thischristianguy

Cricket and Luck an Existential mirror

2011-12-29T01:55:00.000-08:00

In watching the Indian Cricket players on the fourth day of the Boxing Day Test Match there was a difference between the Indian players and the Australian players, specifically two of them. Opening the second innings for the Indian team was the mercurial batsman Virender Sehwag whose head was facing the sky in what looked like prayer before the innings began. At the other end was the new Australian fast bowler James Pattinson waiting primed and eager to begin. The thought I had was “Does Pattinson acknowledge any deity to aid him in his pursuit for success?”

Long ago back in the 1970's and even in the 1980's the image of the Australian fast bowler with chains gold around their necks proudly displayed over their hirsute chests would usually have one chain with a crucifix on it. Who can forget the proud display when Brazil last won the world cup with players falling to their knees thanking God after winning the final game. One had a shirt under his strip declaring his faith. In the South African team Hashim Amla proudly bats on hottest of days with his long beard a statement of his islamic faith. Even in the Pacific nations with their traditional tattoos proudly display a heritage and tradition that is copied by many Australian males in the current test team. Cricketers are often an incredibly superstitious lot to the point where many have rituals that have to be carried out in a religious exactitude that if disturbed will ruin the entire day for them. Yet seeing the religious fervour of the Indian fans it often makes us uncomfortable and I wonder why?

Listening to the ABC coverage of the fourth day of the Boxing Day test I overheard Harsha Bhogle the indian commentator say “In India people say that Sachin is God and I don't like that”. Harsha's reason for this is that he knows and speaks regularly with Tendulkar. Earlier in the coverage Harsha conveyed Tendulkar's reticence in being away from his family. For Harsha, Tendulakr is a man like himself (though unlike Tendulkar Harsha is not on 99 centuries in test match cricket) and I would like to ask Harsha why he considers the deification of Tendulkar unfavourable. The effect of such worship was not a favourable gain for the Australian Rules player Garry Ablett who was nicknamed “God” for his talents. Though Ablett did try to lower the title by insisting for a lower case “g” the effect of his descent was clearly evident. Even though his son's and nephews play at the elite level he is involved in the sport as a supporter and fan, rarely giving interviews.

Worshiping a person just for their talents and abilities is dangerous for the person being worshipped and the people worshiping them. But, bringing God into the sporting arena is not a problem for other countries, why not ours? The old line trundled out by the victors throughout the ages has been that the won because God was on their side. The opposite, that God was not for them, has of course been used for the losers as well. Bringing God into the sporting equation for Americans is of no problem it has been the stereotype of many a sporting film (sans Disney of course) for the team to pray for the big win. Still, Australians are these days reluctant to rely on a higher power to aid their arms in battle. Or do they?

Over the last few cricket seasons in Australia the momentum has swung in the favour of the tourists. Momentum and that elusive gift of good luck is often mentioned. Sayings like “The luck swung our way.” or “It was just bad luck.”. Often I wonder if it devalues the players skill who won the game while minimising the mistakes of those who played poorly. Of course its the common way of expressing that despite their best efforts a team or individual has not performed to expectations. Surely this is not dissimilar to the old line “God was with/against us.”. Luck is an enigmatic and often cruel mistress. At once friend and foe, the reason for failure and the extra help in success. This was the ancient pagan understanding of God or gods they helped when it suited them, they were capricious and often deceitful. But to cross them was worse,to do so would put you in their bad books forever. So why have a God or gods at all when they just get in the way and merely take the praise due to the hard work and effort or are the excuse when failure was up to poor execution or foolish preparation. Why not accept the failure for what it was and praise the victors for a well played game. I wonder if it is because we see people do the right thing and work hard and still fail, while others seem to do very little and succeed. Is the need for a reason for success and failure in the sporting arena a mirror to the existential angst that we find in our own lives? Though unlike the sporting arena not everyone is watching us on television in an arena where we cannot hide what is happening behind closed doors. When success eludes us or others and we ask why, can we simply say it was poor preparation or poor execution, or that despite our efforts we just fell into some bad luck. Or was it the work of a capricious deity who puts obstacles in our way and we need to placate him/her/it so that they will fight on our side next time? Which do you think? I wonder now that the indians have lost the test match what do Virender Sehwag and the indian supporters think.

Went to the Orchestra and wrote a story

2011-12-11T16:51:00.000-08:00

On Saturday I went to see The Melbourne Symphony Orchestra play Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony at the Melbourne Town Hall. I am not a regular attendee for classical music and was rather daunted by the weight of history and culture that accompanies going to the orchestra. So, I made sure I did not walk in unprepared. Before the day I listened to the entire symphony on youtube and did the research on the history of Shostakovich's writing of his fifth symphony. The history tells us Shostakovich's Fifth is a reaction to the Stalinist regime and the loss of friends to the purges that happened around him. The Communist party wanted a symphony that fitted their heroic leanings and all through the symphony is this darkness that looms in the background along with a bombastic and cynical rejoicing enforced by a military beat from a snare drum.

What I began doing was searching the symphony for the emotions and themes within the four movements and while I did this I could see a story emerge. My excuse for this is that my experience of classical music comes from movies and animation. As I hear classical music I expect the themes to tell a story. When that does not happen I find myself lost and unable to appreciate the music as it has nothing for me to grasp onto.

This inability to grasp the music happened earlier when a new piece The Lost Art of Letter Writing by Dean Brett was played. It was technically brilliant but it was very difficult for me as a novice to comprehend and receive it, let alone enjoy it. Compared to Shostakovich's Fifth this new piece was as if I was hearing another language that was communicated with sounds that I had heard before but put together in an unrecognisable form. Surely this is how people approach the unfamiliar searching for something that they are used to hearing.

A good example was put on youtube recently of Grandpa Al listening to dubstep for the first time. Al is clearly a big Beatles fan as the wall behind him is proudly arrayed with Beatles paraphernalia. Have a look and see how Al searches for something that he can understand and does find it despite his early dismissal.

Al finds the beat and then he can deal with the unfamiliar because he has something that he knows. Grandma however cannot get over the alien nature of the sounds and cannot even accept the beat that her husband tries to get her to dance to. Al's situation was similar situation I had with the new piece performed by the MSO. It wasn't until the fourth movement of the new piece which used the familiar large sound that an orchestra has at its disposal that I was able to hear something familiar.

Of course being thischristianguy I feel the need to use what I just wrote as a mirror on how we present the gospel. Are we making it easy for people to grasp the gospel are we making it possible for many to come and find the familiar in the gospel that resonates within them? Can we do this in a way that presents the gospel without the Christian-ese and other baggage that weighs down how we traditionally communicate message. The information is out there and people can read the basics much like how I did, they can also take friends they trust to help them understand what is going on. But if there is nothing that people can find familiar then the words just mean nothing.

What this means for those who are in church like Grandpa Al is that there will be the familiar beat of Jesus as the only way to God, salvation, grace and forgiveness that we can dance too but the sounds and sights are going to very different at times. The technique will change but it will still be based on the same foundation of Christ the Lord of the Dance who can dance the waltz, shake a tail feather, do the twist, the macarena, rock out, shake his groove thing and jump around. To paraphrase The Rolling Stones It's only Jesus Christ but we might not like it, to begin with.

Gay marriage in Australia......meh!

2011-12-04T15:39:00.000-08:00

As of very recently (I think it was yesterday....I don't remember I was watching the cricket) the governing party in Australia, the Labor party made the decision to support Gay Marriage. This has been a hot topic for conservative and religious minded people all over the world and I have thought about it for some time.
What I have come up with is......who says that the state cannot say what it thinks marriage is? Its the state, the government is elected to govern for the times it lives in. The political breeze is blowing rainbows and thats the way they will roll. Do I think lobbying is going to change anything, yes but not for the conservatives. Politics is about fighting the battles you can win and looking good in the eyes of the majority and lets face it Christians are no longer the majority in Australia. So what do we do in this situation riot? rebel? leave the country?

I believe Paul talks of praying for the state officials and only going against the state when it stops or make illegal the practice of christian worship and the declaration of Christ as Lord. Nothing in this possible future legislation (because it is has yet to be tabled and who says the fickle winds of politics wont blow another way by the time Parliament sits again) that restricts anyone from being married, in fact it makes it possible for anyone to get married. It probably wont be tabled in such a way as to FORCE celebrants to marry those they do not want (the only point I would get mad about) so who cares. Its not like the "gays" are going to do marriage better than the straight people, or will they?

Marriage is not the greatest of instituions these days. Long gone are the days when the song "Love and Marriage" was known for its true advice on matrimony and not the sarcastic title song to "Married with Children". Then there is the divorce rate which is also highlighted by the wonderful Kanye West song "Gold digger" add to this the celebrated position of Hong Kong as the divorce capital of the world, and the wonderful proliferation of the "Game over" t-shirt and what is marriage but a deed end street which results in financial ruin and unhappiness.

Marriage needs to be the example that God intended it to be, as it has been cheapened and dumbed down since the time of Moses. I know this is a bit rich coming from a single almost 40 year old virgin, but, if the Church holds true to the sacrament of marriage as a holy rite how does a state law opening the boundaries of civil union do anything but pale into comparison. There is more in the biblical image of marriage than just safe sex, children and the family unit. There is something so much bigger than that. We talk of the future wedding supper of the Lamb where Jesus and his bride the Church will celebrate their union together forever. This is the happy ever after echoed in the the disney tales that ruin people with a way too high expectations of what marriage will be. Marriage as a sacrament looks forward to something greater than just two people who think they love each other, its about the future union of God and humanity. Which I think is often forgotten on many a wedding day.

As for the situation with the legal postion maybe we need to look back to the age in which Paul and the first church lived and how they had to be different from the authorities in word and deed. This is not a Christian country anymore and all I can say is get used to it. The boundary lines between those who believe this doctrine and that doctrine are not going to mean much when the real problems come. Seriously this is not the worst that a government can do to us. There are no atheists in fox holes and there is not much difference between a catholic and a protestant when persecution begins. We need to realise that this is more to do with us not acting and presenting the truth so that they will know we are Christian and not just merely speaking and shouting. If marriage is precious and sacred we need to show it and live it in all its hardships and sacrifice as well as in its joys and passions. And doing this in such a way that points to the future wedding celebration when Jesus comes and it really is that desired happy ever after.

All protests, flames and pleads for me to change my thoughts on this subject begin now. This is not a troll but me thinking out loud. My opinons can and may change but remember I am stubborn and prone to oppositional defiance.

Dark Night of the Soul - Google Image Search

2011-12-02T23:26:00.001-08:00

Dark Night of the Soul

2011-12-02T03:58:00.000-08:00

I have had a fascination with the mystical part of christianity for some time. Healing, tongues, prophecy, all that stuff did attract me, however, it didn't seem enough. People often use the word more to describe a desire for that extra something that the feel they are lacking in their life. The answer for some is power and enabling, the call of ministry, mission and leadership. For others it can mean service (not that service is distinct from ministry, mission or leadership but that there are some who as Jesus showed us to lead by serving others). For me I find none of these pursuits alluring and I often wondered where my vocation was within the body of Christ. Then in the desire for more knowledge, finding myself in a place to grow and learn I came across people that spoke of a more that was not what my parents found.

My parents taught me that more means service, putting yourself in a position to help others even if it means that these people will ultimately end up hating you. That is Jesus example to the fullest. As I gained more knowledge about the traditions of my own faith, the theology and the history of Christianity I found that there was something deeper drawing me on. I saw Barth and Aquinas and even Augustine as men who saw God, knew God, loved God but there was something missing in their words. Then I found Hans Urs von Balthassar a contemporary of Barth's a catholic preist with the pen of a lyricist. von Balthassar's vision of Christ dead in the place of the dead was overwhelming for me. Here was that more, yet, even now I struggle to read von Balthassar. There was much lacking in my learning and in myself.

Then came Thomas Merton, God bless the great monastic writer of the 20th century. Merton a trappist monk from America a man who had plunged headlong into the abyss that is God and returned refined and enabled to shine a light on the plight of his nation, his order, and the world. Through Merton I learned that intimacy with God was what I desired, that through meditation leading into contemplation I too will be refined by the dark fire of God's love.

This dark fire of God's love is mentioned many times by St. John of the Cross in his epic "The Dark Night of the Soul". This refining fire of love that burns the soul, purifying it so it can accept the love of God becoming more like God in a movement towards ultimate perfection. I have been slowly reading this epic and it has been no picnic. An old fear has over taken me once, I have not been able to receive the same meditation results as before, there is a dryness in my prayer life. Yet, my art is vibrant and colourful, I have put aside meditation for a contemplation that is less dramatic yet more precise. St. John talks of growing from a baby to a child, that once we received the milk and love of a mother. Now God is weening me of this milk of meditation and the glorious result of it. I am being taught to stand and walk in this contemplation of God which as Merton tells us is Life with God. You know the old song "You are always on my mind." Well despite the marijuana Willie Nelson has given us a wonderful example of contemplation. God always on my mind.

I am not sure where any of this is leading. What I am sure of is that it is worth it.

The lamp post in Narnia - What God uses for us

2011-11-20T01:42:00.000-08:00

When the Pevensie children enter into Narnia from the wardrobe they encounter the lamp post. A piece of their world in the world of Narnia, out of place and out of context. What is this? What is Clive Staples Lewis hinting at?

If there is one thing I know about Lewis' analogical tale, everything has a meaning and often more than one. Aslan is Jesus, the stone table the Cross.... I could go on but that would be getting off the topic at hand, the lamp post. The origin of the lamp post comes from "The Magician's Nephew" (which being the second book makes it a prequel meaning George Lucas has been pipped at that) where the white Queen herself takes a broken lamp post with her to Narnia where amazingly it grows into a new one. By the time the Pevensie children arrive it has been there forever and quite normal for Narnian's to see. Normal but not in the same context as the Pevensie children or ourselves and this is the point I will endeavour to make. Why? Because there are people, places, times and maybe even objects and animals that God uses for his purpose. God brings the familiar of our world of our senses to explain a part of His. Now we could split hairs here about the duality of mortal and immortal divine and human sacred and profane, but I often wonder if that's not something that is as far separated as we think. And I believe that Lewis saw this to be true.

The lamp post sits in the wood in Narnia alight in the dark and the cold of the White Witches winter. A sentry to the divide between the worlds. Mr. Tumnus tells us this is boundary of Narnia the threshold. For Tumnus the lamp post is the end of Narnia for the Pevensies it is the beginning. This is the point where I tell you to think about the people and places God has used to invite us further into His world. Your memory should be able to tell you these things more than I can. What I am going to tell you is that God has done this since the beginning of creation. Creation was an invitation for humanity, Moses and the pillar of cloud and fire, the Prophets, Angels, Chariots of Fire and Jesus too.

Jesus is the lamp post familiar and out of context at the same time. Human with flesh and blood able to die and also divine and risen Lord of all. The archetype is one that God uses and continues to use, bringing people and places, organisations and even memories to use. So when you read this and remember these lamp posts, these things that are used by God familiar yet out of context to where you think it should lead. We should not glorify the lamp posts but God who put them there. Don't look for them because like the lamp post they will come when you least expect them, even in a wardrobe.

Images To Inspire You

2011-11-05T23:25:00.001-07:00

Almost at the end of this semester at college and the final essay is unearthing many things that might make it here. But till then here's some images to inspire you all.

The Trinity - more than one way of holding onto it

2011-10-28T17:20:00.001-07:00

Being a student of Theology under the bearded and wise Dr. K I have had to rethink many of my ideas of how God is. The big word is ontology which is the study of being. When we study the ideas of God's ontology we try to perceive through the mirror dimly using the information at hand to grasp an understanding of God. What usually occurs is that people look at what they don't like about God and try and change it. Often they begin from creation trying to understand that God must be like us because we are made in God's image. Now that's kind of okay as long as God remains God in the nature of God-self. Once God looses immortality, immanence, wisdom and becomes anthropomorphised with too many human attributes then God is no longer God.

