If we’re so small, why is the universe so big?

So, as I was looking up at the stars last night, a thought came to me.

We find it hard to believe that God made the whole universe for us humans. The huge amount of space when our corner of the universe takes up – like – a speck of dust. Why is there such vastness out there?

the universe and our relative size

 

All we get to do is stare at it through the findings of Pioneer, Voyager 1 & 2 or New Horizons and imagine and analyse it through Hubble’s brainchild. Even our trip to the moon was infinitesimal comparatively. The final frontier is so hard to fathom that when we stop to think about it, we go a little insane.

I doubt I’m the only one who would day-dream longingly of taking part in a mission aboard the NCC-1701 or stowaway on the Millennium Falcon. Personally, my heart was captured initially by Star Wars but deeply entrenched by Asimov and his Foundation Series. To top it off, I would spend my summers on a 10 acre Island on Lady Evelyn Lake in northern Ontario and loved floating around in the water at night mesmerized by a sky without light pollution and trying to fathom the distance and space of what I could see. Knowing that everything I could see was still only inside our galaxy.

We will forever be baffled by the size and complexity of the universe.

What if our eternity spent with God gives us the ability to explore all that creation? If we are indeed no longer bound by human speed and time, we could get wherever we wanted in a matter of moments (are moments measurable in infinite time?).

This sounds amazing and even more compelling towards a life eternal. We can see the wonders of the universe and continually stand in awe of its awesome creator.

It is as if God has been building this playground for his kids (us) since the beginning of time anticipating the moment he can truly pull the covers off it for his children to go play in. We’re stuck inside staring out the window seeing only small elements of it excited to see what it will really be like. As if God is saying “Hold on kids, just a little while longer playing in your little restricted space, and then you’ll be able to play outside for the rest of time”.

Our God is an awesome God.

If God is real, why is there so much evil in the world?

This is one of the biggest questions we can tackle in Christianity.

Over the Month of March, our church worked to answer this and 4 other top questions teens are asking today.

1. Do All Religions Lead to the Same Place?
2. Can We Trust the Bible?
3. Are Science and Christianity Enemies?
4. Why is there so Much Evil in the World?
5. Was Jesus Really God?

I taught the first one as well as the 4th one. It doesn’t transcribe well to this format (read, a little long) but I hope you find it informative, faith building and maybe even something that really answers the tough questions you’ve been having in this area.

Off we go…

Bertrand Russell asks this question differently when he asks “How can you believe in God when kneeling at the bed of a dying child?” This is Bertrand trying to say that God isn’t the answer in times like this.

We all can get this way.

When something big happens in our life that drops us to our knees, we can be awfully quick to wonder “where is God in this?” We can feel like “does God see this? Does God care?”

Evil and pain and suffering in our lives or in the world around us stirs all kinds of questions. “Why did he let this happen?” “What have I done wrong to  deserve this?” “This isn’t fair! Why me?”

One Christian apologist answered Bertrand Russell by saying “what would Bertrand Russell say when he’s kneeling at that child’s bed?” The point here is, everyone experiences these hugely challenging events in their lives and even Bertrand Russell will seek to find an answer. Whether he believes in God or not, he will still have to wrestle with this pain and seek answers to these questions.

Let me tell you a relevant story from my life.

A year after we were married, Melissa became pregnant. 20 weeks later, at the first ultrasound, we were filled with anticipation to find out if it was a boy or girl so we could start making arrangements at home, eager to share our family with a new little one. Do we paint the room pink or blue? I think we decided on yellow being a little neutral.

We always liked the name Nathaniel if it was a boy and Aleah if it was a girl. From the time we found out, we gave “it” the nickname “bean”. Nathaniel means “gift from God” little did we know how true this would turn out to be.

At the ultrasound, after what seemed like a very long time waiting outside excited to go in to join Melissa and hear the results, they called me in. When I saw Melissa in tears, I knew something was really wrong. We discovered that there were some major issues. It turns out that our little Nate had no amniotic fluid and no kidneys. Without amniotic fluid, his lungs couldn’t properly form. Among other things, these issues pretty much ensured his eventual death. Even if he made it to full term, he would die within minutes of being born because he wouldn’t be able to breathe and if that didn’t get him somehow, the lack of kidneys wouldn’t help.

Over the next 20 weeks, we had non-stop ultrasounds, meetings with multiple doctors, geneticists, and specialists. At every turn, we were told to terminate the pregnancy, “he’s going to die anyway, why would you choose to keep going through this?” Even our parents on both sides, friends and other family members would suggest the same thing.

In this, there was a lot of room for us to have all these questions we’re asking today.

• Why is this happening to us?
• This isn’t fair, we’re Christians and faithful?
• What did we do wrong to have this happen?

Eventually, Nathaniel went full term and was stillborn. He died at some point during the labour. And our experience with Nathaniel really was an immeasurable gift from God.

We know we can’t have everything be perfect all the time but the amount of pain that comes from a hard situation is real and overwhelming and we want to get some answers on how we’re supposed to deal with it and how to make it go away. So, what do we do when this happens to us? How do we reconcile this? How do we deal with it? Had we turned to Bertrand Russell, how would he respond? Depending on where we turn, we would get different answers, let’s look at a few.

From the lesson on different religions, we’ll take a few examples.

Buddhism:

Life is full of suffering. Suffering comes from selfish desire. Rid yourself of selfish desire by:

• Have correct understanding of your position in the world
• Think the right way
• Have the right speech
• Have the right actions
• Live the right way
• Make the right effort
• Keep your mind right
• Meditate right

Would this answer satisfy you?

I don’t feel much better about my situation now. I get “you can’t do anything about it, this is how the world is, ‘be the change you want to see in the world’ and it will eventually get better” (yes, I know I’m mixing a little Gandhi in with my Buddha). This doesn’t do anything for me to answer my questions. How about for you?

Here are two Atheists responding to such a question:

Suffering happens for a reason, not always understood at the time e.g. the Black Death in the middle ages. As we acquire more (scientific) knowledge of bacterial and viral infection from vermin, for example we find ways to avoid/prevent illness. We can forecast storms, tsunamis, and many other potential catastrophes and avoid them. (Whether we do or not in practice is another matter.) We can treat many medical complaints, and we’re getting closer to being able to predict earthquakes accurately… Of course, there are trivial ways in which suffering can be a punishment: the man who deliberately fails to take his anti-malarial drugs and then catches malaria is being punished for his negligence. The agency, if any, is himself.

 

We have developed pain receptors, negative emotions and other tools with which to involuntarily suffer because suffering brings our attention to the fact that something is wrong. This has always been advantageous to our survival and prosperity. If a lion bites your arm, the pain will alert you and give you a chance to find a weapon with the other arm, or simply run. If your spouse or child is missing or injured, you feel the agony of having failed in your self-appointed responsibility to protect them, whether or not you are really to blame. Family solidarity strengthens. The suffering itself has no purpose, but knowing its source is of use to us. When I suffer I know there’s a reason, but I also know that there’s no ultimate purpose for it, or to rephrase, no reason why I should continue to suffer. My suffering is a symptom of some situation I may be able to change. So I try to change it.

Okay, first off, the lion on my arm and looking for a weapon with the other hand distracted me a little. Aside from that, do you feel this is a good enough answer to quell your pain?

The fact that we have pain receptors is a good explanation on why we experience pain and sure, there is benefit to this but we’re really looking for something to help us understand how we deal with such desperate pain. If there is no purpose to the pain, we should be able to just “stop crying”. “Oh, you’re son died? Get over it, it’s all just part of life”.

There, no you feel better, right?

Would this answer your suffering? It doesn’t for me either. I agree that if we have pain receptors, there must be a reason for it. Situations like Nathaniel are a very personal form of pain and suffering. Maybe it hits home for some of you as well.

God put those pain receptors (physical and emotional) in us for a reason and I see why in the answers below.

Let’s break evil (or pain or suffering) into some different categories to understand the answers better

Some evil comes from our own hand.

Self-Inflicted Evil

I was trying to come up with good examples of this and, unfortunately, needed not look any further than my own life.

I shall not ask “why is God allowing us to lose our house” when I failed to pay a couple mortgage payments and remained behind for over a year.

I shall not wonder “why God allowed my licence to be taken away” when I had thousands of dollars of speeding tickets and points and I couldn’t pay them. (this is almost 2 decades ago, honestly)

I shall not complain that we had to go into bankruptcy when we were spending every penny we had coming in and lived far beyond our means.

I can’t push responsibility to God that I can’t get up for a quiet-time when I’m consistently staying up too late and choosing to hit snooze 7 times.

Here’s an example fortunately not from my life. One that we see happen out there.

If I neglect my kids or my spouse for years and now they don’t want to spend time with me anymore, I can’t say “why is God causing so much pain in my life?”

There are consequences for our choices. Sometimes those consequences seem like they might be from the last category we talk about today but are really from our own actions…

Disasters.

• If you buy a house on a flood plain and disaster comes in the form of, say, a flood, this is a consequence.
  • Did you know there are hundreds of stone markers from over 600 years ago in Japan warning people not to build below the stones in order to protect them from future tsunamis?
• If you live in an area with a massive fault line and then have an earthquake ruin you, God isn’t the one responsible for your pain.
• If you build a trailer park in tornado alley, everyone is going to think God hates trailer parks… it’s just not true.

