Grace for All

What I most enjoyed about the book All of Grace by C.H. Spurgeon were the great sense of compassion the author had for the reader and the apologetic aspects of the book.

In a day when compassion for other people and actually caring about what they are going through is so sparse it was refreshing to hear Spurgeon plead with me to love Jesus. When he says “Oh, receive the Lord Jesus into your soul, and you will live forever” I get the sense that he loves me and wants to see me in heaven even though he lived over a hundred years before I was even born. I think one of the great struggles for the church is to have a heart for the unreached. Not only to be thankful for our salvation but to want other people to have that salvation is something that is lacking in so much of our lives. I know that so many times I have had to force myself to pray for a heart that will love people. It was so refreshing to read a book by someone that had a genuine heart for me.

I’ve been commanded to be an evangelist by God and this book was a great example of how to explain the gospel to non-Christians. Spurgeon didn’t leave any room for us to escape without completely accepting or denying Christ and his work on the cross. He was very good at reading the readers mind and answering any questions we might have. In chapter 11, he takes many excused for our lack of following after Christ and refutes them all with basically one verse: “when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.” We don’t have excuses not to follow Christ because he is our strength and our salvation. Praise God for that!

God is not...

God is not the easter clown

God has many attributes. Some of which we are able to understand and know, and others which we are unable to comprehend fully. One of the major ways in which we can know God and his attributes is to be in relationship with him. Much like when you spend enough time with someone, you begin to gain an understanding of who they are and how they behave. Another way in which we can know and understand God is through theology, the study of God. Through theology we can begin to learn what God is and what He isn’t. Being able to know how God acts or behaves, as best we can, can help us in evangelism, apologetics, and our own personal lives. It is my personal opinion that knowing the attributes of God, what he is and what he isn’t, is the best way to know God.

In my personal relationship with God I am quick to hold on to his sovereignty, omniscience and immutability. I love the sovereignty of God. It is so dear to me when living through the many trials that I have and will face in my life. To know that there is someone in control of this mess and that he is perfect and can have no wrong intentions is so comforting. Open theism commonly attacks the omniscience and sovereignty of God. I hate open theism. In an open theistic world, I’ve created the mess around me completely. There is no father going before his son with a flashlight through the woods.

Another attribute of God, which he has fortunately shared with us, is love. An attribute of God that I don’t think I fully understood until I heard John Piper speak at the reformission conference in 2004. I was only able to fully realize his deep love for us by realizing my great iniquities. My whole life I had been asking why God didn’t save everyone. At that conference my question became, why did God choose me? Only a truly loving, gracious God could look past my failures and still love me. Since that day it has been a quest to understand how to live in his grace and not my works. I believe my true conversion happened at that conference.

If you’ve noticed I have described only two of the attributes of God, it blatantly yells of my lack of knowledge of who God is. I can only pray through this process and Lord willing a full life of time in his scriptures that I will become closer everyday to knowing the true God and what he is and what he isn’t.

Trinitarianisticism

Trinitarianism is a crucial theological issue, which many Christians find hard to wrap their minds around. I myself have troubles understanding it beyond the Sunday school lesson explanations. I believe comparing the perfect unity of the Trinity to other theistic beliefs is important to do, to strengthens ones own understanding of it.

In order to come to an understanding of the theology of God and more specifically the Trinity we must have a God with contours and edges. We must know who God is and who God isn’t. We can only do this with much prayer and petitioning to God that he would enlighten our minds so that we can see his grace for what it really is. We must also view scripture as inherently God’s word and respect it as a double edged sword that can cut through our hard hearts.

The trinity is the belief that God exists in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The three persons of the Trinity are constantly working together as one to accomplish the same goal, to give glory to Themselves. The Father created the world and sent his Son to save the world that rejected him. The Son experienced an excruciating death and is now seated beside the father in heaven, which we worship through the help of the Holy Spirit.

Atheism is the belief that there is no God or gods/goddesses. A belief system that would have been completely unbelievable in Old Testament times, which assumes that everyone believes in God, the God of the Trinity. Psalm 14:1 and 53:1 state “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.” The failure of atheism is that it requires our fallen minds to have complete knowledge of all things. 2 Corinthians states: The God of this age has blinded the mind of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.

Believers in Agnosticism state that we only have access to the physical world around, and cannot begin to know the spiritual world or God. The bible states the exact opposite. Agnosticism being almost right states that we can’t know God, however errors by not thinking that God can reveal himself to us, which allows us to know him, specifically Jesus who came in human form to earth.

Polytheism states that there are and can be many gods or goddesses. We see over and over again the consequences of this belief by reading almost any portion of scripture. One example would be the story of Jeroboam in 1 Kings 12. He constructed idols to worship and as a result dogs and birds ended up eating his family. An extreme example, but not nearly as extreme as spending eternity in hell for worshipping the wrong god or goddess.

Monotheism is the belief in one God. Monotheism is very close to Christianity. Christianity is more than another monotheistic religion however. God is not satisfied with a belief in a God. Many people believe in one god, be it money, power or sex. God requires us to worship him alone, the one true God exactly how he is revealed to us through the scriptures.