One big stumbling block is the triune nature of God. God is one and three or God is three and then one. How can God be both? This is not normal to our understanding of the nature of being. Which is why the ontology of God is such a contentious issue. Many have their points which claim that God is unity before diversity or diversity then unity. Of course then there are those who cannot get beyond their created nature and call it all impossible. And, illogical gets mentioned somewhere along the line.

Historically the Western and Eastern Churches have differing views ontologically. The simple way to get this is that Western begins with One God and three persons and the Eastern is Three persons of the same substance unified by communion. There are three basic terms that despite having different words within reason mean the same. Substance and essence are considered interchangeable. It is considered essential to the Trinity that all three share the same essence/substance, otherwise they are not God. Person is often exchanged for hypostasis. This is because Person has shifted in its meaning over time. At first it was a theatrical term for the mask that Greek actors would wear. The Capadocian's took it and gave it a dynamic and relational meaning. The persons/hypostases within God-self share the same essence/substance with each other in a non-individual way that is in the opinion of John Zizioulas that this participation between the members of God-self is God's existence.

Think about it for a bit. Chew on this in your heart and your mind. God is not like us in his nature. God's essence is shared in a way that is dynamic and relational which is beyond any being we can see with our eyes. The word used to describe this unity in diversity is Perichoresis, it means a circle dance with three people. God is a dance. Fluid motion, never ending intwined in each other in the only perfect loving relationship. Now if thats an image of God that we can take and implement in our lives. If we use it where will we end up in our relationships with others?

I often scour the internet looking for images of Perichoresis and the Trinity, most are disappointing. This one comes from www.flickr.com/photos/andreacyclop/ and is wonderful in its movement. There is something about abstract expressionism that grasps the Trinity in way more representative art cannot. This has to do with the fact that Abstract art does not attempt to capture a representation of the scene, person or landscape, but, to merely depict it. God is beyond us. In the nature of God-self there is a dynamic relational existence that we can only depict in word images, metaphor and analogy. Theologians try and represent Gods ontology but often end up grasping at words like person, essence, and perichoresis because God can only be depicted by us at this time.

Augustine talks of seeing God. Seeing for Augustine is knowledge imparted to us by scripture and the creeds (in Augustine's case the Nicene Creed). For him the pure in heart will see God (Matt 5:8) now because their faith has believed and they now 'see" God. But God is invisible and Augustine asserts this to be true but that one day when all is under the rule of Christ it will be given to the Father (Phil 2:5-7). It is then that the pure in heart who believe by faith will see God-self. I am looking forward to that day where I will see with my eyes something that I can only grasp at now.

The God puddle

2011-10-23T18:52:00.000-07:00

There is a vision I get regularly about how I hold the world and God together. Maybe you like to keep things in boxes or categories so you know whats happening in which situation? Perhaps you just let it all out and can exist in the milieu that is life. I struggle with situations where there is little context or multiple contexts which you have to discern. Social situations are often uncomfortable because I struggle to work out where people sit. This also includes God as God is a hard concept, unless you let God out of the Box. In my situation in studying Theology God broke out of the box. Here is an understanding of what happened and what is happening.

I hold all the world in a series of boxes. I hold them all nicely God is one of the boxes. All the boxes are filled with water and they fit nicely.

Well they do until the God box starts to fill to overflowing stopping me from being able to hold all the boxes neatly.

They fall to the floor as the God box bursts freeing itself from the confines I place God in. The water flows all over the place splashing on me. The other boxes fall into the puddle as well.

At first they float, but, they begin to melt into the God puddle that is still growing steadily.

There are no boundaries only colours that shift and flow as the boxes and their contents become one with God.

Finally there is just water and more water. It rises further and further till I am consumed as well.

It is not a drowning, nor is it a baptism. It is an immersion into a new environment, the true environment or at least as true as it can be before the renewal to come.

Train out Impulsiveness?

2011-10-20T23:41:00.000-07:00

Impulsiveness is a trait of the natural life, and our Lord always ignores it, because it hinders the development of the life of a disciple. Watch how the Spirit of God gives a sense of restraint to impulsiveness, suddenly bringing us a feeling of self-conscious foolishness, which makes us instantly want to vindicate ourselves. Impulsiveness is all right in a child, but is disastrous in a man or woman—an impulsive adult is always a spoiled person. Impulsiveness needs to be trained into intuition through discipline.

Oswald Chambers

Just thought I'd put this up. I wonder how we can go about training impulsiveness out of ourselves? By we I mean me of course, but, you can all join in too.

Craving Miracles

2011-10-18T14:03:00.000-07:00

A very good friend bought me Bjork's latest album Biophilia. Warning, I love Bjork and the layers of sound she creates in her music. If you find it disturbing and a bit weird, then I understand. Please do not judge the musician if you cannot go where they travel. We all have our limits. What I would like to focus on are the lyrics of the song, the chorus mainly.

May I, can I, or have I too often?
Craving miracles…
May I, can I, or have I too often now?
Craving miracles…
Craving miracles…

I would like to ask the question do you Crave Miracles? Can you with all honesty say that in your life you have too often been Craving Miracles?

Its about at this point that the discussion about petitioning God or claiming healing in Jesus name comes up. Some people are adamant that God will heal them. They are desperate that only by an amazing miracle they will be healed. Others detest that position and claim it as foolishness depending only on modern medicine. My experience has been one that has seen both happen together.

I have a few physical abnormalities the most threatening one was Scoliosis. My spine had a curvature above 40 degrees and surgery was required. Around this time my parents searched the bible and other churches to find healing for me. Instead they found Baptism of Holy Spirit which changed them forever. Many prayed for me, many hands were laid on me - no miracle. The operation was scheduled and I was going to be in plaster for 6 months and have limited movement forever.

Then God set in motion things that changed everything. In my parents search they believed God was calling them to leave our home and family to a distant city in the tropics. We went leaving in a bus with my Grandmother crying believing we were headed for disaster. In this city there was no surgeon for my operation and to do this we had to go to another city. In this city I had a different operation. Within 4 weeks of this operation I was playing at the beach.

I believe God moves the world for us sometimes and he begins by moving our hearts. You do not know what God can do for you and you cannot just restrict him to one form of miracle. Crave them - yes you should. But never expect it just one way because this is God we are talking about the impossible is nothing for him.

"Thunderbolt"

Stirring at water's edge,
Cold froth on my twig,
My mind in whirls
Wanders around desire.

May I, can I, or have I too often?
Craving miracles…
May I, can I, or have I too often now?
Craving miracles…
Craving miracles…

No one imagines the light shock I need,
And I'll never know
From who's hands, deeply humble,
Dangerous gifts as such to mine come.

May I, should I, or have I too often?
Craving miracles…
May I, can I, or have I too often?
Craving miracles…
Craving miracles..

My romantic gene is dominant
And it hungers for union,
Universal intimacy,
All embracing.

May I, should I or have I too often
Craved miracles?
May I, can I or have I too often
Craved miracles?
Crave…

Waves irregularly striking,
Wind stern in my face.
Thunderstorm, come,
Scrape those barnacles of me!

May I, may I or should I too often
Crave miracles?
May I or should I or have I too often

All my body parts are one
As lightning hits my spine,
Sparkling
Prime runs through me,
Revive my wish
Inviolable.

May I, can I, or have I too often?
Craving miracles…
May I, can I, should I, or have I too often?
Craving miracles…

Picasso's Girl on a Ball 1905

2011-10-08T03:50:00.000-07:00

This is Picasso's Girl on a Ball from 1905 at this time Picasso was highlighting the nature of the outcast using the Saltimbanques or Circus Performers. This is a bleak landscape with a horse, woman, child and a dog in the background in a bare bronze field. In the foreground we are drawn to the titular girl and what is presumably the Strong man. They are differentiated by their proportions as well as what they stand and sit on. Supple and lean, balancing on the ball is the young girl whose delight is topped by the red bow in her hair. The Strong man is seated in a classic pose his strength at rest, yet watchful of the girl. It is not clear whether this is a lesson or merely practise, whether this is a father daughter relationship or that the Strong man's protective concern is merely that of a member troupe.
It is Picasso's social conscience that pokes you as you realise that these people were the refugees, the gypsy's of the era. Here Picasso is humanising them in the form of the girl yet also suggesting that this is an insular group isolated by the community at large through the protective imposing figure of the Strong man.
For me personally this piece is astounding because this is not what comes to mind when you think of Picasso. I know that if I could pain the human form like this I would never have ended where Picasso did. Perhaps I do not understand why Picasso developed the way he did because it seems like a backward step for him. Where as Matisse developed a joyous colour and form, Picasso descended from this to something that is in my opinion less than his true potential.

My Birthday, Art Nouveau and the Hope required in Art

2011-10-06T18:26:00.000-07:00

Its my birthday and I am sitting researching Art Nouveau. I love researching art and design, well, I love research. The whole exploration of a topic or person from history or today is just very exciting as you uncover more information, you get a better understanding. What draws me continually to Art Nouveau (though this time I am beginning an Essay on Guimard and Art Nouveau) is their ornamentation. However in Art Nouveau ornamentation is the essence of the objects design. The organic flowing curves and lines of Horta's Tassel house and Guimard's Metropolitan Entrance are the application of art on an object. The utility of the object is not restricted by the art it is enhanced and gains more value as a whole. These bespoke creations are about not bringing nature into the house but of make the house closer to nature.

Plants, insects, water were all used in the creation of Houses, furniture, wallpaper, posters, cutlery and carpet. They all used nature as their influence and inspiration. Now most people will begin to use Guimard's Metropolitan Entrance or maybe Gaudi and they would have a wonderful example for Art Nouveau. For me none compare to the completeness of Victor Horta's Tassel House in Brussels. Its a national treasure, you can visit. The place seems like Horta took a forrest and turned it into marble, wood and steel to make a house. To quote from James Grady's Nature and Art Nouveau "A Horta room seems to grow and blossom, to be composed of live forms controlled by a sensitive designer." Now if that's not a wonderful image that we can take to see ourselves as the creation made by the creator, I think I should give up theology and art.

Its my birthday as I said before, and, a few years ago I would never have admitted that I was fearfully and wonderfully made. In fact there was a time when I considered myself a weed with thorns. Other than a flower that grows and blossoms by the grace of the sensitive creator God. God calls us to acknowledge that despite what we see in the world there is more beauty in it than evil. That when God made all things and called them VERY GOOD, God meant it and still means it today. We are very good creations with the ability like Horta to create beauty either with our hands, voices, minds, bodies or just with who we are. My prayer is that you and I are able to grow and blossom in time with the sensitive creator who knows that you are VERY GOOD.

Art was always made with the hope that it could change the world. We need to make art with the Hope that God made us to be VERY GOOD and base that hope in our art. Not as kitsch but with the reality that good works of art get mentioned because they are good works of art. If Horta's Tassel House can lead me thinking about myself this way then what would art made with God's promise of resurrection and renewal in the form of Jesus' resurrection bring about? I believe the correct internet response here is - Challenge Accepted.

Mark Rothko : Number 10 1950

2011-10-04T16:46:00.001-07:00

This is Mark Rothko's Number 10.

Is it not just lovely.

Bright shining and peaceful at the same time

If you click on it you can see it in a larger size

Look at the softness of the edges

Rothko believed that his paintings conveyed emotions

They all do

Colours placed on the canvass

Not juxtaposed or ordered

Rothko places them there because that is where they should be

I suppose I am just a bit tired and emotional

This reminds me of the sun and the beach as a child

Of good and glorious blessings

That I am not as I was

Thanks Mark - I hope you're there to paint in the renewed world.

Love never dies - The cloud of witnesses

2011-10-01T00:25:00.000-07:00

The sequel for The Phantom of the Opera is called Love Never Dies, which, despite the fact that I would never go see this show the title is very true. Love never dies and there's a few things I'd like to touch on when it come to God, Love and about those who are no longer with us.

Love is very important because it is considered a major (if not the major) attribute of God. How often have you heard people sing, say, write God is Love. How is God Love? Well, if you ask the theologians about this you will get an explanation that involves the interpenetration of God-self within the trinity. The Father loves the Son and the Spirit and the Son loves the Father and Spirit and the Spirit the spirit loves everyone too. It is a perfect loving community, sharing and loving in perfect intimacy. God has love before we came along then Love existed before creation before you and me. He has no need for us to have love, don't think that God has love because of you. God loved first, he always loves first in fact that's a good thing for us.

Jesus in the beatitudes says that we should love our enemies and pray for those who persecute you. When you love you can love and not have it given back to you. Like God who gives and receives love within God-self when we give love it is expected to be returned back to you. In fact when it is not given back and you continue to give love its quite exhausting. Most people cannot sustain love in this situation when it is not returned if you do I think its called an abusive relationship. In the face of this Jesus says Love your enemies, but they really wont return this love, will they? Edward Schillebeeckx gives an example that the love that God gives us can take the place of the love we give to those who will not return it. So does that mean we rely on God to love us in the place of those who will not, not always. There is a limit because abuse is always wrong. What it does do is point to God as the major source of love for us. God's love available for us always and forever. We should live knowing that God's love is always there for us. It is continuos it is that same love always given to those who accept it, all of those throughout all of history.

Love never dies. So what happens to those who are not here anymore? Jesus while being crucified says to the guy on his right “Today you'll be with me in paradise.”. Jesus also tells us that there are many mansions prepared for us. This is when those reading who follow the escapist doctrine of rapture and those who take heaven as the bodiless spiritual destination are going to not agree with me. The situation of the paradise and the mansions is the place for those who believe go to after death before the new bodies they and we will get when Christ come again. Revelation makes mention of the dead in Christ who call out from under the throne for Jesus to set all things right, judge the world and renew and heal all of creation. Paul uses the term cloud of witnesses in Hebrews 21:1 that are cheering us on. I mention them not in passing but because I'd like you all to get into your heads that if love never dies then the love of those who are no longer with us is still there. These people who we love still love us they are part of the cloud of witnesses who cheer us on. Think of the biggest stadium you have seen full with players on the field. We who are alive are still on the field and those not on this earth are in the stands cheering you and I on. Their love is not gone and lost neither is yours for them. We cannot speak to them nor they to us, who can hear a single person from the stands in the middle of a football match. What we do receive is their love by God through Holy Spirit in us.

They see us and are proud of us in our endeavours they can see the field of play and they cheer us on. I say this because we need to know that their love is always there and they know we love them. Because Love never dies it always returns. God's love is so big so amazing that all of this is possible because of his love. There are those who see God as a shining light a bright wondrous thats just one way of seeing God. Thomas Merton says God is an abyss that in God there are depths that are unfathomable. This is how deep and long and wide God's love is, an abyss of love. Love that will never end, that always gives, love will always be there. How does the children's song go? Wide wide as the ocean, high as the heavens above, deep deep as the deepest sea is my saviours love. I though so unworthy, still I'm a child of his care. For his love teaches me that his love reaches me EVERYWHERE. This is just it love reaches everywhere. Love never dies because God is Love and love has ALWAYS been. Before creation there was love and after this world is reborn there will still be love. This love is available to you always and forever why hide from it?

Jesus Superman and Batman

2011-09-18T02:51:00.000-07:00

Can you represent the two natures of Jesus by using Batman and Superman. Should you try to explain this dualism of how two things that seem so opposing like divinity and humanity are together joined in Jesus Christ?

Jesus is the Son of God, you know virgin birth, immaculate conception, miracle worker, speaker of a subversive way of life that no one has ever truly lived up to. He's a Superman whose origin is not of this world, raised by earthly parents, to bring truth, justice and Kingdom Way. Personally I have always had a hard time realting to Superman. How can an alien who though he lived alongside us could never be like us, could never suffer like us. He might feel pain emotionally but he is unable to relate to us and our situation as he is not one of us no matter how much he looks like us. There is no relationship just condescension.