I think we know this stuff. I believe we’re smart enough to distinguish when suffering is actually coming from our own hands and should not be all “woe is me” when these things happen. We can sometimes bring on the suffering ourselves. Even though we know this, it’s hard to avoid at times.

What’s the point?

There are lessons in those consequences. The bible helps us understand what we can learn in one of my favourite scriptures.

[our earthly fathers] disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share in his holiness.11 No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.

Hebrews 12:10-11 NIV

Holiness means set apart. God is helping us to be set apart as he is. When the Jews didn’t die from illnesses that the neighbouring cultures did in the Old Testament, it was because God shared some life-saving lessons that set them apart. Discipline from God helps us be different.

We make the choice that causes our suffering but understanding God helps it to be a lesson learned.

After the bankruptcy, we don’t act the same way as we used to. Sure I have tendencies towards foolishness and I believe we all do towards our areas of weakness. Hopefully, we gain wisdom and learn from it and decide to make better choices. I think this is another reason why we’re given one another. I’ll get to that in a bit.

We are given freewill and when we have it, we are free to make mistakes that cause ourselves pain.

So, why are we given freewill? It makes sense that freewill should be taken away because of how dangerous it can be. But that tension must remain.

The tension is

• The downside is freewill can be dangerous if people choose poorly
• The upside is freewill can be amazing for all parties involved.

Let’s look at an example.

Why do we want kids? There’s risk in having kids. The kid could grow up to reject you. Freewill also means they could grow up to be the one who goes postal and takes out an entire school. Kids can give us more heartache than almost anything else in this world. I have experienced some of the greatest heartbreak in my life from my kids and also some of the greatest joys.

That’s only possible with freewill.

If we just invented a robot who would do what we want and tell us “I love you”, would we be happy? Would we feel loved? No. There is something so special when our kid comes to us in their own freewill and says “I love you dad”

The whole point is we want someone to give love to and get love back from.

Same with my wife. When she comes to me and loves me even when I’m a doofus, that love is a choice and it means far more than hearing what I want to hear under compulsion.

God created us with freewill for the same reasons. If we were made to love God without any choice in it all, would we really feel that love… or feel his in return? God gave us freewill and that’s the special sauce that makes humanity so awesome. There is power and amazing things that come from us having the choice to seek him or reject him.

This comes with an immense amount of risk too, though.

If someone decides not to follow God or choose not to love him, bad things can happen. This is where we get the next type of evil: Evil committed against one another.

This is where we get the next type of evil: Evil committed against one another.

Evil at the hand of humans

• Property crime
• Personal crime
• Genocide
• Racism
• Terrorism
• Selfishness

These definitely fit into “why is there so much evil in the world” I made these PG and not R rated for the sake of the kids here. You guys can fill in your own levels of evil.

• Someone breaks into your house and steals your stuff.
• The stabbings we hear about in the news occasionally
• Stories like Columbine
• 9/11 and bombings and other terrorist acts.
• And as minor as “guys driving up the shoulder to get way ahead in the line of cars”

This is what happens when we reject God. These are the consequences of a world of people with freewill.

King Solomon reports his understanding as to why all these things happen.

But I did find this: God created people to be virtuous, but they have each turned to follow their own downward path.

Ecclesiastes 7:29 NLT

God made us virtuous and we chose our own path instead – and it wasn’t good.

Jesus summed up his hope to get us back to where God wants us in this statement.

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”

John 13:34 NIV

Imagine what the world would be like if we just got this one command right. We wouldn’t have any of this stuff.

When people love only themselves, there is automatically an effect on others.

You’re in a line of cars and someone drives past you way up to the front and pulls in. Who benefits? Who loses?

Someone flies a plane into a building to make a point, does anyone really benefit?

Contrast that to what the Bible says it should be like:

Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. 4 Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.

You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.

6 Though he was God,
    he did not think of equality with God
    as something to cling to.
7 Instead, he gave up his divine privileges;
    he took the humble position of a slave
    and was born as a human being.
When he appeared in human form,
8     he humbled himself in obedience to God
    and died a criminal’s death on a cross.

Philippians 2:3-8 NLT

Consider others better than yourselves. Jesus, who had every right to demand glory and honour for himself set himself up as a servant. We have been called from the very beginning to love God and Love our neighbour.

…the Lord has told you what is good,
    and this is what he requires of you:
to do what is right, to love mercy,
    and to walk humbly with your God.

Micah 6:8 NLT

 

Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

James 1:27 NLT

When we treat each other this way, we would never get these problems. We have to ask ourselves what are we going to do with the freewill we have been given? Are we going to only look after ourselves or others? Are we going to Love God and serve him or just serve our own needs? We see evil at the hands of humans because we forsake the direction from God and choose our own path.

Let’s look into the last set of evils. They are what I call the “God only knows why”

Evil for God Only Knows Why

This is things like:

• Natural disasters
• Random diseases
• Freak accidents

God created the universe and everything in it. So it can be thought that all this stuff is God’s fault. Like somehow, if it’s not our fault, it must be his.

Sometimes bad things happen. Although they affect us negatively, they’re not, in themselves, bad things.

Let’s follow this for a minute.

In the 70’s Carl Sagan said it would only take two factors for a planet to sustain life.

1. the right kind of sun and
2. the right distance from the sun

After years in technological advancement in astrophysics and government sponsored searches for such planets (SETI), the number of criteria for a planet to sustain life are now well over 200. These factors point to such an infinitesimal chance of another planet sustaining life, apart from God, we shouldn’t be here.

Where I’m going with this is, that in order to have much of what we have here on this blessed planet, we must have over 200 precisely tweaked variables to achieve this fragile balance. We don’t get the weather we have without some big weather happenings occasionally. Every part of what goes on in this world is necessary to maintain the balance that sustains life.

So, as hard as it for us to suffer through some times, there are also good things that come from stuff like Hurricanes. Check this out.

Interestingly, hurricanes may also provide ecological benefits to tropical and sub-tropical environments. Rainfall gives a boost to wetlands and flushes out lagoons, removing waste and weeds. Hurricane winds and waves move sediment from bays into marsh areas, revitalizing nutrient supplies. Fragile coral reefs can also receive benefit from hurricanes during the warm summer months, as the storms’ upwelling of cooler waters help to alleviate thermal stress. In addition, waves and tidal water movements scour some areas, removing macroalgae and exposing the solid limestone structure of the reef, which provides a firm foundation on which corals can settle and grow

I didn’t know this.

We live in a harsh environment that gives us sun and warmth and all that weather we love AND it can also kill us. As unfortunate as it seems, it’s not a bad thing. Death has to happen. Death is a part of life.

Death comes from weather and death can come from random accidents. The new husband to my sister was crushed by a 20-ton beam at work 3 months after their marriage at 19.

It’s hard to make sense of these random things.

Let’s look at disease for a few minutes.

Death can also come from disease. There are some horrible diseases out there. Seemingly random diseases really make us question what God is allowing. What good can come from disease?

Well, in the atheists or Buddhists world, they’re going to work on self-improvement or saying “it’s just part of life, deal with it, learn from it and improve yourself”

Look at the contrast in people who follow the Christian bible.

Let’s look at how they dealt with some of the ugliest diseases and the death all around them.

Instead of fear and despondency, then, the earliest Christians expended themselves in works of mercy that simply dumbfounded the pagans. For them, God loved humanity; in order to love God back, one was to love others. God did not demand ritual sacrifices; he wanted his love expressed on earth in deeds of compassion. The first Christians not only took care of their own, but also reached out far beyond themselves. Their faith led to a pandemic (pan = all; demos = people) of love. Consequently, at the risk of their own lives, they saved an immense number of lives. Their elementary nursing greatly reduced mortality. Simple provisions of food and water allowed the sick that were temporarily too weak to cope for themselves to recover instead of perishing miserably.

Pandemic Love – Charles Moore 2009

This is amazing.

At the risk of their own lives they helped others live. When everyone else was running away, they were running in to help. This is the response God wants from us. Because of this selfless focus, Christians have initiated some of the best things we have over the millennia.

Look at what we have because of the response to God’s love for us found in the scriptures.

The biggest response we can have to suffering and pain in our lives and the lives of others is, rather than turn inward and try to deal with what we’re experiencing on our own, to move towards the tension and recognise it’s an opportunity to be like Jesus and serve others.

The thing is, we get a dose of reality when someone close to us gets sick or dies or experiences tragedy and we get a glimpse of our own mortality and the best response is to seek out answers. Suffering leads us to understand the other person and even if we don’t know how, we can provide help.

We learn compassion when we suffer

All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is our merciful Father and the source of all comfort. 4 He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. 5 For the more we suffer for Christ, the more God will shower us with his comfort through Christ. 6 Even when we are weighed down with troubles, it is for your comfort and salvation! For when we ourselves are comforted, we will certainly comfort you. Then you can patiently endure the same things we suffer. 7 We are confident that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in the comfort God gives us.

2 Corinthians 1:3-7 NLT

We suffer and we see suffering so that we can comfort and understand others. We have the scriptures to search out and understand suffering for our benefit and for the benefit of others. This is the crux of it all. Suffering is there for a reason.

• Sometimes it’s at our own hands,
• Sometimes it’s had the hands of others who are not following the direction God wants for them.
• Sometimes it’s for seemingly random things.

