to men on the outside but dead on the inside. That's worse than being externally wicked, looking bad to men on the outside. If you're in the latter category, repent of your sin and turn to Jesus. If you're in the former category, repent of your religion and turn to Jesus.

There's a lot of variety in what a man may need to turn from -- but there is only one he needs to turn to.

Grace and peace, friends.

Do What For Who?

I was listening to a co-worker at lunch today describe some of the annoyances and other issues going on in his life. I've heard similar accounts a time or two before and couldn't help but think later "man, he needs Jesus in his life." Now that I say it, I wonder how many times one of my Christian brothers, and former co-worker, thought the same thing about me. This person is not very receptive to Christianity from what I can tell, and I admittedly don't try to steer any conversation in that direction with him. In my own weakness and self-righteousness, I admit I don't really care to have him in the lunch group because of the attitude I perceive he has toward Christianity -- as well as the worldly topics of conversation.

Now that I write it, it sounds like I have too much of a religious attitude that I need to repent of and get dealt with. After all, it was the Pharisees and teachers of the law who were the worst ones in Jesus' day -- and he told them to repent as well, being the worst ones enslaved by pride.

But that particular shortcoming is not what I wanted to deal with in this post -- rather it is my lame motivation behind the thinking "man, you need Jesus in your life." In this case, and others, I thought a person needed Jesus in his or her life because of some issue or attitude -- usually having to do with relationships with other people. While it is true that being transformed by God's Spirit can certainly improve strained relationships, that is absolutely the wrong motivation for coming to Christ.

I am somewhat sickened that the attitude revealed here reminds me of false teacher Joel Olsteen and his message that God just wants you to be rich, healthy, and have good relationships. What a load of crap. How was Jesus' relationship with people? Well, his family thought he was crazy during his earthly ministry. Many of his followers left him when he said something too tough for them to swallow. He was continually at odds with the religious leaders, who eventually murdered him because he claimed to be God.

When speaking about how people should view him, Jesus said "I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person's enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me." (Matthew 10:35-37)

Clearly, Jesus is not all about fixing our personal relationships. He is all about us repenting of our sin and coming into a relationship with him, and God the Father through him.

And that is what the motivation for pointing someone to Jesus should be. It should not be "hey man, turn to Jesus, he can make stuff in your life better." Jesus can do that, but that doesn't mean he will. In fact, some things might get a whole lot worse, depending on your perspective. After all, those who hate Jesus don't care much for his followers, either. Think about the typical Hindu or Muslim on the other side of the world who is the first in their family to come to Christ -- it is not going to go well for them, considering how coupled religion, culture, and family are in much of the non-western world.

So again, our motivation should not be "Jesus can fix some of your problems" but rather "Jesus has already fixed the one big problem." He is, after all, Lord and Savior, not Genie and Magician.

Shalom, friends.

The Genealogy Of Jesus

Jesus is probably the most talked about ever. As well, he is probably the most disagreed about person ever, despite having a rock solid record of his coming to Earth, his ministry while here, his sacrificial death on the cross to atone for our sins, his bodily resurrection, and his ascension into heaven. As we approach Christmas where believers focus on the incarnation -- God becoming flesh in the person of Jesus Christ -- let's take a quick look to see what the Bible has to say about his ancestry, as presented in the four gospel accounts.

Mark is easy; he doesn't deal with it. Maybe that's a little weird, but it is not without purpose. Mark was writing to a Roman audience -- generally a multicultural audience who didn't care a whole lot about genealogy and cared quite a bit about getting things done. Mark's gospel account also happens to be the most fast paced and action oriented of the four. Jesus went here, said this, did that, went there, did this, and so on. Jesus was a doer, and he got the job done.

Luke is different; he's an investigator. He's writing the book for a guy named Theophilus, who was taught about Jesus and wanted to know the truth behind what he was taught -- or if it was all bunk. From what I understand from people who know Greek, well, Luke's writing is very articulate. He was also a doctor. In short, he's a really smart guy bankrolled by a really rich guy who's funds aren't going to run dry -- he did his homework. And what does that homework say? Jesus is from the line of David, through his adoptive father Joseph. Luke also makes sure to record that Mary's pregnancy is a miracle from the Holy Spirit -- not some horrid offense against the betrothed couple where Mary had physical sex, violating the sanctity of their marriage.

Matthew was a follower of Jesus, and he wrote to a Jewish audience, so he's got a different agenda. Things not important to those Mark and Luke wrote to are of vital importance to Matthew's audience. Right up front, in the first sentence, Matthew makes sure to say that Jesus was both a son of David and a son of Abraham. He also, like Luke, makes sure to record that Mary's pregnancy is a miracle from the Holy Spirit, plus he adds that Joseph didn't even have sex with Mary until after Jesus was born. I think this is so there was no question at all -- not only was Mary a virgin when she became pregnant, she was a virgin when she gave birth. On top of that, Matthew does something not normally done, in that he includes the names of women in his genealogy of Jesus -- including Mary, which seems to imply that she also is from the line of David. Again, this is probably done so there is no question -- if adoptive father Joseph and biological mother Mary are both from the line of David, there's no argument!

And now we get to John. John is writing to Greeks, who are steeped in philosophy and don't really know a whole heck of a lot about Jewish history and religion. So rather than go down that road, John choose another one. Using terms like the Logos (the Word), and echoing the beginning of scripture, he shows that Jesus is the eternal Son of God -- the second person of the Trinity become the God-man on earth. Jesus' earthly line doesn't matter here -- the fact that he is the eternal creator and sustainer of all things does.

So there we have the God-man's coming to earth recorded from three different perspectives. Why does it matter?

Prophecy and truth.

If Jesus was just the product of two teenagers messing around, the Bible would be a horrid lie. He would not be the promised savior from the line of king David in fulfillment of prophecy, and other things the Bible says about Jesus would not necessarily be true. If Jesus is not God in the flesh come to save us, we who claim the name of Christ are terribly duped and are spreading evil. Really it's the same issue as Paul brings up in one of his comments on the resurrection of Jesus -- which says that if Jesus did not in fact rise from the dead, we're rightfully the laughing stock of the world. Thank God that is not the case, and that we do have good evidence, historically and experientially, that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.

So what about prophecy as it applies to the birth of Christ over two thousand years ago? There's a lot that can be written here -- more than I know about myself for certain -- but let me throw out a couple that I think are particularly relevant to my post.

First, Micah 5:2 -- "But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, who are too little to be among the clans of Judah, from you shall come forth for me one who is to be ruler in Israel, whose coming forth is from of old, from ancient days." Who's origin would be from ancient days? No mere mortal man for sure. Biblically that leaves the messiah to be an angel, as the Jehovah's Witnesses believe, or God himself, who Jesus actually is.

Second, Isaiah 9:6 -- "For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." Exactly who is going to be born that we're going to call "Mighty God" and "Everlasting Father"? No mere human for certain. No angel or other created being, either. You don't call anything created "Mighty God" nor "Everlasting Father" -- even Jesus himself was the one who said "call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven." Only one can fit this prophetic description, and that is the God-man Jesus.

Let's also not forget a few other comments recorded early on in the gospel accounts about the baby Jesus. Mary was told to name him Jesus in the first place, because he would save people from their sins, and Jesus means "savior." The name for your child meant more back then in that culture than they do to us westerners. Also, when Mary and Joseph brought Jesus to the temple, a prophet there said that he had finally seen God's salvation and could now die, and a prophetess gave thanks to God and started telling people who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem that he, Jesus, was it. On top of that, the wise men who understood prophecy about the promised messiah came to find Jesus and worship him, bringing him gold (for a king), incense (for a priest), and myrrh (for his death, the purpose for which he came!). Now please note, when these wise men worship Jesus, who was a toddler at the oldest by then, no one rebukes them -- and people have been rebuked in other places in the Bible for worshiping angels. Angels certainly are, by Biblical description, much more intimidating than a kid in a diaper. So who is this child again?

God in the flesh. Our Lord. Our Savior. Jesus Christ.

Destroy Your Bar

I ran through a possible scenario in my head tonight that ended up with me yelling at a bunch of people. Yeah, I do that. The daydreaming thing from childhood hasn't gone away, but now I'm loud and angry in my daydreaming, and what I'm angry at is religion.

I hate religion. I am so prone to religion.

Here's an example. In watching a non happy Disneyland world TV show tonight with the family, that wickedness came out in the way I thought about one character's immoral actions who professed to be a Christian. It also came out in thought in something I almost said to Novalee after joking that Jamie was going to kill me and I'd see her in heaven later -- "be a good girl and I'll see you there." Yuck, vomit. Filth. Judgmental and performance based nonsense that divides people into "good and bad" instead of "bad and Jesus."