Jesus is also human, unlike Superman Jesus' mother is human. Mary conceives Jesus by the Holy Spirit and gives birth to him in Bethlehem. Jesus came into this world not by a spaceship but through the birth canal like one of us. Jesus grew up, fell over, cried (I do not accept the christmas carol at all, babies cry), had friends, a business. Jesus also came to make the world a better place, to bring justice, forgiveness and a new way to live. He fought against the world order to bring about this new kingdom of God. He fought hard against those who were abusing the poor, the orphan and the widow.

Batman is not a brilliant Jesus analogy but he is human and is followed by tragedy by violence and suffering to bring about the order required. Batman's quest is a band aid, a war fought by one man against the filth, and violence of those who would live by abuse, crime, oppression and death. Batman would sacrifice his own life for another's and do what every it would take to save his city. Batman is mortal, he can die, he has no powers all he has is the mission to avenge his parents death at the hands of crime generated by poverty, cruelty and injustice.

Jesus is divine and human he does give his life to avenge the death of all our parents (Adam and Eve) a death that should not have happened the way it did. Jesus waged a one man war against sin and death telling the world he had come to free those chained to the strong man he had come to defeat. In giving his life on the cross Jesus frees us from the clutches of sin and death doing something no normal man can do. The proof of this is that Jesus rises back to life, but, his body still bears the scars of his very human suffering. A body that now exists in the dimension of Heaven that lives alongside us as Lord of this universe waiting till he appears again to come and judge the living and the dead.

People find it hard to communicate these two natures, we rarely do have anything in our world to compare to the best of humanity and a gracious and noble divinity. What we do have are constructs that depict these two natures of Jesus in the very well known and knowable characters Superman and Batman. The world's finest super-heroes joined together to make an analogy of a concept that is a stumbling block those who say they believe Jesus is the son of God. It is not a perfect analogy and no analogy ever is. It is just a momentary light of understanding that you can use to grab hold of something of Jesus nature. Jesus has to be divine otherwise he cannot save us from sin and death, he has to be human otherwise there is nothing for us to relate to. The achievement of Jesus has to be something we can attain, not through trying hard and being moral or fighting evil but by faith in what Jesus has done for all of us. Jesus is Superman from another place with powers beyond mortal men. Jesus is also Batman whose parents were stolen from him, who fights the evil powers to save us with suffering and death. We cannot separate these natures so that is the reason for me not separating Superman and Jesus.

thought this should be up

2011-06-05T01:03:00.000-07:00

sought not searching
finding not found
discovering not discovered

Have been thinking about how we get to know those we deem special. You know, mothers, fathers, siblings, cousins and those other special people who may become very special. Often the words used to describe the special person are as a "catch" like a possession, or at the worst "scoring". We have a child, a father, a niece, a wife, a partner there seems to be a finality to the relationship once the label has been set. Saying that there is finality in the possession status of another person is presumptuous however the assumption of finality is suggested. I have found this is false.

I have had an interesting time of the last few months getting to know a few special people. My niece's and nephew and some new friends oh, and the triune God revealed in Jesus Christ. Like the other special people God is hard to get to know just by believing that I can find God and that is all. There seems to be no end to how much more depth people have and the adventure (with very special people it is a great adventure) in this exploration is difficult, dangerous and worth it.

This fumbling dance that is getting to know another person can be very quick, very slow, when you think you understand the situation you discover more. This was a real revelation when practicing silence and finding out that what was on offer from God was intimacy. That this intimacy was what I actually wanted was a bit of a shock. I never thought about God like that, in fact I am quite sure I never thought about anyone like that. Which kind of makes any relationship quite difficult. My early attempts at trying to get to know more of God were very fumbling and I required the assistance of the community to be introduced properly. Since then there have been a few fumbles but there is a depth I find in God that leads me onward. Such depths I have seen in others. It is in acknowledging depth that has brought this new understanding.

There is a trail, a path that continues onward when you open up any person by relationship. As God has depth that is unfathomable and if we are made in his image then we too have a depth that is unfathomable. God wants intimacy with us and we also need intimacy as well. We do not just search for it, it is desired and sought for. When we find it, the depth that people have (yes I see God as a person) cannot be found in its totality. You are always in the state of finding within the depths. In those depths we are always discovering more and more about the other and our self. It is a constantly changing trail that will never really lead to a final door because, as the depths of the two merge and mix they change and shimmer in reflection and response to the other. This creates more to discover together, never reaching an end but always sought, finding and discovering.

The Christology Essay

2011-04-24T05:54:00.000-07:00

Last year I did an essay on "Holy Saturday" which is when Jesus is dead in the place of the dead. I know I wrote something earlier about this here but I have had a few people ask about it. So because of the demand here's what is one of the worst structured essays that ever passed with a 58%. I should post a version with the corrections by THE bearded benevolent one Dr. John Capper cause they show the great grace given to a disturbed student.

Describe, assess and critique the recent revival in Christian reflection on Holy Saturday.

Holy Saturday the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday is the day when as the Apostle's Creed declares “he descended into Hell”. Very recently, discussion on Holy Saturday has made a rather large revival in the form of Alyssa Pitstick's book Light in Darkness and her allegations of heresy of Hans Urs von Balthasar. The issue of Roman Catholic heresy when it comes to Balthasar's progressive theories is not my concern. My attempt here is to explore this mysterious part of the Apostles creed its relevance within Balthasar's imagery, its tangled historical origins and its misuse which can lead into a foolish hope for the departed.

The traditional understandings of the descent are defined by scratchings of scripture (canonical and non canonical) pieced together to understand an event that has no witnesses. Christ's Death and Resurrection are seen for all the world but the actions and events mentioned of the descent within the scriptures and creeds have no first hand witnesses at all. All that exists on the subject has its origins in Christ's preaching to the dead in 1Peter 3:18-20 and the action packed harrowing of Hell from the Gospel of Nicodemus which are victorious in their descent. Yet even these traditional views are often are considered suspect.

According to J.N.D Kelly the descent “involves exegetical difficulties of no mean order” (Kelly:378). In his work Early Christian Creeds Kelly delves through the history of the descent explaining that teaching on the descent was “commonplace of Christian teaching from the earliest times.” (Kelly :379). Apart from showing the number of references to the descent within times past he also explores why the descent was inserted in the first place. Kelly tries to find a meaning for the inclusion of the descent into the creeds, one being that it is possible to have been included to defend against Docetic heresy.

“It is just possible that the details of the Lord's experiences were elaborated so as to underline the reality of His death...... that Christ's descent to the underworld proved His participation in the fullness of human experience.” (Kelly: 383).

Kelly also goes on to express that despite this being possible that the descent could also be taken as a further expression of Christ's death and burial. This view has been taken by Randall E. Otto who sees the descent as a “mysterious article” that to include “seems very unwise”. He concludes for the descent not to be used, that it has no “clear substantiation in Scripture” and that “there is no truly sensible or widely acceptable meaning for the clause”(Otto:150). In taking Kelly's opinion of the descent being simply restating of Christ's death and burial it is no wonder why Otto comes to his conclusion. The descent cannot just be a second affirmation that Christ was dead and buried. Otherwise the line makes no sense at all. Can you imagine reading a translation of the Apostles Creed which took Kelly's conclusion?

“Crucified under Pontius Pilate, Died and was Buried, no really! He was dead and buried.” (Apostles Creed, addition by Phillip Hall in bold)

However, the possibility of the descent underlining the two natures of Christ his Humanity and Divinity, that in Christ's humanity and “participation in the fullness of Human experience” Christ goes to the inferos – the place of the dead. That makes more sense than a reiteration that Christ was dead and buried.

Some however find it hard to accept any place of the dead. How you see the human trajectory - the journey every person takes from birth, life and death and whether that trajectory includes any destination or place like Hades, Sheol, or Gehenna - will influence your opinion of the descent. Balthasar comments on the belief of a place of the dead or an after life is not merely a cultural myth but that we are...

“...defending ourselves against a stronger conviction which tells us that death is not a partial event. It is a happening that affects the whole person, though not necessarily to the point of obliterating the human subject altogether.”(von Balthasar:148)

If we believe in a destination after death and that this is part of the human trajectory then Christ “in the fullness of his humanity” had to go there as well. In the end all of this is merely speculation that despite persistent thought on Christ's descent, it is just that Christ's. I believe that Barth says it better than I can.

“Is there any one of us who has been condemned to a sleepless night by the knowledge : I shall one day be buried and then be “pure past”? This conception in the form in which we have fashioned it and tricked it out with our own ideas is poles away from what the Creed says in crucifixus, mortus, descendit ad inferos...We cannot know of it...But Jesus Christ did know of it.” (Barth 1962:89)

In Balthasar's image of Christ's “Going to the Dead” he takes from both scripture and from the dramatic interpretations. His central theme is one of solidarity.

“In the same way that, upon earth, he was in solidarity with the living, so, in the tomb, he is solidarity with the dead.” (von Balthasar:148-149)

It is the solidarity of Christ there suffering in Hell with the dead that is writ large in Balthasar's picture of Christ's “Going to the Dead”. To Balthasar there is no three tiered universe with heaven above, earth in the middle and hell below, there is no victorious storming of Hell with Satan cowering under the invasion of divine light penetrating the dark domain. Christ is humanly dead, the traditional actions given to the descent are that of a living person even the action of descending is abandoned. Passively Christ goes to the place of the dead as a part of his death on the cross where He is really dead. There is no contact with God and with other human beings, Christ is silent and mute, dead with the dead. There is preaching but this taken as being “the outworking in the world beyond [the place of the dead] of what was accomplished in the temporality of history.” (von Balthasar:150)

The effects of the cross “the work of redemption” are “deployed and exercised in the realm of the dead”(von Balthasar:150). This is preaching can be taken as Christ's witness being dead with the dead.

The placing of Christ in Hell with the dead whether that is either victorious preaching or victorious opening the gates (doors) of hell can lead into radical thinking about the soteriological aspects of such a descent. Balthasar's theory of going to the dead is not seen as another work of salvation beyond the cross but as a natural progression of Christ's completion and redemption of the human trajectory. It is the extra-soteriological views that have been a part of the negative view of the descent and reasons for its exclusion. The full realisation of such thinking ends up in the salvation of all either through Christ's descent and resurrection or by His storming of Hell to take all back with him. It is suggested by Kelly that such universalist thinking was the true origin for the descent being added into the creed.

“….the time when the Descent was beginning to appear in creeds, the ancient notion of Christ's mission to the patriarchs [the preaching to Adam Eve et all] was fading more and more into the background, and the doctrine was coming to be interpreted as symbolising His triumph over Satan and death, and, consequently, the salvation of mankind as a whole.” (Kelly: 383)

When taken to extremes such a view of salvation leads to the place that Jurgen Moltmann finds where “Since his [Christ's] resurrection from his hellish death on the cross there is no longer such thing as 'being damned for all eternity'.” (Moltmann:254). Moltmann continues in glorious tones of freedom for all through the salvation of Christ who gives pardon so “all will be liberated and saved”. This is the extreme view of universalism one where even “Satan, the Devil and fallen angels” are redeemed as “God's Judgement puts everything to rights”(Moltmann:255).

Yet there is a more subtle slip. The vision of Christ in Hell can lead to a foolish hope where in Hell Christ can preach the gospel to those already dead. The false image of Christ's solidarity with the dead “supports the belief that the dead have not failed in faith and that, the power of the Holy Spirit, God is one with the dead” may lead one to see the descent as a “narrative knitting humanity together....including those who while alive seemed to have no chances left.” (Connell:130). Such images attract the heart and the desire to see another chance for those dearly departed.

“The descent into hell means that no place is cut off from the love of God. Even hell belongs to Christ...It means that nobody is God-forsaken, not even the person who chooses to reject God's love. It means that the last word is not suffering or death or desolation or lostness: the last word, the ever-present and undying word, is love.” (Hunt:58)

When you read Connell and Hunt in their description of the results of the descent emotions lead you to wish for this and hold onto such a foolish hope. Unlike universalism which is loud in its promise of all things being redeemed, false hope attracts using compassion and love proclaiming love conquers all boundaries and no one is ever truly lost. The unfortunate reality of this foolish hope is that it is a false view of the solidarity of Christ with the dead. It is not the dead in Hell who have solidarity with Christ but those who are dead IN Christ who have solidarity with the dead Christ.

“We must not deny that Jesus gave himself up into the depths of hell not only with many others but on their behalf, in their place, in the place of all who believe in Him... In faith we shall never cease to leave wholly and utterly to Him the decision about us and all men. In faith in Jesus Christ we cannot consider any of those who are handed over by God ”as lost.” (Barth 2001: 496)

There exists the image of an “undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveller returns [which] puzzles the will.” (Shakespere: 159) a place of the dead that is the end of the human trajectory. If to be fully human is to go to the place of the dead, then for Christ not to would be inexcusable. Christ going to the dead as correction against heresy supporting His dual natures becomes less of a possibility when you look at it this way. What has not been assumed cannot be redeemed, if there is a place of the dead that all humans go the believers position has been taken by Christ. Solidarity with Him is in his substitution for us in death and the subsequent going to the dead, a solidarity enacted out in baptism. Christ does this not for those with Christ in the place of the dead, but, for those who are dead IN Christ. Balthasar's imagery is vivid and confronting because he has stripped away the actions of a living active victorious Christ. These are actions which are impossible for a dead man which Christ has to be to stay within His human trajectory. It is hard to accept the death of God passively in torment detached from the Father but by the Spirit stretched to a sliver. It is hard to accept that loved ones who have not believed do not get a second chance but this too is true. Yet Christ's going to the dead on Holy Saturday is just the darkness before the glorious dawn of Easter Sunday. In the fulfilment of His human trajectory of Birth, Life, Death, and Going the Dead He adds Resurrection to those who believe. This is Holy Saturday it is sad and painful, it is difficult to accept because there is no way to see if it is true or not except by faith.

Bibliography

Barth, K (1962) Credo New York : Charles Scribner's Sons

Barth, K (2001) Church Dogmatics, Volume 2 Part 2 The Doctrine of God Edinburgh, Scotland: T&T Clark Ltd.

Connell, M. F. (2002) Attolite portas, "open up, you doors!" liturgical narrative and Christ's descent Worship 76 no 2 Mr 2002, 124-143.

Hunt, A (1998) What are they saying about the trinity? (1^st ed.) Mahwah, New Jersey: Paulist Press

Kelly, J.N.D (1967) Early Christian Creeds (2^nd ed.) London: Longmans, Green and Co Ltd

Moltmann, J (1996) The Coming of God: Christian Eschatology London: SCM Press

Otto, R. E. (1990) Descendit in inferna : a Reformed review of a creedal conundrum. Westminster Theological Journal 52 no 1 Spr 1990, 143-150.

Shakespere, W (2003) Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (12^th ed.) Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press

von Balthasar, H. U. (2005) Mysterium Paschale : The Mystery of Easter (2^nd ed.) USA: Ignatius Press

Faith and Doubt

2011-03-29T02:53:00.000-07:00

I have been asked (well its actually an assignment, so, I haven't been asked. I've been told) to take part in a forum about Faith and Doubt. Everyone writes something about Faith and Doubt then reads others and tells them how wrong they are. Okay maybe not tell each other how wrong they are but maybe work out why others believe that Faith or Doubt is different from them.

So what did I say?