Through it all, we are to

• Draw closer to God and
• Use what we learn to comfort others.

Here is a brief summary on why there is so much evil in the world:

Self-inflicted evil

• So the consequences will train us (Hebrews 12:10-11)

Evil at the hands of other humans

• Because there is freewill and this is a good thing
• God made us to be virtuous but we choose otherwise
  (Ecclesiastes 7:29)

Evil for God only knows why

• So that we can seek comfort in God (2 Corinthians 1:3-7)
• So we can comfort one another (2 Corinthians 1:3-7)

Back to our son Nathaniel for a minute.

When my wife and I went through this, we spent every day pouring through the scriptures try to understand the challenges we were going through. Here are a couple scriptures that really stood out to us.

David begged God to spare the child. He went without food and lay all night on the bare ground. ¹⁷ The elders of his household pleaded with him to get up and eat with them, but he refused.

¹⁸ Then on the seventh day the child died. David’s advisers were afraid to tell him. “He wouldn’t listen to reason while the child was ill,” they said. “What drastic thing will he do when we tell him the child is dead?”

¹⁹ When David saw them whispering, he realized what had happened. “Is the child dead?” he asked.

“Yes,” they replied, “he is dead.”

²⁰ Then David got up from the ground, washed himself, put on lotions,^[b] and changed his clothes. He went to the Tabernacle and worshiped the Lord. After that, he returned to the palace and was served food and ate.

²¹ His advisers were amazed. “We don’t understand you,” they told him. “While the child was still living, you wept and refused to eat. But now that the child is dead, you have stopped your mourning and are eating again.”

²² David replied, “I fasted and wept while the child was alive, for I said, ‘Perhaps the Lord will be gracious to me and let the child live.’ ²³ But why should I fast when he is dead? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him one day, but he cannot return to me.”

1 Samuel 12:16-23 (NLT)

David did all he could to try to compel God to change his mind and save the child. After seven days of trying, it wasn’t to be so he got up, washed, ate and went on with his life.

Our joy in the face of great challenge was because of this level of surrender. We prayed and fasted and wept to try to save our son’s life and yet, we were surrendered to the outcome. Our thoughts were “we know God can save him and we hope he does but even if he doesn’t, we’re okay with it.” Also, why would we terminate when we don’t even know the answer yet?

Like the advisers in David’s life, the people in our lives didn’t understand. They were asking how we could be so joyful so “okay with it all?”

While David’s suffering with his child born with Bathsheba was because of his sin, ours wasn’t necessarily from something we did wrong. I don’t believe we were being punished. Another scripture that helped us was this:

As Jesus was walking along, he saw a man who had been blind from birth.² “Rabbi,” his disciples asked him, “why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents’ sins?”

³ “It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins,” Jesus answered. “This happened so the power of God could be seen in him.

John 9:1-3

Not all negative events are because of our sin. It’s easy to beat ourselves up because we think we deserve the negative things that happen to us. As it states here, Jesus says it’s “so the power of God could be seen in him”.

One of the most amazing things that happened through our time with Nathaniel is how much the church in Vancouver was moved. Their faith was built as ours was. They rallied around us and we saw the power of God at work. There were many more amazing things than negative things that happened because of Nathaniel.

When we were comforted by God, we were able to comfort others (2 Corinthians above). And, have had the opportunity to do so since, as well.

There is a spiritual battle going on. He wants us to work together for the benefit of each other and to point each other to him.

God is not evil nor does he desire evil in our lives. Satan wanted to be God and was kicked out of heaven. We wanted to be like God and chose to eat the fruit and get kicked out of the garden. Since then, God has been doing everything he can to reconcile us. To win us back to him… To the point of sending his own son to die in our place.

We weren’t every promised an easy life, a pain free life. We may not feel as bad as those other people should feel but we know, we know we’ve done stuff that deserves consequences. What we were promised is the CHOICE to have a relationship with God through his son Jesus.

On that note, pain doesn’t ever seem fair.

But think about this for a minute.

Could you watch your only son be tried with lies, falsely accused, tortured, spit upon and mocked and eventually killed in the most humiliating way and just let it happen?

God did.

If God sat by and let his own son go through this level of pain, what do you think we really should expect. There is a HUGE story going on outside of what we see. He let his son suffer the most so we can see how important it is to get to through this life with our relationship with God intact. He wants us and desires us all to get to heaven where there is no suffering, no pain, no evil and no tears. I believe all the pain and suffering we get here are being used to point us back to him.

Job experienced major suffering and loss. It wasn’t God who wanted this for Job, it was Satan. He wanted to take Job out and believed if he could ruin him, Job would curse God and become Satan’s. Satan is like a sore loser in the school yard. He can’t win so he wants to ensure everyone else loses with him and he makes everyone’s life miserable to try to make them fail. God wants us to win, he wants us to be with him. He will put whatever he needs to in front of you to get you to move to him.

We just choose the response to the things that happen. Do we turn to him to search out meaning or do we turn into ourselves and try to comfort ourselves?

• Self-medicate
• Seek out pleasure
• Keep ourselves busy

God is asking

• “Do you trust me when you lose your job?”
• “Do you seek me when you are in pain?”

Without God, there is no purpose. Without God, we have no good answers to why there is so much pain in the world. In the scriptures and in God, there are answers. There is comfort. Give up whatever you need to. Do whatever it takes to get a relationship with God through Jesus. Then you will start to understand how and why everything is like it is.

Give up whatever you need to. Do whatever it takes to get a relationship with God through Jesus. Then you will start to understand how and why everything is like it is.

To God be the glory.

 

What have you done to deal with the evil or suffering experiences in your life?

Do All Religions Lead To the Same Place?

When it comes to religion, there seem to be more questions than answers. I get it. I’ve been there and I’m still always asking. The difference is, I now have answers to some of my biggest questions… the important ones at least.

If you’re a curious person and like to get to the bottom of that big ol’ question “why”… Keep reading.

This is a sermon I preached last month and the response was good so I figured I’d attempt adapting it for my blog. I’ll apologize in advance because the paragraph structure might be a little poor at times. Since this was spoken, it translates a little different in written text.

Over the Month of March, a few of us tackled the top 5 questions teens are asking today.

1. Do All Religions Lead to the Same Place?
2. Can We Trust the Bible?
3. Are Science and Christianity Enemies?
4. Why is there so Much Evil in the World?
5. Was Jesus Really God?

It’s good to be curious and ask lots of questions. These 5 questions are good ones and many religious people fear others asking questions like this. We embrace it. Don’t buy into someone who says “because that’s always the way we do it here” or “because I said so”. Anything great has come from people asking “hmmm, I wonder…”. Especially about our own convictions.

So…

Why are we here? (Not here, as in front of a computer, but here on earth) What is the purpose of our lives? What does it all mean? These are big questions and this article is the start of some of the answers.

Although philosophy, Science, and religion all try to answer these questions, we’re going to focus on religion today. First, let’s look at some definitions of religion:

Def.1. Religion is an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence.

Def.2. Religion is a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature and purpose of the universe.

When we are talking about religion, there is a ton of debate. In fact, I would say there is little that can stir up more trouble than talking about religion. Heck, even discussing religion in a group that all believe the same thing can get heated.

Why is that?

Religion is emotional. Religion is very personal. Religion is not typically black and white. There are a lot of gray areas, so a lot of room for opinions.

Extra research and experience has been put in before this article so please feel free to connect with me afterward to dig in. Also, there is so much material on this, I cannot possibly cover it all today and I’m just touching on some of the basics.

When people ask “Do all religions lead to the same place?”, they usually mean “ending up in heaven or paradise”. That being said, you could also include enlightenment as the place in which to end up. So, it’s valid to include everyone and all religions in this question.

This question comes up in different forms too:

• “Every religion is based on the same fundamentals, right?”
• “Do good and get good. And do bad and get bad, right?”
• “Every religion has a ‘do to others as you would have them do to you’, right?“

This last reference is found in the bible in Matthew 7. Interestingly enough, many religions have this in their teachings. Take a look:

• Christianity: do to others what you would have them do to you.
  – Matthew 7:12
• Confucianism: Do not do to others what you would not like yourself. Then there will be no resentment against you, either in the family or in the state.
  – Analects 12:2
• Buddhism: Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.
  – Udana-Varga 5,1
• Hinduism: This is the sum of duty; do naught onto others what you would not have them do unto you.
  – Mahabharata 5,1517
• Islam: No one of you is a believer until he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself.
  – Sunnah
• Judaism: What is hateful to you, do not do to your fellowman. This is the entire Law; all the rest is commentary.
  – Talmud, Shabbat 3id
• Taoism: Regard your neighbor’s gain as your gain and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss.
  – Tai Shang Kan Yin P’ien
• Zoroastrianism: That nature alone is good which refrains from doing another whatsoever is not good for itself.
  – Dadisten-I-dinik, 94,5

This is just one example of how all religions seem to point to the same place. Although they seem to teach the same things, when you look deeper, there are much bigger differences. We’ll get to that.

Here’s another way people view religions.

• I live a good life, I don’t hurt anyone, I pay my taxes, I’m a good citizen,
• Sure, I’ve done some bad things in my life, haven’t we all?

I learned an interesting phrase this week for something I’ve noticed before. The Fundamental Attribution Error. We judge others by their results and we judge ourselves on intent.

