The Bible says a lot of things, should I really base my beliefs on words in a book?

Let’s think about someone’s words and someone’s character/actions.  Let’s think about the Parable of Two Sons from Matthew 21.  The words of the first son were “ I will not”.  But the actions, were different.  He “went”.  The words of the second were “I will, Sir”.   But the actions were also different, and “He did not go”.

Now with humans, as is probable in this circumstance, they can say one thing and mean it, but change their mind.  But with God, though it is true His words never change, many different people can interpret them in many different ways.  If you read one of my older post with regards to perspective, and how one could look at a 6 and be right and the other could look at that same number from a different perspective and see a 9 and be right.  So how can we know how to interpret things correctly?  There are people with much more education and degrees than me that look into the history and the context and the language used and it is fascinating and potentially useful information.  But what I believe is even more telling, is the actions observed. 

One could look at the first son’s answer and say in that time period it was well known that the first son’s spoke opposite of what they meant.  Or based off my research, on Tuesdays of 15BC (which is when my studies and events I cross referenced with says this happened) was opposite day and the first son actually meant he was going to do it. Then you could have someone argue that based off of their research, it was a said on a Wednesday and they never lied on a Wednesday  ect.   Basically what I am getting at is, by the words alone, different perspectives get different answers.  So if my religion was based solely off of words, even what I believed to be ‘Holy Words’, my entire beliefs could actually be wrong, and unintentionally based off of ones interpretations.  However, when we look at the actions, there really is no potential for different interpretations, no different perspectives.  If the job that was asked was done, those are the actions, no interpretations.  Either done or not, observable and concrete.

All of that being said, what do we know about God, or what have we observed about Him?  It is said that there is no greater love than to give one’s life for another.  And what does give your life mean?  I specifically didn’t say “die for another”, but to “give one’s life”.  There are secret service that are willing to die for the president, to take a bullet, or soldiers willing to die for their country or parent willing to die for their kids.  But could they give their live for them?  Live every moment as a ‘slave’ to them, at their every beckon and call, doing the desires of them for their entire life?  But even this would be giving your life to a family or friend.  What if it was someone who hated you or you loved them, but they turned on you, treated you terribly.  Could you or would you still continue to live for them?  Devote every second and purpose of your life for them?

Jesus lived every second of His life honoring God, but it also honored God to serve man.  The ones that hated Him, and treated Him badly, He still served them, He gave His life (every second of it) to serve man (and in doing so, also serving God).  So yes Jesus died for us, but He also gave/devoted His life for us.  The creator or the world, the one who deserves the highest of all honors, because our servant.  How is that not the most incredible example of love?  A very clear distinction between the abductors ‘love’ and real love.  If you don’t agree that devoting every second of your life for your creation (even when most of that creation insults, mocks, and steals your rightful glory multiple times a day) up to the point of even dying for them, even death on a cross.  Then no need to read on further.

But everything you read in the Bible should be read through that lens of truth and love realized.  So when you read that God killed thousands of women and children or something that seems un-doable, or is absent of love, you must first realize how immense that love demonstrated was first.

There is the story of the poor man and Lazarus the rich man.  The rich man had a comfortable (but we have no clue how miserable or depressed that man could have really been) long life, and the poor man had a difficult life.  Maybe they both lived 100 years.  That poor man lived a miserable (possibly not even miserable, but uncomfortable, we have no idea of the joy he might have had with the circumstances he was given) 100 years, and then went to Paradise for eternity.  So we can comprehend it, lets say he went to Paradise for 1 trillion years (though eternity is unfathomably longer than that).  If a man suffered for 100 out of a trillion years, it would sound like that bad of a deal.  Compared to the guy that lived comfortable for 100, but then in Hades for a trillion years.  So who was more “blessed”?  What of those that died in Sodom and Gomorrah or Jericho?  Perhaps removing them from this wretched earth surrounded by wretched people was a blessing?  We don’t know what happened to them when they were removed from this earth.  We do know that God wanted to stop the wickedness on earth and He did.

