December 18, 2005 - What do most people mean when they ask you if you are SAVED?
Monthly Archive for December, 2005
Where are the risk-takers in Christianity?
That may sound like a silly question considering most people see the church running about 50 years behind the rest of the world. And no, I am not kidding. As early as the sixth century, the world had been suggesting a heliocentric theory, but it took the church a thousand years to catch on to the idea. The church was still embracing a flat earth, an illogical gravity, and an earth at the center of the universe. Galileo incurred the wrath of the church as many still do today: even though the church is wrong! No one believes in the goecentric theory today; however, the church still embraces some ideas that are about that old.
Continue reading ‘Fall in Love’
We need to go back to WWJ and ditch the WWJD bracelets!
There are days when I think there must be a demon behind every thought, bush, or act. Then there are times when I am convinced demons are much like the Maytag repair man: they are bored stiff with nothing to do. We do it all to ourselves- who needs demons? Many charismatics are fond of yelling at the top of their voices, admonishing those pesky minions of the devil that they don’t stand a chance against God. Well, THAT we do know for sure, but is that the point?
Continue reading ‘Put Some Life Into It’
For way too many Christians, the challenge is that they are called upon to defend too many completely unreasonable and irrational doctrines. I know, I came from that side of the tracks. Once upon a time I would be asked why there were so many contradictions in the Bible. Of course I would respond, there are no contradictions, you just don’t understand; which meant I didn’t understand! As an example, there was no way I could match up the number or names of geneaology in Matthew vs. Luke.
Continue reading ‘We’ve Lost the Image’
There are lots of stories about Jesus as a healer. When He prayed, things happened. For me one of the most amazing is the story of Lazarus who had been dead for four days, but at the command of Jesus, he just comes back to life and walks out of the cave. Who wouldn’t like to be able to do that? Most would settle for a lot less: say, the healing of a migraine? A simple headache?
I do believe we’ll have to increase our faith a bit. Big time!
Continue reading ‘Real Faith’
I guess one of the most difficult concepts to grasp is a statement that I made yesterday, “Something can be profoundly true and yet not factual.” It’s not some Zenism; however, I think it would qualify. I heard the statement first from Marcus Borg and I must admit it took some time to grasp the reality.
Continue reading ‘True and Yet not Factual’
What does it really matter?
Why do so many American Christians get so angry over the small stuff? It must be because there isn’t any small stuff in their world: it’s all major big-time stuff. So, let me test your tolerance level and ask a few questions.
Continue reading ‘Does it Matter?’
Let me start off with a quote from St. Augustine, “Many belong to the church that don’t belong to God, but many belong to God that don’t belong to the church.” What’s up with that? How in the world are we going to tell the good guys from the bad guys? But then just how important is that?
Continue reading ‘We Deceive Ourselves.’
Well, here it is. This is a chance for all of those who read these commentaries to more than comment, but to ask questions. Next year I will begin what’s known as MDT.3 or Men’s Discipleship Training #3. This five month segment will be devoted to discussing and answering 25 questions (5 per month).
Continue reading ‘MDT 3′
The New Kid
The child has grown up and he is nothing like we think!
Remember when you’d see some family members once a year (Christmas or summer vacation)? All of a sudden that scrawny kid has grown up and he looks a lot different than you once thought. Well, we have the same thing going on in the church (in the world) today. This kid was the offspring of two parents (Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment). Now, while applaud the efforts of Galileo and Michel de Montaigne, I am not so sure as to just how enlightened we are. And as a Catholic priest said to me not too long ago, “I wished the Protestants had reformed religion.” I hope you get his point: it’s valid!
Continue reading ‘The New Kid’