Let me ask you a question to prove my point. What do you think when someone is late? “Man, that person doesn’t care about me”, “they’re so selfish”. We all want to believe we’re thinking “Man, I hope they weren’t hit by a bus”. Maybe we do after a minute of ranting.

When we’re late our response is “hey, I tried super hard to get here on time”. We believe the other person did this intentionally and when we do it, we were intending the best outcome.

We do this when it comes to religion too. We say “that other guy really isn’t a nice guy, he probably won’t get to heaven”. With us, we say, “my intentions are good, surely that’s good enough”. 

What people really want to know is “can I live life the way I want to, and still get to heaven?” Or, “how good do I actually need to be to get to heaven?”. How about this one. “Surely a loving God won’t punish everyone for trying their best to do good and falling short.”

It’s very easy to see the bulk of religious and philosophical teachings out there and wash over it with a broad brush and think everything is roughly the same. Like that do onto others piece and that each religion just expects roughly the same things from us. What we really need to do is to get above our view of things and understand the bigger picture.

The thing is, we get into these questions because we know there are things we’ve done wrong and no matter what we do, we can’t seem to shake them. We want to know that we’re doing okay by the rules. The truth is, we can’t even hold to our own standards. Want proof again? Who’s ever cheated on a diet? This comes from believing that we are reliant on our own actions to get us to where we want to go. That’s not completely true. More on that in a bit.

Back to answering the question.

I was talking to someone the other day at work about this subject and her mom changed religions because one served her needs better than the other when she was sick. This is a prime example of looking at things from our human level only. We see someone do a better job of serving and we just assume that person is better or closer to God because of it.

Again with the fundamental attribution error.

My friend continued “about your question, do you believe they all lead to the same place?”

Here is the answer to the question:

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. 7 If you had really known me, you would know who my Father is. From now on, you do know him and have seen him!”

John 14:6-7 NLT (emphasis added)

The Author John, an eyewitness who walked with Jesus and one of the key players in why we have the bible today, is quoting Jesus here. This is a bold statement. He’s saying “if you have seen me, you have seen the father” He’s talking about God. Right here though, he actually answers our question. Don’t all religions lead to the same place? NO! (to be cheeky, I suppose they all do, aside from one). This sounds frightfully exclusive. Believe it or not, there is nothing more INCLUSIVE. I’ll get there in a bit, though.

You might be looking at this and thinking, “well, I’m really not all that sure I even believe in Jesus.” “Where does that leave me?” And “who does he think he is, God?” Yes…

Let’s back up a little first. We are here talking about “religions” so let’s go into detail for a few minutes. I’ve had a colourful life. I’ve been through a lot of stuff I wouldn’t even wish on those who don’t like me. Last weekend was my 20^th birthday as a disciple of Jesus and this is my greatest “accomplishment.” I wasn’t always committed to God, in fact, I ran the other way for years. See, I grew up with some intrinsic faith and believed in God, I’d say, naturally.

I didn’t go to church growing up, although, I remember my grandma taking me to a catholic play group that was led by what I used to call “penguins”. Maybe that’s where I got the idea of faith. That being said, I believe this:

Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart,

Ecclesiastes 3:11a NLT (emphasis added)

This is written by King Solomon, historically regarded as the wisest man who ever lived. Other kings from around the world would come visit him to gain wisdom. I don’t have to tell you this though, we know this. We have an inkling of something more than what we see here in this life. We are curious that there is more out there. Religion has been around as long as we have. We have a fundamental belief in something more than just what we see. We’re born with that innate sense of something more. But, Religion doesn’t leave

However, religion doesn’t leave man because of he grew up. It’s not something like Cinderella that was a great story when we were young and we’ve now matured and don’t believe any more. No! It’s the experiences we have with it that make our faith what it is today. Events happen that rock someone’s world or change the way they see religion and they choose differently based on that. Or, the world beats it out of them by everyone’s lack of faith around them.

Let’s look at a Case study: ME

After a bad church experience as a pre-teen, I got turned off the whole religion thing and got into much worse. Previous to the last 20 years, I’ve studied through and lived out:

• Satanism
• Wicca
• Buddhism
• New age, Psychic arts and tarot
• Agnosticism
• Atheism and, ultimately,
• Christianity

I could have stayed in Christianity from the beginning if I saw a different example. Maybe you’ve had a similar experience. Maybe this is where you are. Maybe you’re feeling that there is no way there could be a God because of what you’ve experienced. (This other article details more about this)

There is a whole new group of people best-called Anti-Theists. These people are not out to argue whether there is a God or not, they are out to destroy religion. In reading one of the highest regarded Anti-Theists, Richard Dawkins, it’s evident to me he’s had a major event or several in his life that turned him off religion. If we had better examples of what religion is supposed to be, we wouldn’t have as many divisions as we do. For me, I had to get out of what I experienced, put my bias on a shelf and really commit to finding some answers.

So let’s talk a little about what I’ve discovered for a minute or two.

I want to make the case for believing what Jesus said when he sounded so exclusive when saying “I am the way the truth and the life.”

“No one comes to the Father except through me” – Jesus

This illustration really describes what he’s trying to say. All religions will get you so far. Only passing through Jesus will get you to God. Obviously, this is a big claim so, let’s dig in.

Pagan and Theistic Religions

I’ve chosen to distinguish between mostly humanistic or philosophical and mostly theistic (believe in a super-being or an invisible God). The big three on the theistic side are: Christianity, Islam and Hinduism. These three make up over 5 Billion people.

Let’s have a little qualifier here. Hinduism is not fully a theistic, homogeneous, organized system. Many Hindus are devoted followers of Shiva or Vishnu, whom they regard as the only true God, while others look inward to the divine Self (Atman). But most recognize the existence of Brahman, the unifying principle and Supreme Reality behind all that is.

Still, I grouped this in with theistic religions.

Although the size of the words do illustrate comparative size, the two sides don’t relate. Atheism with 1.1 billion, Buddhism with 360 million and Chinese religion at 394 million PLUS all the rest of the non-theistic religions don’t even total half the big three.

Here in Edmonton, we’re likely to run more into other Christians, Muslims (Islam), Atheists, Anti-Theists and Pagans (believe in natural spirits such as aboriginal religions). We’re going to just get away from all the humanistic religions because we’re trying to get to heaven. We understand they likely won’t get us there.

If we are truly trying to get to heaven, the humanistic religions won’t get us there. If you look at this well-researched website, you can see many of the world religions and philosophies and what they believe in.

For the theistic religions, let’s review them quickly.

Hinduism, Hare Krishna, Taoism, Baha’I and many others shown here believe in enlightenment and reincarnation. I don’t know about you but I don’t particularly want to come back here once I leave. I just want to settle into eternity and stay there. (That last link will allow you to go into more detail than I can here)

The graphic above shows we need Jesus to get to God. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Mormonism, Jehovah’s witnesses and Seventh Day Adventists all believe in and have Jesus as part of their central message. I chose to narrow down the field to those that have regard for Jesus because he is a real and tangible man and he is the focus of our study today. Each of these believe Jesus was a real man and he walked the Earth and died on a cross at the hands of the Romans and Israelites. There is more than sufficient evidence to believe Jesus lived, died and was resurrected. This isn’t the subject of our talk today. For more information on this, see the resource PDF attached.

Judaism, Islam, Mormonism and Jehovah’s Witnesses see Jesus as a prophet and some see him as the son of God. None of them see Jesus as God in the flesh. Judaism and Islam do not see Jesus as the Saviour, Messiah, Christ (all mean the same thing in English, Hebrew and Greek respectively)

Only Christianity and Seventh Day Adventists believe in the Trinity and that Jesus is God in the flesh. This is very important as we get to the heart of the matter. Because, in order to fully buy into Jesus saying he is the way and if you have seen him, you have seen the father, we need to believe Jesus is God.

Just to narrow it down as much as possible. Let’s discuss the Seventh Day group for a second. Seventh Day Adventists believe in maintaining the Sabbath as holy. While many of the other Old Testament laws have been “renewed”, they see this one as still in place and therefore they have church on Saturday, the seventh day. There are a number of other differences, but that’s where their name comes from.

The Holy Bible is the most complete and best place to see what we need to know about Jesus. Looking at this scripture again, we need to answer one vital question: Was Jesus who he said he was or was he a nut-bar or lying? Turns out, if the guy predicts his own death and resurrection and pulls it off, we should all be following him.

The scary thing is, when he was here, he spent an uncomfortable amount of time raising the bar to crazy standards. We talked about “what if I just live a good life?” Let’s take a look at some of severe, bar-raising examples.

 “But I warn you—unless your righteousness is better than the righteousness of the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees, you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven!

Matthew 5:20 NLT

Jesus is talking to mostly Jews, those who grew up understanding it was important to obey and live out the God of the Jew’s commands. The Pharisees were the most religious of all religious people. If you were doing everything perfect, you might be considered to place membership as a Pharisee. Jesus says, that unless our righteousness (living for God) was even greater than them, we can never enter. Yikes! What about just avoiding getting speeding tickets.

How about this:

You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’ 22 But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell.