Sure all of that is hypothetical, only God knows why He does what He does.  The point being, again, looking through knowing the amazing love God demonstrated, we can easily say that same love was given to all things He does.

We also see the actions of God at Nineveh.  God was going to pour out His wrath on them for their wickedness.  Not the wickedness of the past, but the current ongoing wickedness.  So pouring out wrath seems to mean again, to stop the active wickedness from occurring.  Because when Jonah spoke and told them about God and they repented, what happened.  The wrath never came.  There was no need to pour out wrath for things they did in their past.  And there was no more wickedness occurring in the present, so no wrath was poured.

The adulterer who was asked of Jesus to stone.  I think she was currently doing it, caught in the present even, with no sign or remorse maybe?  But what did Jesus do.  He forgave her, and it was most likely that kindness that lead her remorse and repentance.

There are countless examples of God’s wrath not being poured out for actions done in the past.  Does this mean that God is unjust?  Justice is met when the one offended says so.  Every time we sin, we offend God.  A sin is not doing the will of God, and it is saying, we are god, we do what we want.  We are denying the glory that belongs to God and He is offended.  But if the offended wants to pardon for whatever reason they want to, they can.  They can set conditions that need to be met, but they can also waive those conditions at any time, it is up to them.  Just is what they say it is.  This is why Jesus could forgive the sins of the adulteress, He was/is God, He was offended, and He pardoned.  This is why God could give a hot coal to Isaiah and his sins were forgiven.  This is why by the blood of Jesus the sins of all are forgiven.  These are all conditions set by the Judge.

So God could just snap His fingers and all sins be forgiven, why doesn’t He do that?  We can see the actions of God were never about scrubbing the past clean or holding account to the past.  Rather the present and future.  God doesn’t want your sins of the past forgiven, He wants you to repent, so there are no sins in the present or future.  This is why Amos 5 speaks of not even accepting offerings, or Isa 1 the Israelite’s are told to stop bringing meaningless offerings, and He says “Stop doing wrong”.  He wants to fix us, to fix the problem, so that in the present and future we stop.  As soon as we stop, the past is gone in God’s eyes, the problem is fixed.

So why did Jesus die for us then?  If all we had to do was stop sinning, couldn’t we just do that?  Well first to stop sinning is impossible.  But though with man things are impossible, with God all things are possible.  There are so many reasons why Jesus came and gave His life for us and died for us.

Now as humans we have guilt, and I believe that is why He gave them a scape goat, and eventually Jesus.  There is no magic in telling your sins to a goat, it isn’t transferring some magical for of sin from you to a goat.  God wants us to not feel guilty for the past, He wants us to put the past behind us.  Jesus tells us to yoke ourselves to Him so He can pull us, to cast our guilt on Him, let Him be the scape goat.  He wants us to feel free.  The truth is God doesn’t look at our past against us, so we shouldn’t either, and that is the truth that sets us free, guilt free. 

We also fear and respect God like the Israelite’s, and can’t stand before Him, so He gave them Abraham as a mediator and now Jesus as a High Priest and Mediator between us and God while we are on this earth.

We also as I said above, can’t not sin.  We need help, help from God.  After Jesus died, God gave us the Holy Spirit who helps us not sin.  The problem is, we always need His help, and we get distracted and forget to ask Him for it.  Like Peter, who was able to walk on water when Jesus was His focus, but the second he got distracted (no longer focused solely on Jesus), he started to sink.  The good news is Jesus reached His hand out and still helped Him.  Which shows that Jesus wants us to try our best to not sin, it is really the trying that He wants to see rather than the result of not sinning.  And giving glory to Him and having a relationship with Him in asking for His help. 

Believing in Jesus dying for your sin is humbling oneself, it is admitting we can’t do it, we need God’s help.  It is that belief that is where the ‘magic’ lies.  Not so much in the blood of Jesus that washes us, but the meaning of that blood.  The belief in a God who loves us so much that He would go through all of that for us. 

