"God MUST Understand"...A Conversation With the Old Me

     Times have certainly changed.  I was speaking with a young cashier in Wal-Mart a while back and in the course of the conversation, she sounded very proud to be 18 and working.  She was also engaged and she mentioned that she was going to live with her boyfriend for a few years before they got married to make sure that they could tolerate each other being in the same house.  I thought to myself, “Wow, that sounds very strange, but then again it is not uncommon.”  Not to be a hypocrite, my wife and I lived together during the summer before we got married.  We both went to school in separate places and one summer she came to do a rotation in North Carolina.  We lived in my apartment and I must say that it was not a very good idea.  I make no bones about my former life and how messed up I was so I hope that I don’t offend anyone.  One of the reasons we got married is because I got tired of being a phony. Danielle got me going back to church and whenever we got there, I’d be in church feeling as guilty as sin because of our relationship and the pre-marital sex that we engaged in.  Truthfully and candidly, shacking is not marriage but marriage is no longer respected as an institution created by God.  In 2012, the prevailing attitude regarding marriage is simply two folks living in the same space and sleeping in the same bed.  No wonder that the divorce rate among Christians matches that of non-Christians.  Even though people get married in church, they sometimes forget that their vows are before God and not just the preacher and the witnesses.  Marriage has even been perverted to include same sex couples. 

     Crude behavior is much more acceptable now.  I can remember when I was a boy and I watched a movie called “Night patrol”.  It was a comedy that depicted a rag tag police force that was always up to some shenanigans.  It was rated R but was much raunchier than the R rating.  The language was obscene and the sexual references abounded.  The “Police Academy” series was probably inspired by this movie.  Other movies like the animated “Heavy Metal” and “The Adventures of Fritz the Cat” were also quite crude and offensive in retrospect.  Looking down the telescope of time, I can see where movies like Jacka**, the Hangover,  the Scary Movie series, the Adam Sandler collection (his movies are actually pretty offensive if you are old enough to understand the humor) etc. got their inspiration from.  It seems now that the more crude the movie or the humor, the more laughs you get.  I personally get offended now by much of the same stuff that I used to think was funny.  A teddy bear having sex?  C’mon folks.  I guess Paul was talking to himself in Ephesians when he said that there should be no coarse jesting or silly talk between us...then again, the people that make these movies probably think Ephesians is some sort of skin disease or something.

     There is no such thing as modest dress anymore. EVEN KIDS CLOTHES ARE FORM FITTING NOW! I catch the devil buying clothes for my 6 year old daughter.  I literally want to find the designer that created skinny jeans and knock him over the head with my bible!  Just kidding, but it is quite annoying.  I remember when spandex was used strictly for workout gear and not to wear to school, to church or even just out period.  If a girl wore spandex with nothing covering it up, which is the current cultural trend, they were immediately seen as an easy target for sex.  The thought was, “Any woman that comes out of the house looking like that MUST be easy or looking for a man.”  I remember when crack cocaine got a foothold in my neighborhood; spandex was common wear for those women that sold their bodies to get drugs.  Now, if you go to any college campus, high school football game or wherever, you can see young ladies sporting leggings with simply a short t-shirt to ensure that you get the full effect of the outfit.  Peter says in his first epistle that we are to dress modestly and that a woman’s beauty should come from the inside, not the outside (1 Peter 3:3, 4).

     What have also become common are coy attitudes regarding God.  We see God as nothing more than a granddaddy in the sky that is there to simply give us gifts and make sure we get home safely when we are on a trip.  I was reading “The Knowledge of the Holy” by A.W. Tozer and his chapter on the immutability of God is what inspired this post.  This particular chapter has a very salient point near the beginning- Tozer is quoted as saying this” God is perfectly holy, He has never been less holy than He is now and He can never be more holy than what He already is.” (Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy, P. 49).  When I read this statement, it made me realize that my own attitude toward God used to be VERY BAD!  I mainly minimized God to justify my own desires and participation in sinful activities like pre-marital sex, excessive drinking, lust…etc.  An example of what a conversation would be between the 22 year old me with a Christian telling me about God’s holiness would have gone something like this:

Me: “God has to understand that times have changed!”

