10 posts tagged “christianity”

That title certainly got your attention, didn’t it?

So many people believe the common misconception that the point of Christianity is sin. More specifically, they believe that the point of Christianity is to not sin. But that simply isn’t the case.

God isn’t just interested in the covering over of our sins; God wants to make us into the people we were originally created to be. It is not just the removal of what’s being held against us; it is God pulling us into the people he originally had in mind when he made us. This restoration is why Jesus always orients his message around becoming the kind of people who are generous and loving and compassionate. The goal here isn’t simply to not sin. Our purpose is to increase the shalom* in the world, which is why approaches to the Christian faith that deal solely with not sinning always fail. They aim at the wrong thing. It is not about what you don’t so. The point is becoming more and more the kind of people God had in mind when we were first created. (from Velvet Elvis)

*The common meaning of shalom is peace, but it is much more than that. Shalom is the presence of the goodness of God and not just the absence of strife.

You see, sin just isn’t the point. Sin is a byproduct of the fall of man. It was never intended to be the point. But because of the fall of man, sin permeates everything in this world. And God is just dying (no pun intended) to restore the world.

Let’s go back to the beginning - to a garden out in the middle of the Middle East. It was there that life began. God created a man named Adam and told him that his job was to manage the rest of creation. Then God created Eve. Adam and Eve are the only two people in all of the world who have ever had a good and complete relationship with God. After the Fall, we all have a pretty distorted view of God, but Adam and Even walked in the garden with God.

Do you know how Moses described the main characteristic of a person before the Fall? Moses said people before the Fall were naked and weren’t ashamed. I’m not making this up. When he got to the end of chapter 2 of Genesis, the part of the Bible where he described what paradise was like, he concluded his description of paradise by saying Adam and Eve were naked and were not ashamed. It’s right there in the Bible; you can look it up if you want. (See Genesis 2:25.) (from Searching from God Knows What by Donald Miller)

So what? What does that have to do with Christianity, sin, or anything else? Everything! Did you know that in just about 100 words used to describe Paradise and the Fall, Moses repeated the idea of nakedness with no shame five times. Why so much? For him to have repeated it so many times, he must have wanted the reader to truly understand what he was saying.

The very first thing that happened after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil was that they noticed they were naked. And man, I couldn’t stop thinking about it; I couldn’t stop thinking about how whatever happened at the Fall made them aware they were naked. This isn’t “hidden wisdom” in the text. It is the text. It is blatant, and yet I had never heard anybody unpack it before.

And then it all came together. It all became so obvious, it was actually frightening. Moses was explaining all of humanity right there in Genesis chapter 3, and because people were always reading it looking for the formula, they never got it.

Here is what I think Moses was saying: Man is wired so he gets his glory (his security, his understanding of value, his feeling of purpose, his feeling of rightness with his Maker, his security for eternity) from God, and this relationship is so strong, and God’s love is so pure, that Adam and Eve felt no insecurity at all, so much so that they walked around naked and didn’t even realize they were naked. But when that relationship was broken, they knew it instantly. All of their glory, the glory that came from God, was gone. It wouldn’t be unlike being in love and having somebody love you and then all of a sudden that person is gone, like a kid lost in the store. All of the insecurity rises the instant you realize you are alone. No insecurity was felt when the person who loved you was around, but in his absence, it instantly comes to the surface. In this way, Adam and Eve were naked and weren’t ashamed when God was around, but the second the relationship was broken, they realized it and were ashamed. And that is just the beginning.

If man was wired so that something outside himself told him who he was, and if God’s presence was giving him a feeling of fulfillment, then when that relationship was broken, man would be pining for other people to tell him that he was good, right, okay with the world, and eternally secure. As I wrote earlier, we all compare ourselves to others, and none of our emotions–like jealousy and envy and lust–could exist unless man was wired so that somebody else told him who he was, and that somebody else was gone. (from Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller).

You see, getting that relationship back is the point. The whole point of salvation is for God to restore the world into a place of harmony with its maker. Sadly, that point is often missed by today’s Christians (heck, I’ve even missed that point most of my life!). I know some pretty miserable Christians because they focus all of their time on how often they fail God. But sin isn’t the point (I can’t stress that enough).

The point isn’t my failure; it is God’s success in remaking me into the person he originally intended me to be. (from Velvet Elvis).

And originally, Adam and Eve were created naked. Completely secure in who they were and their relationship with God.

And that’s our job: to relentlessly pursue who God has created us to be. That is the point.

I just want to direct everyone over to read Trampolines and Bricks.

