Some good words from Faithless.org

“When theology masters religion, religion dies; it becomes a doctrine instead of a life. The mission of theology is merely to facilitate the self-consciousness of personal spiritual experience. Theology constitutes the religious effort to define, clarify, expound, and justify the experiential claims of religion, which, in the last analysis, can be validated only by living faith. In the higher philosophy of the universe, wisdom, like reason, becomes allied to faith. Reason, wisdom, and faith are man’s highest human attainments. Reason introduces man to the world of facts, to things; wisdom introduces him to a world of truth, to relationships; faith initiates him into a world of divinity, spiritual experience.” Taken from faithless.org

Any thought?

TrueU

On a scale of 1 to Awesome, TrueU.org breaks the scale! Seriously. And, if I knew of any other awesome adjectives besides “awesome,” I’d use them to describe this awesome website. TrueU.org has awesome articles that deal with tough issues, awesome threaded discussions where you can discuss everything with other Christians, awesome graphics that are pixilated for your enjoyment and even awesome awesomeness, which speaks for itself. So, if you’re looking for a place to discover the truth (and to be awesome), visit TrueU.org.

Seriously though, this site really is great. It offers great explanation on life issues and the Christian faith which are presented in a really non-combative or non-Pat Robertson/Jerry Falwell manner. There are amazing articles by world class philosophers, debators, scholars, and other junk along those lines. I would realy encourage you to check it out if you have given up on Christianity or plainly, if you just have some questions that our culture cannot answer.

To you who read.

To you who read this blog, please feel free to comment on my postings. For those of you I do not know, but yet you read this blog, feel free to post. In fact, everybody out there: feel free to disagree with me, yell at me, cuss at me, get angry at me. Let’s put some emotion into this blog.

Praxis. Lent. International Anglican Church.Tribute.

Greetings to all,

For this blog, I am going to try less to make a stance on an issue and rather just explain about what is going on in life. First off, last week was simply phenomenal to say the least, from the reading, to the class lectures, I really believe I matured quite heavily in the faith. If I could give last week a theme, I would call it, “Awareness of oppression, Listening to the Spirit, Casting Aside.” Now, I have neither the patience nor the time to give full explanation of these themes, but let me say this: evangelicals, I believe, at large, simply brush aside demonic oppression. For sometime, I feel we have left this branch of the faith simply up to the pentecostals or the fundamentals. I now believe much differently. In Roc’s class, and from the reading the night before, I became enthralled with the way that Satan attacks us in seemingly obvious and emotional ways. Too often, we simply ignore these attacks as simple emotional or psychological fits. I believe that this is a great help to the enemy, that is, to undermine his work and to lessen our belief in such situations. Anyway, I have become aware of both my psychological failures and also the way the Enemy attacks. On a postive note, I had the opportunity to meet with Roc on Friday. It was simply unbelieveable. He has had the reputation of being rather prophetic, and in pretty blunt terms said this, “Yeah, I think you need to head to the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, get an M.Div, and get in the church.” Oddly, without revealing specifics (though I did list the seminaries I was considering and certain passions that I feel the Lord has given me), he nailed what I feel the Lord leading towards in ministry.

Secondly, I would ask all of you out there that read this blog to pray for my fiance’ Christian. She is taking her Praxis exam on Saturday. For those not familiar, the praxis is the test that elementary education majors take in order to be certified and liscensed to student teach, and later teach professionally.

Third, my good friend Mike Kasprzyk and I are going to be participating in Lent, so the next two days, Mike and I are going to be praying about what we can give over to the Lord for the next 40 days. We will converge on Tuesday night with our felt convictions toward sacrifice, and from that point on, help keep each other accountable during the 40 days.

Fourth. Today I went to the International Anglican Church here in Springs. Behind Mars Hill and my own home church, it was one of the most wonderul experiences of my Christian Church experience. An experience of liturgy, praise and worship, and evangelicalism. There are many more details I could share, but for now, I will be brief.

Fifth, a tribute to John Hume, who after ten years at Lincoln Avenue Baptist Church in Jacksonville, IL goes on Sabbatical starting March 1. John, for all you do, for who you are to everybody, you deserve your sabbatical. May it be a time of relaxation, reflection, spiritual renewal, and family unity. Blessings my friend, blessings.

um

In class a couple of weeks ago, our marriage studies professor, Roc Bottomly, an incredibly warm, gentle, and humble man casually remarked towards the girl about finding a quality man. And then, out of no where, he comes up with the conclusion that you should watch out for Arkansas guys who, according to Roc, “spend their time getting drunk and shooting squirrels.” So, in honor of Roc Bottomly, I pledge to my wife-to-be to never get drunk or shoot squirrels, in hopes that she may find me a quality and worthwhile mate.

