Saints and Sinners

Does one remain a sinner when one becomes a saint (follower of Jesus)? The common phrase is that “we sin because we are sinners.” Now, are saints (holy ones) still sinners? Or, are saints not sinners who still are able to sin from time to time? I guess this could also be a question of what the extent of God’s work in a God-follower’s life on this earth. I have thought of verses, and some of these may be pertinent: Romans 6; 2 Corinthians 5:17; depending on how you interpret Romans 7, whether Paul is talking about himself post-conversion or pre-conversion. Does a saint still sin? Yes, he does from time to time. Is it because he is still a sinner, or is it because he is a holy person who is still able to?

Narnia

I went with a group of students from our church to go see Narnia: Prince Caspian last Friday night. I enjoyed the movie, as did the students. I highly recommend it to others.

I was able to pick out what I believe to be two allusions to the Bible. The first is when the Narnians are storming the Talmarine castle. During the seige, the Talmarines come out and start whooping the Narnians. The Narnians start retreating, but a lot of them get stuck in the castle, and we know what happened then. This event made me think of when Israel went to attack Ai and got whooped.

The second allusion was when King Peter fought the Talmarine King. This made me think of David and Goliath. The reason: The fight between the two men would determine the fate of each army. If Peter won, then they conquered the Talmarines. If the Talmarines won, they conquered the Narnians.

Now I wonder if the Narnians were allusions to the Israelites in the Old Testament…

I noticed that Peter needed to learn humility.

I have now started reading the Narnia books once again, starting with The Magician’s Nephew.

Repeat after me…

In today’s evangelical world, it is expected when one wants to follow the Christ that one prays a prayer, and one becomes a Christ-follower.  The thought occurred to me, “Is that how it happened in the first century?”  When Jesus told Matthew to follow Him, did Matthew step away from his tax booth, bow his head and close his eyes, and follow Jesus in a sinner’s prayer?  When the mass of people at Pentecost heard Peter’s message and asked Peter what they should do, did Peter say, “Now, repeat this prayer after me, or one like it, and you will be saved”?  No, Peter said in Acts 2:38, “Repent, and each one of you be baptized…”  Now, repentance, if I remember correctly is a turning around.  You are going the wrong way and turn around to follow the right way.  It is a lifestyle change.

Should a “sinners prayer” be the defining mark of when a person becomes a believer (or saved)?

Just another thought running through my mind.  Comments and guidance are welcome.

God’s Bride

I started reading Jeremiah recently.  I came across the “marriage” analogies that God used sometimes when speaking of His relationship with Israel.  God did that quite a bit in the prophetic literature (of which does not have to be foretelling, but most of the time is rather a lot of forthtelling; ie. telling the people to shape up or God will ship them out.  The foretelling usually is more along the lines of hope, that God will not forget His people but still has wonderful plans for them.)  As I was thinking about the “marriage” analogies, it came to my mind that the Messiah has been spoken of in the New Testament as being the groom and the church as being His bride.  The thought that ran through my mind is this: Could the church as the Messiah’s bride be God bringing Israel back to being His bride once again?  Jesus is God from what I understand.  If that is the case, could this be a reference to the church being faithful Israel, even with Gentiles mixed in?

Of course, this thought is in it’s primitive stages and has not been thoroughly examined.  If anyone has any thoughts on this, I’d be interested to know what they are.

Changing Music Tastes

So lately I’ve been slowly starting to enjoy some forms of country music.  I thought this would never happen.  I enjoyed rock music throughout high school and college.  I was totally NOT into country music.  I never thought I would start liking any of it.  Then came the year 2007.  I have come to like some of it.  I am not into all of it.  I am not really into gospel music either.  I know I am involved in a Southern Baptist church, but I just don’t like southern gospel music.  That’s because of the style of music; I’m not even talking about the words in it, yet.

That’s it for my music tastes for now.  Strange how things happen that we thought would never happen.

UnChristian?

I had said that I would attempt to make a comeback to blogging.  I’m not sure that it’s working out like I thought it would.  For some reason, when it comes to blogging, I just can’t seem to come up with something to blog about.  Perhaps I have blogger’s cramp, similar to writer’s cramp.  I just don’t know.  Perhaps I will write something down one day to blog on.

Wait, I just remembered.  I did just finish a book.  Yes.  I can blog about this book.

The book is called unChristian by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons.  The book is written with at least three years of research to show what many 16-30 year olds, both inside and outside the church, view the church as.  In the book, there are six chapters devoted to the top six views that 16-30 year olds have of the church: Hypocritical, Get Saved, Antihomosexual, Sheltered, Too Political, and Judgmental.  Basically, I believe what the overall idea of what the 16-30 year olds view the church as is focused so much on itself that it doesn’t really care about anyone outside it.  That’s what I believe their overall view is from reading this book.  This book definitely has a missional mindset.  I think it’s a good eye-opener book for believers.  Here’s where you can get the book: unChristian.

Also, congrats goes to my sister’s high school band who made sweepstakes!