God created the world, He created the love a father has for his son.  He created the rituals and ceremonies of the Passover lamb.  Not because this was a requirement made by someone above Him, but He thought this is the best way to give us a glimpse of understanding of the immense love He has for us.  Jesus died for us.  And though I do mean that it was accomplished for our atonement, I also mean that it was for our benefit, in that it enables us to get a glimpse of an understanding of who God is and how amazing He is.  Like taking a 1 millisecond peek at one tiny corner of the most beautiful scenery you could imagine.  It was for our benefit so that we could not only get a glimpse of who He really is so we could glorify Him even more, but so that we could see the truth of how He always wanted us to live.  That He wants nothing more to have a relationship with us, He wants to help us, so that He can be glorified even more.  So that we aren’t bogged down with guilt of things we did in the past, that guilt that drags our souls down and then while down is taken advantage of.  It leads us to be selfish, uncontrolled, angry, angst, impatient, sad, hurt others.  But to be free, and in that the love of God will spring in us, and selflessness will come from that.  Self control, peace, patience, kindness, love, joy.  That was why He gave His life for us.  So that we can live life to the fullest, and in that He will get even more glory!

I am not saved from hell, and I am not motivated to save others from it as if hell is a place of eternal torment.  Rather I see the light, my eternity started already, I desire for God’s will now and through all of eternity, and my desire is for that love of God, that guilt free transformative love of His, will shine in me and other may know of God’s love for them now.  In fact I believe if you don’t know of His love and are held in captivity by guilt and by the great liar, you are already in hell.  It is my desire for you to be free now, not just escape eternal torment at a future time.  Free you from the torment now, and God will be even more glorified!

It isn’t just lack of guilt that allows this peace or freedom.  If you simply don’t care of what you have done in the past, I am certain you are still miserable.  The freedom comes from being valued, accepted and loved by your Creator.  When you see that you are loved and valued by your Creator despite your past, you have no guilt.  You realize the things you did were terrible, but God values you so much, He takes away that guilt.  I am saved from lies that tell me I am worthless, God doesn’t love me because of what I did, God can’t use me, lies that say I don’t have an eternal purpose.   I am saved from so much more than just “hell” or eternal torment in the future.  I am saved from guilt, despair and darkness!  That is what I mean when I say “I am saved!”.  That is what I desire for everyone.  BUT I also know that God desires this so much more than I could of everyone and it shouldn’t be a motivation for me.  I shouldn’t try to ‘save’ or convert anyone.  I just love my life the best I can honoring God with all my heart, strength, mind and soul and loving others as myself.  That love inside me will overflow and touch others and they will see God in me and they will come to know God and they will be saved from darkness, despair and guilt too.

God does call some to evangelism and missionaries, but as of now, I believe I am called to 1 Timothy 2:2, to live a quiet and peaceable life, godly and dignified in all ways.  This is good and pleases God, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.

When read read about the Thessalonians or the book of Peter or 1John, much of those books were written to comfort or reassure those churches from false teachers. They were being taught that Jesus had already returned and they missed it, or that Jesus wasn’t coming back at all. So the writers of those books were using the scriptures to reason with them showing them this was a false teaching and what the truth is, that Jesus has not come and when He does, all the wicked will be punished. Which isn’t a bad thing I guess, it can be of great encouragement to the flesh that what you believed is not wrong. But these people are supposed to have the Holy Spirit living IN them, the power of the God of the universe IN them. The transformative truth of God in them. Where they merely following god because God promised to bring them comfort? Eternal reward and comfort? I would hope that once the light was revealed to them, they would be desiring to worship God from now and forever regardless of their situation.