Christian: “Well, times may have changed but God has not changed at all.  The bible says in Malachi 3:6 “I am the Lord, I change not.”  Hebrews 6:18 says that God is immutable and His promises are immutable.  Do you know what that means?  It means that God cannot be moved from the position that He has taken.”
Me: “God can’t expect me to stay celibate with all of these women throwing themselves at me and all of these hormones!  Why did he make me this way only to stunt my access to the things that I like?”
Christian:  “Well, your attitude is quite cavalier towards sin.  Actually, God made sex to be enjoyed between a married man and woman.  Adam and Eve were the first couple and God said that it was not good for a man to be alone.  Sex outside of marriage is no better than two animals mating in the woods.  There is no intimacy, no spiritual connection between you and your partner and no real love.  It’s just a means to an end.  Not to mention 1 Corinthians 6:15 which says that every time you lay down with a woman you are becoming one with her and it is equivalent to lying down with a prostitute.”
Me: “God couldn’t possibly expect a young man like me to stay away from the vices of the world!  He must know that times are different now!  How could God punish me for something that comes so easily to me?”

Christian:  “Well, although you think that you are special and that there are new things happening, the bible says in Ecclesiastes 1:9 that there is NOTHING new under the sun.  Everything sinful vice that you like, people liked it in ancient history.  I hate to be the bearer of bad news to you but God is not going to change for you so that means that you are going to have to change to meet his standards.  God demands holiness, He says “Be holy as your Father in heaven is holy (Matthew 5:48).”  God also says through John the revelator in 1 John 2:16 that we are not to love the things of the world system: the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life.  What Satan is presenting you with young man is a trap that is a certain pathway to destruction!  Remember, sin does not pay a very high wage; the wages of sin is death.  It costs MORE to persist in sin and it costs NOTHING to accept the free gift of God’s grace.” 

Me:  “Holy?  Holiness is unattainable.  There is no way that I can be holy!  I love sin too much and people like you that always scream at people like me about being holy are just hypocrites!”

     At this point, I am taking the blog back over from the old me and to things straight.  That was me around 15 years or so ago: looking for loopholes, looking for ways to justify sin and looking for an easy way out instead of looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of faith.  I had a mental ascent to believing in Jesus but Jesus was not in my heart.  Today, by the grace of God, I can truly say that not only does God understand, God TOTALLY understands.  The problem is WE don’t understand!  God gave us a way out of the vices, the sinful attitudes and actions that fallen man seems to enjoy so much.  God gave us a way to fellowship with Him and enjoy Him that we don’t readily see when we have a downward view of God rather than the upward view that God demands! 

     God gave us Jesus, sent to earth as the standard bearer for the Father, sent to earth as the second person of the Trinity and sent to earth to bear the sins of all mankind.  For all that come to Him and believe that He is sent from God as the only begotten, that He is God, that God raised Him from the dead, they shall be saved!  All of their sins are forgiven the instant that they acquiesce and say to Jesus, I need your forgiveness and I desire for you to be Lord over my life.  The way out demands, in reference to the final statement above regarding holiness, surrender of my will and my perceived sovereignty over my life to the will of the Father.  The Way out demands that I get off the throne of selfhood and bow at the throne of Godhood.  In order to be holy, first we must be transformed and not only that, submit to the process of transformation.  Jesus said to Nicodemus that we must be BORN AGAIN in order to see/enter the kingdom of God and as a result escape the flesh and the corruption that comes along with it. 

    So, I guess this leaves us with a question.  What is your view of God?  Do you see God as holy and supreme over all things OR do you see God as limited in His power, limited in His ability and at your beck and call?  If you chose the latter, and believe it or not, many folks do, then you’ve got some serious soul searching to do.  The way that we view God will determine how we live our lives.  Often times, people that do not view God as the incredible Creator and master of the universe, see him as granddaddy in the sky that winks at the sins that we commit.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  God is holy and that alone demands our reverence.  He does not have to change with the times, He lives outside of time and cannot be placed under the demands of mankind.  He fully understands who, what and how we are.  Now it is time for you, if you have not already been enlightened, to understand exactly WHO HE is.  The Holy Scriptures would be a good place to start.  Grace and peace to you my brothers and sisters.