Think I just went off the deep end and said Christians have license to sin willy nilly? No. Those born again of the Spirit of God don't want to sin; however, when we do -- and we all do -- God doesn't love us any less.

Don't believe that we all still sin and think you're "good" now? You're prideful. Pride is the worst sin and the one that got Satan kicked out of heaven. Pride and religion go together a lot. If you think you're "good" like I have and sometimes do, maybe you should think about that and examine the motives behind your actions and examine the how you think.

Don't believe that God still loves us the same when we sin? He loved us so much that he died on a cross while we were sinners and hated him. If he loved us less after he bought us with his blood and our hearts were turned to him, that would be insane. Last time I checked to the best of my ability, God isn't insane.

Now I'm off on a tangent, so back to the ranting in my head. It made me think of one thing religious people do, and that is make bars. Not places you serve drinks, but lines that divide -- on one side is the good people who get a pat on the head and on the other side is the bad people who get a pat somewhere lower than their head and a lot harder.

Consider a vocational or lay leader in a religion. If you can tolerate disagreement and discussion easily and you're trapped in religion, then I'm talking about yours. If you spin up easily and I might piss you off if I disagree with you, then I'm talking about someone else's. Whatever you like to keep reading, I don't care. For the record, this equally applies to mainline protestant denominations, evangelical Christians, and whatever other labels are out there. Just get a picture in your head and pay attention to the point.

Okay, this leader, he's good at what he does. He checks off all the do this boxes and the don't do that boxes. He's respectable and the church looks up to him. He reads his Bible every day. He goes to the Wednesday night service regularly. He gives ten percent. He doesn't smoke, drink, cuss, or waste his time on frivolous pursuits. He's the one to imitate in behavior -- except in thought, he's all screwed up. He's better than the others in the church. Some poor soul comes in off the street who's a broken mess and he wants to help this pathetic person become an upstanding gentleman just like him. He thinks God blesses him more than the rank and file members because he dots all his i's and crosses all his t's.

How about that rank and file member of the church? Maybe he works a tough job that's really demanding on his time, and he doesn't get paid that well. He has a hard time reading his Bible as much and giving as much as the first guy. He smokes and drinks, but he kind of hides it and feels a little guilty about it because those uppity people at his church give him funny looks when they smell something on him. But he thinks to himself that he's trying, and that at least he's not as bad as his neighbors who don't even go to church and are fighting all the time.

How about those neighbors? They work hard. They pay their taxes. Their kids don't cause trouble in the neighborhood. They don't really invite the previous family over a lot though; they feel a little ashamed about that shouting match and don't want to risk it coming up in conversation. They declined the same neighbor's invitation to church in the past, saying that they were glad Jesus worked for them, but that they didn't really need him. After all, they were decent people, not like those scumbags in prison who murdered and stole and set buildings on fire.

How about those scumbags? Bottom of the barrel right? Not much more to say? You know what they think? "At least we're not as bad as that child molester and that rapist over there."

All these people are the same. Yes, that's right, the same. They're all blinded by some form of religious pride. There's concern for image and obligating God and not needing God and all of that as we go through the list, but there's also one thing that all of them have in common. That stupid bar. That piece of crap that they use as a measuring stick to say "I'm above the line and you're below the line, so let me pat myself on the head and give myself a gold star." It is so easy for us to compare ourselves with other people and make ourselves look good, and it's so wicked.

That's not the gospel.

You know what the gospel is? The real bar is so high we can't reach it. Our religious effort and moral behavior won't get us there. God's not grading on a curve here. The standard is perfection and to be with God we have to be perfect. How the heck are we going to do that? In comes our intercessor Jesus, God in the flesh. He took the punishment for our sins on himself and when we put our trust in him, he gives us his righteousness. When we are in Christ, we look perfect before God. Now that's good news!

In short, those in Christ are not better people -- just sinners who are loved and forgiven, and who God is working on to make more like his Son Jesus Christ -- so if you've got a bar forged by religious pride, destroy it.

Joe Dude's Bible Thoughts: Jude 1 (Verses 9-25)

Verse 9

This is an interesting verse because of the lost extra-biblical source that Jude quotes, "The Assumption Of Moses" according to Origen. Some texts have been found that are either from this book or from a different one called the "Testament Of Moses". What has been found doesn't contain anything related to this dispute however. The whole thing seems a little sketchy.

I also think that's a totally wrong focus on the verse.

Let's look at what Jude says and the point he is making. The first immediate thing that comes to mind is "Don't !@#$ with the devil!" If Michael, one of the princes of God's angels, left it to God himself to rebuke Satan, who are we? Don't mess with him and don't talk to him -- go to God and ask him to deal with it.

Verse 10

The bigger point here is that, while super-powerful Michael didn't dare rebuke Satan to his face, the merely human false teachers Jude is dealing with blaspheme all kinds of stuff they don't get. I'm not sure if that means with their words, or with their immoral lives, or what.

The latter part of the verse brings Romans to mind -- "although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves".

In short, God gives people what they want. If they want to make themselves or something else their god, he will let them and give them over completely to their false and godless ways. Jude puts the false teachers in this category -- these are people who have become like "unreasoning animals" living life worshiping the gods of pleasure and self instead of God himself.

Verse 11

Jude gives some examples of others who went their own way instead of God's way. Cain out of anger, Balaam out of greed, and Korah out of pride and a rejection of authority.

Verses 12 through 15

Jude calls the false teachers a bunch of names and says they're going to hell.

He doesn't cater to the wolves. He shoots them. Lord, give me the same kind of boldness.

Verse 16

"Loud-mouthed boasters, showing favoritism to gain advantage" sounds so much like slick TV preachers (Joel Olsteen, cough cough) that are always upbeat and don't have anything bad to say about anyone -- wolves who through out a "God wants you to be rich and healthy" message to the world.

Ever see the camera pan out across the audience, I mean congregation, for these liars? There's a ton of people there. Like I said, God gives people what they want. You want God, you get God. You want some godless bull!@#$ message that makes you feel happy, you get a steaming pile.

Verse 17 and 18

False teachers are not anything new.

Verse 19

"It is these who cause divisions, worldly people, devoid of the Spirit."

This punch hits hard.

In the past when I heard "false teacher" my mind would go to other religions outside the mainstream Christian denominations -- Mormonism and Jehovah's Witnesses for example.

Next my mind would go to the liberal views in the main denominations that promote all kinds of nonsense -- gay is okay, the Bible isn't God's authoritative word, Jesus wasn't necessarily divine, the resurrection doesn't really matter, there is no hell, everyone's going to heaven, and so on.

My mind is starting to shift from that a little bit -- closer to home. And rightly so -- it's not the obviously erroneous stuff that kills people, it's the subtle stuff. It's the religious people who check the boxes, speak Christianese really well, and have no heart for God and live like the rest of the world, seeking only the pleasures of the world in self-deification and living for today instead of eternity.

God help me to not be a Spirit-less religious guy, because I am so easily sucked into religion. Show us all where were are stuck in religion and KILL IT.

Verses 20 through 23

Hang on Christian, and help your brothers and sisters hang on too! It's a bumpy ride, but Jesus has our back.

Verses 24 and 25

That's right, Jesus rocks!

Perfect Hater

One of my cousins posted a link the other day that had that wonderful bunch of chaps from the Westboro Baptist Church in it. If the name doesn't ring a bell, that's the "God hates fags" group. If that still doesn't ring a bell, excellent. Your head will probably hurt less and your dinner has a better chance of staying down. Let's keep it that way.

That's enough about that group itself. I could go on a long rant that includes in it points about jacked up theology, wrong motives, and causing God's name to be blasphemed and dishonored. That wasn't my original intent, so I'll leave it at that. I wanted to see what the Bible said about hate -- in particular hate coming from God, as I've heard and read mixed things that warrant clarification.

The cliche phrase always comes to my mind -- "hate the sin and love the sinner" which sounds good to me. Interestingly, the phrase came from Ghandi, not the Bible. Even so, is it sound advice for the Christian? We'll see.

I wanted to get some other thoughts, so I went to a website that generally has very solid answers and read this:

"Even as Christians, we remain imperfect in our humanity and cannot love perfectly, nor can we hate perfectly (in other words, without malice). But God can do both of these perfectly, because He is God. God can hate without any sinful intent. Therefore, He can hate the sin and the sinner in a perfectly holy way and still be willing to lovingly forgive at the moment of that sinner's repentance and faith."

That sounds pretty harsh to me. I guess it's because I am human and don't get what "perfect hate" is and how God can love perfectly and hate perfectly at the same time. To me, God hating someone sounds more like "I want to squash you like a bug." That is obviously not the truth, otherwise we would have all be squashed long ago.