Matthew 5:21-22 NLT (emphasis added)

Okay, we know murder isn’t a good thing. Now Jesus is saying “if you are angry with someone”, “if you call someone an idiot”, “if you curse someone, you are in danger of hell”? WHAT? Are you guilty of any of these? Yep, me too.

“You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ 28 But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Matthew 5:21-22 NLT (emphasis added)

Our society can be messed up but we still understand Adultery isn’t going to get you closer to heaven. Jesus says “if you even look at a woman lustfully.” Isn’t this just common practice?

When you look at all these things, it’s obvious that Jesus set a standard too high for us to achieve. There are rules and then Jesus takes these rules to a new high. He does this for a reason though. All religions tend towards rules. We like rules because we can judge how we’re doing by them. It’s like a check-list. Did I have my quiet time, check. Was I nice when I didn’t want to be, check. Did I avoid that prideful feeling in my heart? Nope. DARN. Well, I guess I’ll have to do better tomorrow. We like these checklists because we can measure ourselves. Jesus comes in and

• Did I have my quiet time, check.
• Was I nice when I didn’t want to be, check.
• Did I avoid that prideful feeling in my heart?

Nope. DARN. Well, I guess I’ll have to do better tomorrow. We like these checklists because we can measure ourselves. Jesus comes in and tell us we’re never going to get the check list good enough.

This is maddening! Does that really mean we’re all doomed?

YES.

The whole point of Jesus going there with all of this is he’s making the point that we’re all doomed. If you thought you might be okay, after listening to Jesus, you get the idea you’re not. You’re not. And, you can’t be.

I know, this isn’t sounding like one of those gospel messages, But wait, it gets better. Much better. This is really, really, REALLY good news.

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. 7 If you had really known me, you would know who my Father is. From now on, you do know him and have seen him!”

John 14:6-7 NLT

This is the point. Jesus died for our sins! He picked them up and carried them away when he died on the cross.

• All that stuff you feel guilty about
• All those missed check-boxes
• All that stuff you can’t get out of your heart
• All those new levels of righteousness Jesus was talking about

Jesus just wanted to make sure everyone of us would sit back and go “I can’t get there”. He wanted us to be broken. If we don’t think we need a saviour, we won’t turn to Jesus.

Check out what Paul said just a few years after Jesus’ death.

For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. 24 Yet God freely and graciously declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. 25 For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood.

Romans 3:23-25 NLT (emphasis added)

We know this. We have all done things we’re ashamed of. We try to bury them and they just keep rearing their ugly head. Well, God sent Jesus to die in our place. And he took at that crud with him.

You see, all religions give you ways to deal with your sin, your guilt, your shame. Often they are rules, or penance, or processes. Here are some examples:

• but they should also offer interior acts of penance, works of virtue, sacrifices, inconveniences, and all the pains and hardships under which we labor.
  – Catholicism.
• Ramadan is coming and you’ll have plenty of time to earn good deeds, get your rank raised and your sins forgiven.
  – Islam.
• Learn from those actions and promise to try not to repeat them.
  – Psychology
• Humbly apologize for all the mistakes you have been doing. Do it emotionally and not by mechanical recitation of some dialogues or mantras.
  – Hinduism

In Contrast, here is what Jesus says.

Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”

Matthew 11:28-29 NLT

Christianity is the only religion that states “I am the way”. All others state ways for you to fix it. Christianity states Jesus is the way.

You see, God doesn’t want something from you, he wants something for you. He gave us his only son as a ransom for our foolishness, our sin.

All other religions give you prescriptions, Christianity gives you the cure.

Do all religions lead to the same place? Except one, yes… NOT to God.

Maybe this is the first time you’ve heard of something like this. Maybe you’ve heard this and are a great believer. Maybe you’re like I used to be and aren’t sure of anything and are searching for some answers. Hopefully this created some curiosity and some hope.

My encouragement to you is to look into this yourself. I can’t convince you of all these answers in one article. You have to study it out yourself.

For me, I walked away from faith in God. At that time, I would never come back. It wasn’t until I really wanted to know the truth that I dug in to really seek answers. It’s up to you now to go and scrutinize and be willing to put your doubts and set mind aside to ask more questions.

Don’t leave here without committing to find out more. This is free and it’s available to everyone. Here, there, everywhere. All colours, all races, all religions, all of you.

Why is it a choice – Christian Music or Good Music?

Photo by David Lenker

A while ago, I read a great interview with Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins where he says the next frontier of Rock Music is God. This is a relatively uncharted area – unless decidedly anti-God.

I would love to see more great music focused on God and Jesus. There are very few songs that play on Christian Radio Stations that I would consider good to listen to. I’d rather hear “How Great Thou Art” sung at my church (which is amazing by the way) than listen to anything modern in the Christian music genre. Technically, I’d probably rather be poked with sharp sticks than listen to music in the Christian genre (rock, pop, metal, anything).

My impression is that a Christian band starts because they love God and love music. They write and record some music and present it to their favourite radio station who is honest with them and says “uh, not very good. Sorry”. Then, as they field their music around, lo and behold, the only station that will play them is the Christian station because they need more content and are okay with the mediocrity. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure they’re playing with all their hearts and are sincere in their words but, like how American Idol really needs to shut the door on some very sincere and non-talented people, some of these songs shouldn’t be aired.

In my mind, we want to do everything to glorify God. In my love of music, songs that are powerful and well written and are sometimes gut-wrenching do more to inspire my thoughts towards God.

There is a local band here in Edmonton called Zerbin and their songs are really good. Now that I know they’re Christian focused, the lyrics make more sense and make me think more about God. You can have a Christian focus and not make it preachy. I’m not saying you should hide the worship of God subtly in the lyrics, just make better music that can make it on (for me) the rock or alternative stations – that’s a hard task in part because of the station and their listeners attitude of “la la la I don’t want to hear about God”, but it can be done. Isn’t this a great way to convert the masses?

Again, I’m not down on someone getting out and making music that makes them think of God. Nor of a radio station being devoted to playing Christian music, I just want more talented music that doesn’t make me think God is being done a disservice by hearing this.

Many of my friends who are committed disciples of Christ don’t want to be preached at and yet love singing songs of worship and still adore hard music that some would think blasphemous. Ironically, I can get more out of Johnny Cash singing Trent Reznor’s (NIN) HURT than I can out of any Christian pop song I’ve heard to date – he sings of real pain in that song.

Look at the psalms, many originally were songs. They are dark and raw and some are praising. They are about the real struggles that go on in a person’s life. Gut-wrenching and real.

Below is a list of music that draws me closer to God. Only a few are by Christian artists and some aren’t even focused on God but they make me think of the battle we’re in or lifting my eyes to God.

Two of the songs on the list come from everyone’s favourite spiritual guy – Ozzy Osbourne (haha). Check out some of the lyrics to After Forever from their 1971 release – Master of Reality:

…

Could it be you’re afraid of what your friends might say
If they knew you believe in God above?
They should realize before they criticize
that God is the only way to love

Is your mind so small that you have to fall
In with the pack wherever they run
Will you still sneer when death is near
And say they may as well worship the sun?

I think it was true it was people like you that crucified Christ
I think it is sad the opinion you had was the only one voiced
Will you be so sure when your day is near, say you don’t believe?
You had the chance but you turned it down, now you can’t retrieve

Perhaps you’ll think before you say that God is dead and gone
Open your eyes, just realize that he’s the one
The only one who can save you now from all this sin and hate
Or will you still jeer at all you hear? Yes! I think it’s too late.

I love this. Now, go listen to the song and see if religious people everywhere don’t go running to cover their kids ears.

There’s obviously a place for Christian music stations and I also fear for religiousness blinding the truth of the sincere worship regardless of where the music is played.

Here are some from my list:

• Allman Brothers – Blue Sky
• Black Sabbath – After Forever
• Black Sabbath – Lord of This World
• Bobby Darin – More
• Carolina Liar – Show Me What I’m Looking For
• Classified – Inner Ninja
• Everclear – Wonderful
• Hoobastank – The Reason
• JJ Grey & Mofro – The Sun is Shining Down
• Johnny Cash – Hurt
• Matisyahu – King Without a Crown
• Needtobreathe – Oohs and Ahhs
• Needtobreathe – Feet, Don’t Fail Me Now
• Rancid – Fall Back Down
• Rhema Soul – Off the Edge
• Stabilo – Flawed Design
• Supertramp – Even in the Quietest Moments
• Switchfoot – Bullet Soul
• Zerbin – New Earth

Might you suggest more?

Are you a Cat or a Dog?

I saw a funny Facebook post the other day. It read:

The Difference Between Cats and Dogs

The dog looks at you and thinks to himself,
“You feed me, you shelter me, you love me.
YOU must be GOD!”

The cat looks at you and thinks to himself,
“You feed me, you shelter me, you love me.
I must be GOD!”

I thought it truly demonstrated the different ways I’ve been in my relationship with God. We can come from a space of gratitude or entitlement. The difference between God as a genie in our life and God as Lord of All who provided everything for our good.

The funny thing is, I can, at times, be one or the other. I’ll swing from entitlement to gratitude. I find, in order to get the attitude of gratitude, I need time with God. Meditating on his word, his promises and his amazing sovereignty.

When things are good, I’m definitely the dog. I just need to keep the discipline of spending time with God each and every day.

I knew I was more of a dog person. How ’bout you?

