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Posts Tagged ‘theology’

THE BIBLE’S ‘FAILURES’

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on January 17, 2015| 8 Comments »

Bible diversity intelligent happy tolerantAccording to this meme, found on an atheist website, I’m probably not “saved”.

Here I am, a follower of Jesus of Nazareth (who many people believe is the son of God) and yet:

  • I’m reasonably happy, however one would define that word and apply to our culture.
  • I’m intelligent enough to have graduated high school and earned a college journalism diploma & a university management development certificate.
  • I have yet to write a single word on this website, or during my 26 years in journalism, condemning diversity.
  • Mentally stable? There have been times when I was taking a mild anti-depressant, just like millions and millions of other people (it’s safe to write that some of them are atheists).

I guess following Jesus has failed to save other people like me, too. Churches all over the world are attended by black men and women, Asian men and women, African men and women, native North American men and women. And some of those people are gay and/or divorced and/or alcoholics and/or convicted criminals and/or mentally challenged.

Intelligence? Ooooo, lots of failures there, too. Among them are university professor and committed Catholic Brian Kobilka, an American Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry. There’s also Christian paleontologist Mary Higby Schweitzer and 2007 Nobel Prize Winner (for chemistry) Gerhard Ertl.

That’s just the beginning; Wikipedia lists more than 60 Jesus followers active in biomedical sciences, physics & astronomy, chemistry and engineering. Gee, I’d call that an EPIC failure on the part of Jesus. (Chances are, most of these folks are mentally stable, too.)

Beyond all this sarcasm, I hope it’s obvious to you that deciding to follow Jesus — His life and teachings, His sacrificial death (to make up for all the wrong things his followers have done and all the right things we’ve failed to do) and His resurrection — often helps people become happy, intelligent, tolerant of diversity and mentally stable.

Following Jesus helps us understand that God loves us, and everyone else on this planet, equally and beyond measure. That love comes not from what we’ve done or not done. It comes because that’s who God is.

Serious Jesus followers also understand that just as we have been forgiven much, we should turn around and forgive much in others.

There’s more: serious Jesus followers appreciate science because it helps us understand how God does stuff. Serious Jesus followers believe something that famed evangelist Billy Graham said: “It’s the Holy Spirit’s job to convict (people of their moral crimes), God’s job to judge and my job to love”.

Do we fall short of this? Absolutely. But most serious Jesus followers have it in our sights and strive after it daily. And doing that makes us better people.

Interested in striving with us? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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WHEN LOVE LEADS TO LOVE

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on September 20, 2014| 3 Comments »

WhenLoveLeadsToLoveHmmm…before my wanderings into atheist internet communities, I’d never heard the notion that loving God means I have less love to give others.

Maybe that’s true for some unfortunate people, who are into “religion” and believe they should sit in judgement of others. But for most of the God-loving people I know, the reality goes something like this:

  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to homosexual people. That means speaking up whenever they are mocked, denigrated or unjustly criticized.
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to homeless people.
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to people who’ve been through the pain of abortion. (Ever met anyone who liked having an abortion? Me neither.)
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to people who don’t care about the environment. (It’s God’s world, not mine, so I need to care about what we humans do to His planet.)
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to people who are arrogant and pretentious.
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving toward people whose political views are diametrically opposite to mine. That means respecting and defending the values of democracy.
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to Jewish people, Muslim people, Buddhist people and Hindu people. That means defending their right to worship without fear.
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to atheist people. That means protecting their right to be atheists.
  • I love God, so I need to be more loving to people who oppose and mock or denigrate my faith.

People like me understand that we’ve been offered a great gift — Jesus of Nazareth, who many people believe is God’s son. Because we’ve accepted that gift, a perfect and holy God has hit the ‘delete’ key on all the wrong things we’ve done and the right things we’ve failed to do (like not loving others enough, for example).

Serious Jesus followers understand that the gift of Jesus is given out of unfathomable love. And that gift is offered to every person on this planet, no matter who they are, what they’ve done (or not done) and whatever faith they have (or don’t have).

How do I know this? Consider this excerpt from one of the four original source accounts of Jesus’s life: “God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him would not be lost but have eternal life. God did not send him to judge the world guilty, but to save the world through him.”

That’s why I have more love to give. You can have more love to give, too. Interested? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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THE CONUNDRUM OF LOGIC

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on September 13, 2014| 11 Comments »

Logic 9.14If you know anything about following Jesus of Nazareth, then maybe you’ve thought the same thing as this graphic.