Next I did a search in the Bible for words with "hate" and found a lot of people hating people, people hating God, God hating people's actions, people being told not to hate and so on. I found the following three verses that deal with God hating people directly:

- "The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers." (Psalm 5:5)

- "The LORD tests the righteous, but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence." (Psalm 11:5)

- "but Esau I have hated. I have laid waste his hill country and left his heritage to jackals of the desert." (Malachi 1:3)

So based on that, I must conclude that the website is correct, and God does in fact hate the wicked. Ouch! Remember that "the wicked" includes me and everyone else on the planet. We have all sinned against a perfect God and are deserving of nothing but his wrath.

Even so, God loved the whole world so much that he sent Jesus to take the sins of the world upon himself and be the payment we cannot pay. This love is expressed well in Romans 5:8, which says "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." In other words, while we hated God and were his enemies, and while he hated us for it, he still loved us and died on a cross for us. I don't really GET that kind of love, deep down. I don't think I will on this side of eternity.

I think the explanation of how God's love and hate play together is explained well in this: "Mysterious but true is the fact that God can perfectly love and hate a person at the same time. This means He can love him as someone He created and can redeem, as well as hate him for his unbelief and sinful lifestyle."

Does that mean we should do the same? Absolutely not. We're flawed humans and told many times in scripture not to hate. We can't love perfectly like God, nor can we hate perfectly like God. The advice "Love the sinner and hate the sin" is absolutely appropriate for us mere mortals!

Joe Dude's Bible Thoughts: Jude 1 (Verses 5-8)

Verses 5-7

Jude gives some examples of those destined for hell. First are those who saw God's awesome power as Moses led them out of Egypt yet did not believe. Second are angels who would have even been in the presence of God, yet rejected him. I think it is implied by the text that these demons are those angels that pridefully rebelled against God with Satan. Third are those people from Sodom and Gomorrah completely given over to wickedness and their own pleasures.

I don't know why Jude picked these particular groups of creatures, but there is definitely a lesson to be learned from each of them.

When we see God's might and power and still reject him, that's evil. Each of us has a time in our life when the push from his Spirit to turn away from sin to him is the strongest it will ever be, yet sadly many reject that push and turn away from God forever, condemning themselves to hell. I can't imagine being one of those delivered from slavery in Egypt, crossing through the Red Sea, seeing God lead as a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire, and still not believe in him. Yet, I am also reminded of the parable of the rich man and Lazarus that Jesus told -- where at the end he says that the rich man's brothers will not believe, even if someone were to rise from the dead.

When we desire a higher position than God has given us, that's evil. Especially evil is pride. Satan had this to such an extent that he wanted to be God. I would say thank God we're different, but that's not necessarily true. How often in our lives have we wanted to be God instead of God? Maybe we wouldn't say it or think it like that, but how often have we behaved that way and then found ourselves in deep water? As people we have a fine way of allowing Jesus to sit on the throne of our lives until things get a little too good or a little to bad and then we kick him off the throne and try to do things our own way. It never works out well, and it never will.

When we make ourselves our own gods and decide our main purpose in life is not to glorify God, but to seek fulfillment from carnal pleasures, that's evil. For many the sins of the men of Sodom and Gomorrah are obviously wicked -- "well, thank God we're not like that!" Yet how often do we seek our own different pleasures first in this world? Maybe it's television or games. Maybe it's sports or hobbies. Maybe it's food and drink. Maybe it's home and family time. There are many things in this world we are free to enjoy in Christ, but, as Paul wrote, not everything builds up. When we let something other than God enslave us and take over, we're in trouble.

And now that I've written about all three examples a little bit, I see how they could follow each other in succession from disbelief to pride to self-appointed godhood, but I don't think that's the intent here, especially given verse 8 below.

Verse 8

Jude brings out the commonality in the examples by comparing them to the problematic people that prompted his letter in the first place. The commonality in all of them is rejecting God's authority in favor of some other authority -- trying to make something else God in the place of God. For the Israelites in Egypt, it started with the golden calf. For the angels, it was themselves -- they wanted to be God, or at least the ringleader did. For the wicked men of those cities, they wanted to rule their own lives, thus making themselves their own gods as well.

All of the above trusted in something other than God, and Jude says the same thing about certain false teachers that appear to rely on the authority of their own dreams rather than scripture, or Jesus, or something a little more compelling than the product of a bad meal and background head noise. They ground themselves in experience, which is no ground at all. Based on their experience, they go on living like the devil, which reveals that they do not know God at all.

Really, to me, it just seems like an excuse to sin -- with a God sticker slapped on it. There's nothing new under the sun. As an example from the past, there were temples to fake gods with temple prostitutes. What was the thought process there? "Hmmm, we like to have sex with whoever, let's do that and call it worship." As an example from today, we like the "good life" here in the first world, so what do you see? Name It And Claim It, God's your magic genie. The Prosperity Gospel, God just wants you to be rich and healthy. Or how about even those who get the real gospel being bad stewards in the name of "enjoying God's blessings"? I know that one. It's devious, and it's dangerous.

I am not saying that experience is bad, but it better not be the sole basis for your faith. I had an incredibly transformational experience when my heart was turned toward Jesus, but that experience also lines up very well with the Bible as well. The two complement each other well. If I were to just have some very moving experience, but it didn't line up with the Bible at all, that would be a big problem.

There are people with very moving conversion stories to various religious systems that are similar to mine. There are people who have claimed to have special new revelation from God. There are people who have claimed to talk to angels and demons and the dead. There are people who claim to have dreams and visions that came from God. It is far too easy to just go after experience these days, but such experiences are worthless or outright harmful if they don't line up with God's Word. All of scripture points to Jesus, so if you've got some "new thing" that points away from Jesus or goes against what he said, you're deceived or just full of crap.

I'll stop here for now and go through additional parts of Jude next post. I never thought a one chapter book in the Bible would yield so much from my brain.

Joe Dude's Bible Thoughts: Jude 1 (Verses 1-4)

I thought I'd jump around. Here we have the start of the shortest book in the Bible, written by Jude, the brother of James, both half-brothers of Jesus.

Verse 1

Jude also seems to be tracking with the idea of the elect -- those predestined by God to be saved -- when he says "to those who have been called".

The phrase "who are loved by God" could be a bit confusing, as it could imply that God doesn't love everyone. God does love everyone, demonstrated by the fact that he doesn't destroy us all immediately because of sin and demonstrated by Jesus coming into the world to save all who will receive him. However, God does not ignore sin, and only God's covenant love is extended to his adopted children -- those who put their faith in his son Jesus.

Verse 3

Jude wanted to write about the salvation and faith shared with other Christian brothers, but changed his mind to deal with more pressing issues of false teachings that were surfacing.

However, before he switches gears, he says something that appears to be of significance -- "the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints." That's an interesting way to put it, and I know I have until now overlooked it.

In Romans and Hebrews the same phrase is in there talking about Christ being our sacrifice for sins -- he died once for all. His death on the cross is what pays the penalty for sin, nothing more, and nothing less. In the same way, the final revelation about our faith came through Christ, in his teachings passed on to the apostles. Nothing more was or is to come -- we have all we need to know regarding our salvation, proper Christian thought and action, and so on.

Verse 4

It looks like Jude is concerned about false teachers creeping into the body of Christ -- "godless men, who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord."

This reminds me immediately of Paul in Romans 6 -- "What shall we say? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound?" (verse 1) and "What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!" (verse 15). He says the same types of things elsewhere as well, and the point is clear -- just because we have freedom in Christ does not mean we have freedom to sin.

A person who thinks that their freedom in Christ gives them free reign to sin freely and be good with God is not in Christ. The person who is in Christ has a new heart for God that desires to know him and love him and flee from sin like Joseph fled from Potiphar's wife.

Obedience

God threw this one to me today so I thought I'd share

Jesus said "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." (John 14:15)

If we're believers, what do we think when we hear that? A typical response I think is something like "Okay God, I love you, I'll keep your commandments." We better get the gospel when we say that, because if we don't get the gospel, one of two things will happen.

- Thing 1. Pride. We'll do well, in some areas, and say "Look how good I'm keeping A, B, and C compared to those other people. Man, I rock!" Never mind D through Z.

- Thing 2. Despair. We'll recognize our miserable failure to do what we said and give up. "I can't do this, it's hopeless for me!"

We need to get the gospel.

Jesus didn't say "To be saved, keep my commandments." He said "If you love me, you will keep my commandments." If you just read that as "Obedience doesn't matter" that is NOT what I said. Hold your thought and keep reading. Let's focus on the first part -- "If you love me..."