Fertilizer Makes Things Grow: A Lesson from Job

This is a guest post. This is one of my favourite posts by my wife. Originally posted in 2011 by Melissa. Her take on some of the challenges we were going through at the time. Please read and enjoy. You can see her blog here

Why do you complain to him that he answers none of man’s words? For God does speak – now one way, now another – though man may not perceive it. -Job 33:13-14

[Apologies up front for the length…what started as a short summary of ideas gleaned from my current Bible study has turned into something akin to a PhD-worthy paper.]

I am not a gardener. I will never be a gardener. I joke about having a black thumb instead of a green one because, in my house, the ratio of plants that die to those that thrive is very, very large (or small…I don’t know which it is, statistics is not my thing). But even in my lack of expertise I know that if you want a plant to grow to it’s full potential it needs fertilizer. Something that brings much needed minerals and nutrients to those leafy greens and makes them leafier and greenier than they ever would become if left on their own. We see it all over – this is something I’m sure our farming ancestors figured out by observing nature. Which plants grew the most? The ones in the forest that were blanketed yearly with dead, decomposing leaves. Or the rich thicket of weeds that grew on dung heaps which had composted over time and become one with the soil.

Now how pleasant is fertilizer? Not very. How could it be? It is made out of manure – feces, excrement, crap (to be base) – or made out of dead and decomposing produce and/or foliage. Mmmmm, appetizing. NOT. It’s stinky and smelly and odorous, yet we put up with it because it produces a bigger, better, healthier version of whatever it is we are cultivating.

So…Why do we hate it so much when fertilizer when it is dumped on our life?

Huh? What? Yeah I hear the “what is she talking about” thought in your head. Let me explain…what do we spend most of our emotional energy on? All the annoyances we deal with day to day. The things in our lives that stink, frustrate, anger or tire us. All the “bad stuff” we would rather not deal with thank-you-very-much. Troubles come in many different sizes, shapes, textures and fragrances. It may be tangible to others, or maybe not. It could be related to many different things: health (physical, emotional, mental), relationships, finances, family, job or career…the list is endless. But why is it there? Are we being punished for something? Why do bad things happen in the world? Why do bad things happen to ME? [Warning: I’m about to tangent, but hang in there, there is a point, I promise!]

American humorist Erma Bombeck wrote a book entitled If Life Is A Bowl of Cherries What Am I Doing In The Pits? It’s a pretty funny book, and an appropriate analogy to how we feel a lot of times going through life. If life is supposed to be so wonderful, then why do I feel like I’m down here wading through all this garbage, the spat out remnants of something other people were able to savour and enjoy? [Well isn’t that funny…in order to get rid of the red squiggly you-spelled-it-wrong line under “savour” I had to switch my spell-check dictionary from English (United States) to English (Australia). I’m on the other side of the globe from Australia! Anything to keep the “u” in colour, flavour and favourite I guess. haha. But I digress…] My point is, most of the time the majority of us feel like we’ve ended up with the short end of the stick, having to deal with crap that we don’t deserve. In my opinion, the minority who sail through life claiming to be trouble-free are either delusional, extremely shallow conflict avoiders or are just flat out lying to themselves. Some of the crap in our life we will acknowledge as brought upon ourselves due to poor decisions or planning, but for the most part we think “what did I ever do to deserve this?”.

How on earth does this relate to Job??? The book of Job, from what I’ve gleaned, is all about looking at the big picture. Here was a man who had everything taken away from him: his kids were killed, his business was ruined, his health deteriorated quickly, he was shunned by family & friends & society, and his wife thought he was nuts! Murphy’s Law’s perfect storm.Everything went wrong. The biggest pile of manure ever was dumped on this man in the course of a couple days. (Job 1:13-2:10) Talk about holy crap!

But why did this happen? What on earth did Job do to deserve that?

As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds are taken in a snare, so men are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them. -Ecclesiastes 9:12

Just. Like. Job. So what do we do? How are we supposed to deal?

Yes, the crap that is dumped upon us, especially because of someone else’s foolish, malevolent actions, is heartbreaking. I would never ever, ever, wish it upon anyone. But the fact of the matter is crappy things happen. Three things in life are inevitable: death, taxes and crap. It’s unavoidable. And just like the first two things on that list, anyone who goes after, searches out and makes trouble for themselves is insane! In my opinion, anyway.

OK, back to Job… Here is a man who was blameless and upright in God’s eyes, who had the world’s largest pile of manure spread over his whole life. But why? First, God was trying to make a point to Satan, to prove that Job feared him [God] because God is God, and not because God had protected Job and made his life comfortable (Job 1:8-11). Second, and this is where my point comes in, I propose that God chose Job so that a) Job would grow in his understanding of God and b) he [Job] could be an example for others to learn from.

If Job was considered by God to be blameless and upright (Job1:8) I’m sure we can safely assume that he worshiped God with all his heart, that he was kind to others and treated them with respect, and that he was diligent in observing the Jewish Law (or whatever was required at the time; the dating of the book of Job is usually put at around the time of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, so before God gave his people the Law through Moses.) Either way, whatever Job was doing, he was doing right in God’s eyes, therefore we can assume that others would have considered him a “good” person. I’m sure Job was fairly confident that he knew and understood God.

Throughout the book, Job’s consistent plea is for God to explain to him what he did to deserve this punishment. He did not understand where these troubles were coming from because, as far as he knew, he went over and above in his devotion to God. At the end of his rant Job finally accuses God of being unjust. Yikes. God himself weighs in at this point and blasts Job assuming that he understood what makes God tick.

Job was humbled and repented. Because he changed and humbled his heart before God, God blessed him with more than he ever had before all this manure happened. (Job 42:12-17)

Do you think Job was excited to go through all that crap? Yeah, I doubt it. BUT, considering the results, did it improve his life in the long run? Yeah, it did. I think about plants in a garden and wonder, if they had conscious thought, would they be super fired-up to have a heap-load of manure dumped on them? It stinks! But in the end that fertilizer causes them to flourish to their full potential.

Remember those cherry pits Erma Bombeck wrote about? Well what do you think gives a cherry its foundation? That’s right – the PIT. A cherry cannot exist without a pit. So maybe pits, which we conventionally view as only good for composting (which, not so ironically, is used as fertilizer) aren’t all that bad after all. Starting to catch my drift?

We will always feel and need to deal with the manure that comes as the consequence of our own foolish decisions, but what about the manure dumped upon us because of someone else’s actions, or plain rotten luck? (See there? “Rotten” luck? What are rotten things good for again? More composting!) Maybe, just maybe, the crap we go through in our life has been allowed for a reason. God knows our full potential and he wants to help us reach it, and means reaching him. God may not restore our health, finances, worldly possessions, relationships or whatever it is we’ve lost, but when we change our perspective and look for the lesson to be learned and embrace it, our joy, peace, happiness and our ability to deal flourishes.

So…my point? After reading through what I’ve rambled on about, I’m realizing there are two parts: 1) Crap = manure = fertilizer = an opportunity to grow and reach our full potential, but 2) in order to make use of the fertilizer in our lives we need to get our eyes off the tree of today that we see from our worldly human perspective, humble ourselves and try to glimpse the forest of our life that God sees and take advantage of the opportunity to grow and draw closer to God.

No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. -Hebrews 12:11

Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. -2 Corinthians 7:10 (7:8-11)

He is wooing you from the jaws of distress to a spacious place free from restrictions, to the comfort of your table laden with choice food. -Job 36:16

I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil – this is the gift of God. -Ecclesiastes 3:12-13

There is something else meaningless that occurs on earth: righteous men who get what the wicked deserve, and wicked men who get what the righteous deserve. This too, I say, is meaningless. So I commend the enjoyment of life, because nothing is better for a man under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany him in his work all the days of the life God has given him under the sun. -Ecclesiastes 8:14-15

Love Always Trusts

This is a guest post. Originally posted in May 2011 by my wife, Melissa. Her thoughts are an excellent example of the great discussions we have. Please read and enjoy. You can see her blog here

Every couple weeks a group of us married women get together for fellowship, to encourage one another and to share what we are learning in our bible study & walk with God. We take turns planning the lesson and this past week it was mine. It occurred to me that in our particular group, I am the oldest (though not by much lol) and have also been married the longest, so I took upon myself the charge in Titus 2 for the older women to “urge the younger women to love their husbands and children”.

My husband and I have been through quite a cornucopia of challenges in the 12 years we’ve been married, from the typical “you left the lid off the toothpaste AGAIN” spats to serious relationship stressors such as (but not limited too) job loss, serious illness, major behavioural challenges with kids, failed business ventures & bankruptcy, and the loss of a child. So yeah, you can say we’ve been through the grinder. Surprisingly, each of these challenges, while bringing temporary and minor setbacks in our marriage, have only proven to strengthen our relationship not only with each other, but with God. I have pondered many times why we get through these tough times with renewed faith and peace of mind while other couples fall apart at the mere sight of the lid left 6 inches away from the toothpaste tube. The conclusion I came to is the aspect of love that is probably the hardest to commit to: trust.