Pregnant By the WRONG Man

     We have all seen and heard stories about women that lay down with men that they only intend to use for sex and end up getting pregnant by them.  The same holds true for men.  Some men have gone into a woman's bedroom looking for one thing and nine months later they ended up with something else, a child.  There is only one way to make a baby which I will not elaborate on here but you all are old enough to know what I am talking about.  There are four steps: intercourse, conception, gestation and finally birth.  Between a married man and woman, this is a beautiful process and it glorifies God in that the created obey His command to be fruitful and multiply.

     There is a different take on pregnancy and birth in the book of James that is quite interesting.  James, in discussing temptation says the following in James 1:13-15:

"When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death."

     James makes it clear that temptation cannot and does not come from God.  God cannot be tempted nor does God tempt.  Does God allow tests? Absolutely, but even in the case of Job, while God allowed Satan to test Job, He did not do so Himself because Job was innocent in his sight.  God does not pour out His wrath on the innocent, which is was Satan was trying to incite Him to do.  To make it even more plain, how can the One that is Holy and the One that tells us to avoid sin entice us to sin?  It does not compute. 

     James is very forthright as to where temptation comes from.   Temptation, in this case, must be understood in the context of temptation to sin.  The Greek word can also mean a test or trial.  Man is tempted when our own lusts draw us away and then we are enticed.  Let us think of this in very graphic terms.  Our lusts which are a consequence of our fallen nature and still exist even in one that is born again, basically drag us into a dark place where we are then enticed.  Enticed (Gk deleazó) is written in the Middle voice which lets us know that the enticement comes from an outside source.  So Satan uses our own desires and thoughts to push us past desire to sin.  This is the intercourse between Satan and our lust, after which something very strange happens.  We become pregnant with an illicit desire.  Once pregnant, once conception occurs, the next step in a logical progression is birth. 

     James indicates here that lust gives birth to sin once lust is coupled with the enticement of Satan!  This is interesting here because James uses this quite graphic analogy to illustrate something that happens when we do not stop temptation in its tracks.  Sin, once fully formed, leads to death.  Paul says in Romans 6:23 that the wages of sin is death.  When we practice sin, when we live unrepentantly, the just punishment for that is death.  God would be less than Holy to have any other punishment for sin that death.  We saw this same scenario play out in Genesis when Satan tempted Eve.  There is one difference.  Because Adam and Eve were created in perfection, they did not have a fallen nature. Therefore, Satan had to initiate the entire situation from start to finish including implanting the lust, enticing Eve and eventually leading her to sin by disobeying God.

     We need to understand that as a consequence of the fall of humanity, lust naturally resides within man.  We are all born into sin.  That lust is intensified by Satan's enticement.  Lust is not always sexual but it always leads to sin.  We usually think of lust when we think of sex but you can have a lust for money, power, respect or anything that pulls you away from the Living God to pursue your own will.  It is any passion built on strong feelings.  The Greek word can be positive or negative but a positive passion will be born from faith whereas a negative passion will be born from within our own nature.

     How do we prevent this illicit spiritual pregnancy?  Thank God that there is "birth control" in Jesus.  Jesus showed us when He was tempted in the wilderness that whenever Satan seeks to entice us away from what God wills, we need simply to use God's Word to combat Satan's advances.  When Satan went after Jesus' flesh with things that Jesus knew would not endure (bread, pride, kingdoms), Jesus responded with the Words of the Spirit.  When Satan offered bread to abate hunger, Jesus replied that man should not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.  When Jesus was taken up to a high point and tempted to test God and cause the angels to come to his rescue (see Psalm 91), Jesus answered again from the scriptures, "it is written, "Do not put the Lord your God to the test." (Deuteronomy 6:16)   When Jesus was offered the kingdoms made of brick and mortar, that He already OWNED might I add, in exchange for worship of the created being, Satan, Jesus said simply that we are to worship God alone!  Every word that Jesus spoke came from scripture.  Every word that we speak when we are at war with Satan should come from scripture (2 Cor 10:4).  Can you see why the Holy Ghost is so important in our lives?  He is the One that brings all things to our remembrance.  He is the one that gives us the words to say when we are under attack by the enemy (Luke 12:11).