Well how do you get to the point of loving God?

"We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother." (1 John 4:19-21)

How did God first love us?

"In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 John 4:10)

"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him." (John 3:16-17)

"God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8)

So God first loved us through the cross. When we repent of our sins and turn to Jesus for our salvation, we get a new heart, a new nature -- one that desires God above all things. It is from this new nature that we can truly love God, and demonstrate it through obedience, which includes loving others.

But let me try to be very clear -- this obedience from the new nature is not a "try really hard to show my love" thing. It's a "by my new nature I will obey, because I love God" thing.

Or to put it another way getting rid of that pesky and confusing "you will" and clarifying the meaning:

"If you love me, you better keep my commandments to show it." No.

"If you love me, you're going to keep my commandments." Yes.

Not getting this right leads to works based self-righteousness that focuses on ourselves and what we do. It makes our perception of God's love for us, and possibly our state of salvation, dependent on our performance. That's evil.

Getting this right leads to to grace based Christ-righteousness that focuses on God and what he did. It makes our perception of God's love for us, and our state of salvation, dependent on the cross. That's good. That's God.

Sola Scriptura

It's been a while, but I did say I was going to write a post about "sola scriptura" or "scripture alone". If you're not grokking what that means, it basically means the the Bible is THE authority for doctrine. To be very clear, that means we should hold to the doctrines clearly found in the Bible (directly or through valid logical reasoning of what the text says) and that we should NOT hold to doctrines that are not clearly found in the Bible (again, directly or through valid logical reasoning of what the text says).

I'm writing this to think more about this statement, which was a response to a man questioning whether or not the Bible was the only authority for truth -- "You can't really demonstrate sola scriptura from Scripture. The Bible doesn't expressly declare that it is the Christian's only authority. In other words, sola scriptura is essentially the historic confession of the Reformers, over and against the Catholic claim that it is Scripture plus the Church and Tradition. For us, then, it is a theological presupposition, our starting point rather than a proven conclusion."

It's a well said answer, but I'm not sure I agree with it. I think I can demonstrate the Bible is our only authority from Scripture, and I'm not going to do it with a verse, but with bigger ideas that surround a lot of verses. For some context, look up the following:

- The first parts of Matthew 15 and Mark 7, where Jesus is ripping the religious dudes for putting their traditions over the word of God.

- Colossians 2 where Paul argues against listening to reasonable human arguments for things that are really only self-made religion, which takes away from Christ.

So how does that tie into scripture alone? It's all in the DANGER.

When we go outside scripture for something, we're depending on men, fallible and sinful. Even the most well meaning men who love the LORD are bound to screw things up. That's kind of our whole problem in the first place. So let's go into the way back machine to when Moses was walking and talking and leading a bunch of grumblers and complainers through the desert.

God delivers the law. God's people want to follow the law. Leadership looks at something like "don't work on the sabbath" and tries to figure out how they should obey that. That's a good thing. Unfortunately over time you end up with a mess of rules that is put forth and accepted by many as what God wants, rather than looking at what God's Word is going for. For fun, go read some of the things rabbis way back wrote about proper washing of hands. It's absolutely insane, and it *started* with men trying to faithfully obey God -- but it went way off in the weeds. Jesus wanted, among other things, to get people out of the weeds and on the road.

So what about groups that claim Christ but don't have the Bible as the sole and ultimate authority? Off the top of my head I can think of Mormonism, Catholicism, and the Jehovah's Witnesses, who have more than the Bible -- as well as many, we'll call them "liberal" -- Christians who don't believe the Bible is the inspired Word of God.

In Mormonism you have other stuff (the Book of Mormon for example) and a claim to be the true church, but that the other stuff doesn't conflict with the Bible or is supported outright by it. In Catholicism you have other stuff (church tradition for example) and a claim to be the true church, but that the other stuff either doesn't conflict with the Bible or is supported outright by it. On top of that you have the idea that the extra stuff the Mormons say doesn't conflict really does. Then you have the Jehovah's Witnesses who claim our translations are jacked up so they have their own version of it, the New World Translation -- along with the claim that the Watchtower Society is the only group with the authority to interpret scripture.

Then you have Bible-only Christians who say this is all nonsense.

What we've ended up with in many cases are extra-biblical beliefs invented by men and taught as truth. Sound familiar in a way? There's nothing new under the sun.

Now before I continue, know that I'm not writing this to pound on and argue individual doctrines in different groups, but rather to point out that you need to start out with the Bible as your authority and go from there -- not start with extra junk you've been taught and shove it into what you read into the Bible. You can find some verses to support any fool thing you want to. Satan did tempting Jesus. The prosperity gospel people do. The "homosexuality and abortion are not sins" people do. We do, but we shouldn't -- we need to catch ourselves and read things in context and look for the plain simple meaning of the text!

With that said, I'll fairly pick on one thing from each of the groups I mentioned to make my point very clear.

- You don't START with the Bible and get different levels of heaven. Yes, I see in 1 and 2 Corinthians where people try to back that up with. If you didn't start with the Mormon doctrine you were taught about the celestial, terrestrial, telestial (what?), and so on, you wouldn't come up with that in reading the Bible. You know what you get when you read phrases like "third heaven" -- well, the atmosphere, space, and what is actually heaven, which is what Paul saw but had no words for. "The LORD will open the heavens to give rain / Anyone who dies in the open country the birds of the heavens shall eat / rain from heaven. Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens / stars of heaven. Look down from your holy habitation, from heaven." Hundreds more uses of heaven to mean three different and obvious things!

- You don't START with the Bible and get that Mary led a sinless life, was taken up into heaven like Jesus was, and is an intercessor for us now that we can ask to pray for us. That's not even a logical conclusion based on the biblical text. "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." "Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed / Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!" "Here are my mother and my brothers! For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother." Plus, where the Bible mentions talking to dead people, it's always in the context of sorcery, witchcraft, and so on, not asking them to pray for us!

- You don't START with the Bible and get that Jesus was Michael the archangel. Yes, I see in Hebrews where people try to back that up with, and I get the New World Translation of the Bible is different -- despite the fact that people who actually know Greek and look at it will tell you the translation doesn't match any source documents we have correctly! I've done the "Jesus Is God" post before, so go look that up if you really want to understand this; I'm getting a bit tired of writing, and this is a BIG one.

Now that I've probably pissed some people off, including friends and family, PLEASE take this advice: read the Bible for YOURSELF, ALONE, PRAYERFULLY, without drawing from what's been drilled into your head as much as you can -- and see what the plain meaning of the text is. God gave us a book that is simple enough to read and understand without us crapping it up and shoving our own ideas into it. It's a very dangerous thing that didn't end so well the first time.

Hoarder

Ever see that show Hoarders? It's quite the look into the lives of people with great unhealthy attachments to things and trying to break them away from it and get their homes or property cleaned up. There was a burst of time in my life when I watched it a lot, and in that time I saw episodes about people completely attached to animals, collections, projects, day to day things, food, and even complete junk and trash. Cleaning crews, psychologists, and "professional organizers" were brought in to help with the situations. Some of the time there was success in cleaning up a home or property, but despite that, more often than not, the deeper issue of attachment remained unsolved.

With the light and knowledge I have graciously received in my life, I couldn't help but think when watching "All your prattle and rationalization amounts to nothing -- these people are, almost certainly unknowingly, trying to get their fulfillment, or their hope, or their security, or whatever else, from the wrong source. What they need is the power of Jesus Christ to break them away from idolatry and sin and give them a new life."

That is, after all, what he did for me in my own life. I was seeking fulfillment from all kinds of things, trying to fill a hole in my heart that only God could fill. I just didn't know it until he broke into my life, showed me my sin, and ripped me away from myself -- granting me repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. Praise God for that!

Now what about the sin in my life and how it relates to the topic? There were definitely attachments associated with that sin, but was I a hoarder? Let's look.

One of the sins of my past that totally wrecked my head was adultery. I've cheated on my wife countless times with countless women through the magic of the Internet and my own jacked up imagination. But not only did I do that, I collected them. I had the modern day equivalent of the stack of Playboys on my hard drive -- except I could fit a whole lot more of a whole lot worse on there. Before I was really born again, I believed in God and would try to make deals with him. "I'll delete all this if you do that. I won't get any more, I promise." Yeah, that lasted about what, 2 seconds? The Jesus hole was still in my heart, and my efforts were my own and with wrong motive. So of course I was bound to fail and fail back into hoarding porn. One tick mark for "hoarder".