I had a piece about truth, faith, omnipotence, emotion, reason and other stuff. I found that there was something about faith and trust in the character of God that was amazingly pure and divine to the point that it overwhelms and hurts us.
Yet, despite all of this pushing away there is something in the aspect of the divine that draws us in as well which God also has because of his divine and infinite nature. Like when Jesus says all that hard stuff in John 6 about himself and everyone but the disciples leave. Jesus looks at the disciples and asks them why they wont leave. Peter pipes up with 'Lord, to whom shall we go?'. That is where I end up. Nothing else but God can satisfy me. None other than God has been so consistent in all things, none other than God loves me in such a way that it overwhelms me not the consume me but to sustain me.
Doubt makes me question 'Is all this true?' and when all is doubt and questions I find myself replying like Peter for there is nowhere else to go to. Nothing left but God. Nothing more true than God. Nothing more divine than God. Nothing more Love than God.

So just fall into Him.

Fitness Outside and in

2010-11-23T16:10:00.000-08:00

Right now, this very moment I am in that haze of soreness and apathy that comes from pushing the body just a bit too far.
Yesterday was cool. Rode the bike to work, worked for about 5 hours, rode home checked the web sites and then rode to play soccer. After 2 hours of that I rode my bike home the short way up the big hill. Now I am paying for this extra effort and I still have to do some work today and clean the house. I boiled the kettle about ten minutes ago and I forgot about it. Now that I think about it I also did the laundry..... that's waiting to be hung out. Oh good! now the dog wants outside.
(time passes)
Dog's out and I made cup of tea number 2. Did I also mention that because I was exhausted from over doing it that I had dinner late and went to bed after Letterman. Well now I have. Also there's no one to blame but me. Okay where is this all going you may ask. Ha! "you may ask".
Well fitness outside and inside seem different. Not that any spiritual discipline is easier than physical fitness but the next day after certainly is. After having a day of silence there is a cleanliness and a softness to the day and to yourself. After riding and running for 3 hours well the next day is hard to start. I know I've done a good thing for myself in both but the results are shockingly opposed.
Some of this could do with the fact that I have spent the last 3 weeks sitting in a car, sitting at a computer, sitting in a class and sitting watching television. Yet the effect after pushing the body, this day of apathy where I have to push myself to do anything makes me ask questions. Am I giving in to bad emotional habits when faced with pain? Is this more than just a come down from the endorphin high? Do I need to make a decision to be like Dory and keep on swimming?

Being grumpy or apathetic about the day because I over did it yesterday may not be a decent reason to give up and do nothing. I still need to do something and I almost have in doing this post. There are some easier things to do today like, putting out the washing.
I have no understanding why the repercussions from physical fitness are more taxing than the emotional angst for trying to find intimacy with God and failing. Perhaps we are spiritual beings with a physical exterior? Then again some people can run for 3 hours and not have any apathy the next day? Maybe there are a few decisions I can make to not responding to the drain I feel after over exertion the day before?
Not giving in to the apathy, just keep on swimming? Not in my own strength but in the strength that God provides. If I just try the Dory way on my own then I will eventually run out of whatever strength is left. In God there is the unlimited resource of His love which is wider than the universe. It is no quick fix as we often do not know how to give into God's love. Even if you do learn how to do it you may fall on hard times and old ways leading you away from His love.
I need to remember "Lord Jesus, help me!" and continue my day. That's my discipline into spiritual fitness which leads into God's universally wide love.
To finish on a high note here's a Paul Kelly song that reminds me of God's continual and persistent call through all time for all of us to give into His love. Get this in your head that God is calling you to give in to His love. Please do.

Surrender given and accepted

2010-11-09T16:53:00.000-08:00

I ended the last post describing the drop off point into the depths of the love of God. The deep blue in which exists the totality of the almighty waiting for us to just surrender ourselves into it. The good news is that I have been able to surrender into that deep love. I had to be shown and led there like being taught how to ride a bike. Which is humbling and appropriate because pride of accomplishment would only taint it.

So how does one describe the experience of surrendering into the love of God? Firstly I can believe that this is NOT fully what surrender is. This is merely the first steps into something that will grow beyond. Probably the biggest surprise was that.... I really do not want to say the I got there because it is so much more than that. Yes I did the leg work and the praying and went to where the mystics and contemplatives advise us to go to. But, there is so much more that God and others have done to help me to this position.

I had spent that whole weekend and most of the week before praying only “Lord Jesus, help me!”. The exclamation mark is definitely needed. I was quite sure that where meditation and contemplation leads I had not gotten near the door.

“But the contemplation of the saints is fired by the love of the one contemplated: that is, God. Therefore it does not terminate in an act of the intelligence but passes over into the will by love.” St. Albert the Great - Spiritual Direction & Meditation (48)

What St. Albert describes was a bit of a stumbling block for me as intellect and thought processes dominate my waking hours. I exist in my thoughts, in my mind. There are a thousand links being made between different facts and images every day in any mind and mine is no different . Sometimes I think mine is a bit more active than others. Being able to be still and know that He is God is quite troublesome if you cannot be still for more than a second or two. So the silent Saturdays , the not talking to myself Tuesdays and regular primitive prayer of “Lord God, help me!” Were a gradual acclimatisation to the silence required to place myself in a position to be still for more than a few minutes. One of the biggest helps was reading two books by Thomas Merton. Spiritual Direction & Meditation and Contemplative Prayer. In Spiritual Direction & Meditation Merton maps out the plan for the apprentice (or religious as Merton calls the beginner) to be guided by the experienced Spiritual Director much like the desert fathers with their apprentice or Christ with His disciples. The lessons are learned with the Director encouraging and assisting the apprentice pointing the apprentice to God and the path well trod into the established forms of Prayer, Contemplation and Meditation. Contemplative Prayer is more of a technical book a call for a redevelopment within monastic practice a call back to contemplation with action not just one or the other. However, the drops of wisdom in Merton's descriptions of Meditation and Contemplation are what made me realise that it was intimacy with God that I was being led into. An intimacy that I was very intimidated of.

“I cannot discover my “meaning” if I try to evade the dread which comes from first experiencing my meaninglessness!
By meditation I penetrate the inmost ground of my life, seek the full understanding of God's mercy to me, of my absolute dependance upon him” – Contemplative Prayer (84)

“...we should should let ourselves be brought naked and defenceless into the centre of that dread where we stand alone before God in our nothingness, without explanation, without theories, completely dependant upon his providential care, in dire need of the gift of grace, his mercy and the light of faith.” - Contemplative Prayer (85)

Being brought there not on on my own but being assisted there in front of the whole class was vital. With the lecturer (or as Merton would say Spiritual Director) just helping holding the bike steady enough to let me get my balance in this new light of faith. There was no way I can ever claim any of this as my own. Too many witnesses for me to ever try and tell anyone otherwise. I had been prayed for and have had similar experiences but these were fleeting and never did I think that I could return. I had no thought of meditation and contemplation. In fact I probably had way too many competing thoughts and God has waited till now in His time. My first thoughts after class were “So this is what that communion with God is. Gonna have to do this again (if he'll let me)”. Of course He'll let us back in again. Does not the lover call to his beloved always? Does not the father embrace the prodigal taking him back, putting rings on his fingers and clothing him as a true son? Is it easy, not all the time. There is a descent sometimes like closing your eyes on the downstroke of a swing and a return to the surface of active thought again as the dog barks or a car speeds past. This is something that is practiced and learned like riding a bike. It will change and grow as I learn to ride the surrender bike better.

To describe it factually would be wrong and sully such a divine residence with any analysis of feelings. I find myself describing it in riddles and metaphors such as “dunking my head in bucket and finding the universe”. Water and depths instead of sunlight describe the experience better for me at the moment. I expect change as God has never left me in the same place for very long.

"It is precisely the function of meditation in the sense in which we speak of it here, to bring us to the attitude of awareness and receptivity. It also gives us strength and hope, along with a deep awareness of the value of interior silence in which the mystery of God 's love is made clear to us." - Contemplative Prayer (49)

Silent Saturday 31/10/2010 and No Talking to Myself Tuesday 2/11/2010

2010-11-02T17:50:00.000-07:00

Saturday began wet and raining no chance at all to do any of the lawn mowing I had planned to do. No television, no internet, no computer, no radio. Just the sound of rain on the roof and cars driving past. The dog and I were dry inside. I got to my painting preparing two canvasses and finishing one piece. I also continued my reading of Thomas Merton's Contemplative Prayer which became more and more enlightening about where I am when it comes to my relationship with God.

It seems God is just an omnipotent friend who I call for help from when the effluent hits the propellor. My noise internally and externally were boundaries which kept him from me until I wanted his help. In stripping away the external noise in the car and in the home I have come across the internal noise that is also there to stop God getting too close.

“The way of prayer brings us face to face with the sham and indignity of the false self that seeks to live for itself alone..” Merton Contemplative Prayer

The sham of my own rapid stream of thought and noise that goes on searching for the next piece of amusement to dwell on is a barrier to any true silence. Any real prayer of the heart is impossible with this background internal noise.

“Man's heart is far from him [God] when it is occupied in superfluous cares...” Peter of Celles in Merton's Contemplative Prayer

I last mentioned the use of Psalmody and recitation of Proverbs 3:5-6 and Ephesians 6:10 and that they have led to singing versions. Now thats all well and good but it's an amusement, a novelty and a distraction which leads in other directions of mirth and enjoyment. Such enjoyment is good and praise to God is a great thing yet another novelty is another distraction. This is supposed to be contemplation aiding me to get beyond the internal noise not adding to it another form of mirth.

“The whole life of Christ was cross and martyrdom why do you go looking for rest and mirth” A'Kempis, Imitation of Christ.

So I have gone further back to a more primitive form of prayer which should not be given rhythm beyond inhale and exhale. “Lord God help me.” or “Lord Jesus help me”. Distraction in the form of rhythm, rhyme, melody is going to become another novelty right now and I have too many of them.

When I first tried silence I found the fear of silence was really a fear to not let God closer. I used the noise of television, radio, and the internet to block him out. This was merely the first level making space for him to enter. Now there is further and deeper closeness as Merton describes so well...

“We wish to gain a true knowledge of God, our Father and Redeemer. We wish to loose ourselves in his love and rest in him. We wish to hear his word and respond to it with our whole being. We wish to know his mercy and submit to it in its totality. These are the aims and goals of meditatio and oratio." Merton Contemplative Prayer

Intimacy with God is what Merton is describing. Loosing ourselves in his love could be found in a ballad about lovers and thats an intimacy I have not experienced. I find myself once again staring at the next depth and fear of the unknown as before grows. I can delight in standing at the top of a mountain or a tall building, but depths scare me. Put me in the ocean looking at the drop off where the real sea begins in its depth and darkness. Where blue becomes darker and darker until blackness where anything can dwell in that suffocating darkness. Yet I am reminded that God is light and love and he delights in me as I should in him.

No Talking to myself Tuesday 26/10/2010

2010-10-27T20:18:00.000-07:00

I did not succeed in this for more than an hour. What began as a morning of silence developed into not a talking to myself day. As hard goes, this was as hard as hang gliding for the morbidly obese.

I went for an hour while mowing the lawn and did not begin to start talking to myself until I got a song from the Simpson's in my head. The Sherry Bobbins episode to be exact which had a few songs. I had realised that I was going to do a bad job on the lawn which segued into “Just do a half-assed job”. I was singing which is technically not talking to myself but it was close to something I would talk to myself about. From here I did not stop trying but it did get harder and harder not to engage the mouth in the mental discussion in my mind. That is where it started and always starts in my head. The idea is planted and I follow the tenuous links till I am far away from where I started.

It is in the head where the battle begins and ends. What are you focused upon? What will you let in? What links will you follow? Where will you end up? I have had mental wanderings that ended up in places I did not want to be in. This is the habit of an uncontrolled and ill disciplined mind. Something Thomas Merton touches upon in Contemplative Prayer in talking about a “deep interior silence” which is an opposite to the “mental prayer” which uses “reasoning, active imagining and deliberate stirring up of affections”. These workings conflict with the silence and get in the way any peace in our minds. Now singing songs from the Simpson's is not a mental prayer at all (except for the Flanders rendition of “Bringing in the Sheaves” or the wonderful “Arise and Shine and give God the Glory, Glory”) but it is active imagining and a genuine stirring up of my affections. The simplicity and peace of deep interior silence is fleeting when we do not have any ability to tame our thoughts. The wanderings of my mental processes let alone mental prayer while mowing the lawn, driving the car, walking the dog, browsing the internet requires a leash to restrain it. The author of James puts this in its place when describing the bridling of the tongue in chapter 3. To bale to bridle or restrain the tongue or mind involves practices that are simple and repetitive. Merton suggests psalmody and a few simple words from scripture or even simple prayer like “Lord, come to my aid.”

What I began and stopped not long after trying it for a week was reciting a few remembered scripture verses.

Be strong in the Lord in the power of his might. Eph. 6:10

Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding in all your ways acknowledge him and he will keep your paths straight Prov. 3:5-6

I have decided to try and keep in my mind on a loop are variants of these two verses. You can sing them as they do lend themselves to being sung. Be strong in the Lord becomes a dirge and Trust in the Lord has evolved into a country tune. In these versions I can use my habit in brining up songs to use these songs instead. This then becomes a form of basic prayer/meditation that can be repeated in different ways. So from silence I have ended up in meditation and recitation of scripture.

Reflection on Silent Saturday – October 23/10/2010

2010-10-26T17:16:00.000-07:00

A Silent Day is not me being silent but when all information like computers, stereos, televisions are not turned on. This is a form of silence which earlier in the year I was very uncomfortable with now I am more used to it. This was the second silent day and it was very productive as I spent the morning fixing the toilet it needed a new washer which was at the base of the cistern. After this was done I read some Thomas Merton (Contemplative Prayer) and had a siesta. The evening was just as productive as I spent it at a friends going through our songs. A whole day without any information being spewed out at me.

I am getting more comfortable without having noise around me. However there were moments when I found myself wandering back to the computer like it was on. In fact that is a time wasting habit that I have noticed more and more since. My first impulse is to go back to the computer and search for stuff, check the blogs and facebook. This desire to be amused, entertained and distracted is a part of that cocoon of information that we keep around us. Thomas A'Kempis calls it “hearkening after novelties and rumours” and what this cocoon of novelties does is stop us from being in the place have a “direct encounter” with God.

When I first tried silence I found it very fearful. The silence was cold as steel compared to the warm cocoon of noise and novelties. This warmth though was an artificial warmth like wearing a blanket to generate enough warmth to make a you drowsy. You do not really need the warmth its just an added layer and when you acclimatise to the real temperature you realise you did not need the cocoon at all. Silence is no longer a bitter cold or a black night it is a bracing wind that wakes you up to the reality around you.

Silence and the Struggle with praise

2010-10-20T17:56:00.000-07:00

Reflection of the no speaking day 20/10/2010

Probably made it too much fun in being able to communicate without talking this time. Instead of being in a quiet library all day with minimum contact I had class in the afternoon. This involved my regular routine of having lunch at the Caf with the regular lunch pals. Of course there was some well meaning teasing and baiting but this was well parried with the set of notes I had ready to use. I also used the laptop to answer direct questions addressed to me. In using the laptop it probably stretched the known understanding of being silent, but it was a social context and isolation is something I do a little too well. What I am attempting to learn is to not control the conversation but let it go and listen to others more than offering my own thoughts. The goal is to have the habit of listening. In the time spent not talking in a social context I had more people talk to me than I would normally have had. This being Australia and me being a loud and very verbose person the tall poppy had to be cut down a bit. I did reply in gestures and facial expressions as to how I thought about the jibes sent my way but I knew it was all in jest. After class was over I was encouraged by most of the class who know me well that what I had done was a great thing. My mother told me after that this was something she had never done. And still I find such adulation and praise uncomfortable. Constructive criticism and pointing out the flaws in how I go about a certain task I love. I can combat and defend these comments, but there is no defence against praise. There is only acceptance or rejection when appreciation is thrown at you. When you have the bullshit metre set on high and the weapons set to stun all the time you have no response to love and praise. I have no response to praise. I do not accept it easily at all. What am I afraid of? Does this link into the control and the defensive stance I have always ready. The one where I hold the weird geek out as a crash-test dummy who can be slammed, abused without the real me getting hurt. Which is the real Phill? Have I been in this defensive stance for such a long time that there is no real Phill behind the dummy?