 

When Paul brought his letter to the Romans to a close he emphasized the wisdom of God. Verse 27 says, “To the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ! Amen.” But what is wisdom? Theologian J.I. Packer defines wisdom as “the power to see and the inclination to choose the best and highest goal together with the surest means of achieving it." God’s infinite wisdom is His ability to see what is best for His creation and to see how to make it come to pass. It spans the ages and is outside of time. It is through God’s wisdom that creation, from the beginning, pointed towards the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, and it is through God’s wisdom that creation can look back to the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ to receive redemption. Romans 11:32-34 says, “For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all. Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?”

Wisdom is an attribute that God freely gives man. When God offered Solomon anything in the world, Solomon wisely chose wisdom because he wanted to be able to govern God’s people and discern right from wrong (1 Kings 3:9). Solomon wrote Proverbs in order for others to also gain wisdom and discipline—but was careful to acknowledge that wisdom begins with fear of the Lord (Proverbs 1) and that God is the One who gives wisdom (Proverbs 2:6). The believer who follows the commandments of the Lord and walks in wisdom is one who will be saved “from the ways of wicked men, from men whose words are perverse” and “from the adulteress.” The believer who walks in wisdom will be protected by discretion and understanding (Proverbs 2). He will be blessed (Proverbs 3). The believer is commanded to be wise, “Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is” (Ephesians 5:15-17). Once a believer understands what wisdom is and begins to walk in wisdom, then he will begin to understand what needs to change and how to change in order to become like Christ.

 

When we speak of the holiness of God, we are speaking of an absolute fundamental and moral purity. He is completely pure in who He is and what He does. The prophet Isaiah repeatedly refers to God as the “Holy One of Israel” (1:4, 5:19, 5:24, 10:20, 12:6). God calls himself holy throughout the Old Testament. In Isaiah 6:3, the prophet drives the point home when he writes the cry of the seraphims: “Holy holy holy is the Lord of hosts…” They do not merely repeat the attribute, but they say it three times! This is the only aspect of God repeated in Scripture three times because all other attributes of God flow from His holiness. His power is a holy power, not a tyranny. His love is holy love, not some soft emotion.  His wisdom is holy wisdom, not a spiteful shrewdness.  And His holiness is not simply the best we know raised a little higher. Everything about God is above and beyond our comprehension. That's why God is so holy.  We can only know about God what He has told us—and He has been gracious enough to give us the Holy Scriptures.

When we begin to comprehend the holiness of God, it is awe-inspiring. God is holy, and no one in His creation is. This holy, pure, set apart God has decided to encounter our stained, sinful, unholy humanity. Everyone—every counselor and counselee—is marked by sin. We are the exact opposite of a holy God, yet He chooses to extend His hand and be actively involved in our lives. And when we allow God to be actively involved, we are set apart and begin the process of sanctification, or the process of being made holy, in the image of God.

One cannot accept God’s free gift of grace if he first doesn’t understand what grace is. Exodus 35:6-7 proclaims the graciousness of God: “And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, "The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation.”

What is grace? The definition that we’re most familiar with is simply “undeserved favor.” It’s getting something you don’t deserve. So how do you come up with this definition biblically? It must be noted that in order to get an accurate view of what the Bible says, you must view the Bible as a whole. It must be “precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little, and there a little” (Isaiah 28).

Ephesians 2:89 says that we are saved by grace. We know that we all deserve death because no one is righteous (Romans 3:23), but that God gave us a “pardon” by sending his Son to take the punishment for us (John 3:16). It is through that pardon that we are saved (if we accept it). That’s a clear example of God giving us something that we don’t deserve (salvation/eternal life) and how the Bible says that is grace.

Paul’s message is consistently about grace. He uses the term (the Greek word charis or charisma) more than 100 times in the New Testament. From the New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology (NIDNTT):

“For Paul, grace is the essence of God’s decisive saving act in Jesus Christ, which took place in his sacrificial death, and also of all its consequences in the present and the future (Rom 3:24-26).
…
Paul unfolds the reality and power of charis in a stubborn conflict with rabbinical ideas of justification by works and synergism. This leads him to set up and then contrast two antithetical, mutually exclusive series of ideas: grace, gift, the righteousness of God, superabundance, faith, gospel, and calling on the one side; and law, reward, sin, works, accomplishment owed, one’s own righteousness, honor, worldly wisdom, and futility on the other side. The person and work of God’s Son has made it possible for justice in the Judge’s pardon not to conflict with grace. In Christ, therefore, God’s grace is given as a precious gift. Apart from him there can be no talk of grace. But this also means that grace can never become a quality that someone possesses in one’s own right.”

Paul constantly contrasts grace with the law. In Romans 4 (specifically vv. 4-16), the ideas of grace and debt (a reward for work accomplished) are mutually exclusive. In the previous chapter it is also clear that righteousness comes from faith by grace and not through the law (emphasis mine):

“But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law.”