Aside from being an adulterer, I was also a thief. Do you know how many pirated programs and songs I had on my computer? I don't either, but it was a LOT. Did I try to rationalize it? Absolutely not. I knew it was stealing and I was proud of it. Crap I didn't even use or listen to. It looks like that was hoarding too. Two more tick marks for "hoarder" -- one for the software and one for the music.

That's three strikes already. I'd have to say based on the evidence that I was definitely a hoarder.

Does it matter to identify the old man like that? Probably not. I just think it's interesting that in my old nature I had the same mentality about digital things that the people on this show had about physical things. Looking on the outside in, no would would peg me as a hoarder, because the outward appearance wasn't there, but the internal thought processes and attachments were the same.

I also find it interesting that, in either case, the outward signs of such a mentality are pointers to a deeper problem that plagues all men -- our sinful nature. That kind of deeper problem cannot be solved by man. It can be ignored, excused, or rationalized, so that a person "feels better" about being broken. However, a real solution can only come from God through repentance and faith in his Son, Jesus Christ.

Sola Fide

I've been reading a book about a couple who grew up solidly on the Word of God, was very against the Catholic church, and eventually through their study in the Word came to the conclusion that the Catholic church was the true church founded by Jesus Christ. While I'll obviously disagree with some of the arguments in the book, it's still an interesting read.

The man did make some good points I never thought about how the different covenants in the Bible (with Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, and David) were connected and how the groups involved grew from a couple to a family to a tribe to a nation to a kingdom -- until at the end you reach the new universal covenant through Jesus Christ. I've never really looked into the different covenants all together before, so that to me was an interesting approach about how the bigger picture went.

But now on to the main two points of this pair of posts -- sola fide and sola scriptura. The man he said that through his studies, these two pillars of the Reformation, which he held as the only pillars, were knocked over for him. Those are what I want to think and talk about here. For today, I'll deal with sola fide. I wanted to deal with both, but this ended up to be a very long post as it is.

Sola Fide

Sola fide means "faith alone". In other words, we're justified, or made right with God, solely by our faith in Christ, not our faith plus works we do. Now I didn't quite follow how the man's logic went as he told his story, but he did quote two verses, James 2:24 (a man is justified by works and not by faith alone) and 1 Corinthians 13:2 (if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing). Well those sound pretty compelling on the surface, but you can make a lot of things compelling when you take them out of context.

First let's look at the James verse. There's a part of the verse missing. It starts "You see, a man is justified...". He is concluding an argument. Go read the rest of James chapter 2 for the full argument. He uses the word faith in two ways. One way is "lip service" which is bogus faith. In other words you say that you believe but that's about it. The Bible has a lot more to say about that kind of non "faith", and it's never anything good. The other ways is "real faith". What kind of faith is real? The kind that produces something -- for there will absolutely be evidence in your life to show that your faith is real. If someone can't look at your life and tell that you have a heart for God, you should be very troubled.

Now let's look at the 1 Corinthians verse -- the argument here seems to be that I am nothing if I have faith but not love -- so to be something, I must have faith plus love, which is shown by my good works. How about the verse just after it too, though? "If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing." Those are works, that without love, make him nothing. There's other stuff in that passage too, that, without love, makes him nothing. One might say then "well then, I need faith, and works, and love, and " but read the whole passage and get the context. Paul isn't talking about justification anywhere in the passage -- he's talking about the importance of love and what it looks like. That's it.

Now, to be fair to the man, he's not presenting his full argument in this book -- just telling his story and throwing in some key points. I'm sure these two verses aren't the extent of his supposed discovery, but for a person who writes about himself as a student of the Word, to take them out of context like that to argue an important point is not a good thing.

What his wife said in her explanation resonated with me more: "Justification meant being made a child of God and being called to live a life as a faithful child of God through faith working in love." I read that and thought "duh" but I also don't see how in the world that goes against sola fide. I'm really not quite sure what she understood it to mean before! Absolutely justification means being made a child of God, and after you're justified, you're called to, and will, produce fruit -- with the Spirit in you, you'll have a desire to obey God and live a life that glorifies him.

Look at how it works from my understanding and experience -- you repent of your sins and put your faith in Christ. That in itself is a gift from God, and recognizing it as such glorifies him. We're not talking "I said the sinner's prayer and I'm good to go" nonsense, we're talking "Jesus barged into my life with a wrecking ball and got me" faith. Okay, at that point, you're justified. Born again of the Spirit. A new creation. Adopted into sonship. Bye bye heart of stone, and hello heart of flesh. After that, what are you going to do? Walk the walk without taking away the credit from God -- glorifying him. What about when you fall? Mourn over your sin and thank God for his grace and mercy in forgiving you and picking you up -- glorifying him.

Notice there's a running theme here, and it's not about you.

So however you say the words to understand this mystery of being "right with God" through Jesus Christ, never go down that dangerous road where you think "I NEED to do [whatever] TO BE or STAY in good standing with God." It's evil. The proper response for the Spirit filled believer is "I WANT to do [whatever] BECAUSE I'm ALREADY in good standing with God."

The first takes the focus off God and puts it on you. The second takes the focus off you and puts it on God. Only one of those glorifies him.

Hard Stuff

There's some pretty harsh stuff in the Bible. Harsh stuff about God even. There's sections I know pastors skip over much more than not because there's just hard things to deal with in there. Things that people say keep them from believing the Bible in full or in part, and things that make those who claim it to be the absolute word of God still question "Would God really..."

I've asked those questions before, and I've answered "yes" to those questions before. I don't have a problem with some of the actions I read about, but I certainly won't scoff at those who wrestle with them either. I'm not sure where this difference in attitude comes from. Maybe it's the way Jesus just broke into my life that makes some sovereign actions less of an issue. Maybe it's because I came the Bible to be true first through the lenses of science, history, reliability, and prophecy about Christ that I trust all of it to be an accurate account of God's interaction with humanity. Maybe I'm impersonal and callous enough that I just don't put myself in the stories and feel the weight and pain in them. I don't know. Probably some of each.

That said, I wanted to write something about what I don't hear talked about whole lot. First, do a search in Revelation for "book of life" and see what there is. Among the results are these:

- "The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life." (Revelation 3:5)

- "The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to rise from the bottomless pit and go to destruction. And the dwellers on earth whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world will marvel to see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come." (Revelation 17:8)

- "And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire." (Revelation 20:15)

Real book, symbolic book, I don't really care. Let's work with the imagery we're given. It looks to me like a person's name was put in the book before the creation of the world, other people's names were not put in the book, a person's name can be blotted out from the book, and if a person's name ain't in it, there's hell to pay. Literally.

Who did the writing or omitting, can do the blotting, and will do the judging? God.

So that might make a person's brain hurt. God can make someone knowing they will be destroyed? Well, yeah. God can make someone with the purpose of destroying them? Well, yeah. Check these out:

- "But for this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth." (Exodus 9:16)

- "Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory -- even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?" (Romans 9:21-24)

I picked these on purpose because they both show not only the sovereignty of God in raising up people for whom it would not end well, but also the reason behind it -- God's glory. God can't very well demonstrate his love, grace, mercy, and so on, in delivering people -- without having something to deliver those people from. It's his universe, and he do what he wants with it, even show off his goodness by allowing or outright making the means to show it.

Think that's not fair? From a human perspective, it certainly could, and we're pretty tied to human perspectives. If you're there, consider this:

- It's not about us and our sense of entitlement. It's about God and his glory. All have sinned and fall short, and he's under no obligation to save anyone.

- Though under no obligation, he did choose to save people through his son Jesus. He lived as a man on earth, suffered much at the hands of those who should have exalted him, took the sins of the world on himself, and died a horrific death on the cross.

- All that stuff I just said -- he did for his enemies, such as myself, before I put my faith in Jesus Christ.

So before we throw up that cry of "unfair," consider how fair, from our human perspective, it was for Jesus to take our place on the cross so we could have eternal life and live with God forever instead of eternal punishment and be separated from God forever. From my point of view, Jesus getting a pile of wrath and God getting us left him with the short end of the stick. Of course, that limited view is because I'm the clay dude, not the potter.

If that still seems unacceptable and unfair toward some people, consider that for just about everyone, it's their own words and actions that will condemn them, by rejecting the means of salvation God has provided. In other words, though I can't prove it from scripture that I know of, I believe that most people start with their names in the book of life and cause it to be blotted out by rejected whatever light God reveals to them. Why do that and complain you've been unfairly destined for destruction? Why not instead turn from sin to Christ and prove yourself to be destined for glory?

Finally, if that STILL seems unacceptable, I don't know what else to tell you other than go make your own universe and run it your way. Good luck. I'll stick with this one with a God I know is completely sovereign and able to do anything, a God who is for me and not against me, a God who has a crazy love me and wants me to love him back with all my heart, and a God who is always right and just even when we don't get it, because he cannot be otherwise. This is my God, and though he's not safe, he is good.