     When evil or lustful thoughts enter into our minds, we are to take them captive.  Any thought that seeks to exalt itself above God, we are to take it captive to obey Christ (2 Cor 10:5).  The second the thought comes in, we are to take it captive because a wrong though will incite is to lust which then gives Satan the doorway that he needs to come in and entice us.  We are to stop the thought in its tracks and do not give it time to set up, impregnate us and eventually lead us to sin.

     Truthfully, if we are not worshipping God, then we are worshipping Satan.  Worship of God through Jesus Christ should lead to obedience, not disobedience.  No we will not live in sinless perfection but we will also not be driven by our lustful desires (Gal 5:16; 5:24) if we walk by the Spirit.  Use the spiritual birth control that the Father has given us in the Son.  Jesus has given us everything we need to be obedient to His word.  He also lived a life of perfect obedience while he walked in the flesh.  We must submit to Him as our Lord in order to truly bear fruit in keeping with repentance and for righteousness.  May God bless you as you walk in submission to His will and as you obey His Word by His Spirit.  

Do I Have to Be IN Church to Have Church?

My good friend Lynn Green over at Hicktown Press, an excellent blog that pulls no punches, recently wrote an article about four churches that took off a Sunday to do work in the community.  The link is here (Canceled Church Service).  She and I mildly debated regarding the issue and while I do not advocate canceling church every Sunday, one Sunday out of the month to get the entire congregation involved in serving the community is not a bad idea.  The issue centers around the scripture in Hebrews 10:23-25 where the bible says this: 

"Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.  And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near"

If we unpack this scripture we see several things but not one of them is where we are to worship.  The scripture says simply that we not forsake assembling together, not in a building, not to hear preaching, but to encourage one another!  We are to encourage each other and provoke each other to love and good works...in this way, we glorify God, we show proof of our discipleship and we obey God's word.  The Christians that this scripture is referring to did not meet in a particular place.  Actually, in the 1st century, they met house to house. 

What these four churches did is commendable and I don't think anyone will be going to hell over serving the community with Jesus in their hearts and God's love on their minds.  They were doing exactly what the bible says to do, spur each other to good works and to love.  What better way to do that than to take the church to the community and show them that there are Christians that put some works behind their faith.  James 2:14-16 is succinct about how faith and works correlate:

"What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good^b is that?  So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead."

These people did no wrong in canceling one Sunday to do what the bible says we should do.  Jesus said that we are to let our lights shine before men that they may see our good works and glorify our Father that is in heaven.  If this were me, I would have had a few minutes after all of the work was done to lift the name of Jesus and to help the congregation understand why we did what we did.  I don't know if the pastor(s) actually did that but I would not be surprised if they did.  What the pastor should stress is this, these things WILL NOT get you into heaven.  We are not saved by works, but saved folks ought to have some works to put behind what we say.  Staying cramped within the four walls of a building does nothing to stretch a person's faith.  Actually, we have gotten too comfortable and we don't do enough of this type of stuff in the church.

We go to church to "worship" God.  Worship simply means that we make God the center of our lives.  The actual word in Greek, proskeuno, means to kiss towards.  Literally, to kiss the ground that the object of worship walks on.  We know that God does not walk on the ground but the thought is that God is so awesome that we should bow at his feet and kiss the very ground before Him!  Knowing this, we should worship God every day with our lives.  We should worship by using our talents and gifts to glorify God, we should worship by living out what the Bible says.  We should live as if we KNOW that God is real and as if Jesus was coming back tomorrow.  That cannot be contained within a building but within the heart of the believer.

I am not saying that people should not go to church.  The apostle Paul laid out the offices of the "church", that we call the body of Christ, in Ephesians 4.  We know this model as the five-fold ministry. Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers all work together to build up the body of Christ to unity of the faith.  The model has been working for thousands of years.  We get a room full of like minded people (hopefully they are like minded) together to encourage one another, corporately worship the living God and to hear the Word of God proclaimed.  I actually enjoy going to church and I also enjoy preaching the gospel.  But we cannot simply think that we can hole up in a building and love on one another but not love those that are outside of the walls as well.  Our good works may be the thing that reminds some lost soul that God loves them.  However, if on a given Sunday I choose to go to a homeless shelter and serve breakfast and break bread with the men and women that live there, I do not believe that God would be mad at me.