This position advanced here refers to something called the “Trinity”. It states that God, as He’s understood by serious Jesus followers, exists as three equal entities: God, Jesus (who many people believe is God’s divine Son) and the Holy Spirit.

If this leaves you scratching your head, you’re certainly not alone. It’s probably easier to explain nuclear fission.

But let’s think more about the “logic” of all this, since it’s the main point of the graphic. Just because it may not be logical doesn’t mean it can’t be true — especially when even the most logical people accept and live out all sorts of illogical things:

  • Many professional athletes receive millions and millions of dollars per year while social workers, commercial pilots and nurses (who, let’s face it, do far, FAR more important work) sometimes need second jobs just to pay their bills.
  • People still attempt to climb Mount Everest even though it’s long been proven to be enormously dangerous and there is no legitimate reason to bother trying.
  • In Canada, elected politicians who want the province of Quebec to separate receive pensions paid for by all Canadians.

None of these things — and I’m sure you can think of many more without a lot of effort — are even slightly logical, and yet they continue to happen every day. Often without a peep of protest.

So if you are willing to accept the rampant illogic of the world we human beings have created, why aren’t you willing to accept what might seem illogical about the creator of time, space and the universe?

There’s something else to keep in mind here: God will never fit into a tidy box of what you and I consider “logical”. Like it or not, God will always be beyond our full comprehension.

But here’s something that’s easier to understand:
1. God LOVES every person on this planet, no matter their age, gender, sexual preference, place of residence, religious belief (or lack thereof), and behaviour.
2. Because every human being has fallen short of who God designed us to be (through the wrong things we’ve done and the good things we’ve failed to do), we separate ourselves from our creator.
3. God does the heavy lifting to bridge that gap, offering the life, sacrificial death and resurrection of His son Jesus to every person on this planet.
4. Anyone who accepts this gift can find his/her life transformed in the here and now, and in the life to come when our time on this planet ends.

I accepted that gift in my 40s, after many years of reading, pondering and debating with Jesus followers. I certainly don’t understand everything about my faith, but I also know that when this life is finished, all my questions simply won’t matter anymore.

Despite any questions you have, the gift of Jesus is offered to you too. Will you accept it? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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BRAINWASHING? OR SEEING REALITY?

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 23, 2014| 3 Comments »

14+-+1-2Have you watched someone give their “testimony” on a TV show and describe being at their lowest point when they became a follower of Jesus of Nazareth?

Did you shake you head and have the same reaction as the words at the bottom of the graphic? Once, I would have been in your camp. After all, that is the easiest, fastest response, right?

So here’s a challenge: skip the path of least resistance, the path that our culture pushes us onto, and really think about this.

Perhaps someone said “I found God at the most vulnerable point of my life” because they suddenly realized that all the ‘stuff’ that’s supposed to be so, SO important is really trivial.

Maybe they realized that in the midst of their vulnerability, nothing that our culture offers us really changes anything. Self-help books can’t help. Friends sending out ‘positive vibes’ makes no difference. And drugs or alcohol will eventually leave them even worse off than before.

Perhaps they figured out that our culture’s focus on being self-reliant in everything just doesn’t pass the smell test. It’s not realistic.

Maybe their vulnerability has made them realize that dismissing/ignoring God and Jesus (who many people believe is His Son) is, in fact, brainwashing. And for the first time, they’re seeing life — and what could happen when this life ends — outside of our culture’s narrow and shallow confines.

I was in my 40s when I stepped off the path of least resistance and really thought about the how and whys of people deciding to follow Jesus. I wasn’t at the most vulnerable point of my life. In fact, I was doing just fine, by the standards of our culture. I had a decent career, parents who didn’t abuse me or abandon me, several meaningful romantic relationships, no serious diseases and a good future.

But I knew there had to be more to life than all this. I knew there had to be something deeper and something that would look beyond 80-odd years on planet earth. After much reading, a lot of thought and many debates with brave Jesus followers, I decided to become a follower of Jesus.

That decision had — and continues to have — a profound impact on my life. It greatly affected who I decided to marry and where I now work. It gave me hope — not in things or in people (the first is meaningless and the second will disappoint and hurt and abandon)  — but in a creator who offered me the gift of His Son.

I accepted that gift. Have you ever thought about doing the same? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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WAITING ON GOD

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 16, 2014| 4 Comments »

WAITING ON GODHave you met anyone sitting around, drinking margaritas and watching awful TV shows because they have nothing better to do than wait for God to fix stuff?

Me neither. I suspect this graphic, found in an atheist internet community, is making an offhand reference to prayer. If I’ve learned anything from my interactions with atheist people, it’s that almost all of them believe prayer is an idiotic waste of time.