Joe Dude's Bible Thoughts: Genesis 19

Okay when I get to verse 5, I think what the !@#$ is wrong with you people? But then I remember. Our sinful nature. That terrible thing common to all people. That thing that makes us not live up to our own standards, let alone God's. That thing behind child abuse, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, sex trafficking, strip clubs, pornography, prostitution, abortion, murder, rape, kidnapping, neglect, fornication, adultery, divorce, backstabbing, gossip, fraud, envy, and so on. That thing behind making idols out of sports, games, food, clothes, jobs, kids, homes, bank accounts, cars, boats, hobbies, and so on. That horrid thing that, when we realize it, leaves us in a place where we realize we need someone who can solve a problem for us that we cannot solve -- a place where we realize our need for Jesus Christ.

So back to the gathering crowd. I get Lot's pleading with them not to do the wicked thing they were intent on doing. But, especially as a father of daughters, I do not get why in the world he would offer to send out his daughters in place of the men. I could get "touch my daughters and I will hunt down every last one of you and murder you while you sleep" but willingly giving them to the men I do not get. I can only assume based on a limited understanding of the culture, that hospitality was so greatly valued and women so little valued that this made sense. The hospitality thing seems to make sense when Lot says not to harm them "for they have come under the shelter of my roof."

It crossed my mind for a bit that maybe Lot's response would be different if he didn't know his guests were angels. But the text doesn't read that way to me, and I don't see that Lot actually knew they were angels.

If you try to picture the next scene in detail, I think there's something interesting. First, this angels strike the men with blindness -- they don't pussyfoot around here. However, why did the men wear themselves out groping for the door? If you were near the door, I would think you'd find it quickly or give up far before you wore yourself out. That's just my own thinking though -- we have to take the Word at face value here.

I get how Lot must have felt when he told people that the place was going to be destroyed. I feel the same way when I tell people about Jesus and they give me a "that's great, I'm glad it works for you" or scoff, or reject the message in some other way. It's very frustrating. It reminds me of when I was first rescued by Christ -- I asked a good friend "Why didn't you tell me?!" His response -- "Would you have listened?" The answer is a resounding no, I guess I wouldn't have.

I never really paid attention to the destination before -- that Lot requested to go to Zoar instead of to the hills. I could make something of that, but it would probably be reading to much into a simple detail of the account.

Lot's wife turning to salt has got to be one of the oddest miracles in the Bible. I still think confusing the languages is more odd, but this one is right up there. I've had people scoff and use this as an excuse for not believing the Bible is true -- "Really, salt? I don't think so." While I think it's weird, it's not beyond God. I mean, really, he made the whole universe and people to live in it. Aren't those a lot more awesome than a person turning into something?

The whole escape scene contains a great lesson. First you have people who don't believe Lot at all, and they perish. Then you have the people Lot didn't even tell, and they perish. Then you have Lot's wife, who looked back, and she perished. It's the same with Jesus and the coming judgement. You have people who reject the light of Christ, either outright, or by looking back and longing for their past with it's habitual sin they found so enjoyable. They will perish. But what about those who didn't hear the message? Don't worry about them.

"What? What do you mean don't worry about them." Don't worry about them. God's pretty big and can deal with that sort of thing. It's the person, maybe you, who hears a lot about Jesus, gets the message, and still rejects him, that has something deadly serious to worry about.

Okay, back to the account again. "We don't have a man around, so we'll get our father drunk and get pregnant by him." That doesn't sound like very solid thinking, but then again I don't think ahead regarding my actions a lot of the time. I wonder what he thought when they started showing, assuming he didn't remember what happened!

Proud To Not Be Proud?

Harry preached on the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector today in his series on the beatitudes -- today's message was on meekness. I thought that was great after hearing a message from John Piper on the same passage, with a different focus.

Today God used Harry to remind me of two points I typically forget -- that the Pharisee in the story really is as good, by man's standards, as he claims to be. He's not exaggerating. The people of the day would look at him as the model to follow, the one we should be more like. They wouldn't look at him as some hypocritical jerk who doesn't know God. Conversely, the tax collector in the story really is horrid in the eyes of the people. He's a sellout to Rome, taking money from his own people for taxes to fund the government that is oppressing them -- and taking extra money as well to line his own pockets. Yet the tax collector is the one justified before God, not the Pharisee, because the Pharisee puts the focus on himself and the tax collector puts the focus on God alone.


Thank God for constant reminders of this, because pride seeps into our hearts so so easily.

I thought after service before going to lunch with the family I would re-read the parable for myself just to get it in my head even more. I flipped to Luke 18:9 and read this preceding verse:

"To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable"

Stop.

I didn't get to the parable yet, and already there's trouble! What came into my head? "Thank you God, that I don't look down on other people." That sounds right. That sounds nice. We have the knowledge of Christ. We know his words and teachings. We know we shouldn't be putting ourselves above others, because we are all under God. So what's the problem?

The problem is in what is implied in the statement. It might as well read "Thank you God, that I don't look down on other people, like those self righteous people who look down on other people." Oh crap. I did the same thing. By thinking that way, I've just split people into camps in my mind and put myself above other men -- different men than the Pharisee did, but it's the exact same thing.

Think of this way through two people, Moral Deist and Ima Sinner:

- Moral Deist thinks he's really good. He gives God the credit for it. Even so, that kind of thinking leads him to look down on all those "other" people who do horrible sins. He prays "Oh thank you God that I'm not like those guys who cheat on their wives, or those guys who sell drugs, or those guys who are workaholics and never see their family, or those guys who murder and rob other people, or those guys who molest kids" and so on.

- Ima Sinner knows he's not good. She prays "Oh thank you God for showing me my sin and turning my heart to Jesus Christ. Thank you for showing me that in my own heart, I was the adulterer, the drug dealer, the workaholic, the murderer, the thief, the child molester, and so on. And thank you so much that you showed me this, and that I'm not like one of those hypocritical self-righteous people who put themselves above others, because we are all sinners who need to be saved by grace."

Moral's two groups were the people who do "good things" and the people who do "bad things". He put himself in the people who do good things group and thought himself above the people who do bad things. But the prideful act of looking down on others and thinking himself above them puts him square in the latter group anyway.

Ima's two groups were the people who don't think themselves above others and the people who do. She put herself in the people who don't think themselves above others group. The prideful act of creating two such groups in her mind puts her in the latter group anyway.

That is why the parable doesn't have the tax collector pray "Thank you God, that I'm not like the Pharisee", but rather "Have mercy on me God, a sinner".

In the end, there really ARE two groups -- the saved and the lost. But crossing that line comes through faith in Christ, which in itself is a gift from God. Really getting that leaves no room for a man to put himself above another.

A verse came to mind as I was writing this that very much applies -- "I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned." (Romans 12:3)

LORD, kill our pride.

Joe Dude's Bible Thoughts: Genesis 18

Abraham's visit is quite interesting, probably on a number of levels. But the level that maks me wonder the most is the LORD'S appearance to Abraham as a man. It's not insane -- after all Jesus came to earth, becoming God in the flesh.

I think what's most strange to me is Abraham's calmness about the whole thing. It seems like he looked up and thought "Oh look, it's the LORD and two angels. Let's make them dinner." This is GOD we're talking about, the creator of the universe who breathed out stars and also knows how many hairs are on your head. And here he comes walking up as a man without an indication of this being just a tad bit odd from Abraham. Though we do know Abraham has encountered the LORD before, so maybe it was in a similar form.

Whatever the case here, I am always reminded of Hebrews 13:2 - "Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares." The writer of Hebrews almost certainly had to be thinking about this when putting pen to paper.

I am also sometimes reminded of that time when Jesus was talking with Moses and Elijah in the New Testament, and Peter says they should put up three shelters. I think Peter gets a bad rap for his comment. Is that really so different than giving the LORD and his angels a meal when they show up? I don't know for sure, but I think we should give the poor guy a break on this one.

"Want to make God laugh? Tell him your plans." "Want to make Sarah laugh? Tell her God's plans." How often do we doubt God? Yes we acknowledge that his is sovereign. We sing songs about his power. We tell people that God is in control. But do we really believe it?

I love God's question here: "Is anything too hard for the LORD?" Well, that answer is yes. It's probably too hard for God to make a square circle, a married bacheolor, or a burrito so hot that he couldn't lift it. Nonsense questions, all of them. Aside from such mumbo jumbo, no, there is nothing too hard for the LORD. But do we really believe it? And believe that he's for us and not against us? And believe that all things for for those who love him and are called according to his purpose?

