Earlier this week, I was listening to Francis Chan, a pastor who I first heard at Passion who has become one of my favorite people to hear speak.  He was talking about Jesus coming back and how we should be excited about that like a bride would be excited for her wedding day.  That really hit me because I do not even think about Christ coming back much at all.  He then went on to share about comforting people with the return of Christ.  This I think is something that we often miss.  When we see the world falling apart around us and feel like there is no hope, we can always rest in the fact that Jesus Christ is coming back to make all things new.  So when you hear about someone dying from cancer, when you hear the stories of the horrible genocide that is going on in the Darfur region of Sudan, when you hear about the children that were killed by a terrorist bomb, when your world falls apart, or when you have lost all hope, never forget that the King is coming back to make all things new!

This post was written in the spring of 2007:

A few days ago, I was listening to one of my friends share with a group of high school students at Hoover High School’s First Priority.  He was sharing about Satan being the ruler of this world which is something that I have heard spoken upon millions of times over the course of my life growing up in church and a Christian school.  This time, however, he had a new perspective that I had never thought of before.  He was talking about Satan using culture to get our focus off of God.  He said that media tells us who to worship, what image we should shape ourselves into, and how we should live.  I had never thought of worship in this way before.  We constantly worship people, images, clothes, music, friends, and the list goes on.  We worship anything that we put before God on the throne of our hearts and lives.  All of our sin tends to flow from misplaced worship.  When we take Christ off of the throne of our hearts and lives and replace Him with something else that we deem more of a priority that is when we begin to fall back into sin.  When the Word and my relationship with Jesus take a backburner to something else, that in when I am falling into sin.  When pleasing God, worshiping God, and serving God are my focus, I am in tune with the Holy Spirit and His daily leading of my life.  When I drift away from that as I so often do that is when I am going to live a life that does not reflect Christ.  I am reflecting what is on the throne of my life whether that be my ego, my friends, my desires, or my Savior.  It is a daily decision to follow Christ.  The question is: Who will I worship today?

This post was written in December of 2006: 

A few days ago, I was on a lunch break from work at a fast food restaurant waiting on my food when something caught my eye.  There was a little boy about 2 years old with his mother, and they were looking at the fish tank.  I have gone to that restaurant countless times and seem to never notice the fish.  This little boy, however, was totally infatuated with the fish in the tank.  He was counting, with the help of his mom, the fish in the tank over and over and over.  He seemed so into the fish that he never lost interest in doing the exact thing over and over again.  I think that as we grow older and more educated we lose sight of this childlike wonder.  We so easily brush by the little things in life that God has given us to enjoy.  These things are not just given for our enjoyment, but they exist to reflect the beauty and wonder of their creator.  The psalmist said that “the heavens declare the glory of God” (Psalms 19: 1).  When we slow down enough to glimpse the beauty that out Creator has designed, we can praise God for the beauty that we see.  I think that part of living a Christian life is to be looking for beauty in the midst of a world full of sin.  Beauty can be found even in the most unlikely places.  So, we should slow down enough to look for beauty in our world and praise the creative Designer of that beauty for what we see.   Brain McLaren puts it this way “whenever we here a song or see a scene in a movie – whenever we enjoy good art or good cooking or find ourselves in good architecture or read a good paragraph in literature – whenever this happens, we celebrate that goodness, enjoy it, savor it, and most of all thank God for it” (italics mine).  Living like this will help us to be more thankful and live the gratefulness of Thanksgiving day throughout the rest of the year.

We live in a world that is constantly full of noise.  You can never get away from sound.  From the random orchestra music in the elevator to the popular tunes on the radio, music invades every area of our lives.  When we finally get to times of silence, it seems very awkward.  I was eating with some friends tonight at a noisy restaurant.  The background music was stopped and there came the awkward silence that comes once in every five minutes of conversation when one of the people in the group remarked that the silence was very awkward.  Even when it seems awkward, we need to still embrace the silence.  Because in the silence is where we can meet God.  When we are willing to steal time away from this busy world of our day to day noise-filled worlds that is when we are in a place of silence waiting to experience God.  I am reminded once again of the words in the book of Psalms: “Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth” (Psalms 46: 10 NIV).  We need to be willing to journey out into the silence and know who God is and exalt Him as King of our lives.