Addicted

In this post, I want to address a very serious issue in the church.  I want to address the issue of addiction.  Not to drugs or alcohol or even sex, but to charisma and fame.  Preachers are addicted to fame and parishioners are addicted to charisma.  Preachers want the most followers and followers want the most charismatic and eloquent preacher.  They want to brag and boast about "passtah" and repeat what "passtah" said.  Addiction is killing the church and it is luring many away from the faith.

One who is addicted to fame seeks his own fame at the expense of all else.  One who is addicted to fame will say whatever they have to in order to get a crowd.  Pastors/preachers seeking fame take the word of God don't adhere to orthodoxy or proper tradition.  Someone might counter with the assertion that Jesus was radical and he railed against orthodoxy and to that I will say that Jesus railed, not against orthodoxy, but against hollow religion.  Jesus was against false religiosity and those that knew the practices and the traditions but not God Himself.  Fame addicts speak their own version of what the Bible says, not what God actually said.  Jesus set the model for preachers.  John 17:4 says "I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do."  Jesus glorified the Father through His work here on earth.  Jesus set his own needs aside in order to fulfill the agenda of the Father!  In his prayer he says "YOUR will be done on earth as it is in heaven."  He did not twist the words of the Father, he did not add to them nor did he sweeten them to tickle itching ears.  Jesus said plainly that he did not speak on his own initiative but He only spoke what he heard from the Father (John 14:10).  In John 6, the message that Jesus preached regarding "eating my flesh" and "drinking my blood" turned many people off.  Jesus was saying this figuratively and was likely looking forward to his departure and the remembrance of His death during the Lord's supper.  But those that followed left.  They thought He was a madman and they were unable to bear His teaching.  I would not doubt, although the bible does not give an indication of this, that many of the ones that left were seduced by false teachers and led away from the truth by even more bizarre teachings.

There is another class of addicts in this mix of religiosity.  These are the charisma addicts that follow the fame addicts!  Charisma addicts are always looking for who sounds the best, who whoops the best, who sings the best, who makes them feel the best- but are uninterested in a true and Spirit led interpretation of the word.  Charisma addicts are wide awake during praise and worship and yet sound asleep at the preaching of the word.  Charisma addicts repeat what the pastor said instead of what the Bible says.  The problem with repeating what the fame addict says is this: it probably is not what is in the bible, but a cleverly crafted distortion of what is in the bible.  If you ever notice people that are involved in cults or churches that resemble cults, they never talk about what the Lord says, they only parrot what the pastor says.  Even if what "passtah" said contradicts scripture, they will believe it.  A perfect example is Jonestown, Guyana.  People addicted to Jim Jones followed him thousands of miles away from home into the jungles of South America only to be led to commit suicide because of Jones' deranged mind and teachings.  A further example is the Word of Faith movement that  has gobbled up many with their promise of health, wealth and prosperity and those that leave that cult come forth battered, broken and shaken because what "passtah" said was not the truth.  The Emergent Church, a movement within the evangelical circle, has sought to reinterpret the bible to fit society and to dismiss sin and the penalty of sin as figments of our imaginations and yet God says "I change not" (Malachi 3:6).  The Bible says that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8) so we know that God is not a shifting shadow but a constant, Holy, Righteous Spirit who does not bend to the will of man nor does He condone sin.  The Charisma addicts want a God that they can control, they want a God that they can put in a box and tell what to do.  That's not the true and living God.  The Corinthian church was addicted to charisma and even sought to put a rift between Paul and Apollos because of the physical stature and oratorical skills of Apollos. He looked and sounded the part, and although he was not seeking is own glory, there would be many that would use that situation to their advantage. 