With so many views of what and who God is, the world has so many choices as to whom to worship. I argue along with Christ that there is only one true God, which we should worship. Christ states in John 14:6 “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Amen.

Who am I?...I don't know. Looks like you've got some things to ponder

In the upcoming weeks i will be posting papers that i've been required to write for the deacon process at Mars Hill Church. I hope you find them educational and informational. I'm sorry for the long absence too, writer's block and too much going on are bad combinations.

Proving the existence of God:
The existence of God can be proven in several different ways; following is a summary of arguments for the existence of the true God.

Ontological: Brought forth by the philosopher Anselm of Canterbury, this argument proves the existence of God by stating that humans are constantly aware of a perfect and greater being than themselves. This being is as perfect as humanly imaginable. Also, since humans are only able to envision that which exists, God must exist. To summarize this argument states that God exists because humans can imagine he exists.

Teleological: This argument takes the avenue of creation and the intelligent mind that created it. It is hard to escape the beauty and order of creation, and to ignore that is to ignore its creator. The amount of intricacies and exactness in the world are not mechanical but creative processes being orchestrated by God. The illustrations of a watch or an airplane have commonly been used to illustrate this point. Watches and airplanes are not randomly brought together by powers outside of them, they are however created by humans, much like the world was created by the hand of God.

Cosmological: Simply stated this argument follows the relationship between cause and effect. There is no reaction if there is no action. God spoke the world into existence, and the world was created. Things are not created from themselves, but rather things or in this case, beings outside of them. God is eternal; he has no beginning or end allowing him to be the creator and sovereign ruler of the world.

Kalam: This argument originated with medieval Muslim philosophers, which argued that since time exists God must exist. Similar to the Cosmological argument in that in order for time to exist, something outside of time had to create it. The reference point of time beginning was created by God.

Morality: Every (sane) created being has a sense of right and wrong built in, referred to commonly as a conscience. Where does this conscience come from? We are created in the image of God, which gives a moral compass helping us to determine what is right and wrong. It is when we ignore our consciences that we fall into sin and reject God.

settlers of satan....i mean catan

i've recently had the privilege of becoming a nerd. it blew me away how fun it was.

some of you may have heard of the adult board game called "Settlers of Catan". i say adult not because of the content but because children just wouldn't understand, in fact the last time i played it, the kids had to be put to sleep...i mean bed.

this game really sucks you in, i was definitely skeptical at first. just watching the game being played you'll hear statements like "i'll give you wood for your sheep, or i really need some wood, or do you have any wood for me?" how could i not want to join in on the fun?

the game lasts for hours, depending on who you play with, it can be long excruciating hours. during the game play your heart is racing. i find myself saying "alright, i can win! i can win! i can win!" and then i lose. the crushing defeat usually takes me about a half hour to get over, unless there is another game coming up, then i'm instantly thinking about how to change my strategy.

i've never done crack but i'm sure that "settlers" is very similar. the rush of building a city, the enjoyment of building the longest road and then the crushing defeat all have to parallel the story arc of doing crack.

i pray you don't do crack, but rather would become addicted to settlers so you can come over to my house and we can do it on the coffee table.

here's a link if you need your fix http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Settlers_of_Catan

confronting our lameness

why am i so lame, or for that matter, why are we all so lame?

when faced with a confrontation i squirm like gollum.

that's me->

i am currently in the process of working up the courage to confront two people in my life. one of them is my neighbor above me, who tends to forget that ash on a balcony doesn't make my wife happy, (the other will remain nameless until confronting has taken place.) it's been happening for 2 months now, i've walked by his room once, and even braved up the courage to knock on his door once...thank God he didn't answer or I would have had to of talked to him. two things would happen if i grew some balls and talked to this guy. my wife would respect me and i wouldn't have to write stupid little blogs about the situation anymore.

the thing i find myself thinking about most when i'm afraid is what do i say? if any of you know me, i'm not the most talkative of guys and have never had a case of diaherra of the mouth, however i do have a blog...we'll see how it goes. i'm so afraid of looking like an idiot, and being proven wrong that i completely forget about Christ.

Jesus tells us "Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them. Of how much more value are you than the birds!" Luke 12.24

I find this verse almost sickening in times like these. i am more valuable than a bird, more valuable than anything on this earth and yet why do i think i'm nothing? i'm only something because God feeds me, yet when i start to get hungry again i forget where my last meal came from.

how easy it is to ask for prayer, advice or just talk to someone else about the third party than it is to just do the thing you're asking for prayer about. don't get me wrong community and prayer are both wonderful things and very necessary for a saint to perservere, but couldn't we save a lot of people a lot of time and energy if we'd just man up and trust Christ and the access to strength we have through him? the war is over.

i pray that anyone reading this would find strength and courage in Christ and nothing else to face the ashers from above in the future. the following is a quote from John Piper

"But Jesus does not call us to make safe choices. He calls us to make loving choices. In the short run, love is often more painful than self-protecting conflict-avoidance. But in the long run, our consciences condemn us for this easy path and we do little good for others. So let’s be more like Jesus in this case and not talk about people, but talk to them, both with words of encouragement, because of the evidences of grace we see in their lives, and with words of caution or warning or correction or even rebuke.

welcome

hey guys, thanks for checking out my blog.