There are a lot of decisions in life, and some options that are so monumental words just don’t do credit to descriptions. Few people make major decisions over night, it’s usually a slow erosion of ideas, events, circumstances, or just a recognition that your lifestyle just isn’t getting it done. It’s a Dr. Phil question of, “And how is that working out for you?”
Continue reading ‘Faith is Dangerous’
Monthly Archive for December, 2005
This is my fifth and final pre-Christmas Commentary, I’ve covered the basis from Scriptural reivews of the only two known historical records: Matthew and Luke’s infancy accounts, to a myriad of fantasy secular and Christian beliefs. For a final overview, just in case you don’t already have too much information, WIKIPEDIA has a great recap. I want to end on some very personal beliefs and observations.
Continue reading ‘Pre-Christmas #5′
In this fourth commentary leading up to Christmas, let me affirm some of the things that those who are atheists, agnostics, or of another faith remind us; that are true!
First of all Jesus was NOT born on December 25th. There is no reference in the Bible as to the date of His birth. I won’t try to go into historical details that few would care about, other than to say that shepherd’s usually were not tending to their sheep in the cold Judean winter of December. Most historical scholars think he was born in the month of September or maybe March. Whatever!
Secondly, I understand that December 25th was the Babylonian celebration of the feast of the sun god. Isis, the Egyptian queen is said to have given birth to a son at this time. By the way, it was a virgin birth as well, or so history records. Interesting how we can pick and choose which virgin births we want to believe and not believe, isn’t it. Before the 4th century, there was no Christmas celebration. But, when Constantine declared Christianity as the religion of the land in 312, Christmas was combined with the pagan holiday celebration.
Thirdly, over centuries we have adopted traditions that have become part and parcel of the holiday season. Yule logs, mistletoe, and Christmas trees were not a part of Christmas celebrations in the 4th century. And all those Christmas cards so many people spend hundreds (and the White House hundreds of thousands of dollars) of dollars on each year, where’d they come from? Most people would be surprised to know that Santa Claus and all that stuff are recent American traditions.
Finally, we have gotten so far off course over the centuries that Christians have little standing to complain of the habits of those who do not enjoy Christmas. Instead of trying to defend WHEN Christ was born, WHERE, and HOW, why don’t we simply EMBRACE & ENJOY the FACT that HE WAS BORN and that no one can deny. Well, they can but, you get the point. Maybe if we would go back to the “reason for the season”, those who do not embrace Him, would!
Those who do not share our faith in Christ see our Christmas habits and ask themselves why they should even think about joining us in our: drunkenness at parties, stress at over spending and buying presents, impatience at merchandise counters, and lack of joy and peace. We sing Joy To The World, but our countenence reflects something other. We speak Peace To The World, and yet our agitation speaks louder.
We need to more than just CHILL, we need to come back to our first love and have our hearts BURN again with His love. There’s just too much stuff (can you say crap?) that gets in the way of us truly celebrating His birth! May this weekend be the most calm, peaceful, and loving ever.
In this third commentary leading up to Christmas, I want to follow up on a point I made yesterday alluding to the fact that Matthew in his infancy story chooses some of the more dark characters to put in his list of forty two generations leading up to Christ. Lest we allow patrology run amuck, there are five names in that list that are not male! And they aren’t the names you’d expect either.
Continue reading ‘Pre-Christmas #3′
What’s Matthew 1 got to do with Christmas?
In this second commentary (click below if interested in yesterdays post) leading up to Christmas, I want to hopefully shed some light on what in the world Matthew (probably not the one you’ve been told) had in mind with all those names in the first sixteen verses? Have you seen the list? And why does it differ from Luke’s list (I’ll save that answer to later)? Remember that Matthew’s primary audience is to the Jews, and thus his “Kingdom of heaven” phrase was exclusively Matthew.
There are 42 generations listed in those first sixteen verses, divided into three groups of generations of fourteen. Matthew is using the listing of names to confirm that Jesus was a natural evolutionary person to come out of Jewish-Hebraic history, and bring to light something too many of the religious crowd miss today.
Why did Matthew choose the names that he did? Ever give that any thought? Are you kidding me, who cares who begat whom? Why Isaac over Ishmael? Why Jacob over Esau? And why Judah over Joseph? Who cares you say, what’s the point here? I believe Raymond Brown hits it on the head when he says, “Matthew is faithful to an insight about a God who is not controlled by human merit, but manifests His own unpredictable graciousness.” If you know you are still a sinner being saved by grace, and always in need of mercy, you just have to love Brown’s comment. If you’re aware of your righteousness, the statement means nothing.
We know about the two great reformers: Luther and Calvin. But we’re not all that acquainted with the third and most radical one- Ulrich Zwingli. He had the rhema word on this area. In January of 1519, he beagn a series of sermons on the Matthean genealogy. How boring could that be, one would have to ask unless you saw what the Spirit of God was bringing to light. Many of the men Matthew mentions (instead of others he left out) are Romans 5:8 people.
In the first fourteen grouping we have the patriarchs of which many were liars, betrayers, and outright immoral. In the second grouping of fourteen we have the Judean kings and we know all too well of their less than glorious histories. The final list of fourteen; and talk about a list of no-names! Who is acquainted with the likes of Azor, Sadoc, Abiud, or Matthan? Exactly the point the Holy Spirit wanted us to see!