Romans 11 tells us that being chosen by grace and a life based on works have nothing in common. Grace would not be pure grace if they did; it would be compromised by the principles of accomplishment and achievement—“So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace” (vs. 5-6).

In Galatians 2:21, Paul offers the high point of his theology of grace: “I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”

In Galatians 5, Paul warns the church that those who try to find their justification through the law or through their works that they are alienated from Christ:

“You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace. But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.”

Grace is a free gift from God. Romans 6:23 says that the wages of sin are death but the gift of God is eternal life! Salvation is a work of God for man, rather than a work of man for God. No aspect of salvation, according to the Bible, is made to depend, even in the slightest degree, on human merit or works.

It is only by understanding this concept that one becomes a child of God and can begin to conform to the image of the Son of God.

Something disturbing happened tonight at my small group, and I covet your prayers. A discussion was started that ended badly because it became evident that our leader holds a belief about salvation and grace that isn't biblical (though he swears up and down it is). It got so bad that his wife left the room crying and a man who wraps his whole existence in God is now doubting his faith. And the whole time, the one with the differing view did not change his opinion or admit that he could be wrong or seem to care that others were upset and offended.

Pray that the spirit of confusion will be rebuked. Pray that God opens his heart (and ours). Pray wisdom for me as I put together a study that will be Scriptural on this issue. Pray that hurt feelings will be healed. Pray that God will guide all of us to the Truth. Pray that unity, not discord, will once again reign.

 

I'm pretty sure I posted about The Irresistible Revolution a while back. It was an incredible book! If you don't have time to read the book, here's a video of Shane speaking at a Youth-Fusion conference. It's a little long (50 minutes), but it's incredible. He has a lot of good things to say. His ideas get a little radical, but you know what? Jesus was a radical too.

 

 

 

 

 

At the end of the presentation, Shane shows a video clip of a child who is severely malnourished and suffering from PTSD. He is shaking uncontrollably. Until he is touched.  The power of a loving touch is amazing. That segment made me break down…sitting at my desk at work.  If you don’t watch anything else, at least go to the end of the video* and see that. See the power of love.

*You'll find the segment when there are 7:15 minutes left.

I finished the book. I won't try and dissect it all in one post - Bell covers way too many topics. This post is about one particular section that really spoke to me - enough so that it brought tears to my eyes when I read it. I swear, he wrote this particular passage specifically for me.

You see, I've realized that I define my worth through the man I'm with. If a guy wants me, then I must be worth wanting. I feel special when he makes me feel special, and only when he makes me feel special. From Sex God, chapter six (emphasis mine):

Do you realize that you are worth dying for?

You don't need to give yourself away to someone who won't give himself to you. You don't need to use your body to get what you need. It's a cop out for not being a certain kind of woman - a woman of dignity and honor.

Some women only know how to relate to men by making a series of transactions. They want to be wanted, and the man wants, well, the man wants what lots of men want. So they trade. Essentially they strike a deal with men, time and time again.

I have what you want, and you have what I want, so let's make a deal. I need this, you need that.

Some women learn at an early age how to negotiate. They need to be loved, to be validated, to be worth something, and they discover that by giving a little of themselves to a boy, they get what what the need in return. It's a cycle, a pattern that can stay with them their entire lives.

Sex becomes a search. A search for something they're missing. A quest for the unconditional embrace. And so they go from relationship to relationship, looking for what they already have.

This search is about that need.

But sex is not the search for something that's missing. It's the expression of something that's been found. It's designed to be the overflow, the culmination of something that a man and a woman have found in each other. It's a celebration of this living, breathing thing that's happening between the two of them.

You don't need a man by your side to validate you as a woman. You already are loved and valued. You're good enough exactly as you are. Do you believe this? Because it's true? You have limitless worth and value. If you embrace this truth, it will affect every area of life, especially your relationship with men.

You are worth dying for.

Your worth does not come from your body, your mind, your work, what you produce, what you put out, how much money you make. Your worth does not come from whether or not you have a man. Your worth does not come from whether or not men notice you. You have inestimable worth that comes from your creator.

You will continue to be tempted in a thousand different ways not to believe this. The temptation will be to go searching for your worth and validity from places other than your creator.

Especially from men.

But you don't have to give yourself away to earn a man's love. You're better than that. You're already loved.

When you give too much of yourself away too quickly, when you show too much skin, you're not being true to yourself. When you dress to show us everything, then in some sense we have all shared in it, or at least been exposed to it. There is a mystery to you, infinite depth and endless complexity.

As the woman says in Song of Songs, "My own vineyard is mine to give." In the ancient Near East, a vineyard was a euphemism for sexuality. She is saying that she doesn't give herself to just anyone. She is fully in control of herself, and she is not cheap and she is not easy.