My advice to those that are hooked on their pastor or to a pastor/preacher that is hooked on fame...go to rehab.  Search the scriptures, pray and ask God for forgiveness and ask God to show you that He is to be glorified above all else.  Preachers, preach the WORD, preach what is in the bible and not what is in your head.  Parishioners, test everything and hold fast that which is good (1 Thessalonians 5:21) and never exalt a man above God.  Jesus Christ is the rehab for these addictions that eventually will lead to death.  In Philippians 2:21, Paul gives Timothy a vote of confidence while simultaneously exposing the glory seekers in saying that the glory seekers, the fame addicts seek their own interests and not those of Jesus Christ.  God said that his glory will not be shared by anyone.  The sooner we realize this, the sooner we detox from our addictions and come to know God in a real way.

Disappointed

Dr. Brad Braxton has a very distinguished career.  He has been a professor at Wake Forest, McCormick Theological Seminary and will soon assume an endowed chairmanship at Southern Methodist University.  Dr. Braxton has also been the pastor of the prestigious Riverside Church in New York where his compensation package exceeded $600,000 (Big Bucks).  I know that Paul said that the worker deserves his wages but this was quite exorbitant.  The church was split because of the monetary issue and Braxton resigned in less than a year.  I recently stumbled upon an interview conducted with Dr. Braxton on McCormick's website (Braxton Interview) and I was really taken aback by what I read.  It was actually confirmation of something a friend of mine told me as I drove to church to our men's meeting tonight.

I first encountered Dr. Braxton when I was a postdoc at the University of Maryland.  He was the guest speaker at our church graduation celebration.  I was thoroughly impressed.  He spoke glowingly about his wife and their dogs that he humorously referred to as their children (he does actually have a daughter now).  He gave a powerful message that was enlightening and uplifting at the same time.  I remember vividly that he was livid over black men calling each other "dog" as a euphemism for friend and he said something to the effect of taking his belt off and whipping the next person that he heard call someone a dog.  Suffice it to say, I was impressed with his preaching and his personality.  He preached from a three ring binder with neatly typed notes and I was taking notes as well.  Pulpit etiquette and the whole nine.  I was paying attention to this brother.

Now Dr. Braxton is joining the "emergent church" movement (the website Apprising Ministries, www.apprising.org, has some very good information regarding the emergent church) and has started his own church in Baltimore, "The Open Church".  He is openly courting the LGBT community which is not a bad thing if your goal is to evangelize them and to exalt Jesus as Lord and Savior.  I think that all sinners should be welcomed into God's house without exception.  However, one of the central tenets of Christianity is that we must actually confess our sins to be forgiven.  Herein lies the problem because the LGBT community does not even consider their lifestyles sinful.  So, what exactly is going to be preached?  How can you preach repentance from sin with a congregation filled with folks who refuse to do just that?  It is totally pointless.  Why even start a "church" unless Christ and EVERYTHING that He taught, and EVERYTHING that the Bible teaches as it pertains to life and godliness are going to be communicated to the ears of the congregation?  Will he even preach from the Bible?  The Bible becomes more of a fairy tale and less of a light if he preaches anything other than the gospel or if he waters down the gospel to suit itching ears. 

While I applaud Dr. Braxton’s social justice efforts and his desire to be progressive, this is a slippery slope.  While Dr. Braxton is quite a dynamic speaker and he has distinguished himself, I cannot agree with this “Open Church”. Where is the emphasis on the gospel and on change or transformation? Years of seminary training and teaching and this is the best that he could muster? Having a lesbian agnostic, with an M. Div might I add,  (read the interview for yourself, 9th paragraph down) speak the first words in his initial church meeting? Wow. This has completely turned me against attending seminary. If seminarians come out with lots of fancy words like “messy eclecticism”, which is how Dr. Braxton defines what the Open Church will be like, but forget the main Word, Jesus, then I want no part of that.

This entire “emergent church” movement is drifting further and further away from orthodoxy.  I pray that the “Open Church” becomes a real church where people come to be set free from sin and to become disciples of Christ.  Here is some advice, Read the bible- not in a technical scholarly way, but in a plain way.  Read the book of James, read the fourth chapter and go down to about the fourth verse.  This is a passage of scripture that passes the first test of hermeneutics which is, if a plain reading of the text is clear, interpret it the way that it reads.  This is for the scholarly folks that put more emphasis on exegesis, which I deem very important, than they put on Jesus.  Read it with me:

"You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God."