1 Corinthians 13:7 has been on my mind lately:

It [love] always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

The concept of “love always trusts” has been at the forefront of these thoughts, especially as applied to parenting and to the calling we have as a wife. It’s been so in my face that I figured the Holy Spirit is trying to tell me something so I decided to dig in and see what the bible has to say on the subject. I started this study focused purely on what it means to trust God in my parenting and as a wife to my amazing husband. While digging, tangents, as these things do, cropped up, trying to lead me astray and turn a 10 minute devotional into a full-fledged 45 minute sermon. I managed to pare this blog back down to the original focus, but be warned that there is now much fodder for future blogs rolling around in my mind 😉

OK. Back to the focus… Love always trusts. We say we love God, but do we trust him, especially with our kids and in our roll as wives? What is trust anyways? From dictionary.com:

TRUST

noun

• reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing; confidence
• confident expectation of something; hope

verb

• to have trust or confidence in; rely or depend on
• to believe
• to expect confidently; hope

[As a side note, I was surprised at how closely this definition resembles Hebrews 11:1.]

It is all over Proverbs and Psalms that we are not to put our trust in other human beings (Psalm 118:8). Even those closest to us will disappoint and hurt us (Micah 7:5). But does that mean we shut down or shut others out and keep away from everybody? Most definitely not. There is a difference between trusting someone and trusting IN someone. The only one we should trust IN is God. We are called to love one another as Jesus has loved us (John 13:34). Since love always trusts, we are called to trust one another as Jesus has trusted us. In my opinion (obviously, as this is my blog) what he trusts about us is our desires to obey God and to do what is right. He knows that we will bumble along, fall and fail, but he trusts that we will get up and keep trying. This is the same trust that we need to have with each other. But more importantly, Jesus trusts that God is in complete control. You know what’s cool? God will always be there for us when we trust him.

For in Scripture it says; “See I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” –1 Peter 2:6

The quote in that verse is from Isaiah 28:16

So this is what the Sovereign LORD says: “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation; the one who relies on it will never be stricken with panic.”

Have you ever been stricken with panic? I have, especially when something happens to my kids. Last summer my then 4 year old daughter was bugging me to go on a bike ride. I was busy working and kept putting off her request again and again. About an hour after her last plea I realized the house was too quiet. Yep, you guessed it. Being the independent, self-confident and very social little lady that she is, she took matters into her own hands and went for a bike ride on her own. PANIC!!! It really was a fight not to panic, as I enlisted my then 8 year old son to get on his bike and search the paths for his sister while I got in the car and drove around the neighbourhood. Did she go down to the lake and fall in? Did she get hit by a car while disobediently crossing a street? Did she fall and hurt herself? Did someone snatch her?

After about 15 minutes I found her a couple blocks from our house, merrily riding down the sidewalk waving and saying hi to everyone she passed by. She was on her way home after going to a small playground by our house. She had kept to the paths and not crossed a road and was coming home in time for dinner. We are very blessed to live in a neighbourhood that has a near zero crime rate so even logically I had no reason to be afraid. But you never know. And that’s exactly where that sneaky Devil will attack in your mind. In our society anxiety is a well-used weapon in his arsenal because it attacks our love’s weakest link: trust.

You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you. –Isaiah 26:3

If trust brings peace then a lack of trust breeds anxiety. When we are anxious about something is it not because we are relying on ourselves or someone else rather than trusting in God? Especially with our kids. We want to protect them, which is part of love, but how much protection is too much? How much bubble wrap is too much? Do we really trust God where our kids are concerned? Yes, we need to be shrewd when it comes to what we will permit them to do and what we won’t, but how much bubble wrap do we use before we suffocate them? Are we teaching them to deal with life and how to get up after falling or are we trying to protect them from ever falling in the first place?

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. –Proverbs 3:5-6

[Just an FYI…this is my all-time favourite scripture; it’s pretty much the theme for my life so it will pop up in almost everything I write.]

There is a footnote at the end of verse 6 that states an alternate translation:“in all your ways submit to him, and he will direct your paths”. I think this version is a more accurate description of the path God has laid out for each of us as it will never be straight as an arrow. On straight paths you can see what’s coming and that is NOT what happens in real life. Our path to God is often like a trail of switchbacks up a mountain. It’s hard work and you are never really sure what lies ahead, be it a mini rock slide to navigate or a rest area with an amazing view. We never know what’s on the other side of the next switch but we persevere and trust that God will take us where he wants us to go, and that at the end of the trail, at the top of the mountain, is an eternal reward.

We each have our own path. Being married, our path is like a cross country ski path, a pair of grooves side by side, my husband and I, two skis attached to a single body. Our kids are on their own path. We can tie them to us keeping them safe and close, and we need to when they are small, but if we keep them there when they are older how are they going to find their own way? Our kids need to find their own path. Are we teaching them to navigate it for themselves, to trust in God themselves, or are we holding tight and trying to force them along the path God has ordained for ourselves? As they grow up we need to trust our kids in the way that Jesus trusts us, trust in their desire to follow God of their own volition. But so much more than that we need to trust that God loves them MORE than we do and is going to do as much to keep them on their correct path as he does to keep us on ours. If love always trusts, how true is our love for God if we don’t trust him with our kids?

There are some things in this life that we are powerless to stop. Job is a perfect example of this. He was successful in business and family and he was “blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil”. (Job 1:1) In his dealings with people he would have been honest yet shred, making righteous decisions that did not wilfully put his family in harm’s way. He raised his kids to adulthood, which back then was a feat in itself, and taught them to respect and fear God. And once they were adults and had families of their own, he would present sacrifices to God on their behalf, just in case (Job 1:5), trying to keep that bubble-wrap around them spiritually. But they were killed anyways. There are some things that we can’t prevent, no matter how much we prepare and protects. But this is exactly why we need to trust in God.

As God-fearing women there is one other area of our lives where trust is pushed to the limit; in our role as a wife.

Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Ephesians 5:24

Submission. At the mere mention of this word most women raise their guard, stick their fingers in their ears and sing “la la la la la I can’t hear you la la la la la” lol. I know. I’ve been there. I’ve tried every argument possible to justify circumventing this command. I’ve tried living in my marriage as if that word didn’t exist and you know what? It kinda sucked, unless you thrive on arguments and strife and don’t mind living with an overall air of unease and anxiety. Keep reading with an open mind and you may be surprised at the brilliance of God’s plan.

Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewellery or fine clothes. Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to adorn themselves. They submitted themselves to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her lord. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear. –1 Peter 3:3-6

What is right is to submit ourselves, our will, our lives to our husband, just like the church is to submit to Christ. I really think this is what Peter was talking about when he called us the weaker partner (1 Peter 3:7); not only do we need to submit everything we are and have to Jesus as our lord, we need to do the same with our husbands. On the surface it does suck and seem unfair (and I could go on and on but that would be digressing) because we in no way have decision-making power like the guys do, unless they give it to us. How on earth can God expect us to submit to this guy who routinely makes decisions we might not understand or agree with? By trusting in HIM, not our husbands. They are human and will make mistakes. [Right now this computer is acting like a real bugger and is frustrating me to no end, which leads me to believe that I’m on the right track and someone *coughSatancough* is trying to discourage the posting of this.]

Anyways…where was I? Right. Obeying our husbands. How does God expect us to show love to Him? By obeying his commands.

In fact this is love for God: to keep his commands. –1 John 5:3a

It just so happens that one of his commands is for wives to submit to their husbands and to respect them. But why don’t we want to? Because it scares the crap out of us to relinquish control of our lives to someone else. But can we really say we love God and follow Jesus if we can’t even lay down our lives for our husbands?

And this is love: that you walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love. –2 John 1:6

We show God we love him by living a life that is obedient to his commands, and the summary of those commands is to live a life that always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. That is why at the end of 1 Peter 3:6 he exhorts us to not give way to fear but to trust in God. If we keep our eyes focused on God, and in our marriages strive to always protect our husbands, always trust that regardless what happens God will fight for our salvation, always hope for the reward of heaven and always persevere in these things, then we will be at peace. We may not understand or agree with the decisions our husbands make or the things they ask us to do, but we can most certainly trust that God will protect our soul and spirit.

The LORD will fight for you; you only need to be still. –Exodus 14:14

Be still and know that I am God. –Psalm 46:10

In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. –Psalm 33:21

You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you. –Isaiah 26:13

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. –Romans 15:13

Remember that unfading beauty of a quite and gentle spirit from 1 Peter 3:4? That is our strength.

This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength” –Isaiah 30:15

That passage carries on to say that we “would have none of it”, which sounds just like most women today. For some reason we fight so hard to have the very thing that causes us distress instead of giving ourselves over to God, trusting him and resting in his peace. Like Paul says in 2 Corinthians 12:9, God’s power is made perfect in our weakness.

Want a peaceful, joyful life? It’s very, very simple.

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. –Proverbs 3:5-6

The Wages of Sin are Death

I was reading one of my favourite letters today – Romans. I must have read that one 100 times. Every time I get more out of it. I keep coming across one piece that is absolutely foundational: Salvation. That IS important, right?

Most of us become Christians because of the promise of Heaven. There are good reasons and selfish reasons but when it comes down to it we yearn for eternal life with God. Solomon points out in Ecclesiastes that “God has set eternity in the heart of man“. So, since the promise of heaven is so important to us, I wonder why we seem to accept such shortcuts to salvation. Wouldn’t we want to get that right?

Now I realize that not only am I treading on very controversial ground here but also ground that has massive consequences for people near and dear to us and those for the last few centuries or so. You’ll see what I mean in a minute. Remember my about page? I’m all about challenging sentimentality and dogma. And, if there’s anything that will shake things up, this topic is it.