Much of the rest of the account shows Abraham asking God the conditions under which he's going to destroy Sodom. He says that if there are ten righteous people found there, he wouldn't destory it. Reading ahead we know that God did destroy the cities because of their wickedness. So it seems that there were not even ten righteous in the city. "No one is righteous, not one." So if Abraham got God down from 10 to 1 -- I still think the city would have been destroyed.

Well then, some may say. Why doesn't God destroy other cities if no one is righteous? The time for wrath and judgment will come, and it's not pretty. I don't get a lot of that symbolism in Revelation, but I get enough of the descriptions to know I don't want to be an unbeliever going through that kinds of chaos. But, I digress. Back to the question. Jesus answered this in Luke 13 -- "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish."

Remember, it's not about our performance, it's about the cross and repentance. The performance comes from the change!

French Hookers

I read this account in a book I borrowed and absolutely love it.

An acquaintance told me about Dr. Francis Schaeffer, a great Christian scholar with whom he was studying in Europe. Dr. Schaeffer decided to take a weekend off to visit Paris with a couple of his students. One night as they strolled the streets of Paris, they saw a prostitute on a street corner. To the student's horror, they watched their mentor walk right up to the woman.

He said, "How much to you charge?"

"Fifty dollars."

He eyed her up and down and said, "Nah, that's too little."

"Oh yeah, for Americans, it's one hundred fifty dollars."

He stepped back again, "That's still too low."

She quickly said, "Uhh, oh yeah, the weekend rate for Americans is five hundred dollars."

"No, that's still too cheap."

By this time she was a little irritated. She said, "What am I worth to you?"

He responded, "Lady, I couldn't possibly pay you what you are worth, but let me tell you about someone who already has."

The two men watched as their mentor -- right then and there -- knelt with her on the sidewalk and led her in a prayer to commit her life to Christ.

That's the end of the story. I don't know what happened to the woman after. Maybe it was just the emotion of the moment that she got caught up in and she's on the streets today. Maybe she's the most zealous Christ follower in her part of the world, letting his light shine through her everywhere she goes.

But that's not really the point. The point of the story for me is not the woman, but how the man saw the woman. As one of Shane Claiborne's college buddies has put it in the past -- Jesus never spoke to a prostitute. What?! That's right. He never spoke to a prostitute because he never saw one -- all he saw was a child who was lost and needed to come home.

Marriage Dots

I just had some biblical dots connected for me that had previously been sitting around as solitary dots. Poor dots. These particular dots have to deal with marriage. Let's break it down.

First, God creates man and woman in his image. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." (Genesis 1:27) Why two sexes? Why not just one, or three, or six? It seems two is significant, and -- I'll jump ahead a bit here and have it make sense later -- it sets the stage for marriage. "Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh." (Genesis 2:24)

Marriage? Why marriage? Why not whoever you please? There are a lot of practical reasons here, but it seems that promise of faithfulness between spouses has a place also. It was a mystery from the beginning, but it has been revealed in scripture what purpose it served -- to be an earthly picture of a more heavenly relationship. Paul tells us this when he quotes the Genesis 2 verse and writes "This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church." (Ephesians 5:32)

Now fast forward a bit, probably a lot actually -- to the return of Christ. He's coming back in power and glory to get his bride, the church. Remember that the church is not a building, nor is it all the people who say they follow Christ but may end up living like the devil. The church is all of those who really put their faith in Christ and have been born again of the Spirit of God, no matter what label they claim. We who make up the church are the bride, and he's the groom coming to take us home, wedding feast at the ready. Check out what John writes about this -- "'Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready; it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure' -- for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints." (Revelation 19:7-8)

So what about marriage after that? All those marriages on earth after the groom comes back for his bride? That's where another dot comes in, where the Sadducees where probing Jesus about the Resurrection that they didn't even believe in, and who a certain woman would be married to at that time. Jesus answers pretty clearly -- no one, despite being married to seven dudes while on earth. "And Jesus said to them, "'The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, for they cannot die anymore, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection." (Luke 20:34-36)

Thus, the dots are connected. God in his foreknowledge and wisdom creates two sexes which allows for this temporary institution called marriage, which becomes an earthly picture of a heavenly relationship between Christ and his church. Once the heavenly picture becomes reality, the temporary earthly one is no longer needed, and it goes away.

It is with this understanding that Paul can legitimately write 1 Corinthians 7 where he says that he wishes others remained unmarried as he was, if that was their gift, urges those who are married to live as if they weren't (hold that thought that just popped into your head and keep reading), and talks about the married having divided interests between worldly affairs and the Lord. He's not knocking marriage, just getting that it's only a pointer to something much, much greater. And it is with an amazing amount of joy in Christ and anticipation of his return that Paul urges people on toward single minded devotion to Jesus, our heavenly groom from whom we ultimately get our eternal joy!

Grace and peace friends.

God, I Thank You

I've been listening to John Piper the past two days and must say that is one solid dude in Christ. I will not be so foolish as to glorify the messenger, so praise God for working through this man to teach the Word clearly to all who turn their ear to him. Much of what I am saying here comes from greater understanding I have because of this message:

http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/conference-messages/did-jesus-preach-the-gospel-of-evangelicalism

I listened to a teaching of a story Jesus told today that floored me in a sense. It's short, and I've heard it and read it many times -- so much that I've never really slowed down in it enough to check out the details. There are just some things in the Word that are right in front of my nose sometimes that I don't even see. That's probably a sad pointer that I should get into it more and do more of my own studying.

The story is very short, so let me just put it here, from Luke 18:10-14:

"Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.' But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, a sinner!' I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted."

Whenever I got to this, I thought "Duh, it's against works righteousness. All this crap I do doesn't earn me anything before God. The point is that it's God who does the saving, not our own efforts."

I missed something that is so small and yet so huge. It lies solidly in four words -- "God, I thank you". The Pharisee was NOT a legalist trying earn his own righteousness with his good works -- he thanked God for making him the way he was. Thus, he gave God the credit for the change inside of him. That's not earning anything.

Let me pause and throw in a side story here. The story is one I've heard of a Sunday school teacher who teaches the story and then blows it at the end by saying "Thank you God, that we're not like the Pharisee." The person telling the story says the teacher blew it because she was acting just like the Pharisee. Now I admit I didn't quite get that. I thought she was okay -- after all, if the Pharisee was trying to earn something, then wasn't it right to say "Thank you that we're not like him" -- not to be superior in anyway, but because we understand that salvation is a gift from God through the shed blood of Jesus Christ on the cross -- nothing we earn.

I missed it, but I get it now.

The Sunday school teacher and the Pharisee acted in the same manner, not because they trusted in themselves -- neither did. They both gave God credit for making a change in them; however, despite giving God the credit for the change, they both still looked to themselves and their own righteousness for justification -- even though they acknowledged it was God given.

Let me make that more plain, maybe just for myself -- if we look to our own righteousness as a basis for our standing before God, even if we give God the credit for the change he's made in us, we're looking to the wrong thing. We must ALWAYS point to the cross. It is NEVER our own righteousness that counts for anything -- it is Christ's righteousness given to us by grace that counts before God.

I must admit I have been guilty of this very thing. I don't know to what extent, but I know that I've certainly thanked God for changes he's made in me -- taking bad stuff out and putting good stuff in. I don't think it made me look down on the unsaved in the same way the Pharisee did, as I still remember the old life I came from and know how easily I could have been in much dire straits in life on this earth. But I do know that I've looked down on my own brothers and sisters -- jumping to quick judgment on perceived sin in their lives -- focusing on specks in their eyes without seeing the plank in my own. I know I've been critical of members of my spiritual family and failed to show grace in the same way I've been shown grace.

I think this evil in my mind almost certainly was a result of falling into "moral deism" to some extent and looking inward instead of to the cross, always to the cross. I can't say there wasn't good intent behind any of it. I still think there's a lot of "easy believism" without any move toward holiness and honoring God with our very lives, and I still think there's a lot of knowing what God's Word says and then ignoring it. I want such evil in my life less and less, but I don't want the pursuit toward that end to make me ever, ever, EVER forget that when I stand before God, I don't want him to be looking at anything in me, other than Christ and his righteousness that was freely given to me.

Let us never boast "I was a wretch that God saved and made good!" but rather let us boast "I am a wretch that God saved, isn't he good?" Let us never forget that moral transformation is not the root of our good standing before God -- rather it is the fruit of our good standing before God that came about solely by grace through our faith in Christ.

