Christmas just ain't Christmas without...

Actually, this isn't about Christmas, but I was just thinking about that old O'Jays song. Gerald Levert just passed away a few weeks ago; Eddie Levert of the O'Jays is his father. Gerald was starting to sing Gospel songs and recently appeared on Bobby Jones' Gospel. I'm sure that his eulogy had him in the presence of the Lord (I'm not being sarcastic).

When I was younger, I was certain about what was Christian, and what was not. As I've grown older, my walls have gotten lower. I have become more accepting. Still, there are some things that I am not cool with.

I still think that being a Christian should at least make you want to have a relationship with a bible that consists of more than a weekly visit over the pastor's text. I still believe that holiness is the goal, and that while we may stumble, we do not fall. I still believe that Jesus is THE WAY, not one of many. I still believe that to "do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with my God" are the marks of someone who has been born again.

I now accept the possibility that there are people who vote D and love Jesus (not that I was a Republican per se), I think that Barack is entitled to a God speed, and so is Sam. I'm still not sure about Sean Hannity though; maybe he needs to go back to the altar....

Must Christians always sound like we need Jesus when we get on TV? I would like to see a Christian other than Joel Osteen smile while on TV. Heaven is a nice place to go to; we ought to look like we are on the way, you know, joyful? Sean always looks like he just found out that he is got a first class ticket to hell. Come to think of it, so does Michelle, and the Sean's blond buddy, Ann Coulter. The only time they look happy is if they have a liberal in their crosshairs.

Now Allan Combs, he looks like a happy man;I might have to start wearing more blue.

For all you college students out there, after you have finished your finals, relax and get ready for next month.

Have a blessed Christmas!

When I think of home...

The significance of home is that it is the place where we feel safe. When we come home, we have expectations; expectations of love, of acceptance, of support. As I meditate upon the fact that Jesus experienced the sting of rejection at home, I am not trying to see what it means for me, for that seems selfish. Why does everything have to mean something for me? Does that mean that if I find no self meaning, then the Word has no value? Can’t the word be valuable for itself, regardless of what benefit that I may take from it?

When we approach the Bible looking for a self-application, are we not saying, with the citizens of Nazareth, “the things which we heard…do also here”? Is that not just another form of treating God like a Cosmic Slave? What gave us the idea that the only reason the Word of God exists is for our self improvement, and if a particular passage does not lead to that result, we may discard its relevance to us?

I awoke this morning with the rejection by Jesus in His home-town on my mind. I did not know why, and at first, I thought that it was significant that it was not mentioned in John’s Gospel. Then I read John 1:11, and wondered if this could not be a reference by John to this same event? For was not Nazareth especially “His own home”? The people of Nazareth emphatically “received Him not.” I then thought about the feeding of the five thousand, and of the fact that this is acknowledged to be found in all of the Gospels. Other than the crucifixion itself, this is the only incident that is mentioned in all four Gospels, according to everyone that I have ever read. Yet I wonder if in a certain discrete way, Jesus’ rejection in Nazareth is not being referred to in John 1:11?

At the same time, it is natural to look at something in the Bible and think, “How do I apply this to myself.” Like the people who came to Jesus during His earthly ministry, we come out of our own sense of need. Otherwise, sometimes we don’t bother to come. Often it seems like the bible conferences that we go to seem to feed upon this tendency. I listened to a woman talk about her experience at Megafest last year basically as a communal self-release. she did not say that the conference motivated her to "take up her cross and follow...."

Some might think that I'm being perhaps too harsh. If so, I'm not trying to be, except perhaps upon myself. When I started this blog, we were running a ministry that was intended to be an evangelistic ministry to people who had not heard of Christ. That ministry folded, and we now feel purposeless, other than what we are doing for our family. That is fine for some, but Theresa and I really want to do more. Right now, though, when I ask for direction, I can't hear a thing.

Perhaps someone who stops by and reads this might have a suggestoin, a testimony, or a word of encouragement. Any or all of the above would be greatly appreciated!

When did Religious Studies morphe into Irreligious Studies? I am studying at a CA state run university, and I have heard as much teaching which denigrates Christianity as supports it. I guess I really was out of the loop in my comfy little church-world, where everybody believes in the Bible.

The class atmosphere is interesting, and sometimes I even get to comment at a little length. I look forward to completing the degree (Religious Studies), and I hope to ultimately land a teaching post at the university. In the meantime, I wonder, do I uphold what I believe, or do I give the teacher what he wants?

What would you do?

Back to Basics...

Christmas Day has past, and the Sunday routines have died down. I ended the day by watching "Bruce Almighty," a very thought provoking movie discuised as a typical Jim Carrey comedy. I went to sleep shortly after it ended, and I awoke about five hours later, thinking about the question, "What does it mean to truly serve God?"

I'm a Pentecostal by revelation and choice. I have dialogued recently with a devout Roman Catholic, but just couldn't get myself to view Church history, culture, and function the way that he does. If I could believe that the Christian movement started out the way he believes, I would be the first to go grab a rosary and get to doing it. I would walk away from my Pentecostal churchin' Gospel music lovin' lifestyle, and learn Latin.

I just can't picture Paul in a cassock, or Peter with scarlet or purple. I find it difficult to see 1st century Jews who believed that the messiah had come as incipient Roman Catholics. Perhaps it's a cultural thingfor me, or perhaps I can't fit what I read in the Book of Acts with what I read later on in the writings of the Latin church leaders.