Your strength is a beautiful thing. And when you live in it, when you carry yourself with the honor and dignity that are yours, it forces the men around you to relate to you on more than just a flesh level.

You are worth dying for.

Those are the words that made me cry. I see myself in them. I've made bad choices because I wanted to feel loved and feel validated. I put my worth in something other than God. I still struggle with this. I don't know when I'll be able to change. It's not as easy as reading these words and flipping a switch in my brain. But it's a start.

This is an incredible book. Here's a quick excerpt:

Please note that this biblical goal of Christlike humility is a far cry from many currently popular, but unworthy, goals of helping someone become well adjusted or develop his "moral consciousness" or achieve personal happiness and success. Our Lord did not come to this planet, live a perfect life, and become a worthy atonement for the sins of the world so that those who become His children can merely be well adjusted, live morally upright lives, and enjoy personal happiness and success. He died to redeem us from the penalty and power of a sinful heart that keeps us from being useful servants of the living God.

I also wrote a post about the meaning of Christianity over on Imago Dei, and I used this book as a source for pretty much the whole thing.

I definitely encourage you to check it out!

Crossposted at Imago Dei (*I've turned comments off here...if you would like to comment, please do so at Imago Dei*).

 

I am told that Christians do not love each other. I am very sorry if that be true, but I rather doubt it, for I suspect that those who do not love each other are not Christians.

Charles Spurgeon

I’ve spent a lot of time in recent months becoming more and more aware of how the world views those who use the label “Christian” to describe our lives. At first I just dismissed those negative views as some anti-Christian bias, but I’ve recently become acquainted with a group of people who harbor some very strong and very negative feelings and opinions towards anything having to do with Christianity. When I took a step back to ask myself how anyone could possibly feel that way, I didn’t like the answers I found.

It felt like a slap in the face when I realized that all of the spiritual growth I’d experienced in the last several months had come with no help whatsoever from the Christian world. God has brought me to some new places by opening my eyes to those outside of the Christian bubble I’ve always lived in.

I noticed pretty quickly when I became a frequent commenter on an atheist blog that it seemed as though the most hateful and condescending comments often came from those proclaiming the name of Christ. Sadly, the problem is not confined solely to the internet. The only “Christians” getting any media exposure these days always seem to be the extreme fundamentalists who are busy proclaiming “God hates fags” or promoting similar hate-speech. If it’s not that, they’re busy condemning our nation as wicked and predicting God’s wrath raining down upon us in the form of a natural disaster. The biggest churches in America are now promoting the “prosperity gospel” where followers are promised financial prosperity through faith, thus turning evangelizing into a form of bribery.

Christians: it’s time to get back to the basics! Is this the face of Christianity that you want the world to accept? Is this what it truly means to be a follower of Christ?

We have become complacent in our faith.

We have forgotten what it means to be like Jesus.

We watch daily as these “Christians” run the name of Christ through the mud, yet we are content to sit idly by and do nothing about it.

Would Jesus ever condemn a man or woman by proclaiming “God hates fags”? Absolutely not! Would Jesus ever sit on a pew in a church comfortably listening to doctrines that promote the “prosperity gospel”? Never!

We must ask ourselves why we let those who call themselves “Christian” do those same things. Why is no one standing up and proclaiming “Hey! That’s not right! That’s not what it means to be a Christian!”?

I once heard a great story about a bag of Oreo cookies that nicely parallels our current situation. A husband and wife bought a box of snack-sized bags of Oreo cookies. When they arrived at home they decided to open up a bag for a snack. The bag looked like all of the other bags, but when they opened it there were no cookies inside! The bag contained nothing but air, so they threw it away and opened another one. Again, though the bag looked normal from the outside, they found no cookies inside the bag. The husband turned to his wife and asked “How many bags of cookies will you go through before you give up and assume they’re all empty?”

How many times does a nonbeliever have to get burned by someone claiming the mantle of Christ before they give up on Christianity altogether?

How long will it take before Christians stand up and show the world what it really means to be like Christ?

Many people, after a brief look, come to the conclusion that Christians have become the most judgmental and hypocritical group of people on earth. Many Christians, it seems, go to church on Sunday and spend the rest of the week living however they choose.

Is it any wonder that people don’t want to associate themselves with anything “Christian”?

The Bible says, “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was” (James 1:22-24).

That paints a perfect picture of how most people view the Christian: hypocritical! Dare I say it: Christians are the most hypocritical group of people living today.

When are we going to start doing everything we say we believe in?

When are we going to stand up and let the world know that Christianity isn’t a label, but a lifestyle?

When are we going to show the world who Jesus really is?