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Archive for February, 2017

BREAKING OUT OF PRISON

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 18, 2017| Leave a Comment »

challenging-beliefs-2-17One of my favourite activities is lining up in solidarity with atheists. It was an atheist who put this graphic on the Internet and I found myself so strongly in agreement that I downloaded it to use on Frank’s Cottage.

As far as I’m concerned, every honest and thinking person MUST challenge their beliefs. Like a jeweller checking a diamond’s purity, they MUST hold them up to the hard light of critical examination.

That’s what I did for a long time. I investigated the claims of Jesus of Nazareth (who many people believe is the Son of God) and weighed them against what I knew about others faiths, including atheism.

I read books, thought hard about the reality of this world, and debated concepts with brave, knowledgeable Christians. Finally, at age 42, I decided to follow Jesus.

Through this process, I escaped the prison of blindly accepting the dogma of our culture, which insists that we:

  • Buy the newest iPhone
  • Save for cruise ship vacations
  • Obsess over which celebrities are feuding on Twitter
  • Never, EVER consider the big questions of existence

So, to quote the graphic that started this blog, are you your own most effective prison warden? Or are you brave enough to wonder if a promotion, a new car and a bigger flat-screen TV will really boost your happiness?

If you’re at that place in life — and if you’ve read this far, I’m gonna assume you are — then consider these claims:

  1. There IS a creator, a perfect creator, and this creator knows everything about you.
  2. This creator wants to connect with you on the deepest level possible, but the wrong things you’ve done and right things you’ve failed to do have erected a Berlin Wall between you and Him.
  3. That wall is so tall and thick that nothing YOU ever do will ever break it down.
  4. So God, your creator, did the hard work for you — sending His perfect Son to this earth to show us how to live right and, finally, to die as a sacrifice. That sacrifice will destroy that wall for everyone who believes in the Son and follows Him. And I mean EVERYONE.

Why, you might ask, is this horrible sacrifice needed to break down the wall? Because the wrong things we do and the right things we fail to do are serious business for a perfect creator. Far, far more serious than our culture will ever admit.

How do I know this? One of Jesus’s earliest and most influential followers wrote, “When people sin, they earn what sin pays—death. But God gives his people a gift—eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord”.

If you come to the place of understanding this, then you will also understand just how glorious the gift of Jesus is. Are you willing to accept that gift? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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THE EMERGING TRUTH

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 4, 2017| Leave a Comment »

crisis of faith atheismI can’t speak for any faith but my own, but I can tell you that most followers of Jesus of Nazareth (who many people believe is the Son of God) have experienced at least one crisis of faith in their lives. And that includes me.

This shouldn’t be a surprise, to the atheist who posted this graphic online or to anyone else. Jesus followers live in a world surrounded by people who often believe there is no god.

That means Jesus followers are constantly exposed to family members, friends, work colleagues, social media, TV shows and more that have a very, very different and often incompatible worldview.

At times, Jesus followers can feel like freaks in a culture that insists power, fame, money, vacations, a trophy spouse, gigantic flat-screen TVs and the very latest iPhones are what we should be pursuing.

Is there a God? Does He care about us humans? Is there anything beyond this life? Are there really standards of right and wrong that don’t change with every shift of the wind? Who cares! Worship your family, get more stuff and plan your next vacation. Somehow everything will all work out, right? Right?

Add it all up, and it’s easy to see that Jesus followers are under a lot of pressure to give up their faith and follow the crowd.

I showed this graphic/meme to Ross Carkner, my thoughtful pastor friend. He agreed with the atheist who posted the meme in that a faith crisis is not about God testing us. He continues:

To my understanding, a crisis of faith is an inability to see the hand of God guiding us through the challenges of life. When we lose sight of God with the eyes of faith, then we become familiar with words like abandonment or betrayal.

So a crisis can take root in thoughts like, “my faith is weak” or “my faith is not big enough”. It may even extend to thinking that this whole God thing doesn’t work.

But faith is not about size, or perhaps even quality. Faith is about believing that God is present, working and guiding us, even when life circumstances seem to be blinding and confusing.

So, what is this “truth” that the graphic meme mentions? Is it the mantra that our culture peddles? Or is it something deeper, more profound and more important?

Let me advance this for your consideration:

  1. There is a creator who is absolutely perfect and, in many ways, beyond our ability to comprehend.
  2. This creator absolutely loves YOU and wants a relationship with YOU that begins in this life and extends into eternity.
  3. The wrong things you’ve done and right things you’ve failed to do don’t change that love, but they do put up a wall between you and your creator.
  4. No matter how hard you try, you can’t scale that wall or knock it down.
  5. In the end, you don’t have to do anything about that wall. Your creator did something about it through Jesus.
  6. Jesus died on a cross for all wrong things you’ve done and the right things you’ve failed to do. Accept what He did, believe in Him, follow Him and the wall is GONE. Forever.

Sound interesting? Post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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