The silence has no place for the dummy because it cannot boast and flummox about with its big words and loud voice. There is no place for the dummy in the silence about the house as the noise merely generates the information that the dummy feeds upon to be able to boast what it knows about. In the silence there is no place for it because it cannot boast or find anything to boast about, in the silence there is no dummy only the hurt one holding the strings trying not to get hurt anymore. In the silence there is nothing to hurt you, in the silence there is only you and the eternal moment made by the one who is eternal. The eternal tells you there is no need for the defence that it has always been from before you were to the when that will only always be. In the silent eternal moment you stand as naked as you were born yet there is no pain or shock as birth because the one who is eternal is not angry ashamed or afraid of you. All the eternal one has is love against that there is no shield strong enough, no wall tall enough and no hole deep enough. Accept love and be loved resistance only leads to pain.

Journal - June 21 2010

2010-06-20T17:24:00.001-07:00

Really don't have anything to write about. Of course that's a load of bull, I can write most days about absolutely nothing for hours on end. I always have things which pop up to think about and wonder about. Usually its what's happened at school or what I have next to speak about at church. I've done that and now I am waiting till the art exam on Wednesday, so yeah just sitting around reading the class notes, looking at the works of art that were used. To do this without using the internet I got 2 books out of the library. One of them being Sister Wendy's Grand Tour which is absolutely wonderful, she is effusive and detailed in the history and context of the works of the great artists. Have a look.

The other book is the complete opposite This is Modern Art with Mathew Collings.

This series explores what has lead to what is now modern art. Of course the art is different but context and story behind the art and artists is somehow similar. Collings passion is restrained and subdued in contrast to Sister Wendy's love and enthusiasm and that leads me to think about the difference between the two ages.

For this we need to watch some Francis Schaeffer. Schaeffer's wonderful series "How should we then live?" holds some real gems and this one is an explanation of the development of thought that leads us from Sister Wendy's art to Collings. Basically there is a hopelessness in human thinking a despair which leads to the decay in beauty and truth.

I wonder if the modern artists are trying to get to that place of beauty but cannot get there and in desperation grab hold of anything. So to this we have Warhol who eschews his entire person for some vapid famous genius. There is nothing to hold onto but the vapours of fame and the icons of the age. As Schaeffer says there is no hope and no reason, man is just a machine. There is no real beauty. But we look at the works on Sister Wendy's Grand Tour and we recognise the beauty of them but do we understand the context of belief and hope that existed in the artists who made them. Back then they had a classical understanding of God and the world and Mankind as a created being. God existed and beauty was possible, truth was possible and the art was stunning. Now the art is still stunning but rarely is it beautiful and true.

Journal - June 18 2010

2010-06-17T17:40:00.000-07:00

Back again after 2 days off, I should be writing this every day but not everyday lends itself to journal writing. Went to the centrelink on wednesday. For those not familiar with the Australian unemployment system centrelink is the name used in Oz for unemployment, pensions and benefits. I have spent more then half of my life in and out of the place and I am comfortable with waiting in lines and explaining things to different people 3 or 4 times a day. The best way to deal with it is to bring a book, a book is better than a magazine or a comic because you look intelligent. The worst thing to do is look like you don't want to be there. Well that's not the worst thing to do the worst thing is to get angry and start acting out, when you do that you get treated very poorly. I am not saying that social workers are vindictive its just that if you treat them with respect and realise they have to deal with multiple cases over and hour they will respect you. Bringing a book is good because it helps pass the time.

What else happened? Not much really I walked a fair bit waiting for things to work out, they worked out I get more money end of story. Oh! that's right there were greeters at centerlink, two people directing traffic all the time. They were good and very helpful centerlink was not like this two years ago. I wonder if they watched the if Starbucks marketed like the church cause that shows up a whole load of wrongs.

I find this video hard to watch as it reminds me of many bad moments in many churches. I also realise that traditional church is all some people have got. But the point is made clearly and without any assumptions or allusions, if this is how you don't do it why do you do it? Well that can be answered by Topol.

And Topol's lines for the Jewish people in Russia could be substituted for most Christian church groups around the world. Tradition is very important without the ties that bind we would be merely a leaf blowing in the wind. If you have seen Fiddler on the Roof then you know that it is this very tradition that is threatened, especially from the daughters choice for husbands. He gives in to the first one and the second but the third crosses a bridge he cannot, marriage with a gentile. Tradition may keep you balanced but it also binds and restricts you to a defined and well known area.

And once again I end up at Mark 2:28 - 3:6 and the restrictions of the sabbath which in the context of Fiddler on the Roof keeps it in the Jewish family. Tevye has his traditions and the love of his daughters allows him to stretch them but not blow them out of all proportion. Its much the same with the first clip of the Starbucks church. Most churches could change and make small steps but not make a leap forward in understanding. What is required of them is to be true to God and his teachings not true to traditions that man has put around the truth that God has revealed to us.

In Mark the Pharisees are shown as being restricted by their traditional understanding of the sabbath. The restrictions they place on the HOLY DAY are binding and laughable at times. Jesus sets them straight that God wishes to set people free from such bondage. Yet what have we Christians have done? Not much better if the Starbucks video is true, which it is.

Where else in our lives have we restricted God to a tradition of our own making? Are our understandings of God so restrictive that He cannot work in our lives? This is something we need to dwell on with seriousness and a caution not to throw out everything and start from scratch. We have to have Christ at the center and hold his teachings utmost but also realise that God is consistent and unchanging. His message and mission have been unchanged from the beginning. Who we praise and worship will never change his teachings on how we are to live our lives are true and always will be. We may need to style it up and package it differently. To step outside our comfort zones once and a while to show we are in the world, but not of the world.

And just for fun here's the classic Matchmaker song.

Journal - June 15 2010

2010-06-14T18:07:00.000-07:00

Stuff to do:
Exam next week (study today)
Video Blog to make (ideas about things I want to get rid of in my life)
Watch world cup matches
Watch season one of The A-Team
Ask about chainsaw from the shop
Pay Rent

Better pay the rent.....done

Then there's the exam, its for my arts class: Philosophy of the Creative Arts. Sounds impressive doesn't it, well it is impressive thinking about the place of art, the creation of art, the place of the artist. The history of art and its progression is amazing from cave paintings to the glorious art of the Sistine chapel, the beauty of the impressionists, the risk taking of artists like Dali, Warhol, Duchamp, and the eventual chaos that is modern art is an amazing ride. Yet the thinking that has lead to these developments - or regressions if you think about the constant shock that is modern art - can be charted to the effect of the image and place of God in humanity. In fact the classical thinking about God led to the art of the Sistine chapel, to David yet the foundations of these great works lay in the Greek philosophers and the tools of thinking that we still use today. Kind of funny that is, that Christian thinking has been influenced by the thought patterns and logic of the Greek philosophers. Those of us in the western world still use the same thinking and modes of logic. Which of course leads me to think how different Christianity would be if it went Eastward and not Westward, if the center of Christian thought went away from the Mediterranean and into the Hindus Valley. I cannot imagine such a church but maybe it did exist certain disciples are said to have made it to the Hindus Valley.

That was fun. To begin at art and end up thinking about the possible development of Christianity as an Asian religion and not a Mediterranean one. This is of course not excluding the east from the joys of knowing and living in Christ, no one is excluded from that offer. It is just that what differences and tools would have developed and molded Christian thought and what would have been the big topics. How important would have the two natures of Christ have been? Would the Cross been a symbol of power and authority? Would the creedal language have developed at all? Would there have been dogma and confessions of faith? What would have the images of Jesus have looked like?

To realise that the way we see Jesus, art, God, life have been from the influences of a few Greek guys over 2000 years ago is actually quite scary. I don't know Plato and Aristotle from Adam yet their thoughts are still being taught today. I am not sure how happy I am with this, that my thoughts are influenced by those so many years hence. However I try I am never going to get outside of the influence of those who came before me, even if I succeed in losing the influence of all humanity I am still going to be influenced by God. No one can escape the influence of the Creator God a piece of art cannot exist without its maker artist. So I am always under the influence of someone whether it is humans or God. We are from what has come before, you cannot have Michelangelo without cave painting, what has been before even if it is considered worthless still has its influence on us. No escape, can't run from it, so then we better use it.

Journal - June 14 2010

2010-06-13T17:31:00.000-07:00

Woke up real early, watched the Socceroos get pumped by Germany, went back to bed. That's all I really want to say about today. Of course I wont just say that only, I can't stop talking and typing and talking aren't that far apart. The thing I am missing right now is the discipline of learning. It hasn't even been a week and I am missing the Liberal Christian Arts College I go to. I have a book on the dialogue between Hans Urs von Balthasar and Karl Barth. I was reading it two days straight when I was in the air of college and now I am at home for four days straight I haven't opened it at all.

I like this book, I like the things in it. The push and pull of ideas between Barth and Balthasar over the correct use or misuse of the analogy of being is stunning. The fact that even after Barth has explained his reasons for not accepting the analogy of being (that creation mirrors the creator) Balthasar still continues to find a way to reconcile Barth to the use of it.

Its kind of interesting seeing Balthasar trying to win a Catholic convert in Barth. Its interesting because of the next bit of the Gospel of Mark that I will be speaking on. Its Mark 2:23- 3:6. Okay how does Jesus correcting the Pharisees about their legalistic views on the sabbath? Well it does in the fact that like the Pharisees and pretty much every religion Barth has found a sticking point between himself and the Catholic overuse of the analogy of being. The use of analogy of being was huge it was considered essential to the faith. To Barth it was a horrible thing and he couldn't stand for it to be given such a high regard. Such use of the analogy of being stopped Barth ever seeing himself ever becoming Catholic. A similar point could be made of Luther, Wesley and every other leader who started his own church because others did not hold to the same articles of faith, or ways of mission, or gifts of the spirit.

Its like an episode of The Big Bang Theory with Sheldon being Barth and Leonard being Balthasar (don't ask me who Penny is). Its like when as a six year old I decided that Beatrix Potter was wrong in calling Peter Rabbit's third sister Cottontail. I was adamant that Beatrix Potter had broken the rules of rhyme and it must be - Flopsy, Mopsy and Bopsy. So adamant was I that I named my dog Bopsy.

So adamant were the Pharisees that the sabbath was sacred and holy that the Disciples should not have taken wheat to eat. So holy was the sabbath that Jesus healing a man's withered hand was an absolute outrage. So adamant was Luther that he broke from the Catholic church, the same for Wesley in his split from the Church of England.

So adamant we are when the patterns of our lives are disturbed in ways that are not wrong except that they are not what we see as the right way of doing things. God rested on the sabbath, why? Because he done all he wanted to do, not because it was the sabbath and according to the doctrine of the almighty he had to. Being humans we see patterns and some of these appear regular, solid, dependable, constants. The sun rises and sets, people live and die. But then there are others that we can take as constants. Whose ever had to drive on the other side of the road? That's gotta be disturbing you've driven on the left side of the road all your life and now you have to drive on the other side of the car AND the other side of the road. All of the sudden the pattern is changed what you thought was the way to drive is now something different. Its still driving but it is driving in a whole new way.

Now how are we going to act when God tells us like Jesus did to the Pharisees that we need to change how we live our life with him. That our way of thinking about God is too stiff and rigid that it needs to expand and grow. That our idea of what church is supposed to be is too rigid and we don't see the way he does. That life as a follower of Jesus is not the prosperity you had been promised but that when Jesus says "Take up your cross and follow me" he meant it.

The Pharisees got a shock that day and they responded in anger and fury. How will you respond? With anger, apathy, indifference, defiance. Or will you say to God "Fair Cop" you're right I have been doing this the wrong way. Change is hard and its even harder when we resist please don't resist submit. Humble yourself before the Lord and he will lift you up.

Journal - June 11 2010

2010-06-10T19:15:00.000-07:00

Its 2 days in a row now and that's a good thing. I spent yesterday making the first part of what has become a 2 part piece on youtube.

Its about the Christology essay I did, which was on Holy Saturday. You know the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday? Yeah that day and what did Jesus do on that day?
He could have been playing cards for all most people know. In fact there is not that much written about it at all. Even in the bible there is less written about what Jesus did in the grave than anything else. Which makes any thinking about Holy Saturday a struggle.

What also makes for more problems is the Apostles Creed and the line - "He descended into Hell" - which brings a range of responses. Mostly I don't know or I'm not sure about that. For me it was a complete empty hole of a day and the whole concept of Jesus descending into Hell was something I had never thought of. Of course now I have thought about it, read about it, and have come to a point of understanding that is not heretical but its certainly not traditional.

The traditional understandings are mentioned in the video and are garnered from a couple of verses in the bible (most taken out of context) and the not so well known gospel of Nicodemus. This scant information being embellished into the fantastic and mythical is a main point of those who wont have it. Yet it is such a silent hole in the Easter story that its silence calls to many to work out what is happening. Honestly I hear it calling out to me and its really hard not to think about this everyday now.

The only real advancement beyond the dogma and confessional beliefs of the churches comes from Hans Urs von Balthasar. For Balthasar the silence of Holy Saturday calls out to him to such an extent that he makes it the center of his Christology. Solidarity is the big word for Balthasar, Christ's Solidarity with the living when he is alive and Christ's solidarity with the dead when he is dead. That's where I end the first part, Christ dead in Hell. Which is incredibly confronting and sad, it is hard to think of Jesus the Son of God dead for any moment of time. Yet the solidarity that Balthasar talks of seems true in the way he explains it. It is in the living out of humanity in its fullness and perfection that Jesus is in solidarity with us. This is also true in the death of Jesus as we die and wherever we go after death Jesus goes to the dead.

What arises out of this solidarity with the dead is much the same as his solidarity with the living. It is the same solidarity just in a different point in the Human Trajectory (Birth, Life, Death, Going to the Dead). There is nothing extra added to salvation by Christ going to the place of the dead it is a part of his whole redemption of humanity. No extra salvation is possible because on the Cross "It is finished".

Despite this others have taken Balthasar's solidarity of the dead Christ with the dead to be a salvation for those in the place of the dead with Christ. A salvation that takes up Hell into Heaven so all is redeemed, this is called Universalism and its got it wrong. The unfortunate thing about such a false hope is that they haven't seen the consistency of the exclusive/inclusive offer of salvation. Not all of those who live are saved by Christ's solidarity with the living only those who decide to admit, submit and follow Christ. It is not Christ's solidarity with those dead with him, it is Christ's solidarity with those who are DEAD IN CHRIST. There is time to make our decision while alive after live there is no second chance. The unfortunate result of this is that those we knew who have passed away without deciding for Jesus is that they are lost.

When you strip away the veil of myth and fantastic there is actually more to Holy Saturday than an action movie. We have God in the form of Jesus dead in the place of the dead, in our place. Redeeming us from the righteous punishment that we deserve. He is silent and passive just like the rest of the dead, yet his preaching is his witness that here in the depths of dispair God has come to put everything right again.

Journal - Online edition June 10 2010

2010-06-09T16:12:00.001-07:00

Thought I would use this blog again as a place to begin journaling online. Not because I have a huge ego and require the world to see my thoughts because they are amazing and important - because I do have a big ego and what I have to say is amazing and important to the world. Ego aside... Having woken up on the first day of what is the mid-semester break from the liberal not so conservative Christian Arts College that I attend. I need to begin what I see as essential disciplines required to survive the break.

Last year I got through my first semester and I just dropped out emotionally, socially and spiritually. Physically I was fine I kept playing Soccer, but outside of that I isolated myself like the UNA bomber. I kept to myself and barely saw anyone at all for the first half of those eight weeks, yeah 8 weeks. So this mid-semester break things are going to have to be different cause I am not going back to that again. The key to this is accountability and making sure that friends and family know what happened and working out what activities I should be doing on a daily basis. Journalling or blogging here is a start.

