Religion

Flash of insight I received during the sermon yesterday: Jesus was a Democrat (or, more appropriately, a ‘Liberal’). More specifically, I don’t see any way I could call Him a Republican or a Conservative. This all spills out from our current sermon series on the book of Mark. Mark is (probably) the first gospel to be composed, and it was likely written by John Mark, a disciple of Simon Peter, the guy of whom Jesus said “Upon this Rock (literally Petra == Rock) I shall build my church”. Mark is all business–this is what Jesus said, this is what it means. If something seems unclear or too Judean, he explains it in a parenthetical note. Mark’s the Cliffs’ Notes for Christ. ...

Aww, man! And he might have helped the Samaritans… Jeff Roberts - Oct 1, 2007 Aww, man! And he might have helped the Samaritans sneaking across the border, too! Certainly, there’s “…if any would not work, neither should he eat” (2 Thess 3:10) and other verses that seem Republican-ish. And the far left seems awash in moral relativism at best, whereas God is clearly serious about rules and consequences. ...

Happy Father’s day to all the men out there. As I sat in Church today, I was taken back to February 10th, to a particular moment I’d like to share. * * * The operation was over. Maria was fine–pink, healthy, and squalling. Whitney was holding up well; I hated to leave her, but I wanted to stay with the baby in her first minutes of life. I gazed upon her as she got her first examinations; the pediatrician said she was fine, with a nice twinkle in her eyes. ...

Spent Friday night and Saturday up in Columbus, Ohio at a Promise Keepers event, held at the 20,000-seat Nationwide arena. It was a great experience, as 7 of us from Northside Christian Church (Pastor Scott, Ryan, Me, Rick, Chuck, Tim, and Jason) headed out at 2:30pm in the rental 15-passenger van. On the whole, it was great to just be myself, not worried about talking sports, or computers, or whatever else. I could be comfortable and enjoy just laughing and being myself.

Just read Nehemiah this morning, the account of the Persian governor of Judah, rebuilder of Jerusalem’s walls after the Chaldeans destroyed them under Nebuchadnezzar. Alright, from Joshua through Nehemiah, I can pretty much boil it down to this: Nation israel = new Nation(); for ( ;; ) { israel.forgetAbout( GOD ); israel.getPunishedBy( GOD ); israel = new Nation( israel.getRemnant() ) } GOD, of course, is a global constant, visible to everyone. ...

_ Yooooooooooooooooooooo…tengo un amigo que me ama me ama me ama Yo tengo un amigo que me ama su nombre es Jesus! :clap: :clap: :clap: _ Welcome to VBS at Northside Christian church. We’ll happily take your kids off your hands, 2 hrs/day for 5 nights (6-8 pm). We had a class of up to to 7: Drew, Jamie, Faith, Brooklyn, Shelby, Sierra, and that gal I can’t remember. From the 2nd night on, we were lucky to have 5. Pretty awesome week, but it wasn’t too spiritual, just rather practical. Really liked all the yummy snacks we had had from the Church women, and interacting with the kids was neat. ...

So, I’m in chruch today and the sermon is on achieving a personal relationship with Christ…then it hits me. God made people. WHY!? I mean, think about it. . .You’re the most powerful being in the universe. Omnipotent, omniscient, everywhere simultaneously. You ARE reality. You DEFINE everything we only have equations and intuition for–time, space, probability. What do you need people for? You’re lonely. I used to ask myself if God was bored. After all omniscent & omnipotent means you know all that’s going to happen, right? Also, I used to get hung-up on the whole ‘can God make an object that even he can’t move?’ ...

One of the hallmarks of my experience in Christianity is my response to the ‘Peace be with you’ ‘How you doing’ moment. In the Catholic mass, there’s a portion where you turn to your neighbor(s) and say ‘Peace be with you’. In many Protestant services (such as ours at Northside Christian), we have a ‘Greet your neighbor’ portion of the service. Until very recently, these moments scared the hell out of me. ...

I had an out-of-body experience at church last night, right in the middle of “Shout to the Lord”. I was happy, sad, sweaty, crying and not-quite-there all at the same time. I lost all consciousness of my surroundings and the other people singing, as though the sound enveloped me with waves of tactile velvet. My senses lost all meaning, much like that passage in “A Wrinkle in Time” where they land on the planet whose inhabitants have no eyes: “No, don’t describe what it looks like, dear. Describe what it *is*.” ...

In my readings through Exodus and Leviticus, Aaron fascinates me. Brother of Moses, spokesman for the Lord, father of four sons, first high-priest of the Israelite nation, this guy (basically) had more power and importance than any other man of Israel, yet he’s a footnote. What was he like? How did he weather being a perennial second? The Torah doesn’t give us much to go on for Aaron. So much of rich biblical history passes him by–the plagues of Egypt, the Exodus, the golden calf, the construction of the Tabernacle, Moses’s law–and yet we don’t see any of his motivation. WHY did he construct the golden calf when he knew it was wicked? HOW did he survive two of his sons being “consumed by the fire of God” (Leviticus 10:1-4)? ...

The Apostle Paul in 1 Timothy sounds alot like me after going through high school with a certain gal w/initials J.M.–he finds women annoying temptresses whose sensual nature will destroy his church, so he tells them to STFU. woman should learn in quietness and full submission. 12I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. 13For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15But women[a] will be saved[b] through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety. ...

Random thought about Dwight’s sermon today: As he discussed Ephesian’s 3:25-32, Dwight interjected something interesting. It seems Europe is being overrun by Muslims. This brings-up the defining conflict of the early 21st century: Fundamentalist Islam versus the Secularist Europe and America. What is the endgame here? Western civilization wants to assimilate the rest of the world (minus the Chinese/S.E. Asian block), but what’s the Muslim game here? Western (especially European) thought is secular, and so can co-exist with Muslim nations. Muslim thought is more fundamentalist, so co-existence seems impossible. ...

Book of James in one sentence: “Have some self control, and do God’s work”. I don’t know why, but I got up this morning with an urge to read the Bible. I made myself some coffee, turned off the radio + tv, and sat down to read whatever struck me. My marker from the last time I was at church was in James, so I began reading this tidy, direct book and it just floored me. ...