This post was written in January of 2007: 

I went to see The Pursuit of Happyness movie last December.  If you have not seen it, it is a great story of coming from the lowest of low to the highest place.  Will Smith goes from being someone living on the streets without a home to being a successful business man.  The movie so characterizes the American Dream that it makes you want to stand up and sing the national anthem, but in reality success and prosperity do not define day to day life for many people not only around the world but in our own cities.  These people are the ones that get brushed into the alleyways, street corners, and garbage dumps of the rest of us while we are living our American Dream.  This issue came face to face with me when I was in Atlanta last week.  I go to school in urban Birmingham so I am used to being in the city and seeing people who are struggling.  The problem is that I have become so used to it that I have lost a heart for people.  They tend to just sink in to the scenery as a walk across campus looking for a good place to whip out my laptop and get online.  This week in Atlanta, however, I got to encounter and feel what these hurting people feel.  I was sitting in McDonalds reading a book waiting for some friends to bring my food to the table when he approached. He quickly got my attention and asked if he could ask me a question.  I agreed so he sat down across the table from me and we began to talk.  He introduced himself and told me the story of his 20 years on the streets of Atlanta with his wife.  He said that they struggle to find food for their next meal and cannot find somewhere warm to sleep at night.  This broke my heart.  He asked me for a few dollars to buy some breakfast, and I gave it to him.  He then went on his way.  This simple encounter has been on my mind and heart ever since it happened.  These people so fit Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 25 when he tells us that whatever we do unto the least of these we have done unto Him.  Why are we not more mindful of those freezing and starving around us?  Where is the heart in each one of us to not just gather in our warm churches and talk theology but to get out and live the grace and mercy of God out to the least of these?  God, make me a person who does not miss the very people who need my help!

We are constantly being conformed to the image of Christ.  After we receive salvation, we then begin a process of being purified and brought back to a place of godliness.  I was reading a sermon by Jonathan Edwards called “God Glorified in Man’s Dependence” a while back, and he had some very good things to say about this process: 

“Men are dependent on the power of God for every exercise of grace, and for carrying on the work in the heart, for subduing sin and corruption, increasing holy principles, and enabling to bring forth fruit in good works.  Man is dependent on divine power in bringing grace to its perfection, in making the soul completely amiable in Christ’s glorious likeness, and filling it with a satisfying joy and blessedness; and for the raising of the body to life, and to such a perfect state, that it shall be suitable for a habitation and organ for a soul so perfected and blessed.  These are the most glorious effects of the power of God, that are seen in the series of God’s acts with respect to creatures.”

 This truth is both liberating and frustrating at the same time.  The fact that we are incapable of doing good and obtaining holiness is a liberating truth.  It is great to know that we do not have to perform to make ourselves into the image of Christ.  This is great in that it keeps us from competing in holy competitions with other believers.  It also takes the pressure off of us to do anything but submit.  That is, however, where the frustration enters the picture.  We are so used to performing, being, and doing that it makes it very hard for us to daily submit to the Holy Spirit to live this Christian life through us and bring us to holiness and purity in His timing.  God is the one who does the work.  Our job is to submit and let Him work in and through us. We are just clay in the hands of the Potter being molded into the image He desires us to be.

Ever feel like you are not good enough?  Ever feel that God could never use you do to the sins that you have done in your past?  Well that was how I felt recently.  The feeling of guilt and sorrow for falling back into sin was taking over.  I did not feel adequate.  “I am a failure.”  “I am a terrible person.”  These thoughts were filling my head.  The demon of guilt was taking over.  Then the Holy Spirit brought me back to a passage that he had shown me at Passion.  It reads this way: 

“Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me.  I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against Him, until He pleads my cause and executes judgment for me.  He will bring me out into the light; I shall look upon His vindication.” – Micah 7: 8-9 ESV

 Jesus Christ has paid the price and taken away the guilt and shame of my sins.  There is no need for me to fear but only for me to trust in God to pick me back up again.  I get the picture of a little baby who is trying to walk.  He slowly stands and then begins to take a step.  He immediately busts flat on his face.  He then begins to cry because he has fallen.  His Daddy comes over and picks him up, wipes his tears away, and then holds his arms and helps him along the way as he returns to the walk.  I think that this description adequately describes how my relationship with Christ goes a lot of the time.  I fall down and cry out and wait for my Abba Father to pick me up, dry my tears, and set me on the path again.

This is a classic book by a beloved author.  C. S. Lewis brings his heart for presenting theology and his great skill as a fiction writer together in this book.  This is a collection of letters of dialogue from Screwtape, an older demon, written to a young demon, Wormwood, to teach him how to tempt people.  The letters consist of very interesting dialogue, and the book gives you very interesting thoughts on temptation and how to respond to it.  Lewis presents his thoughts on temptation clearly in this book in a very interesting and readable way.  The part of this book that stands out the most to me is when Screwtape is informed that one of the people that Wormwood had been tempting had become a Christian.  His response was that the best thing that Wormwood could do now was to keep the new Christian content in where he was spiritually.  If Wormwood could make this new Christian apathetic and his faith, he would have no impact on any other people.  This is a very interesting way that Lewis uses to present the idea that apathy leads Christians to have no impact on others around them.  This is just one of the hidden ideas that readers will find throughout the book.  This is a must read for any Christian to give new insights on the theology and ways of temptation.