What else can I do to stop bottoming out? Well I have a small cache of canvass frames ready to be painted on which is a start. The unfortunate thing about that is that its winter here in Australia, and I haven not yet found a place to paint. "Do it inside." I hear you say. Well, with a rented house and a very messy painting style that uses aerosol spray cans I do not see the landlady being all that happy. Reading - now that is a good idea and I do have a small supply of books that I want to read, but TV gets in the way of that sometimes. Movies that I missed? maybe not everyday but if I make one night movie night then and invite people over that would be a great idea.

Work? Well that is good to and if it pops up then great. Youtube videos on the theology that I have learned this semester would be a great thing and I have already proven I can make a 2-3 minute youtube video. I have a possible collaborator but unfortunately he does not have a mac, so he has to find a way to shoot and edit his movies with a camera and pc software.

Okay the dog needs to be walked and I need to get out of the house.

Short Version - With Pictures...

2010-03-07T20:56:00.000-08:00

The Challenge of Jesus

N.T. Wright 1999

Chapter 1 – The Challenge of Studying Jesus

Where to start well why not with the word that Wright repeats – necessary. The whole chapter is Wright imploring and explaining why the “Quest for the Historical Jesus” is important not just to the historians but to Christianity as a whole.

How is it important? Well there was a guy called Martin Luther and he did some research on this translation which came up with “do penance” Martin's study realised that it was “repentance” big difference between these huh! Of course the changes that came from this and Luther's other work were somewhat extensive. Wright alludes to the possibilities for not just individuals but for Christianity as a whole when research takes place.

Yet in my experience such historical research usually brings results from people who are trying to refute Jesus existence or that he was less than the Son of God. Either that or it is extreme in the other direction that Jesus was some hologram projected by God not a human but a super-human.

Why do we have this split not just between believers and unbelievers but within Christianity itself?

Historically what has happened is detailed by Wright in his belief that asking the question “Who was Jesus and what did he accomplish?” is necessary, but the way in which it is asked is what results in the answers that we have read in shock or dismay. Wright points to the Enlightenment and specifically to Herman Samuel Reimarus who asked the question about Jesus to try and prove that Christianity is merely a mistake. It is from the Enlightenment that the current situation stems from, its separation of fact from faith by elevating human reason changed the playing field. Jesus was either a simple peasant cynic or a superman. This is a generalisation but it is the effect of the Enlightenment and its belief that the main event of human history was in the eighteenth century and not the events in the first concerning Jesus of Nazareth that were the main event (a rival eschatology - asserts Wright).

Because of the resulting answers coming from the question responses were either for or against and the effect of the enlightenment's split between fact and faith is seen in the divide between liberal and conservative. Despite all of this Wright says that the question asked by Reimarus and the Enlightenment is “necessary” and Wrights reasons are as follows.

God – To ask questions about Jesus and discuss him is to be discussing God. We learned last week in Ogden that any question about Jesus is a question about God as well as a question about who we are (the existential question)

Loyalty to Scripture – If we believe the bible then we should be making sure that we understand it in the context that it is set in. Imagine what people will make of LOL or ROTFLOL in two thousand years time.

Truth – We should not be afraid of the truth and what it actually is and the possible changes that can and will occur when you delve deeply into the question “Who is Jesus and what did he accomplish?” Did you watch compass last sunday night? It was disturbing hearing this message that I thought I was okay with that Jesus was (and is) a Jew. This exploration may freak us out but if we believe “The way, the Truth and the Life – it is Jesus” then why should we be afraid

Commitment to mission – We can answer the questions that will come to us from those who believe as well as those who are trying to find the evidence that it is all a sham. If we know the information and the history surrounding Jesus and the first century we can answer these people. There's that joke on the Vicar of Dibley “Have you read the new book of the bible, you know the Da Vinci Code.”

Wright finishes explaining the situation or state of play as he sees it of the quest. The quest came about from a question that was necessary but asked in the wrong fashion, since then there have been three main streams within the quest headed by Wrede, Schweitzer, and Kahler.

Wrede is the sceptic “we cannot know very much about Jesus, he certainly did not think of himself as the Messiah or the Son of God and the Gospels are basically theological fiction.”

Schweitzer – the middle of the road believing that Jesus being a First century Jew had similar understandings about the end times and how they would come about. Also that the Gospels got Jesus character right.

Kahler – Saw that the quest was just a way for historians to imagine up stuff about Jesus.

Wright places himself in the middle ground of course yet he continues to explaining that we cannot just discount the arguments that are put by those we consider to be wrong. That only in joining the quest and producing arguments that lead to theories that disprove them that we can correct them.

It is because of these reasons and the growth that can come from this quest that Wright is pushing it so hard. That this should never be considered a finished work, that the previous generation worked it all out before. Wright believes that every “generation has to wrestle afresh with the question of Jesus” I agree.

If you want to read my long version it can be found at my blog -

http://thischristianguy.blogspot.com/2010/03/tutorial-presentation-challenge-of.html

Other stuff I found its interesting to read.

http://www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2636
http://www.ntwrightpage.com/Wright_BR_Great_Debate.htm
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html
http://vialogue.wordpress.com/2008/12/25/the-challenge-of-jesus-notes-review/
http://www.gracecathedral.org/forum/for_20060514.shtml – Wright with Anne Rice 2006

Tutorial Presentation - Long version

2010-03-07T18:03:00.001-08:00

Tutorial Presentation

The Challenge of Jesus

N.T. Wright 1999

Chapter 1 – The Challenge of Studying Jesus

First and main issues is described with the Kenyan students and the German scholars loosing (?) Jesus

Wright uses the words “vitally necessary” to describe the historical quest for Jesus, not to say that the knowledge that of Jesus that is common within the history of the church is wrong or inaccurate. It is necessary so that we may be able to “get to know even better the one whom we claim to know and follow”

Despite this being “necessary and nonnegotiable” that this can bring out a deeper understanding of the Jesus who we follow there are dangers.

There are extremes who are for this quest and against it. There are those who by asking the questions of “Who Jesus is and what did he accomplish?” that seek to expose Christianity as a big misunderstanding. The unfortunate result of this is that Christians have often looked at such historical study and only seen the extremes. Jesus was a New Age guru or a Peasant cynic. Of course you can go to the other extreme and see those who see Jesus as a “First Century Super man” which is just as destructive.

Of course both extremes view each other with a level of disdain considering their view much more superior. These extremes are not what Wright is on about, where Wright sees this quest should be is somewhere in between this divide between fact and faith. That we can search for Jesus and find him historically in a way that will compliment our understanding.

So from the negatives Wright then talks about the positives giving the reasons for this quest.

“that we are made for God: for God's glory, to worship God and reflect His likeness.” In discussing Jesus we are also discussing God. Whatever we can learn about Jesus will give us an understanding about God. As we learned from Ogden last week the question “Who is Jesus?” also asks “Who is God?” as well as “Who am I?”

Loyalty to scripture we should learn as much as we can about the situation in the first century so we are able to understand the context of what is said in scripture. (Imagine what debates historians will have in 200 years time wondering what LOL ROTFLOL and meh are?) If there is anything that can aid in a closer understanding of the things we take right now as traditions and whether they are biblical or not will aid us. It aided Martin Luther.

Truth. What the gospel truly means in its original setting. That understanding the meanings even more deeply effects how you see the truth of the gospel. We believe that is the truth about Jesus who said as we learned from Ogden last week “The way, the truth, the life, I am it.” Thats just one piece that we only recently learned and that was an eye opener for me. What more could we learn.

The final one rolls back into the intellectual conflict with historians trying to prove that Christianity is a mistake. Knowing the truth of the history of the first century we will be able to explain when the next Da Vinci Code comes out. What do you do when you get the Vicar of Dibley joke – Have you read the new book of the bible? Yeah you know, the Da Vinci code.”

Christianity has to be rooted in the first century happenings of Jesus in Palestine then its all hooey. The sceptics should be answered and in answering this by examining the history of our beliefs which once interpreted correctly (Christmas anyone?) will bring “depths of meaning within them that we had never imagined”

Earlier I looked a bit forward into this chapter and mentioned the divide between fact and faith, this is explained by Wright as happening within a time known as the Enlightenment. I like to call it the En-darkenment cause a lot of the issues in and around Christianity today stem from this period of thinking. Wright describes this as the Enlightenment “asking a question in a misleading fashion”. Because of the results of asking the “Who was Jesus and what did he accomplish?” in the Enlightenment's way resulted in things like the Jefferson Bible and that Jesus was only a liberal speaker ahead of his time and so on. This freaked out the Christian establishment and developed a bit of a suspicion of the intellectual community.

Wright goes into detail describing this history (while apologising that he is not an eighteenth century historian) in which the Enlightenment started asking questions of the Christian dogma which had been static for sometime not continuing in the historical quest that could have offered a defence. So when Herman Samuel Reimarus came about with his Christianity is based on mistake it caused heaps of trouble. It is here that the necessary's come back from Wright, beginning that Reimarus's question was necessary to shake the “bland dogma” and it was not the first time that it was needed. Perhaps it is needed again now. So when the historians come up with facts that you do not agree with about Jesus perhaps we need to go and find out about it ourselves.

In what I see as decisive point to the issues detailed earlier in the challenge of and historical search for Jesus, Wright explains that it was the Enlightenment that split fact and faith. This split exists today on liberal and conservative boundaries. Yet the Enlightenment offers more than a way to think but a rival Eschatology to Christianity. They thought the light or reason and logic in human thought in Western Europe and America in the Eighteenth century. What came before was dark compared to the light of this new Enlightenment. You cannot use this thinking to explain Christology because if the Enlightenment the big moment then what happened in Palestine in the first century was not. So Jesus was brought down to being either good moral teacher or a superman not what he is, the Son of God who come into the world to be a man to live and die and rise again.

Now comes the resurgence of the quest which begins with Albert Schweitzer who pointed to the first century Jewish context of the world in which Jesus lived. It was the study of Schweitzer about the historical Jesus and the first century context in which he lived that convinces Wright that such study should continue and if it does there will be more understanding.

Despite such a search into fresh understanding of the contexts within the bible as Wright implores coming up with fresh and new ways to address the questions of the historical Jesus, there are negatives this way. Because of the history of the christianity and its errors on the conservative and modernist side there are errors in the other way. Seeing Jesus as a demigod untouched by human problems and secret ways to escape this world or this reality. This secret knowledge or Gnosis can be a result of a search for Jesus which takes things further away from the truth in the other direction.

Is there anything new to say about Jesus? Wright suggests yes and no. Jesus did announce the arrival of the Kingdom of God but “What did Jesus mean by the kingdom of God?” I'd like to ask what did Jesus mean by “fishers of men” was this a colloquial saying? We can ask these questions now and expect to find information because there are so many new sources to use. The Dead Sea Scrolls and a lot of historical information on the Pharisees and the Roman agendas of the time. We know a lot now. There is so much that more can be discovered about the time when Jesus was on the planet and if we believe that Jesus is the Word of God made flesh then what we learn should go into understanding the Gospels and Christian tradition as to what needs to be kept and what needs to be removed. Martin Luther did this and the results of this are the rediscovery of “repentance” instead of the mistake “do penance” which was then morphed into a individual and pious understanding not a giving up of your whole a way of life. More than just a change of heart.

This shows us that the Gospels are not to be thrown out but that the research needs to used to weigh and challenge the meanings we have known and cherished. Its a quest that needs to be done by all parts of the church (what even the evangelicals?)

History of the quest (the good stuff and the bad stuff)

State of play in the Quest for the Historical Jesus is (in Wrights view) held in three camps headed by their historical questing forbears. Wrede, Schweitzer, and Kahler

Wrede – sceptic, we cannot know much about Jesus and he never said he was the messiah. So the Gospels are fiction.

Schweitzer – Jesus lived in first century Palestine and had the same “apocalyptic expectation” he died without it coming about. Jesus started the eschatological movement that became Christianity. Oh! And the Synoptic Gospels got Jesus right.

Kahler – God said it I believe it that settles it. The bible and faith only not the imagination of historians.

From these three come the current movements within the quest, Wright considers himself within the Schweitzer camp. There is a history that is stilted when it comes to the quest with certain individuals making steps forward while others were merely piecing together small but supposedly authentic isolated sayings.

From here Wright goes on to explain that it is not enough to disagree with those who have opposing opinions because they are wrong in asking such questions but to argue the point not just them as foolish liberals or conservatives. To come up with an “alternative hypothesis” that gives a simple solution to the problem. - Challenge to those who want to begin throwing stones at each other, don;t just throw stones do the research and throw hypothesises.

Wright ends with a challenge to the church not to just to leave it to the bible boffins to come up with these new understandings. That the answers are not all found and thought of before, it is not as complete a picture as we thought it was. Wright advises that - “each generation has to wrestle afresh with the question of Jesus” that this is a task for the whole church especially the leaders and teachers. It is difficult but Wright points to the understanding and deeper knowledge that can come from such a quest, understanding that could grant us a new vision “not just of Jesus, but of God”

More on Immediately Mark 1:17-18

2010-02-20T17:01:00.000-08:00

Okay, enough with the predestination questions and the calvinist versus arminianist debate which will continue till Jesus returns and settles it. I want to get back onto immediately.

immediately

• adverb 1 at once. 2 very close in time, space, or relationship.

At once, right now, instantly, this second. There was no hesitation for Simon and Andrew in following Jesus call. What does that say about Jesus? What did he have that brought this reaction in people? It wasn't the last time this happened, we can see it in the call of Levi, we can also see it in other who followed Jesus.

I really don't know what I'm trying to get to here. It almost feels like I'm scrapping a barrel that is too deep for me too reach to bottom of. I want to reflect on the immediately that is the calling of Simon and Andrew. The fact that James and John left their fathers behind with the employees. The whole rabbinical style of teaching that was going on at the time. The beliefs on the coming of the messiah and John the Baptist and Jesus and the beginning of Jesus ministry.

There is just so much in here that I am not sure what to exclude. If I try to have all of this together can I make it straightforward enough for people to follow me.

At first I was thinking about the calling itself and the "immediately" response of the men called. I was looking at working on who is this Jesus guy and what powers of speech did He have to do this. Was he a hypnotist, a charlatan, a conman, a leader of men. I was meaning to compare Jesus to certain political figures, also great speeches from movies like Henry V, and Braveheart. I was going to lead into the who Jesus is to be able to do this? What makes Him so special? What does he have to be able to command such a response from 4 guys who leave everything they have known to follow Him?

It looks like I have to weed out the rouge thoughts from the immediately.

"Follow Me" He said, and they did.

2010-02-19T03:09:00.000-08:00

¹⁷And Jesus said to them, "Follow Me, and I will make you become fishers of men."
¹⁸Immediately they left their nets and followed Him.

Mark is brief on the details when it comes to the calling of Simon, Andrew, James and John. It includes less than both Matthew and Luke (Luke of course including the most detail in this event), yet this is the core moment. Jesus calls and they immediately follow. No hesitation, no pause, no talking to their father, mother, wife, girlfriend or life coach. Four guys who have been in the fishing business all their lives (it mentions in Mark that James and John left their Dad with the hired help) it wasn't their lot in life to follow some wandering Rabbi. At least that is how it looks like.

Questions bubble up in my mind about this immediate decision to follow Jesus. Of course being a christian I know that the calling of Jesus the Christ is irresistible. Yet how do I explain this calling? How did Simon, Andrew, James and John answer it? Immediately. It is not a decision that you can take and leave in the back of your mind, or is it? Also, can someone who has decided to follow Jesus leave?