How are we saved?

The grand implications are that, if we don’t have it right or are teaching the wrong things, where does everyone stand who abided by those ways for years, decades, centuries gone by? In my research, up until 1678 or possibly Moody, maybe even Billy Graham, salvation was understood as coming through baptism only. Then the sinners’ prayer came on the scene and, to me, was an answer to quick salvation – and unfounded. Sorry! (I’m so Canadian)

Romans really clears some paths that make a ton of sense to me. For starters, we understand in 3:23 that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”. Well, that sums it up. Who has sinned? Everyone (save one in Jesus, that is). None of us can say “I’m okay”. We’ve all sinned and all fall short. I’ve heard it compared to three guys jumping across a 20 foot crevice. One guy says “I’m pretty good” and gets about 10 feet out, one says “I’m really good” and gets 15 and the last one says “I’ve been good my whole life” and gets 19 feet out – who made it? Not one. All fall short.

Okay, so now we know where we stand, how do we get right with God? How do we make it?

Paul paints a perfect simple picture in Romans 6:1-14. My illustration here demonstrates it. Particularly vs 3-4. Salvation, we all can agree on, is a new life. We get to that new life through imitating Christ. We’re called to that through many scriptures and here, we get to become like Christ in dying to ourselves and becoming a new creation. When we die we are set free from sin (vs 7). The wages of sin are death (Proverbs 10:16), but death no longer has mastery over us as we imitate Jesus (vs 8-10). That death is burial through baptism.

So, where is the point of salvation? Once we were dead, now we are alive, “Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” (1 Peter 2:10). There is a definite line between salvation and death, light and dark, saved and not saved. I’ve found that when I ask people when they received salvation it’s some convoluted story about praying Jesus into their heart (14 times), baptism at some point and finally really feeling like it worked. Although this is intended as tongue in cheek, I know this rings true for me as much as others who have done this. If this is your experience, please consider that it can be this simple – baptism is clear and a definitive point in time. We would all argue that Jesus’ death was the most significant event in the history of man. I would add that proper baptism for the forgiveness of your sins and entry into a new life and the grace of God is the most significant point in our personal history.

Another analogy that makes this clear to me is entering the covenants. The old covenant was entered through circumcision – a definite (and cringingly clear) point in time, the covenant of marriage is entered through the consummation after the ceremony – we all know if we’re married or not, and it was a memorable event. And the new covenant – God’s holy plan for eternal life – is entered through baptism.

I’ll finish with this scripture: 1 Corinthians 1:18 “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

I sincerely don’t want to come off as having all the answers. I’m here to spar with you and make sure our thinking is clear and thought out. I do, however, deeply desire people to know the truth… me included. I’m open to the debate and, as I’ve stated in my about page, I want to bring it back to scripture and truth so we can all make it to heaven.

Does this rock your world or is it the aroma of salvation?

Are you a player or a fan?

I find it hard calling myself a Christian when the word seems to have lost all meaning because of the lives of so many who have little or no faith. It’s like calling yourself an Edmonton Oiler (NHL team. You know – Gretzky’s heydays) when you’re just a fan.

When it comes to Christianity, are we being fans or players? Are we getting down on the ice in the mix of things or just cheering from the box seats? More so, would the owner see us as his team or just fans?

If you ask, close to 80% of North Americans would state their faith to be “Christian”. Now, I know this is a little myopic in the world view but, regardless of the percentage, when Jesus comes back will he find faith on earth? (Luke 18) Similarly, fans outnumber the players 100:1 (or more). I think you can be really, really, really committed and still not be a player – ever seen those guys with no shirts and painted in the team colours?

For the sake of this post I’ll call the believers fans and those with faith the players, to contrast the view of belief and faith. If Jesus comes back today, would we be seen as having  faith or just belief? The difference is eternal.

Believing is something akin to agnosticism: “I believe there is a God, but I don’t know what to do about it.” Whereas faith is living your life inside of those truths. Many believers will go through life giving various levels of credit to God such as “Pfftt, of course God will help my team win”, but someone with true faith lives in complete obedience and changes their life according to His teachings (the scriptures). Most fan-bases are filled with bandwagon jumpers. Fans can be there when things are great and off the bandwagon when things aren’t going well. Then there are fans that won’t give up regardless of how poorly the team is doing – like Maple Leaf fans (haha). Yet, they are still not players. If the players don’t follow the rules, they’re cut.

I find it interesting that the word Christian is only used three times in the Bible. Contrast that to the word Disciple which appears 294 times in the NIV New Testament. The word Christian was a derogatory term and came into use to describe people who imitated and looked like “little Christs”. The people who were called Christians were clearly living their lives so closely to that of Jesus Christ that they were called Christians by those who observed them. How evident is the life of Jesus in self-proclaimed Christians today? Should they be called Christians at all if they don’t actually live their lives according to his ways? This is the question for you and me as well if we are to be called Christian and, dare I say, have faith.

James (the book of) says “…But how can I see your faith apart from your actions? Instead, I’ll show you my faith by putting it into practice in faithful action” (CEV). If we have faith something is true, do we not take action to live it out? Do we work hard enough to get onto the team or just cheer comfortably from our seats.

So, back to faith. When Christ says in Luke 18 “…when the son of man comes, will he find faith on earth?” I believe he’s asking if people will actually be following the scriptures or their own version of what they believe. It takes faith to live in obedience to the bible. You have to be willing to surrender your own understanding (what will happen if you do it your way) and trust in what God has in store for you… regardless of the outcome. You have to have discipline and years of effort to be a part of the team. You have to get into action and practice, to work hard and be tireless. If you want to be a fan, you just have to cheer when it’s convenient and it’s something you like. It’s easy to criticize when you’re a fan.

What ways do you see to be more of a player than a fan?

The Foundation

Solomon, a king and written about in the history books as one of the wisest men who lived, wrote about his father King David’s teachings in Proverbs 2:1-5 My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding— indeed, if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.

When it comes down to it, we need to have a standard to refer back to. Through these posts we will have discussions around many great things and big questions. Now, I’m open to someone questioning the foundation of the bible but it’s very hard to have someone argue against it who hasn’t read it – you must be able to substantiate. Sure, you can have questions. Sure, you can see it as hard to understand. But when it comes down to it, as the passage above states, you must be willing to search as if for silver to find the truth.

With this, I believe it’s important to have something that we can all come back to as the foundation – the one thing that can resolve differences. If everyone goes off of feelings or sentimentality or dogma, we would end up with, well, what we have today – thousands of denominations. I don’t believe that’s what God wants.

As I’m putting this together, I’m finding it tough to get things in the right order. What comes first, understanding that the bible is a foundation? Or, should we make sure we aren’t getting caught up in sentimentality? Or should we prove God first or do we answer some of the questions people have so they can get off on the right foot? I’ve decided the bible is the place to start, since I believe it’s the word of God. The gift God gave us to understand him and our relationship with him. As some have said, “Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth”.

So, what is the bible?

I believe the bible is the word of God. How can I say that this book from ancient times isn’t just a story or the writers’ best description of events and probably filled with mistakes and selfish desires and, like a game of telephone, lost in translation over time?

What I’m saying here is that, although written by mankind, it’s clearly lead by God in it’s writing. I claim it is completely unlikely that humans could come up with something so thorough, so cohesive, so far reaching, so powerful and so relevant.

I remember reading Isaac Asimov’s first books in the Foundation Series. The earliest books were written pre-space flight (early 50s). There is a part where they are communicating between spaceships with loudspeakers. Okay, here’s Asimov, a recognized astrophysicist not knowing that sound can’t travel through space. He didn’t know what he didn’t know… that’s only about 60 years ago. In the bible, we’re talking several millenia.

Here are a few things that I find too important to point to anything other than the bible being God’s word to us:

• The bible was written over a period of approximately 5000 years, in three languages (Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek). There are 44 authors and 66 books. The authors were from different levels of society (kings, the poverty stricken, shepherds, scholars, men and women, prophets and more) and from several different cultures and geographies. If you took two or more people even in the same cultural space and time – like my wife and I – and asked us to write all we know about God, you would likely find some theological discrepancy. And yet, the bible is cohesive and consistent in it’s message throughout.
• The bible contains a very factual and, at times, embarrassingly honest view of people and history. If any of us today were keeping a history of our lives, we would likely embellish, improve, or leave out periods of our lives we didn’t think were flattering. When we see, without fanfare, honest scenes like King David taking Bathsheba as his own and then killing off her husband to cover his sin, we surely would think this isn’t something that most would put in their biography. The bible is as clear on the deepest darkest parts of human history as it is on the occasional bright parts.
• There are rules and stories that we would want to leave out because they challenge us to the core. If I were writing the bible, especially in trying to attract as many as possible, I wouldn’t put in passages like Matthew 7:21 or Luke 14:26.
• The translations and manuscripts are clearly good examples of how ancient text can be carried forward and there are no better examples in any historical texts.
• When the dead sea scrolls were found in 1947, they were very well preserved from times dating back well before Jesus and yet were almost a perfect copy of the books originating back to 750+ BC.

This is just a partial view of what I see as a reliable foundation to build upon.

There is a ton of controversy around the bible, what do you think?