If you told me that the Jesus already came and I missed it, or that He was no longer coming and I interpreted the Bible wrong, I would not lose faith, I would not lose hope. My faith and hope is not in my interpretation of the Bible, it is in an unmovable God! And unchanging, ever loving, just, gracious, merciful, righteous God! My desire is to honor and worship Him starting now and through the rest of eternity no matter where I go or an placed or transported to. I do believe that that will be in heaven a place where like minded people are, from every tribe and tongue, a lace where God will receive all glory as is deserved. But even if I were to end up in hell, I would still praise God. I can’t not know the truth that God revealed to me, the light revealed cannot be covered or made dark.

This isn’t to say that I am any better than any from the church of Thessalonians or any churches of the NT that were persecuted and stood strong or those that were encouraged by Paul and others. I’m sure many of them were killed for their faith and though I hope I would be willing to do the same, I haven’t been placed in that situation and talk is cheap for me to say I could do the same. But I do believe God blessed me with such strong faith that is in Him, from the Holy Spirit, that I desire others to have such strong faith in Him, not just some words in a book, no matter how “Holy” that book may be. I am certain there are those who know the Bible way better than I do, and I know God wants it to be here in its current form and there are things I can learn from it, but the only thing in the Bible I see as prescriptive is the very words of God (or Jesus, who is God). All the rest of the Bible is descriptive words. There are things we can learn from it, but it isn’t a directive of how we need to live.

Paul was a great man, probably better than I will ever be. But even that, Paul was a creation of God, so anything good that Paul did was actually God doing. So if there was any awesomeness in Paul , it was actually the awesomeness of God. I don’t agree with Paul that we should be running a race for a reward, or that is is ok to suffer now because we will be rewarded for that suffering later. I believe that if it is God’s will for us to suffer, praise to God, I want His will. Even if it is His will for me to suffer for eternity, praise Him! I run the race, I do the best I can because that is all I can do. I am just dust, trying to have God help me, honor Him to the best that I can, knowing if there is anything I can do that is good, it is because He did that in me, and He deserves all the glory for that. He is eternal and I am dust, all I do is for His eternal glory.

But I am not speaking in Buddhist terms either. Where our entire existence go from a drop of water, to become the ocean and basically non-exist. I do believe God wants me to be me and wants to use me for His will, and wants to have a relationship with me. He doesn’t want me to become one with Him and get ‘absorbed’ back into Him. He values me as a separate individual and created me to have a full life which I can only have in Him. And that is where my joy comes from, my Creator has immeasurable love for me despite what I have done, and I desire for all to know this God I know. And this joy overflows in me so that others may see it in me, may see God in me, and come to know God and glorify Him!

 I don’t know if you are familiar with Dmitry Belyayev’s breeding experiment, so I can quickly summarize it.  He basically took the most docile looking foxes, had them breed, and too the most docile looking of the offspring, and breed them, and so on, for 40 years.  But even just after 20 years or 10 generations, he actually domesticated the silver fox.  He completely altered their DNA even.  The domesticated foxes had floppier ears, shorter muzzles, and a tail that rolled over the back.

This was done as I’m sure Dmitry was aware of Charles, Darwin’s study of The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication 100 years earlier.

Basically, you have a ‘docile gene’ in 1 fox, however slight, lets just say 1 docile bit of code in the DNA.  When you breed them, the offspring makes more foxes ‘randomly’.  And of those offspring, there might be one that is shows being slightly more docile than the others.  This one might have 2 bits of ‘docile code’ in their DNA.  Then they mate and have offspring with a bunch of ‘random’ triats.  At some point, all offspring have 1 bit of docileness in their DNA code, but there is always a few with more, that are more docile.  So the most docile ones get selected to breed.  Now we have all offspring with 3 bits of ‘docile code’ (and a bunch of other offspring with ‘random’ traits) but the most docile of those bunch get selected again.  And so on, until all foxes end up with 50 bits of docile code, and it is no longer easy to choose “the most docile”.  So you now have this domesticated fox.  The DNA of this domesticated fox and all of its offspring have at least 50 bits of docile code (and some more).  But the original silver fox still is a group that has some with 0 bits and very few with 1 bit.  And of these original foxes, they keep being born with ‘random’ bits of code to help them survive.