Hypocrite

2009-07-31T06:18:00.000-07:00

Do you know a hypocrite? Have you pointed this out to someone before that what they've done goes completely against what they have said to you? Has anyone ever pointed out to you that your actions fly in the face of the beliefs that you say you hold?

Oh really, no one?

Come now you must be joking. No one has ever pointed out that you as a christian should love your neighbour as yourself while you scream obscenities at those who have offended you. Maybe it wasn't that bad, maybe you only thought these things. Of course if no one knows how much of hypocrite you are does that still make you a hypocrite?

Of course it does. In fact it puts you in a good company with some pretty famous people. Also a few infamous people as well. In fact it puts you in company with every person on the face of the earth. We are all hypocrites. Its just that sometimes we just haven't had it pointed out to us, yet.

Consider it pointed out to you.......NOW!

Imagine if you could see yourself like some hovering camera that permenantly looks at everything you do at church (if you don't go to church try another place where you are at your best behaviour) . Then think of how that compares to the rest of your life.

Can someone look at you here at the place where you act the best and then take that as a measure of who you are everywhere else? Are you the same here as you are everywhere else?

Do you measure up? Honestly do you at you best measure up to the standards you believe in?

You don't do you?

Thats great cause I don't either. No human being ever has, apart from Jesus that is.

In Jesus time there were 2 kinds of hypocrite. The kind who realised they were and those who didn't.

Those who didn't were the Pharisees, the religious elite the ultra-orthodox super religious do everything by the boook dot the i's and cross the t's people. The scoffed at Jesus and treid their beest to bring Him down with their questions and tricks. These men professed to know God to understand Him and they did, in their heads as a list of laws. They did what they had to do and made sure others saw it. They also made sure none saw their faults and their sins.

In Luke 18:9-14 Jesus gives a story about those Pharisees.

Luke 18:9-14
⁹Jesus told a story to some people who thought they were better than others and who looked down on everyone else:
¹⁰Two men went into the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹The Pharisee stood over by himself and prayed, "God, I thank you that I am not greedy, dishonest, and unfaithful in marriage like other people. And I am really glad that I am not like that tax collector over there. ¹²I go without eating for two days a week, and I give you one tenth of all I earn." ¹³The tax collector stood off at a distance and did not think he was good enough even to look up toward heaven. He was so sorry for what he had done that he pounded his chest and prayed, "God, have pity on me! I am such a sinner."
¹⁴Then Jesus said, "When the two men went home, it was the tax collector and not the Pharisee who was pleasing to God. If you put yourself above others, you will be put down. But if you humble yourself, you will be honored."

Which camp are you in? Honestly, which one are you in? You better think about it cause a lot depends on this. This realisation of personal hypocrasy is required. Humble yourself, you will be honored says Jesus. Did the Pharisee humble himself or did the tax collector.

Tax collectors, Prostitutes, Theives, Leppers, the Blind, the Lame these were those who gathered round Jesus for the grace He was brining. Yet here we are professing to live His way and do we always? I know I don't do it always and my reaction when I finally realise my hypocrasy is the same as these outcasts and deviants those "greedy, dishonest, and unfaithful". I need Jesus and the Grace He has poured out for me.

There is more to the life we live than just the time we spend at church with everyone looking on. Jesus called the Pharisees white washed tombs. Pure and white on the outside but inside full of dead and decaying bodies. Is that how we live professing to be spiritual and Godly but not living in His peace and love troubled in our thoughts and relationships. Are we unable to love others and show the Grace that He showed us. Do you love your neighbours as yourself?

I don't, in fact my cynical and black heart has come up with some astonsihingly evil words about others and its only recently that God has shown this to me. People who don't follow Jesus have said "Phill for a Christian you're incredibly cynical." I also got "At first I thought you were nice, but you have a real nasty streak."

How do we do this? The same way the tax collectors and prostitutes and disciples did. They listened to His teachings, watched and learned His voice and who He is. They got to know Him personally, they had a realtionship with Him. This is the same for us there is contact to Jesus thorugh His spirit, through prayer, through the word He has left for us. We are free to do this to envelop oursleves into His open Grace ready to be loved beacuse we realise that on our own we can never get there. He is the one who gives the Grace to live the life He lived. The lie is that we can't, that there is no way to change our spots. Through Christ all is possible and as we grow in Him by getting to know Him through His word and His spirit these things will be passed.

Do you know this Jesus who is there for us Hypocrites?

Or are you a white washed tomb?

Back in 2009. Inside versus Outside

2009-07-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

This hasn't been the most consistantly used blog for me at all. Of course you'll see that when you look at the fact that the other posts are all 2 years ago.

What happened thischristianguy? I hear you all ask.

Well I changed my way of preparing the messages I was going to give. I started just talking them out to myself while walking the dog. Of course now the dog barks in tounges - its just a joke.

So now I'm going to begin again posting my message preparations.

Its 2 weeks till my next deadline and I'm already playing around with the concept of inside/outside - Jesus versus The Law. You know the whole whitewashed tombs hypocrasy thing in Mathew 23.

Matthew 23:27-28
²⁷"Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men's bones and all uncleanness.
²⁸"So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

Jesus' teachings focused on the decisions you make, what you think and beleive, on your heart. Not on what people see you do and how you look. The people of Jesus' day had a way of seeing things that was skewed to the visual, only seeing the acts of a person and their physical state. This extended to the sick, ill and disabled. You can see it in the question the disciples ask Jesus about the Blind Man.

John 9:1
¹As Jesus walked along, he saw a man who had been blind since birth. ²Jesus' disciples asked, "Teacher, why was this man born blind? Was it because he or his parents sinned?"

Being pop culturaly minded I find myself thinking of another character who saw things differently. Jay from Men in Black.

Jay looks beyond the exterior appearance of the monsters in the shooting gallery. He sees that one of them is working out, the other is sneezing, and that the white girl in the ghetto with quantum physics books is "Up to somthing". This an obscure way of explaining what Jesus does with all of us, but thats just how revolutionary Jesus teaching is. It's a whole new way to understand the world. Before Jesus everything was external, everything to do with the Jewish faith was to do with your actions. Boys were circumcised, animals were sacrificed, purification and washing of the body was essential, the temple was in the city huge and larger than life. People struggled to keep up with the laws that the Pharisees had established. Of course for the Pharisees to keep ahead of everyone else they went to extremes. They tithed from their spices. This would be akin to thithing from your sock drawer, or teaspoons, or pens, staples, paper clips.

This kind of strict adherance is scary but its still done, yes its done by the religious right wing fantatics in every fait, but its not just Jews, Chrisitians and Muslims. Its done by people folowing trends and lifestyles be it Goth, Geek, Extreme Sports, you name it. We live our lives with a template which we have decided up on or have had decided for us. This is how we present ourselves. The Pharisees presented themsleves was as pious and clean,Jesus called them white washed tombs. How they looked was a facade, merely a mask which hid dead bones.

All of the external trappings we do only mask the fact that on the inside we are like the Pharsiees, dead bones. We need to look on the inside of ourselves and see this is true. Jesus looks inside us all and tells us there needs to be a clean up. Of course this clean up can't be done by ourselves we need purification but not just the washing of our bodies but out hearts as well. A kind of spiritual irrigation is needed. The Jewish customs and traditions all delt with the outside, markings of your body like circumcision, rituall cleansing, sacrifice and the temple. Jesus said he came not to destroy the law but to filfill it. Jesus came to make us Temples for His Holy Spirit. He is the one and only complete sacrifice who died on the cross and rose again, whose blood makes us clean washing away our sin. He asks us to circumcise our hearts and cut out the dead and decaying parts of us that are worthless that lead us into those old ways. Paul describes this best.

Romans 12:2
And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

We need to realise that how we look on the outside isn't as important as how we are on the inside. We can change, we can do more than just what people expect us to be. Jesus is able to do this in us, if we are willing to submit to Him, becoming a Temple of His Holy Spirit. Then He will begin the job of transforming us into the person He wants us to be.

Yeah thats almost there.

God bless

Another Sermon...

2008-07-27T03:46:00.000-07:00

Sermon ugh! thats not the best word to use. It has connections to Sunday's spent being bored to death by young men who didn't know what to say or old men who didn't know how to get my attention.
God I hope I'm neither of those.
Well I'm quite sure I may well be one of those to someone, someday.
I prefer to use the word message. It has a better emphasis. It gives me peace that I'm just giving a message, being God's messenger. The importance is on God and the message and I the messenger am merely the mouthpiece for a period of time. It puts the focus for me off myself and on to Him. So (hopefully) if I'm coming to this not trying to exalt myself and only Him then maybe others wont try to exalt me either. My ego does not need the stroking. Of course when I think of being a messenger I think of a Herald.

The first one that comes to mind is Montjoy from Henry the V.

I told you my ego didn't need any help.

But onto the message for the 10th of August which is a fortnight away and at the moment a fortnight is what I seem to need to find what God wants me to say.

I got the early seeds of the current message from listening to a podcast from the Times Square church of David Wilkerson. Yes that Dave Wilkerson who was played by Pat Boone in the movie version of "The Cross and the Switchbalde".
No I am not going to mention that Eric Estrada played Niki Cruz - bother! - I did. Lord please help me not to geek out anymore on a blog dedicated to you and not to the fact that I spent way too much time (and still do sigh!) on geeking out.

Now in this message given in the pod cast the bloke mentioned that "We don't know what God is doing." He was emphasising that we need to understand God from His point of view. We need to look past our current circumstances and look to God. We need to find out where God is leading us.

When I heard this I instantly thought of Joseph. You know Joseph and the Coat of many colours, who had all the funny dreams and whose brothers sold him into slavery. Joseph who by doing nothing but the right thing got thrown into Gaol. Joseph who ended up being raised to be second in charge of the Egyptian empire. Joseph who was able to provide for his family in abundance despite the famine in the land. Joseph who realised that even though what his brothers did they did for evil. God used it for His good purposes.

There are many stories such as these in the bible old and new testament. Ruth comes to mind, as well as Daniel. Also Paul and Silas in Gaol. But there are other ways God moves apart from saving people through circumstances manipulated by Him. Sometimes its ridiculous

In Mathew 17:24-27 we have a strange piece where Jesus runs into the officials again and deals with it in His own way. Its a real throw away part but I think there's more there than you can see straight away. It shows Jesus contempt of the religious authority its really offhand. I'd better include it here so you can all read it for yourselves.

The Temple Tax
24After Jesus and his disciples arrived in Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma tax came to Peter and asked, "Doesn't your teacher pay the temple tax^[b]?"
25"Yes, he does," he replied.
When Peter came into the house, Jesus was the first to speak. "What do you think, Simon?" he asked. "From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own sons or from others?"
26"From others," Peter answered.
"Then the sons are exempt," Jesus said to him. 27"But so that we may not offend them, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours."

Because we are Sons we don't have to pay to use the temple. It leads to the new temple which God's Holy Spirit will live in (which is Us) and the fact that right now we don't have to pay for it.
What grabs me is that its laughable. In fact if you listen to the New Testament narration I have they have Jesus actually laugh.

Can you imagine what someone who was walking by when Peter was fishing for this one fish.
"Hey Pete whatchya Fishing for?"
"Ummm! Well the Rabi told me to catch a fish for Him" replies Peter not telling the whole story. Because its a bit stupid to be fishing for a fish which Jesus said would have money in it.
Then the line goes taught and Peter pulls the fish in. The passer bay expecting Peter to remove the hook and put the fish aside is taken by surprise when in the fishes mouth there is money.

Of course Peter is just as surprised as the passer by. I wonder if Peter got it then, He probably didn't. If your listening to Jesus and following Him, sometimes its going to seem really foolish to do what He's asked of you.
Its happened to me.
My parents packed my family up from the security of our own home (which was a year or two short for being owned by them outright) and moved our family to another part of Australia. They told me that they were following what God told them. My best friend told me not to go. I never heard what my Nanna said but I remember her crying as we left Perth in the bus. She must have thought my parents were crazy. I'm quite sure that my parents thought they were crazy. For me at the time it was a great big adventure.

Its an adventure that continues to today. At this moment I have a total of $40 or so dollars to my name. I am currently behind a month on my rent. There is money coming but its not coming as fast as I'd really like it too. However despite all of this the money is coming at the right time. Bills are being paid on time, except the rent but the Landlords knows Jesus too and is willing to trust Him and not me for the money. Is there panic? Yes I feel it from time to time. It scrambles at my emotions and tries to make me fear. The amazing thing is that there is this calm that I feel about it all too. I have a decision to make.
Do I
a) Freak out and scream and rant and rave about it all.
b) Pack up and move back in with my parents.
c) Exercise a little bit of faith and grab hold of that calm that God's Holy Spirit is providing me.

Of course its C. I have been grabbing hold of that calm for three months now. God has paid the bills and the insurance for the car on time. I don't need to worry. Jesus told us not to.

Matthew 6:31 (New American Standard Bible)
31"Do not ^(A)worry then, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear for clothing?'
32"For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for ^(AP)your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.
33"But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and ^(AQ)all these things will be added to you.
34"So do not ^(AR)worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

So whats the conclusion here?

Where am I getting to?

Well this is a message from God not a sermon so I guess I gotta ask God for the next bit.

I seem to be moving in the direction that leads us to not worry about our situation. That if we take our eyes off ourselves and look to Him. We find ourselves not worrying about these little concerns. We know God's track record with money. We know he wants to provide for us. I don't mean prosperity here I mean your needs. For you to be fed and clothed and housed these are concerns that He WILL provide for. He provided for Joseph, he provided for Ruth, Daniel and so many more. He WILL provide for you.

See it from His perspective. Realise you are not the center of the universe. You are not the star in your own personal sitcom. He is. Once you change your attitude and decide that He is the center of the universe. Then the universe will begin to make more sense. Things wont feel the way they felt before because you have changed your perspective.

I could go on here and I probably will when I give this message but for now I'm very happy with where I ended up. Well where He got me ending up at.

Thanks.

God bless.

The Single Christian Man

2008-07-16T00:42:00.000-07:00

Its my experience that as a single Christian man things aren't the easiest. There seems to be only so many single Christian women of an acceptable age. I add acceptable age because being 34 I don't think its all that cool to be considering young girls 25 and under as possible candidates. This does make it hard, the fact that I've put certain conditions on a possible partner. I have many (unsaved) men telling me the only consideration is that they be legal. However I have known of Christian men marrying women 10 to 15 years their junior (I also know of the reverse happening too).

But all of this is beside the point and has little to do with what I'd like to address. Which simply is "are you putting certain standards on what God can provide in a wife or husband?"

Are you? No really search your heart and I'd be surprised that you don't have some pre-concieved idea about looks, earning capacity, age, ethnic background, intelligence. If its not this then it may be the fact that you have a senario in your head as to how it will occour. These are notions that you've either made up or accepted from the world. Even the ones from your Parents, your friends and even your Pastor. They are false. Only God knows the how, the why and the when. If you desire marriage and all that goes with it then I suggest you look to Him.

The world tells us if it feels good, do it. God tells us differently. Paul advises that it would be better if we weren't married at all and stayed single. Paul's advice is given in 1 Cor7:7-8 and is rather confronting.

1 Corinthians 7:7-8
I wish that all men were as I am. But each man has his own gift from God; one has this gift, another has that.
Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I am.

At 22 I thought that I'd be married by now. Now at 34 I can tell you that there are things I can do for God that I could never be able to do if I had a wife and kids. Paul's advice is one that leads down the path of service.

1 Corinthians 7:32-35
I would like you to be free from concern. An unmarried man is concerned about the Lord's affairs—how he can please the Lord. But a married man is concerned about the affairs of this world—how he can please his wife— and his interests are divided. An unmarried woman or virgin is concerned about the Lord's affairs: Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord in both body and spirit. But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world—how she can please her husband. I am saying this for your own good, not to restrict you, but that you may live in a right way in undivided devotion to the Lord.