Blessings,
Andrew

Notes

Today I read my assignment for Monday’s Worldview class. I read large excerpts from “The Universe Next Door” by James Sire and “How Now Shall We Live?” by Charles Colson. I have randomly pulled a few qoutes that I feel would be beneficial for all of you to read. Here we go:

An outlook on the atheist’s death:
“Without warning, David was visited by an exact vision of death: a long hole in the ground, no wider than your body, down which you were drawn while the white faces recede. You try to reach them but your arms are pinned. Shovels pour dirt in your face. There you will be forever, in an upright position, blind and silent, and in time no one will remember you, and you will never be called. As strata of rock shift, your fingers elongate, and your teeth are distended sideways in a great underground grimace indistinguishable from a strip of chalk. And the earth tumbles on, and the sun expires, and unaltering darkness reigns where once there were stars.” (Sire, Pg. 59).

“The only task of the church, many fundamentalists and evangelicals have believed, is to save as many lost souls as possible from a world literally going to hell. But this implicit denial of a Christian worldview is unbiblical and is the reason we have lost so much of our influence in the world. Salvation does not consist simply of freedom from sin; salvation also means being restored to the task we were given in the beginning-the job of creating culture…..Christians are saved not only from something (sin) but also to something (Christ’s lordship over all of life).
” (Colson, Pg 296)

“This point must be pressed, because most people today operate on a fact/value distinction, believing that science uncovers “facts,” which they believe to be reliable and true, while morality and religion are based on “values,” which they believe to be subjective and relative to the individual. Unfortunately, Christians often mirror this secular attitude. We tend to be confident about God’s law of nature, such as the laws of gravity, motion, and heredity; but we seem far less confident about God’s laws for the family, education, or the state. Yet a truly Christian worldview draws no such distinction. It insists that God’s laws govern all creation. And just we as we have to learn to live in accord with the law of gravity, so, too, we must learn to live in accord with God’s norms for society.” (Colson, pg. 297)

And as always, my most favorite mantra: All Truth is God’s Truth.
“By becoming a Christian, he (Justin Martyr) argued, he had simply become a better philosopher. He was now able to gather all the individual truths discovered by various philosophers and make sense of them within the framework of the one perfect truth provided by divine revelation. “Whatever things were rightly said by any man, belongs to us as Christians.” (Colson, Pg. 299)

“In fact, the Larsons’ studies have found that it is extremely unhealthy to hold strong religious beliefs without practicing them. People exhibit high levels of stress if they believe in God, but neglect church attendane, fail to read and meditate on Scripture, omit prayer before meals, or fall into sin. One study to chronic alcoholics are found surprisingly high number hold conservative religious beliefs but are not practicing them. The Larsons suggest that the stress caused by contradiction between belief and practice may contribute to their alcoholism. In short, the inconsistent Christian suffers even more than the consistent atheist. The most miserable person of all is the one who knows the truth yet doesn’t obey it.” (Colson, pg 314)

And in a very prophetic tone which reveals the modern moral and ethical failures :
“We live in an age in which liberty has been defined as absolutely free choice. It doesn’t matter what we choose; the dignity of the individual resides in the mere capacity to choose.” (Colson, pg. 319)

Fundies.

I love the biting sarcasm, hate, and ignorant rants that are listed in the following link. Also, please read the comments. Thanks be to God for the fundies.

http://www.sliceoflaodicea.com/archives/2006/02/rob_bell_and_th.php

Wow, the past few days have been amazing here at Focus. More later.

Andrew

God, be small enough to hear my prayer.

The past few days here at the institute have been very spiritually enlightening, though to a degree, the amount I am learning is hard to process. This blog is going to be a few ramblings of what I have been learning from God through prayer, community, and the Bible.

First off, for far to long, the struggles of my personal faith has been that of worship. I struggle to keep focused, to take it seriously, and to be wrongly convicted that I am not thoroughly worshipping because I do not have my eyes closed or either of my hands in the air. I could really digress from this point on my misgrievings and limited views of evangelical worship, but for now, I would rather explain the epiphany I had today during our morning devotional prayer.

I have a tendency (and I could assume that I would not be alone on this speculation) that many of us view God as somewhere “out there,” perhaps and by accident viewing God through a deist mindset. A God, who on occasion comes here. The problem with this view of God is that it results in us having to prove our own faith to ourselves. I have for sometime now, been praying for a new realization towards worship, and I feel today I may have possibly experienced it, though to my error, this realization was simply nothing but an error of perspective. Anyway, I have a tendency to forget the humanity of Jesus, the incarnation, the God-man, or for now, the man-God. I forget that Jesus faced tempation, he struggled, he felt the exhaustion as sweat poured from his brow, he most likely was tired after a long day of teaching and healing. Today during our prayer, I came to recognize the human side of Jesus in a new way. I pictured Jesus sitting next to me, taking deep breaths; or perhaps Jesus standing infront of the room, preparing for us a lecture. I need a God that is small enough to meet with me in prayer yet powerful enough to implement His will, which he undoubtedly does. I need a God who knows my needs, a God who has felt my desires, a God who knows my struggles. Thanks be to God for remembering the obvious in a new way.