Begotten

There's a lot of Jesus camps in the world today, and I don't mean the kind you send your kids off to get their brains sufficiently scrubbed with the truth. I'm talking about different beliefs about Jesus' nature and mission on Earth. There's probably about as many beliefs about Jesus as there are pizza topping combinations, but there are some pretty major groups the take the lead.

You've got the "Jesus never existed" camp and the "good moral teacher" camp for those who don't believe Jesus is the savior of the world, and then you have the camps that believe Jesus died for their sins, some of which say Jesus is God and some of which say Jesus is something less than God. It's the latter camps I'm most particularly interested in, but let's address the first two very briefly.

Regarding the "legend" camp, there's more evidence that Jesus existed than any other ancient historical figure. The Bible is incredibly reliable historically, especially the New Testament which talks about Jesus. In other words, if you're willing to believe a bunch of old dead guys existed 2,000 or more years ago, you have no reason to say Jesus didn't.

Regarding the "good moral teacher" camp, you also cannot say reduce Jesus to this based on his recorded life in the Bible. You could say that he was if you didn't believe most of what was written about him in the Bible, which you'd have no basis for believing, but that would be a whole other blog post. Given that the things he did and said are even somewhere in the ballpark, there some pretty bold stuff in there.

Let's just take a look through the book of Matthew only, quickly. He said that he had the authority on earth to forgive sins. He said that anyone who acknowledges him before men, he would acknowledge before God, and that anyone who denied him before men, he would deny before God. He said that no one knows God the Father unless he, the Son, chooses to reveal him. He said that those who left all for his name's sake will inherit eternal life. He said that he's going to come back in glory with the angels and judge the world. He said that he would died and be raised to life again, and told his followers where to meet him. That doesn't sound like something a "good moral teacher" would say. That sounds like something a lunatic or a liar would say -- unless it was true. There is no door open for the good moral teacher argument. You either say that Jesus is Lord or a nut case or a devil. Those are your choices.

Moving on from there, let's go to the camps that say Jesus is, in fact, Lord. How about those that make him out to be something less than God? Let's take a look at a few things.

How about the first part of the gospel of John? "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." Read on and you'll see that the "Word became flesh". That sounds like God becoming flesh to me. Some will say the Bible is translated wrong here and it should read "the Word was a god" -- nevermind that those who know Greek and have read the ancient text say that's hogwash.

How about the first part of the book of Hebrews, where it was through Jesus the world was created? Not "a" world, but "the" world. Everything. The whole universe. From nothing.

How about in Acts, where it is written "be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood." who's blood? God's blood. Jesus' blood. Same blood.

How about those times people worship Jesus and are not corrected, knowing full well the commandment about worshiping God alone? They are not corrected. Other times people fall down at the feet of angels to worship them, and they are corrected and told to get up.

How about when Thomas says "My Lord and my God!" He's not corrected by Jesus either. Or how about when Paul writes "our God and Savior Jesus Christ?" He does that more than once.

How about Jesus' play on words? "I tell you that before Abraham, I AM." This isn't poor grammar, this is a reference to that whole burning bush thing with Moses, where Moses asks God who to say sent him, and God replies "I AM WHO I AM -- tell them I AM has sent me to you."

How about claiming to forgive sins? He goes around forgiven sins and talking like he's the one offended. Think of it this way -- if someone smacks you in the head, and I tell them "I forgive that," won't you wonder what kind of funny cigarette I've been smoking? I didn't get hit in the head. But that's how Jesus went about -- forgiving sins without checking with the people that might have actually been hurt by people's sins.

How about claiming to die on the cross for the forgiveness of the sins of the world? How could any being less than God himself pay the price for the sins of the whole world? The payment due to an infinite God for sin is infinite. If Jesus is finite, he could not pay it. If Jesus is not finite, then he is infinite, and there is only one who is that.

How about the phrase "Son of God" itself? This isn't some phrase that was taken to be heard as "yeah, we're all sons of God." No, to the Jewish ear 2,000 years ago, that is the equivalent of saying "I'm God." To make it fairly clear, he also said "I and the Father are one." Not one purpose, not one team, not one group. One. Don't believe that's a claim to be God? What was the reaction? "It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God." It's pretty clear that the Jews of the time thought Jesus was claiming to be God.

How about the most famous Bible verse of all time? Let's go to the KJV on this one -- "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Now I'm not a "KJV only" guy, but I think we've lost something in more modern translations with "one and only Son" or "only Son. I get why it was changed -- no one knows what the heck begotten means any more. But look in the lists of families in old Bibles -- "so and so begat so and so who begat so and so and so on!" Begat means you made another one of the same kind. People beget people and dogs beget dogs, and so on. God creates. He created matter, people, animals, plants, and so on. They are not him. But Jesus was not his "created son" -- he was his "begotten son". In other Words, the same "stuff" of God, not anything lower that was created.

So I'll agree, it's true. There is no one place in the Bible Jesus says "I am God." There are a ton, just in case we miss a few of them.

A Streetcar Named...

As of late I have been listening to a reading of the book "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis. I highly recommend it to any thinking person, Christian and non-Christian alike. My only exposure to Lewis before this has been through quotes or snippets, and the movies based on his Narnia books, which I'm sure don't do his written works justice in comparison.

That said, one part of the thought train in his book discusses the impulses we had, and how no impulse on it's own is "good" or "bad", but it is what we do with that impulse that takes on such a characteristic. Now that the statement and following discussion has had a chance to churn around in my brain a bit, I feel the urge to write about it.

Looking back on my life before I was born again by the Spirit of God, or became a new creation, or came to Christ, or whatever phrase you like, I can see the perversion of my impulses, or desires, quite clearly.

Take for example, the desire for sex. A beautiful thing designed for husbands and wives to create children and be a wonderful expression of love for one another. Perverted it became in my own life a desire in my heart for sex with countless women so easily available through the Internet, in solely self gratifying ways that completely betray the natural design and haven't the slightest to do with love.

For another example, take the desire for play. I like to play video games, or should I say more accurately, one video game at a time that I get really into. Fine for a hobby that is in balance with the more important things of life, allowing my brain to shut off for a while. But many times in the past such games consumed my life -- so much so that early on in my marriage I ignored my wife in the real world to battle goblins in a false one.

Or for yet another example, take the desire for bonding with one's children. I absolutely did this when my children were much littler. So much so that they became false idols in my life. I justified it, as men typically do of their actions when they think they are right (and sometimes when they are not), but the fact was there were things in my life that were ignored for the sake of otherwise good intent run amuck.

These are just a few examples from my own life, but you can apply this concept of excess to just about anything.

The desire to work hard is not a bad thing in itself, unless hard work turns into an obsession that trumps family and friends.

The desire to sleep is not a bad thing in itself, unless it makes a person lazy and negligent of his/her responsibilities.

The desire for food is not a bad thing in itself, unless it turns a person into a glutton or a bad steward wasting enormous sums on "fine dining".

The desire for comfort is not a bad thing in itself, unless it blocks a person's ability to be a comforter to others.

The desire for freedom is not a bad thing in itself, unless the fight for freedom is what enslaves a person.

The desire for protection is not a bad thing in itself, unless it makes a person too fearful to step out into new territory to help a fellow soul.

The desire for approval is not a bad thing in itself, unless it turns a person into a mere people pleaser, vain and shallow.

The desire for long life is not a bad thing in itself, unless long life becomes the end goal instead of a gift to be used in service to God and others.

Need I go on? I think not! The point is clear -- our desires are things to be directed and measured out with thought, not released without rhyme or reason so that we run from one to the other, trying to fill with something else a hole that only God can fill.

And that brings me to a desire I have not yet mentioned. There are many, but I speak of one specifically. That is a desire for God, and God IS the end goal, not a means to something else. When we seek fulfillment through any other desire, we don't find it, because only God can give us fulfillment. When we seek fulfillment through a desire for God, we will find it, because he is what can fill the hole inside of us that we may not even realize is there.

Mind you, I did not say a desire for God "stuff" -- I said a desire for God himself. We can exhaust ourselves forcing the study of his Word, volunteering at church, witnessing to people, teaching here, giving there, and so on. Forcing work "for God" I think is a sign of a wrong approach and a wrong desire. Maybe we secretly, even unknowingly, desire the self-satisfaction of meeting our own moral standard. Or maybe it is the approval of others. Or maybe it is because we think it is our "Christian duty". I stand guilty of all of these, hands down. But I know in my mind, and I hope and pray that it makes it to my heart and sticks, that the only desire I should encourage unchecked growth of is the desire for God himself.

Praise God for Jesus Christ, the one who saves us from our sins and thus ourselves when we put our faith in him. It is he that opens the way for the Spirit of God to come live in us and rekindle a desire for God that would otherwise lay dormant and be trampled on by our own self indulgence.