The important thing is, I want to serve God, and I want to do it well. I don't feel this way because of fear, but because I am so grateful for all that the Lord Jesus Christ has done for me, and, through the Holy Spirit, is doing in me and will continue to do with me until the Day. I want to serve God because salvation is such a glorious gift, and I want to have a walk worthy of Him who called me. My problem is, with so many people saying that theirs is the way, how am I to know-I mean, really know, how to please God.

I welcome any ideas that anyone else has out there, regardless of your theological persuasion. I'd just like to hear/read what you think about this.

Is this a Cain moment?

Well, we are coming into the third of the big holidays of the last quarter. Hallowe'en was interesting this year, since Delwyn 2 has figured out that Hallowe'en is a synonym for "free candy!!!" Thanksgiving was the setting for some major drama in the family(which I'm not yet sure how to share), but D2 did not quite understand why McDonalds should be closed before the sun went down just because momma cooked a bunch of food.

Now Christmas approaches. Everyone in the house knows that presents come with the day, from the youngest Delwyn to the oldest one. Since it also happens to be me and Theresa's 9th anniversary, we were hoping to head somewhere for a nice dinner. If I would have known the impact, I definitely would have picked a different day for a wedding.

I know that Christmas is supposed to be all about Jesus, so I'm trying to put the day in a broader perspective. Perhaps the fact that this year December 25 is on a Sunday will help. We recently closed our Bible Cafe, after spending a month fighting with the neighboring businesses and complaining about lack of support from the property manager. To be honest, Theresa and I are kind of bummed out about that, but she is more bummed because she feeels like God had rejected her desire to serve Him through the ministry.

Have any of you ever felt like that, I mean, like your offering was rejected and you weren't quite sure why? As I type this, I find myself thinking about Cain and his reaction to God's response to his offering as compared to his brother, Abel. Not that I'm looking to take anyone out, but I wonder, what was it that drew Cain down the path that lead to his moment of notoriety? Was it possibly frusttration over having his best be rejected? The text doesn't go into that isssue, but right about now, I think that I can kind of relate to Cain, after all, I gave my best at the Cafe, but now we're closed, and we're wondering "what comes now?"

How much do you need?

Tonight I asked the young ladies in attendance at our Bible Cafe what would it take for life to go smooth. Bearing in mind that most of them were young teens, the first thing they said was, of course, "money." My daughter estimated that about 1 billion trillion would do the trick. This could create a bit of a problem, for the total U.S. budget for 2005 is 2.4 trillion, so either the U.S. Mint had better get to printing, or someone is guaranteed to have an unhappy life.

After that chuckle moment, we talked about other things that people think will bring satisfaction; relationships, public acclaim, fame, whatever. I then told them that whatever it was, was God to them, to which most of us "spiritually mature " folk would say, "duh!"

But then I got to thinking, am I selling God short if my strongest bit of good news is that the Creator is better at bringing satisfaction than the Creation? I mean, is that really all that God is good for? I can't believe that the "Herbrews 11 Heroes" did it because "Jesus was the best thing that ever happened to [them]; sorry Clark Sisters!

The Kingdom of God is more than meat and drink, Paul wrote. I'm pretty sure that it's more than personal fulfillment and having "your best life now." In consumer-driven America of the 21st Century, the Church often seems to be offering little more than a better way to get ahold of the temporal things that we will end up losing anyway, according to the common experience of those who die. AS the old saying goes, "you can't take it with you," so why are so many Christian books, tapes, and DVD's offering the very thing that Jesus said would only come to those who let those things go?!!

I caught myself just in time, and directed the girls to look at Christianity, not as the best way to get personal fulfillment, but as the world-view that best fit with reality, if we were honest about it. But how do I know? I haven't exactly test driven all of the alternatives, like Buddhism, Islam, or even a robust Atheism.

Then I remembered the way my life was before I met Christ, it ran kind of like a four cylinder motor on three cylinders, not totally off, but really working hard. Now, while the road might be rough sometimes, I know that I have enough power under the hood to handle the course.

That is what I want my daughter, her friends, and anyone else who graces the NU View Cafe to know-not that God is the best way to have your best life now, at least not as most Americans would picture it. Rather, the Lord Jesus Christ really is the One in whom all things are held together (Col 1:17).

What is Truth?

I stand at a moment of a major shift in Western Christianity, and after reading the various thoughts and absorbing the zest or anguish coming from the various writers, I find myself wondering a few things.

For starters, are the Dalits in India Modernists or Postmoderns? What about the Christians in the Middle East?

My hunch is that our relative lack of persecution here in America gives us the liberty to argue about postmodernism, etc, while in places under persecution, they are so busy trying to be faithful to Jesus Christ, that they are not interested in Neo, McClaren, or emerging from anything but the Kingdom of Darkness, and for them, the darkness is not metaphorical, and it is not objective truth.

I understand that there are some who have become disillusioned with the seeming distance between the Bible and Reality as they were taught in their secular humanistic high schools. I don't think that the Persecuted Church is wrestling with those demons.

So, as I stand on the precipice, I find myself asking Pilate's question, "what is truth?"

The first shot...

Grace2U, much Peace:

I am Panoplia Soljah-sitting on the Western Front (southern CA). There is a lot to say about life here; it's laid-back, weather's nice, everybody's mellow.

Behind the scenes, though, I think that we are living in a time when people are so much lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God that taking up the cross is the last thing many of us saved, sanctified, and Holy Ghost filled folk are thinking of doing. When I go to worship, sometimes I can't tell the difference between Sunday morning, and the Saturday nights that I used to dedicate to "the world, the flesh, and the devil."

What can we do, what are we doing, either to change the situation, or to help it spread?

Are you part of the solution, or the problem? Are you a Soljah, or sitting on the sidelines?