OK.  This isn't out of context, it passes muster upon the plain reading, no need to ask what James means here or what thought he was trying to communicate...it is plain and simple.  The emergent church is trying to be friends with the world and as a result are making themselves enemies to God.  Please wake up brothers and sisters. 

The Illogical Made Logical and Vice Versa

I was reading the Huffington Post and I read a comment from an online user regarding gay rights, gay equality etc.  The comment said something to the effect of not using Paul's writing as an interpretation of what Jesus said.  The crux of the argument was that if Jesus never condemned homosexuality then we cannot say that it is wrong.  This argument has a two-fold problem as I see it.  It sounds logical on the surface but it is actually quite illogical theologically.

The first issue with the "did Jesus say it" argument is based on a faulty premise regarding the Old Testament.  Many that argue that Jesus never condemned homosexuality say that you cannot use Leviticus 18:22; 20:13 as proof that homosexuality is wrong because the scripture in the Old Testament never came from Jesus.  A glaring ommission from these Old Testament arguments is the destruction of Sodom and Gommorah which could not be more clear.  The men of Sodom were homosexuals, they liked other men, they sought to sleep with the angels that came to rescue Lot and they TURNED DOWN Lot's daughters because they did not want them, they wanted the angels (Genesis 19:4-11). 


The second issue with the "did Jesus say it" argument is based on a faulty premise regarding the New Testament.  Paul's writings are our best examples of the bible's denouncement of homosexuality as a lifestyle.  Romans 1 paints a vivid picture of what happens to folks that refuse to repent of sin, folks that exchange the truth of God for a lie and folks that choose their fleshly desires above what God demands.  1 Corinthians 6:9 is also one of the biblical references commonly quoted from the New Testament.  There is also a reference in Jude 7 regarding sexual immorality but it is usually skipped over because it ties in Sodom and Gommorah with the New Testament's rejection of sexual immorality, of any kind, as a lifestyle.  Their argument is this: Paul is not Jesus and therefore Jesus did not ever condemn homosexuality.  While Paul is definitely not Jesus, he saw Jesus on the Damascus road (Acts 9), he saw the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Cor 4:6) and He spoke directly to Jesus (Acts 9; Acts 22:17, 22:21, 23:11, 2 Cor 12:9) which, in my opinion, qualifies him to speak for Jesus.  He met all of the qualifications of an apostle and according to Jesus Himself, was a chosen insrument (Acts 9:15).


Both of these issues have gaping theological holes.  For those that wish to use the Old Testament argument,  the problem comes when we speak of the eternity of Jesus and the fact that the members of the Godhead (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) are co-equal and coeternal.  Jesus existed prior to time just as the Father did (See John 1:1, John 8:58).  In Genesis 1, prior to man being created, the bible says in verses 26 and 27 "Let US make man in OUR own image..."  it also says "male and female, He created them".    There is much evidence for Jesus in the Old Testament!  The Angel of the Lord is a typology of Christ, there are other symbols such as Aaron's Rod and the rock that was in the desert.

For those that wish to use the New Testament argument to say that Christ never condemned homosexuality, you are partially right.  The words NEVER came out of His own mouth.  However, they did come from Him.  Here is why, 2 Timothy 3:16 says that ALL scripture is inspired by God.  2 Peter 1:21 says that no prophecy ever emanated with the person speaking, but God's Spirit moved them and they spoke from God.  We know that the bible was written by men that were inspired by God's spirit to write down what God spoke to them.  And we know that the Godhead functions in unity.  What the Holy Spirit spoke to the writers of the Bible, Jesus and the Father were already in agreement with!    A.W. Tozer makes this very plain in his book, "The Knowledge of the Holy".  In the chapter on the Trinity, Tozer says this: "The Persons of the Godhead, being one, have one will.  They work always together, and never the smallest act is done by one without the instant acqueiscence of the other two.  Every act of God is accomplished by the Trinity in unity."(Tozer, A.W., "The Knowledge of the Holy", p. 22)