I have always loved John Piper’s writings.  Ever since I was first exposed to him in the seventh grade, I am continually challenged by his writings.  The statement that I believe best sums up Piper’s writings is “God is most glorified in us while we are most satisfied in Him.”  Piper has this taste of Jonathan Edwards in his writings that also attracts me to him.  When I Don’t Desire God is by far the Piper book that has had the most impact on me.  This book focuses on fighting for joy and satisfaction in Christ.  This is really hard to do since we are so constantly distracted by things in the culture around us that are supposed to make us happy.  It is about the battle to enjoy God over everything else.  Piper addresses many practical ways to do this including using scripture to fight temptation, becoming more prayer focused, and looking for glimpses of God’s glory in everyday life.  The book also addresses killing sin in your life.  This is a great book that makes Piper’s famous statement practical to everyday life.  Piper uses this book to address the initial question to his statement: “What if I am not satisfied in God?”  He does a very good job making it practical while stressing the importance of finding satisfaction in God alone.  This is an excellent read for anyone that feels like their time with God is dry and that they need some practical ideas to seek God daily. 

Over the last few years, I have begun to see the name Emergent Church tossed around a lot in Christian circles.  I really desired to learn about this new view on being a Christian and what this looked like in light of scripture.  These desires led me to Truth and the New Kind of Christian by R. Scott Smith.  I originally was planning on buying the two most interesting works of the founder of the Emergent Church movement Brian McLaren which include A Generous Orthodoxy and The Secret Message of Jesus and comparing them to scripture.  I then came upon this book by an Assistant Professor of Ethics and Christian Apologetics from Biola University who had done the research for me.  Smith does a very good job of using quotes from the works of Brian McLaren and Tony Jones, an Emergent Church youth leader, to summarize the views of the Emergent Church.  The Emergent Church line of thought is developed fundamentally out of McLaren’s experiences with the church.  He has, like so many others that I have talked to, been burned by the church.  He was tired of the American churches judgmental nature and apathy that it led him to form this new idea of an Emergent Church.  There are several good things that McLaren sets out to do in his ideas which I am very attracted to.  He desires for everyone to live out what they say they believe, become more missions-minded, communicate the gospel to people in culturally relevant terms, experience God as a transcendent Being who is also holy, building community with other believers in order to seek God together, and living a “generous orthodoxy” that puts the great commandment of loving God and loving people into action in everyday life.  Every one of these things are very good things that would not only revolutionize the church but would bring Christians as a whole back to a place where we were actually living out the gospel message and impacting our world in the process.  The major problem with the Emergent Church, as pointed out by Scott, is the fact that all these ideas are, according to McLaren, supposed to happen within a postmodern worldview.   There are several key problems with the postmodern view that when applied to Christianity become even bigger problems.  Postmodernism is based on the assumption that the real world exists but we can only know about this world by talking about it and derive the meaning in the world via our conversations about the world.  This means that we cannot get an accurate picture of the world through our conversation which forces us to deny that absolutes can exist in the real world.  This makes morality up to me and forms the basis of the relativistic moral attitude that we see.  This moral relativism makes living life illogical.  As Scott reminds us, in order for you to say that morals are relative forces you to say that Mother Teresa was no better than Adolf Hitler.  This leaves us in a world where we do not want to be.  So, when this philosophy begins to be applied to the church you are left with no absolute right and wrong so therefore there is no basis for moral actions.  This leaves you in a world where you can do what you want because no one can tell you it is wrong.  This clearly contradicts the foundation for morals that is contained in the Bible.  Another problem is that in order to interpret the world around you must use the language.  So once this is applied to the church, you must become part of the biblical community and learn the language and by that you learn about God.  God is not someone Who you can know of by looking at “the heavens who declare the glory of God” (Psalms 19: 1), but rather you become a part of the community and learn the language which then translates into a knowledge of God.  This presents several problems considering that man is fallen, and therefore is left with a fallen view of God.  This also changes the face of evangelism permanently.  According to McLaren, you cannot tell others about what Christ has done in your life and about the forgiveness and grace that Christ gives us at the cross, but you must invite them into this community where they can experience it for themselves via the language that the community presents about the unknowable real world of which God is considered a part.  I think that the Emergent Church raises some good things that we should seek to develop in our churches, but a worldview change to postmodernism does not need to be accepted and used in order to bring these changes about.