Return to Blogging

Blogging is such a big thing these days with the internet being at most peoples’ fingertips (even if it is dial-up) and news and thoughts just itching to be made known to the world. I have not really been itching to let my thoughts be known. In fact, it’s been almost a year since I blogged on wordpress. I’m not sure about the posts on myspace (even though that now is going the way of xanga). I think that it’s time that I return to the world of blogging. I may not be able to keep up with some who have too much time on their hands and blog every day. But, I can at least blog some, maybe more than once during the week. Perhaps I may start off with the cultural differences within just the different areas of East Texas. Maybe I’ll blog about something in Christianity. Maybe I’ll blog about something in general society. I do not know yet. I will know, though. Just know that blogging will attempt to make a return.

Pup

Running around the yard, pup chased the beagle clutching the tennis ball between her teeth. With pup on her heals, she ran and ran to try to keep pup from getting the tennis ball. Robin (the beagle) stopped and I picked up the ball and threw it for her to catch it again. She grabbed the ball with her mouth and proceeded to run around the yard with pup hot on her tail. Pup was an energetic dog. Being half Jack Russell Terrier and half Chihuahua, he had a lot of energy. He would like to come up to me while I sat on the doghouse and try to bite my fingers. He would try to jump up on the doghouse but was never able to make it up there. I would pick him up and put him on top of the doghouse with me. Then he would wag his tail like crazy, look at the other dogs, and jump down on the ground.

One day, I went out in the back yard to check on the dogs. I noticed there were three dogs running around me, but not four. I wondered if he might have escaped the confines of the yard at first (we’d been having a little bit of trouble with Robin). I finally noticed a strange sight and wondered what might have been going on. I found pup in the bushes, not doing well at all. He was sick, and I knew when I looked at him that there was nothing that could be done. After a day and a half, he passed away. Pup will be remembered as being an energetic dog that was fun to watch, as well as play with.

For all dog owners out there, vaccinate your dogs if at all possible. You never know when something could happen to them.

Evangelism…

Why do you believe that believers do not evangelize as we have been taught and told to do? Is it because of fear? Is it because of a lack of knowledge? Is it because we don’t want to have to answer hard questions that they may ask?

I believe that the main reason that we do not evangelize (tell the good news that the Bible proclaims) is that we don’t truly know that well who we say we follow. We say we follow God, but then have a hard time telling (especially living) the good news that God has accomplished. Do we really know God? Or, do we say we know Him and are fearful of whatever, not willing to have to answer questions (and maybe admit that we don’t know the answers), and really not know God. If we were to know God truly, I believe that we wouldn’t have near as many problems as it seems the church has run in to when it comes to telling the good news. I believe that we would want others to know the good news because of what God has accomplished.

Which brings me to another point. Has anyone ever thought about these verses: Genesis 17:1; Deuteronomy 32:29; Psalm 46:10; 50:7; Isaiah 45:22; 46:9; Exodus 20:5; 34:14; Deuteronomy 4:24; 5:9; 6:15; Leviticus 18:21; Leviticus 20:3; Isaiah 48:11; Ezekiel 20:9; 20:14; and 20:22?

It seems that God is saying to His people that He alone is God. He’s saying there is no other god, period. Therefore, in the first two commandments, He tells His people to not have any other gods besides Him and to not make any image, period. Not only that, but He tells His people that He is a jealous God. Not only does He state that He alone is God, but He tells them that they had better not worship other gods (which of course are rather silly things and leads to a rather silly thing to do) because He is a jealous God (of course, that’s competition that is not equal, but rather, below God) and He will not let His name be profaned by His people. Why is it that we who call ourselves followers of God Almighty (the God of the Bible) think we can get by with doing what we want, all the while banking our very lives on the belief that we will not lose our salvation once we have become saved? When will we realize that we are now God’s people and we are supposed to be holy as He is holy (1 Peter 1:15-16)?

Of course, some of you may say, “Well that’s really not fair at all. God can’t just order us around because we are really free will creatures.” Ok, fine and well. When will we realize that it doesn’t matter if we have a free will or not? It doesn’t matter when it comes to God’s holiness and righteousness! We are the ones who have sinned against God and deserve to be thrown in to the most worst punishment that can be imagined times infinity. It is our fault that we face judgment in first place, realize it.

But, after realizing the greatness of God and the gravity of our sinfulness, I believe this actually magnifies God’s grace, mercy, love, kindness, patience, and so on. I believe that it should make us realize that what God has done is so much greater than what we can imagine. There is no other god but God alone. If that’s the case, and He’s a jealous God at that, then we have totally blown it. Of course, we could finish out the equation: We sin against God, Jesus died for our sins, we confess Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and there we go, we’re saved.

We need to tell people to go out and evangelize, but let’s educate them (and let God’s Spirit do His work in their lives) so that they know God and really and truly have good (great) news to go out to the world to tell. Let’s realize the greatness of God, the gravity of our sin, and the mercy and grace that God has shown us. Let’s realize that God is King, and we must rely on His grace and mercy in order to not have to suffer the punishment that we so deserve.

Back to the original point of the post…Let’s KNOW the God of the Bible.

Another New Blogsite

A friend has a blog on this site and so I thought I would try it out for a while.  Until then, check out my other site.