Who are you? Who knows you or your exploits? Who am I and does anyone outside of my extended family have a clue about me? And if anyone knows anything about any of us, it’s probably only our dastardly deeds that they are aware. Now we have Matthew’s reason for listing the names (I doubt he even knew why he was writing mentioning them). We’re all no-bodys! We’re all sinners! But, we’ve all been created for His glory and for some wonderful purpose we’re somehow just not recognizing (or else we wouldn’t be where we are today).
Take nothing in the Bible for granted! But, neither take everything literally or you’ll really get messed up. The only two infant stories of Jesus are not reconcilable (logically). Luke has Joseph and Mary living in Nazareth as home owners, while Matthew has them living in Bethlehem. Luke has Jesus in a manger, while Matthew has him in a home! Whatever! Remember, both works were written from oral traditions, and or copying works of works 70-80 years after Jesus was born. And we have NONE of the original manuscripts.
But, what I am HEARING and hope you do to, is that there’s something of God to be found in every book of the Bible: probably not in every word or sentence. But to those that hunger and thirst for knowledge and a relationship with God’s Son, Jesus Christ, you can find it most anywhere you want to look. But doubtful you’ll find Him in most of our made-up, modern-day, consumer-driven, fantasy stories. I pray that some of my daily writing will PROVOKE you into SEEKING HIM!
A week of commentaries on the Christmas story? Caution! You’re about to enter a NO SPIN zone! 
Could you handle that? Well, I guess we will see because that is what I am going to write about (so I think). I am somewhat amused and yet at the same time saddened that Christians make so much noise about this being “the reason for the season”, while knowing little about the season. Don’t hear any condescending attitude. I am far from that! I only wish I had more truth, more answers because to go where sacred cows do gather is not good, especially when one is hungry and looking for milk or meat!
The fact that LRC is not having services on Christmas Day or New Year’s Day is amazing some. How could we go without church for two Sunday’s? But where in the Bible is church mandated on Sunday? We’re having church, but on Friday the 23rd and Friday the 30th, instead so families can get together. At least two people have said, “You can’t do that as people won’t come on Friday, and how can you go two weeks without a church income”? They might be right. I’ll letcha know come January 2nd.
I am going to go slow all this week as I unwrap the the Christ birth story, so be patient. Let me begin by saying if it weren’t for Matthew and Luke, we’d know nothing about the birth of Jesus! Twenty five of the 27 NT books say nothing about his birth. Mark, the earliest gospel, which was written 10-15 years before either Matthew or Luke, says nothing about the birth. Wonder why? The majority of the Biblical scholars have Mark writing his gospel around 68-70 AD with Matthew around 80-85, and Luke around 85-90.
So, one of the four gospels (Mark) said nothing. The point is? The point is neither did the gospel of John (but having been written around 90-100) he was a different bird than the synoptic gospels anyway. So, why only two of the four gospels and the earliest one written says NADA?
Okay then what about Paul? He began writing (I Thes. and Gal. as an example) around 48-50. Why did Paul call Jesus, the son of man, after the flesh, and mention nothing about His birth, let alone something as speatcular as a virgin birth? Hard to believe, but then, anything is possible. Why was he silent on such a spectacular event in history? And then what about the lost Gospel of Q, written around 40AD (the earliest work suppossedly)? Just a few questions to set you up for tomorrow when I’ll look at the only two places where we get a clue- even though the two that wrote Matthew & Luke (who were those guys anyway) couldn’t agree (read Matt. 1&2 and Luke 1&2) on their stories and attempts to harmonize, actually demonize one’s thinking.
A final reminder: the end game here is to BUILD your faith in Jesus Christ, but all too often that can’t be done until you tear down the false worship paradigms of Baal! Sorry, there aren’t any easy ways to make the journey
I want to share two practical, theological concepts. Since it’s the weekend I’ll be brief. A man needs his rest and people have better things to do on a Sat-Sun. Before I take off on these simple points, let me say that I do appreciate the emails, questions, comments, and feedback that I get. People are thinking and that’s sometimes good!
When’s the last time you heard someone say, “The encyclopedia says or the public library says”? Maybe a couple of times on the Britannica, but never on the library. Google sure has killed the careers of enclyclopedia sales people! Yet, I can’t tell you how many times I have said or have heard, “The Bible or the Scriptures says”
Continue reading ‘Two Simple Concepts’
What would you do to see some serious, undeniable miracles take place in your life? Is that something that interests you at all? It’s a given that we want a miracle when there is a crisis, a family member has received a bad medical report, a car accident, a child with a a fever of 104 degress, etc. I’m not talking about an every day thing because if that were to happen it would go to our head: we’ve seen too many historical examples. And I’m not talking about any fake TV evangelist stuff that we see too much. And isn’t that the point anyway? Let’s just see miracles without getting money or fame in return.
What are you willing to offer?
Continue reading ‘How Do We Get There?’
I find myself facing two major challenges in ‘06 from a pastoral position. Being in an inter-denominational body of believers brings much diversity and freedom; however, it can be more than interesting when 40% of the body has come from the North pole (Catholics), and 40% have come from the South pole (Baptists). The other 20% is such a mixed breed, there is no description. I use the North and South pole metaphor because of the traditions that are poles apart: yet few know it.
The two challenges are WORD and SPIRIT!
Continue reading ‘Word and Spirit’
A Good Year
The year 2005 “was a very good year” as Frank Sinatra would sing. Oh sure, there were times in the last twelve months that I could have done without. There were some heartbreaks: isn’t there in every year? But if you want to win a big one, you have to pay for it. As someone has said the higher the price, the greater the prize: reminds me somewhat of Mark 10:30.
Continue reading ‘A Good Year’