So while the argument from the gay rights advocates might seem logical on the surface, it is illogical when we consider the true nature of God and the true nature of Scripture.  Scripture, although being made up of different genres, exists as a cohesive whole and we cannot use the fact of whether something is in the OT or NT to determine what we will and won't obey.  God inspired Scripture such that a story unfolds from Genesis to Revelation.  Sure, someone will argue about the Nicene Creed and canonization but I will counter and say that although the Council of Nicea has great relevance, God is the ultimate authority on Scripture and again, inspired even the events that occurred at Nicea.  Lack of a true understanding of Scripture generally leads to faulty premises and illogical conclusions.  The fact is, the Bible says what it says and there is really nothing that we can do about it.  For believers, for people that see Scripture as authoritative, it is logical for us to conceive that Scripture governs every aspect of human life and that we must live according to the Scriptures.  This is illogical to those that have the 2 Cor 4:4 complex in which the mind is blinded by the god of this world.   I pray that as this debate continues, rather than being lulled to sleep by halfhearted theological discussions,we remember that ALL Scripture comes from God and that there is undeniable continuity between the two Testaments.  God bless you.

God's Greatness Cannot be Hidden

Jesus spoke very plainly about how the believer is to carry themselves.  Matthew 5:14-16 states the following “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven."

So, here, Jesus says that His followers are the light of the world and uses two analogies to help us to see understand exactly what He means. 

1. A city on a hill.  Imagine walking in a valley, a very dark valley and looking up and seeing a city with lights blazing, homes with lights in their windows, etc.  How would you feel?  How would a non-believer feel if he saw your city?  A city on a hill is set as a beacon of light and hope to a person walking in a valley.  It can also lead the way for the person travelling in darkness.

2. A candle on a stand.  Notice, Jesus immediately says that you don't light a candle and then put under a basket.  A candle is meant to give off light  and to illuminate the room in which it is lit.  Jesus said to put the candle on a stand and allow it to light the entire house.

I love his final statement- he says let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.  The light comes from the Light.  Jesus is the light of the world, those that He lives through because lights in the world and therefore we are to let the light of Jesus shine everywhere we go.  It reminds me of the song that they used to sing at my church when I was a child, "This Little Light of Mine"- I'm gonna let it shine!  Let Jesus shine through you.

All that leads me to the point of this message.  I met a man at the Montgomery Cancer Center on Friday.  He was a tall man with a very thick medical record in his hand.  When I asked him how he was doing, he looked at me and smiled and said, "God is taking care of me."  He said that he had been coming to the cancer center for 12 years!  I was like wow.  But it got better, he said that at one point in his life he was laid up for 8 months on a feeding tube and for 6 of those months he did not watch TV, listen to the radio or really feel much like talking.  He simply asked God, "Am I going to die?"  We chatted for a while and I noticed that tears began to well up in his eyes and he said, "You smiling at me just made my day."  Little did he know that he had also made my day.  If God was merciful to him, I know that God has enough mercy and enough grace to be merciful to me too!  God has enough goodness to go around!  Not only that, God is so good that you cannot help but tell it to someone else!  His final comments were this: "God is in this place." 

I know that some people there did not want to hear our conversation but I really didn't care.  We talked loud enough to be overheard because you cannot hide the light under a basket.  You can't hide God's greatness!  He gave me a card with a poem that he wrote on the back and I want to share it here.  It really touched me and I thank God that we crossed paths.  I know that God does everything for a reason and I am encouraging anyone that may be reading this to let your light shine!  Do not worry about what someone else thinks of you, let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.  You might just make someones day.  Here is the poem:

GOD for His reason
gave me cancer
 Will I die!
He did not answer.

With love He told me,
do not worry,
Just be patient,
not in a hurry.

For I'll be with you,
so have no fear,
I'll carry you gently,
and hold you near,

As days turned to weeks,
and weeks to months,
I never worried,
not even once,

For the I knew
that the promise is true,
There can be no fear
while GOD carries you.

The destination,
I may not know,
But wherever He takes me,
I will gladly go.

RBW

God bless you!