Lets say in a second scenario, a breeder takes the most aggressive foxes and does the same experiment.  At the end you would now have a breed of aggressive foxes and docile foxes.

Instead of having a human select the traits they want carried on.  Lets say a giraffe.  The traits of a long neck could be selected by its environment as opposed to humans.  The zebra/horse/donkey (whatever a species a zebra evolved from) looking animal starts reaching for high up food, they have 1 code of DNA that encourages them to reach for food up high.  They breed and so on and so on, and now they have 50 genes of reaching high in trees.  Much like the silver fox that was domesticated that in just 10 generations actually altered the appearance of the ears, tail and head, the giraffe does the same thing.  The length of it’s neck is actually altered as well.  Until it no longer needs to grow, it can now reach high in the trees, the “selector” (the environment and not humans) can now, no longer tell the difference between the ones stretching or has no need to stretch, and that part of the code stops multiplying in the offspring.

This is basic evolution dumbed way down.  And at some point, the DNA becomes so different, that it can no longer mate with the ‘ancestors’.  So in this example, the final domesticated silver fox could no longer mate with the original silver fox’s offspring.  This was observed and written about by Darwin speaking about ring species.  On the Galapagos islands, the birds flew from island to island, with each having a different environment ‘selecting’ them.  At some point, the DNA was too different and they couldn’t mate with ones from other islands.

This has been observed and I would assume not argued by anyone.  Some Creationists refer to this as micro-evolution, and “agree” that it is a fact.  What many claim to say is impossible to prove (as to which I kind of agree) is that Macro-evolution (to which I do think is quite possible, but impossible to prove).  Macro-evolution is a made up term, but it refers to the fact that a monkey cannot change into a human.  But we have to look at this from a micro scale.  What do organisms need for life?  They need a means to acquire nutrients, to circulate them.  We humans use our bodies and brains to acquire nutrients, as do monkeys.  But trees, the use their roots and leaves.  If you have one organism that moves to a new location, random offspring occur, and that new environment selects traits to become optimum in that environment.  Some are carried/transported to a new environment against it’s will (even the wind blowing some seeds far from its origination) and some chose to move, and some chose to stay.  But variety occurs, and random traits are given and different species are the outcome.  The DNA doesn’t know that it is a monkey or a human.  There is no wall in the DNA that says, I can change up into this point, but then I can’t change anymore.  It is it’s own thing that has no awareness of the scope that it is in.  It won’t refuse to change, and will continue to change, until the ‘selector’ can no longer cause it to change.

So if this is all true, then why is there no missing link?  The “missing link” is the false non-existent state that Creationist claim to disprove evolution.  Since there is no ‘almost monkey, almost man’, then it couldn’t have occurred.  To explain that, we have to look at a continuum.  There are many continuums in the world we live in, but I like to use black and white, because it is very easy to understand opposites and we can observe the differences and explain them easily.  But with related to “the missing link”, I would also challenge anyone to find the missing link between a 20 year old and a 20.5 year old.  This is a continuum, a gradual change that is imperceptible.  But when looking at the difference between a 4 year old and a 40 year old, it is simple.   But we will use black and white.  There is a continuum of shades of gray in between that in imperceptible.  If you hold two shades right next to each other, and ask anyone to tell the difference, they can’t.  It isn’t until enough shades separate them, that you can slightly begin to tell the difference, and it is when looking at black and white, you can only see that next to each other, they are opposite.  So if you are adjusting the darkness of the white ever so slightly, when does it start becoming gray?  Or stop becoming white?  If you are looking at a window of 2 shades only, in a continuum of 1 trillion shades, do you ever know a “stopping” point?  If you were told you are the DNA, and you are not allowed to be black, only white, but you have to change, you have to move towards the darkness, you can’t remain the same, when do you stop? 