This brings me to my next point as observed from scripture, Luke 22:

54Then seizing him, they led him away and took him into the house of the high priest. Peter followed at a distance. 55But when they had kindled a fire in the middle of the courtyard and had sat down together, Peter sat down with them. 56A servant girl saw him seated there in the firelight. She looked closely at him and said, “This man was with him.”

57But he denied it. “Woman, I don’t know him,” he said.

58A little later someone else saw him and said, “You also are one of them.”
“Man, I am not!” Peter replied.

59About an hour later another asserted, “Certainly this fellow was with him, for he is a Galilean.”

60Peter replied, “Man, I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Just as he was speaking, the rooster crowed. 61The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word the Lord had spoken to him: “Before the rooster crows today, you will disown me three times.” 62And he went outside and wept bitterly.

“The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter.” Oh my, what does this verse mean? Could I replace it with “The Lord turned and looked straight at Andrew?” I wonder what this “look” was. I wonder the reaction Peter received from himself upon looking at the beaten Christ. What does it mean for Jesus to look at us? What emotions are evoked? Could you handle our Savior looking you in the eye? How would you respond; with shame, guilt, surprise, the desire to hide? I am trying to focus my worship around this “look.” For focusing on this look will center my mind on humility, forgiveness, exercise my mind to remembrance, celebrate my salvation, and praise Him for His abounding grace, 2nd Cor. 12:

9But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Next on the agenda is calling and community. In regards to calling, I have come to learn that God has each of us on different paths, and by comparing ourselves to other’s paths, we will be taking our minds off of our own. In a non-relativistic way, my God is not the same as your God. By this, I mean that he speaks, guides, and leads each in distinct personable ways. And by focusing on our own inabilities within the Body of Christ, then we are forgetting that within this Body exists the strength that you or me does not possess.

Tonight, quest team 1 has a get-together. It was an amazing night of worship, connection, openness, some tears, solitude, and prayer. Here are a few verses that I have been experimenting with in the idea of community:

Acts 2:
43Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. 44All the believers were together and had everything in common. 45Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. 46Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, 47praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

Acts 4:
32All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. 33With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. 34There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales 35and put it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.

Acts 17:

6But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some other brothers before the city officials, shouting: “These men who have caused trouble all over the world have now come here, 7and Jason has welcomed them into his house. They are all defying Caesar’s decrees, saying that there is another king, one called Jesus.” 8When they heard this, the crowd and the city officials were thrown into turmoil.

I do not mean to say that the first century chuch is the exact model to go by, but I believe that if we could orient ourselves in greater community where fears and emotions are not only expressed, but embraced, then I think there is nothing that could stop the church of Jesus Christ. Upon visiting Mars Hill in Michigan, Mike Kasprzyk and I immediately remarked at the organic and family-like feel of Mars Hill. Why is this? For what I understand, to be in community at Mars Hill means to be in a house church, where a smaller group of believers meet and pour into each other. In the worship service it felt as though a family was in worship, being circularly joined by song, singing to one another. I really believee there is hope in the church.

I ask that you would all pray for me as I discern God’s will for my life in ministry. I have a few passions and desire, but that is all they are right now, just passions and desires.

Blessings in contemplation and brokeness,
Andrew

All truth is God’s truth.

All truth is God’s truth:”Men and women can endure any amount of suffering so long as they know the why to their existence.”-Friedrich Nietzsche

Okay, I have beeb promising for a long time now to post the notes on the nature of reality according to Rob Bell. I promse by the weekend, I will have posted them. Sorry for the delay.

I am currently listening to a lecture called, “The Genius of Jesus” by Dallas Willard at Ohio State University as presented by the Veritas Forum (www.veritas.org). Also, check out Dallas Willard’s book, “The Divine Conspiracy.”

Keep walkin’…or let’s give him a break

This guy is walking for peace according to an e-mail I recently received. Do you think he ever gets tired or irritated from all the talk and speculation about peace, and yet that is all there ever is, just talk and speculation? In honor of the peace walker, I say we give him a rest and actually get somewhere with the idea of peace (or atleast give him a Pat Robertson health shake).

Blessings from the blogosphere,
Andrew