Being single we can give our all to God to the point where we are available at any moment to drop what we are doing and follow His lead. To be able to have time to listen and pray and study the scriptures. To grow and let Jesus be the all in all of our lives.

That is a hard challenge, give up something that we have been taught all our lives to expect. Its something thats supposed to be given to us, we are supposed to find that certain someone that Eve to my Adam. I often feel that way "Shouldn't i get this, everyone else is". Yet we all know of Spinster Aunts and Batchelor Uncles. It happens. Therefore is marriage not for all of us?
No Marriage is for all of us, just not for some in this world.
All of us who get married and those who don't will as the Bride of Christ experience a marriage of a kind not see before. Jesus is the one true groom who waits expectantly for His Bride the Church. This marriage will happen at the end of this world and the begining of the next. But we can find rest for ourselves in the fact that we are a part of His bride now.

We can find in Him the centre of our lives as one finds it in a wife or a husband. It isn't a lead role like a husband its not as a servant too. We become heirs with Him just as a wife becomes a part of the husbands family we will become a part of Jesus family, the God head.
But for now we should look to Him for direction as a wife looks to her husband. You are loved by Him, and this love isn't the Eros love that we get from a spouse. Its an AGAPE love that is deeper and stronger.

So don't be sad if you are not married. You are promised already to the true Groom. Jesus will always love you, Jesus will never forsake you. Jesus is the perfect groom. You will get none better than He.

Cleaning out the Temple

2008-06-18T22:15:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I feel like I need to do this.
Just get there on Sunday and go around knocking sense into people.
Jesus did it.
He rolled through the temple with a whip and kicked them out. All the peddlers and merchants selling their wares were abruptly sent out of the temple. They did good business in the temple. I'm quite sure there were kick backs to the priests so you got a good spot.

But all of that is merely an aside to what I'm really getting to.

Church would be so much easier without all those people in it. Then with just me and Jesus we could clean up this one horse town. I'd have no one in my face talking about crazy stuff and struggling with the fact the this person is not doing it the right way. There will be peace and I'll be able to relax and have a great time.

Of course I'm never going to do this. I know its just so stupid to do. Why do I want to get rid of everyone when the problem is that the temple I need to clean out is my own. My own understanding of God's grace is lacking. I have not accepted His peace.

The reason why other people annoy and frustrate us is because we believe they have problems that we hold ourselves. They also have other traits that are human and we see them when what we need to see is the fact that they are like us. Fallen human beings who have grabbed hold of the promise of Jesus Christ and His saving grace. They need to be loved.

Its pride that says to us. I know more than you listen to me. I know what you need to learn. Follow me and I will lead you in a deeper understanding of Jesus. You need to show love and care. You can't teach anyone if you think your better because you know a bit more. Its a fine line and you can fall into it so very easily.

If you find yourself in that situation you need to be patient and ask God what you need to learn from these people. Just because you have a bit more experience in one area doesn't mean that they are any less than you. It may be that these brothers and sisters have something you really need to learn. It also may be that Jesus is working stuff in you, so your squirming is a reaction to Him.

We are all going to heaven half a mile a day. Its a song by Johnny Cash and its just so true. No one gets to heaven any faster than anyone else. We have our walks and they are different because God made us individuals and he deals with us that way.

So when the rest of the Church are running this way and that and things look like chaos realise that they are like you. These people are loved by Christ, he died for them just like He died for you. If He loves them and can deal with them why can't you?

May His peace fill you to overflowing, always.

Preaching blues

2008-02-24T17:39:00.000-08:00

I'm getting up this Sunday and preaching. Yep I'm giving a sermon. Its not the first time, but apart from God giving me a no brainer sermon that I know already I'm having to scratch this one out.

I do prefer it when God taps me on the shoulder and says Hey have this pot of gold and give it to everyone on Sunday. I love that. It's only happened once. The other time I've been up there I had an idea that I didn't research well enough and it didn't really fit in with the flow of worship before hand and I was feeling a bit out of place. I went and presented my findings on the armor of God (Ephesians chapter 6:10 and a bit further) but I felt it was a flop. Even after all the encouragement of the rest of the Church I still felt I was at a loss that time.

This time I want to get it right. This time I want to be prepared. So I prayed about what I should be doing, I'm sure about it. James 4:1-11. Thats a pretty hard piece. James calls the believers, murderers and adulterers. He doesn't mince words at all. He tells it as God sees it.

So I'm sitting here at my computer thinking about all of this and wondering if I'm right. Have I found what I'm supposed to be giving? This is hard stuff. Do I want to give this message?

There's a whole load of other things I could do, but God keeps on calling me back here. I can't escape it. There is no other passage of scripture that I can think about other than this one.

I think about my style up there which sort of like rabbit in the headlights at times. My hands shake cause I'm nervous and then I loose my place in my notes and I have to pause for a while and collect myself. I try and rehearse a few bit of it on my walks with the dog and that seems to work a bit. So I'm getting more comfortable with it. Yet I don't want to be copying someone else. I want to be me relating what God has shown me about this piece of very hard scripture.

There are things to explain here and I know I can't get technical. I need for everyone there in Sunday to understand it all. The words need to be simple and if they can't be simple then they need to be explained. I need to make it so that both believers and unbelievers can accept this message. It needs to be a call to those within the Church who are holding back parts of their lives from God and also to those who need to heed his call and come to Him for the first time.

Time passed between this paragraph and the previous on and God's given me a starting point as well as a structure. Praise God.

I should probably start here with the structure and then take it away and fill it out.

Start with the passage. James 4:1-10 or 11 depends on how its going.
Begin by explaining the journey this will take and how its supposed to come together
Where we are now as believers and unbelievers in relation to God
How we are adulterers
That God's way out through the death of Christ and His grace is able to cleanse us of our sin and bring us into a new relationship with Him

That all sounds about right. Now all I have to do is write it up including all the side points.

Lean not on your own understanding in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight.

Gotta hold on to that don't I.

Bible school

2008-02-11T17:24:00.000-08:00

Yes that word does fill me with a bit of dread. Bible school where young Christians go to be infected with the leagalisim and negativity of the old and weary scholars.

Obviously thats not the case and is just a stereotype. But its one I've seen.

So yes as I commenced my little bible school (which if you do the testing it gives you a level of credit toward certain certificates and diploma's available) with some apprehension. I had heard the man who was leading the course preach before and was quite confident that He wasn't a jaded and weary scholar. In fact Tony Schmit is anything but jaded. He's alive and vibrant, you can see his love of the scriptures as he explains it through his own experiences.

I got a lot out of it and I really enjoyed myself. I can't wait till the next installment. The fact that its only on once a month is good but I wish it were on again this weekend.

Gee I'm a bit of a push over. Yet that just shows that my protest was just my snobbery. My experience had put my focus out and I am wary when being taught from someone I don't know. Now thats not all bad, provided you are using your knowledge of the scriptures and taking guiding from Holy Spirit. If you are merely testing the words and deeds of the person teaching you then thats ok. We are taught to check what is taught to us.

But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good;
1 Thessalonians 5:21

Now that context is about prophecy but I think it fits well when it comes to all things that are said to be from God. Whether this is something said in church, or outside church. Don't accept everything said is from God without checking this with the scriptures and also with Holy Spirit. Even Jesus proved himself not just by saying who he was he did things and said things and he can be tested and proven to be true in His actions and deeds. The same must be for all who preach and testify to speak the truth of the Gospel. The words they say may not be what you are used to and some things they do may be awkward. These things may just be tradition and how they are used to expressing themselves. When this occurs be patient, search beyond the way of saying things to the heart of what they are saying. Holy Spirit will confirm his presence in those who are true.

I had another situation this very Sunday at the evening service. Our pastor was explaining faith healing and for an explanation showed Benny Hinn's recent outing in Venezuala. Now Benny's way of doing his thing isn't they way I'd do it. The white suit, his style of speaking. It just grates me. But I cannot deny the miracles that occur when he comes to town. I cannot deny the work of God. I cannot deny the confirming Holy Spirit brings to me when I hear this woman describing the miracle he performed upon her. Have a look.

Benny still grates me though. Why the white suit Benny? Why the white suit?

The way I see the struggle

2008-01-27T18:28:00.001-08:00

I've heard it said that if you talk out whats wrong that you often come up with a solution.

Right now I've pretty much realised that I don't have the mental tools to be able deal with the struggle I am trying to win.

Yes its the same struggle that I have been trying to overcome. The one with how I deal with the pressures that come with being a single man and keeping to the straight line that Jesus set. I've had good weeks and bad weeks (last week was a bad week) so I'm really trying to do the right thing here. And maybe thats the problem. I'm trying in my own strength.

In Ephesians 6:13 it says -
Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.

We are told by Paul to stand. He tells us twice in this verse and again in the next. Standing doesn't seem like much but its what were told to do. In fact in James we're told the following piece of advice.

Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
James 4:7

Standing and Resisting doesn't seem like a hard thing to do. Yeah, just try it when your battling and old habit that is clinging to your soul like hot bitumen to the sole of your shoe. In fact a better analogy would have been chewing gum stuck to the sole of your shoe. Its more gross and what I'm trying to get rid of is something that to many is gross and wrong. So what comes next for the repentant wanting to change his ways and break the old chains that bind him. Well James has the way ahead.

Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.
James 4:8-10

Get close to God, humble yourself, change your ways. That sounds hard. I'm trying to do that, thats where I started this post. But look at the last line of James 4:10 "Humble yourself before the Lord, and he will lift you up."

Just pause a little and think about that. The Lord will lift you up. The creator of the universe the one who died and rose again will lift you up. Kings and Queens of this world lift their subjects up from poverty and obscurity to places of power and prestige. Honour and power of this world is given to them because of their connections to the monarch. How much more honour, power and prestige will be given to those who are lifted up by Jesus Christ.

I think I have answered my question here. Stand, resist, humble myself and come close to God and He will lift me up. I'll finish with the words of Isaiah about being lifted up as only he can describe it.

but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.
Isaiah 40:31

thischristianguysbattle

2007-12-16T22:36:00.000-08:00

Ok I've been reading this book. Its about struggling with the age old problem of men looking and lusting. Well that and keeping yourself within the boundaries that Jesus said.

"But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart." - Matthew 5:28

Jesus sets the bar high doesn't he. Tell me you'd agree with the WWJD there.

Where am I going here?

Well like all men I've had a problem with looking too much. Well not as much as certain men but I do look and of course there's the pressure that comes with this and the eventual release from this pressure.

Of course where I'm going here is masturbation and porn. Duh!

I'm single 34 and a virgin. Yeah thats right never even had a chance at it. Really. I'm not lying here.

So some of you are now thinking this guys got to be a porn king. Well I'm not that into it and before the interent I didn't have much at all. Then came the internet and well you can guess where that ended up. So for the last 4 years I've been going through a roller coaster of either faithfulness and control or ... well smut.

When I was on top of it all and in control I was happy and exultant feeling clean and pure. Of course the opposite of this was true when I was mired down in the muck.

I had been praying to God for a way out of this cycle to one day be free. Of course the first thought was that marriage would get me out of this but, I realised early that a woman was not going to be the answer here. I knew that this was a fight and of course I was aggressive enough to fight this out and I thought I had the will to do this.

Did you notice something in the last sentence there?

"I knew that this was a fight and of course I was aggressive enough to fight this out and I thought I had the will to do this. "

Lots of I's huh! I think I proved that I didn't have the will to do this. Eventually my prayers changed. From give me the strength to give me the tools to live your way. Recently the tools came and in the form of the book "Every man's battle". I was given it by a friend and he said it was an easy read and that I'd get a lot out of it. So I did.

I read it. And it was like, yes done that, done that, oh yeah I done that. It reads like your own struggle with morality and sex. The whole stuff about your eyes darting about latching onto anything with the right kind of curves no matter who it is, thats the first time I'd ever read that kind of honesty. The guys who wrote this book were totally open about their struggles with their eyes. It was very refreshing.

They have some straightforward techniques in dealing with your "roving eyes" and they are very helpful. But there is a warning here.

"This will not change you overnight."

These techniques will take time for them to become habit. They say about six weeks for the initial results. However as a man you will never be free from this struggle.

So I can hear you all ask "Has it worked for you?"

My answer is yes it has. But I have to work at it. I have to continue to practice the techniques of bouncing my eyes away, to swatting away those pesky thoughts and memories of past images and movies and pictures. Do I lose still. Yeah, but I know why I lose now. Cause I stop using the tools God has given me through this book.

So I say give it a read.
If your single though your going to have to deal with the fact that you don't have a wife to help you through this. Personally I found it hard that they didn't include the single man a bit more. I am thinking of a single mans version of this cause it really leaves guys like me in the cold. Literally we have to go through this cold turkey. So its different. Sure for me who's NEVER had sex with anyone but myself its a problem. But then what about men who have been there and done it. One moment your a player and then well your not. I can only imagine the attacks those guys are going to get.

I'm trying to implement these tools now. Its a slow progress and I've fallen a few times since this all started but I can see a way ahead. Its like I'm in a dark hole looking for a way out. Then suddenly there is a ladder I can climb, I can hear a good friend tell me that this is the way out. I still can't see a way out but I know that my friend sent the ladder down for me. All I have to do is hold onto my friends ladder and work my way out, rung by rung, one at a time.

Well thats "every man's battle".

I say do yourself a favour and buy it.

The begining....

2007-03-04T16:30:00.000-08:00

I got the idea to start thischristianguy (tcg) during the evening service this Sunday. The reason for it was as a way to put out some of the ideas that I have been ruminating and struggling with.

I can't say I have all the answers and that they will be here on this blog. But I do know Jesus and that he does have the answers. All we have to do is get to know him and listen to him and follow his lead.

I have other blogs out there. They are for secular ideas and stories I like to tell. I want to be a story-teller. I have the imagination and the desire to do this but I need the outlet to become a better story-teller. Those blogs are that outlet.

This blog as I wrote before is for my thoughts and struggles with understanding my relationship with the God of Creation. Its a personal thing but I think its something everyone has to deal with. Even if you don't believe in God you are struggling with that unbelief cause He believes in you.

I've always wanted to put that on a T-Shirt.
Atheist : A person God believes exists.
This is mainly for shock value. I have other T-Shirt ideas like, Cricketers for Christ and Geeks for God. But their is more to the Atheist T-Shirt that I'll go into some detail right now.

I am a comic person, I read Batman and Spider-man have done for years. Now in those comics often there is a time paradox that often occurs and because a certain event did not happen some characters no longer exist or they are different. Another example of this is the first Back to the Future movie. If Marty McFly's parents don't kiss at the enchantment under the sea dance Marty and his brother and sister will cease to exist.

Now I can hear those of you who are not time paradox thinkers saying. "What is this guy getting at? First he was talking about God and Atheists and now he's mentioning Micheal J. Fox."

The link between time paradox and characters not coming into existence is this. In my understanding of the T-Shirt slogan "Atheist : A person God believes exists." If God didn't believe that the Atheist existed he would quite literally cease to exist.

Fortunately for all Atheists that's not how God works. God has given us all time too make our minds up whether we acknowledge His Son Jesus as the one and only savior of all, or decide for something else.

And that amazes me. If I was God I'd be out there getting in the face of all the Atheists and unbelievers. Hi! I'm God. You don't believe in me so I wont believe in YOU!. -Poof- they all vanish. My God isn't like that. He's the omnipotent God. All that we see in this reality is His creation. Yet in the middle of it there are those who He created who refuse to acknowledge him. Its gotta hurt like a stomach ulcer or worse like gall stones. God still loves these people who don't give Him the credit that is due. Thats why they are still alive, because we are all given the chance to make it right accept we are wrong that we have sinned and accept His Son Jesus as our Lord and Saviour.

I hope you either have made this decision or at least are thinking about it.

Blessings in abundance.

thischristianguy.