I’m not going to delve into prayer in this essay; you can read my thoughts on the subject here: http://wp.me/p2wzRb-9a

What I will write, however, is perhaps the reason this world is struggling is because people DON’T stop and wait for God to do something. Consider:

  • If we had stopped and waited for God to fix the problem, would organized crime have come to North America? I’m referring to prohibition in the United States during the 1920s. Human actions to reduce alcoholism not only failed, they created negative consequences that are still being felt almost 100 years later.
  • People brought rabbits to Australia and New Zealand for food. What followed was an explosive growth in the rabbit population to the point where they are now major pests in these countries.
  • Still in Australia, people introduced cane toads to control canefield pests. Bad idea. Canefield pests are still there and cane toads are now a major problem in their own right.
  • How often have people, through their governments, introduced rent controls to deal with sky-high rent increases? How often has that resulted in major shortages of rental units – making it nearly impossible for low-income people to find a place to live?

So it’s clear that ignoring God and doing things on our own often makes this world a WORSE place.

Sometimes, I’m guilty of this very mistake. Because I’m part of a culture that lives as if God and Jesus of Nazareth — who many people believe is His divine Son — don’t exist, I get sucked into that same thinking.

I forget to pray about things. I forget to wait on God — even though a wise ancient prophet tells me “The Lord is good to those who wait for him. He is good to those who look for him”. In case I didn’t get it the first time, another ancient prophet says “Be strong and brave and wait for the Lord’s help”.

Patience is a gift I’m continually learning as a follower of Jesus. There are other gifts, too: seeing beyond my ego to what’s truly important; understanding that this world is NOT how God wants it to be; and allowing Jesus to work in my life to make me more like the person He knows I can be.

Do these gifts sound appealing? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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WHEN LOVE MAKES A DIFFERENCE

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 19, 2014| 2 Comments »

WHEN LOVE MAKES A DIFFERENCEIs loving God a waste of time? Certainly that’s the opinion of the atheist person who posted this graphic on the internet. And there are occasions when that person is dead-on right.

If loving God makes no difference in your life, then it’s a waste of time.

If loving God doesn’t cause you to love your friends and family more, then it’s a waste of time.

If loving God doesn’t encourage you to love yourself, then it’s a waste of time.

If loving God doesn’t make you want to do more for a world that’s clearly sick and broken, then it’s a waste of time.

Serious followers of Jesus of Nazareth (and I’m one of them) know that despite this world’s horrible problems, God still loves it. In fact, God sent Jesus — who many people believe is His Son — to this world to help fix it.

I can hear some of you saying “How did sending Jesus making one bit of difference? This world is still a mess.” Yes, this world is still a mess. And sometimes, deeply misguided followers of Jesus have contributed to that mess.

That said, consider this: serious Jesus followers believe He died to wipe away ALL the wrongdoings of people who believe in Him. And by rising from the dead, as the original source documents of Jesus’ life describe, He also wiped away the permanence of death.

How does this make any difference? It’s already made a HUGE difference. Energized by what Jesus has done for them, serious Jesus followers have gone on to build hospitals, start universities and do charity work in some of the world’s most hopeless places. That includes treating victims of the Ebola virus in Africa, helping typhoon survivors in the Philippines and building shelters for earthquake victims in Haiti.

All of this happens because people who follow Jesus know that God loves them (and every other person on this planet) beyond all measure. Allowing His divine Son to die on a Roman cross, then bringing Him back to life, is absolute proof of that love.

  • Because I love God, I love my wife and stepchildren MORE.
  • Because I love God, I care about what’s happening in HIS world.
  • Because I love God, I turned away from my insecure greediness and make regular contributions to charities that do amazing work in the name of Jesus.
  • Because I love God, I maintain this website to tell YOU about how loving God and His Son can change your life just as it changed (and continues to change) my life.

Do you see value in loving God and accepting His gift of Jesus? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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WHO IS YOUR SHEPHERD?

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 5, 2014| 4 Comments »

sheep-1I’m just dying to know: who is NOT a sheep? That’s the first thing I thought when I saw this graphic on an internet atheism community.

The graphic refers to a number of original source documents which describe followers of Jesus of Nazareth (who many people believe is God’s Son) as sheep. Here’s an example:

I am the Good Shepherd. I know my own sheep and my own sheep know me. In the same way, the Father knows me and I know the Father. I put the sheep before myself, sacrificing myself if necessary. (The words of Jesus.)

This hardly paints “sheep” in a negative light. But let’s leave that point and examine the motivation behind the graphic.

Like it or not — and obviously, the creater of this graphic would NOT — every single one of us are sheep. We ALL follow after something or someone. And often times, we are happy to put on blinders to make sure nothing distracts us from being sheep.

There are endless examples. Here is but a taste:

Some of us blindly run after power (the shepherd) and we’re such sheep that we’ll do anything to keep it. Just look at all the people who’ve achieved great political power — former U.S. president Richard Nixon and former Italian prime minister Enrico Berlusconi are two recent examples — then crashed and burned as their power (shepherd) corrupted them.

Fame is another shepherd and its sheep pursue it with unbelievable passion. They’ll sacrifice years of their life to achieve fame, then watch helplessly as our microscopic attention spans aimlessly drift to someone else. In just a few years from now, will anyone remember reality TV stars Kim Kardashian or Nicole ‘Snooki’ Polizzi? Their ‘shepherd’ has already thrown them under the bus.

Then there’s money, an infectious shepherd that bids even the most unsuspecting person to follow. Consider businessman Bernie Madoff, a sheep who followed his shepherd so religiously that he defrauded thousands of investors out of about $65 billion. Madoff spent his final 12 years in prison.

Perhaps the most tempting shepherd is sex. It whispers sweet nothings to pretty much everyone, turning all kinds of people into sheep who will do its bidding until it destroys them. Remember televangelist Jimmy Swaggart? He was twice caught having affairs with prostitutes. Where is his shepherd now?

So, can someone tell me why it’s so terrible to be a sheep to the shepherd of Jesus? When I follow Him passionately, He enters my soul and helps me become a wiser, more generous and thoughtful person.

And as a sheep to Jesus the shepherd, I come to understand that through His sacrificial death and triumphant resurrection, all the bad things I’ve done (and the good things I’ve failed to do) are wiped off the books. God sees me as He sees His son: perfect, without a blemish, and worthy of spending eternity in Heaven.

Does this make sense? If Jesus isn’t your shepherd, then who (or what) is? Post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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IRONY UPON IRONY

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 21, 2014| 16 Comments »

Irony 6.14This graphic, which I found on an atheist internet community, instantly grabbed my attention because the inference is crystal clear: if you don’t use your brain, then you’ll become a person of faith.

Indeed, I’ve discovered many atheist people enjoy pointing to studies that suggest the smarter you are, the less belief you have in God.

One such study, reported at charismanews.com, examined the findings of other studies going back to the 1920s and reported that a majority of those studies concluded more intelligent people were less likely to have religious beliefs.

But hold on here. The dude who examined all those studies, psychologist Miron Zuckerman, noted that his report does not mean only dumb people believe in God. Rather, he said, it shows only that more intelligent people may have less need for religion.

“It is truly the wrong message to take from here that if I believe in God I must be stupid,” he said in the charismanews.com article. “I would not want to bet any money on that because I would have a very good chance of losing a lot of money.”

Interesting, isn’t it? I’m a person of faith — I follow Jesus of Nazareth, who many people believe is the son of God — but I certainly have no need for “religion”. (Here’s why: http://wp.me/p2wzRb-cP.)

Besides all that I’ve written so far, here’s what else inspired this essay: They told me to use the brain God gave me. I did. Now I’m a follower of Jesus. Ironic, isn’t it?

Now, before anyone brings up arguments about age or indoctrination, let me tell you that everyone in my biological family abandoned even the social pretense of following Jesus 40 years ago. I was with them until the age of — get this — 42.

I still have my brain. In fact, I do what many, many non-”religious” people don’t do:

  • I always vote
  • I read fiction and non-fiction books
  • I listen to radio documentaries
  • I read newspapers
  • I reduce/reuse/recycle (in that order; recycling is the worst of the three ‘Rs’)
  • I engage in political discussions.

So, does any of this help you to rethink your notions about following Jesus? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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GOING BEYOND SCIENTIFIC PROOF

Posted in Me & The World, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 14, 2014| 12 Comments »

13+-+1-5I love this challenging quote. At the same time, I’m mystified as to why atheists consider it so credible, given that it was spoken by a man (definitely a brilliant man) who died in 1931. It’s hardly a stretch to write that there’s been a whole lot of research done since then.

Without getting into boring details of studies and terminologies (anyone who needs that stuff can certainly find it online), I’ll toss out a few interesting tidbits.

On life after death: In 1991, Pam Reynolds had a near-death experience while undergoing surgery for a brain aneurysm.

Reynolds was kept literally brain-dead by the surgical team for 45 minutes. Despite being clinically dead, when Reynolds was resuscitated, she described some amazing things — like interacting with deceased relatives.

According to Time magazine, as many as 18 percent of people brought back from death after a heart attack said they’d had a near-death experience.

On the existence of Heaven: In 2008, neurosurgeon Eben Alexander III suffered an E coli meningitis infection which attacked his brain and plunged him deep into a week-long coma. Brain scans showed that his entire cortex was not functioning.

Against all odds, Mr. Alexander woke up a week later. And he claimed to have experienced something extraordinary: a journey to Heaven.

In his book Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon’s Journey into the Afterlife, he asserts that there is an eternity of perfect splendor awaiting us beyond the grave, complete with angels, clouds, and departed relatives.

On a personal God: The Internet is overflowing with blogs and articles from people who have experienced God in an intimate, personal way. So I’ll contribute two quotes:

  • “God even knows how many hairs you have on your head” (from one of the original source documents on the life of Jesus of Nazareth – even my wife, who knows me better than anyone, can’t make that claim).
  • “Before I made you in your mother’s womb, I knew you” (passed along by an ancient prophet).

Granted, none of this is the scientific proof that many people demand. But let’s be honest: the creator and master of time, space and universe, who’s responsible for the air you are breathing right now, will ALWAYS be beyond proving or disproving.

God will ALWAYS be past our ability to fully comprehend. Looking for a metaphor? It would be like asking a porcupine to understand the theory of relativity.

So let’s look beyond this to what we CAN understand:

1. God created YOU.

2. God wants to have a personal, eternal relationship with YOU, but there’s a barrier in the way: the wrong things you’ve done (including living your life as if He doesn’t exist) and the right things you haven’t done.

3. You can never do enough to make up for the wrong things you’ve done and the right things you haven’t done.

4. You don’t have to. Jesus, who many people believe is God’s son, did the heavy lifting for you when he died to make up for the moral crimes of everyone who accepts Him and believes in Him.

5. All you need to do is accept the gift of Jesus; make Him your lord and saviour, so you can see your life transformed NOW and have eternal life with Him.

Does this make sense? Yes or no, post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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THE SOLUTION THAT ISN’T

Posted in Me & The World, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 7, 2014| 3 Comments »

Solution that isn't 6.14Our culture loves to toss the word “karma” around. I see it referenced in newspaper columns, online blogs and conversations at coffee shops.

But is it really the solution to anything, as this internet graphic suggests?

Yes, there is a certain logic to karma, which Wikipedia defines as “the universal principle of cause and effect. Our actions, good and bad, come back to us in the future, helping us to learn from life’s lessons and become better people.”

From the perspective of a follower of Jesus of Nazareth (who many people believe is the Son of God), there’s even some evidence to support it. One of Jesus’ earliest followers wrote: What a person plants, he will harvest. The person who plants selfishness, ignoring the needs of others—ignoring God!—harvests a crop of weeds. But the one who plants in response to God, letting God’s Spirit do the growth work in him, harvests a crop of real life, eternal life.

But is that karma? No. A faith research website (www.carm.org) explains the difference: “The law of karma, which makes morality like a law of nature, does not allow for the possibility of forgiveness.  Its consequences are inevitable and inescapable. Because God is personal, and because persons can forgive, God can forgive us of our sins.  Moreover, He has done so through Jesus.”

So, will karma solve anything? Not for me. I don’t want to be locked in a prison of cause and effect. And I don’t want karma to take the place of revenge.

Serious Jesus followers know and try their best to follow this directive, written by one of the ancient prophets: Forget about the wrong things people do to you. Don’t try to get even. Love your neighbour as yourself.

Do we fall short of that directive? Without a doubt. But now you know the ideal Jesus followers strive for. And you know more about God — the only being truly worthy of judging us for the wrong things we’ve done and the right things we’ve failed to do.

If you’re like me, you’ll admit that the ledger of wrong things done and right things not done is pretty long.

But there’s a way out — a way that karma will never offer you. That way is Jesus. He is God’s gift of love to anyone who is willing to accept that gift.

When you accept that gift and declare yourself a follower of Jesus, then you also believe that when He was put to death on a Roman cross, He took on the moral crimes of everyone who calls him saviour.

As a result of that, when God looks at a follower of Jesus, all He sees is the perfection Jesus bought for us. We are as pure as Jesus.

However, please note: That’s not a free pass to do whatever you like and cynically rely on Jesus to clean up the resulting mess. If you take that gift of love seriously, you’ll want to be with other Jesus followers, building each other up, holding each other accountable and allowing God to do amazing things in your life.

Does this sound interesting? Post your thoughts below and let’s have a conversation.

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