Just like an environment that demands change, and selects 1 shade darker every generation.  That DNA cannot see black and white (the big ‘picture’), it only sees one shade next to it.  It is only one who can see the big picture (the full spectrum/continuum) can now tell, hey, that was a money, and now it is a human.  That can’t change from white to black though, it has a ‘wall’ that prevents it.  Obviously white isn’t black and black cannot become white, it is TOO much of a change, it is a Macro-change.  Only Micro-changes can occur, just one shade at a time.  But we have trillions of different continuums with trillions of shades in each of them and that is where the trillions of species come from.  The one gene on it’s own continuum scale has no clue what the gene of another continuum scale is doing.  But they can interact with each other.  It is possible that only when certain spectrums align that interaction may occur.  And that one gene is fine doing its thing until 1 gene on another spectrum changes 1 shade closer to it, and it can now interact with that gene, where as it couldn’t before.  Like when a tail grows, there was no need for flesh or fur there, as there was nothing there.  But now that there is some veins and cartilage and muscle there, there has to be flesh that protects it.  Now we have multiple different continuums interacting with each other, but still all genes are completely unaware of the entire continuum they are on, and the fact that black is on one side and white is on the other.  They just keep changing shades over generations. 

What evolution is not is “random” in that you have a bunch of random genes trying random shades on a continuum until something works.  This is the argument behind the taking all the disassembled pieces of a Rolex in a shoebox and shaking it up a trillion times and out will come a complex Rolex.  No one believes in that level of random.  But random in that the offspring could have 1 or more very slightly different random attributes, that might get selected and keep getting selected.  Like if Dmitry found the foxes with ever so slightly larger eyes, and kept choosing the ones with slightly larger eyes.  The fact that one of the offspring has a slightly larger eye is very random and probably won’t do any good or bad for it.  BUT, if that is selected by Dmitry (or the environment) and this random trait keeps occurring and getting selected, the DNA is going to change and the foxes will eventually all have larger eyes.  And it is quite possible that this large eye random occurrence only randomly happens every 10 generations.  But if something (like the environment) is around long enough to keep choosing it, eventually, the species will end up with larger eyes….”randomly”.

This is why I believe in evolution (even Macro-evolution) as a Christian.  It isn’t as far fetched as some make it out to be, it isn’t illogical at all.  Though I do believe God did program His creation to evolve.  He gave it the ability to ‘randomly’ adapt to it’s surroundings.  But no, I do not believe in the big bang as a ‘random’ event, that everything came from nothing.  Except to say that the universe as we know it came from God, and everything we have came from nothing in that sense, and the big bang is a very plausible event that God could have triggered.   And at some point, God clearly placed living organisms on this earth.  And at some point humans became what we are now, and God liked that, and chose us to be the potential bearers of His image.

Though I will caveat all of that with the fact that I could be completely wrong.  I have no clue to the truth, as I wasn’t there.  But much more importantly, I don’t really care all that much of how (the inner workings, obviously God is the how) it happened?  More of the why it happened.   God created what He created to give Him glory as He deserves all glory!  Our amazing Creator created it all.  Just like the programmer who built the code for windows operating system.  But all that code does nothing until the ON button is pushed, and it begins to ‘build’ itself with ever improving complexity the further it boots up until it is booted up and the programmer can rest and rule over the operating system, interacting with it and controlling it to end up at the will of the programmer and for His glory.  Which is the why, and the importance of admitting we might not know how the universe was made to what it is today, but we have a role in it, a God given role to allow God to help us glorify Him in all we do!

The other reason I like to chose that black and white continuum, is because it has such a universal application.  Or to demonstrate that we only look at the shade that is next to us, we can unintentionally move into great darkness without even knowing it.  This is why God gave us advice about remaining in Him and to look at Him.  It is only when you look at white, that you can compare yourself and see that state of darkness you have in you.  But instead of trying to get one shade lighter, try to be white!

I believe Satan uses this imperceptibility to his advantage.  If you were in a building with no outside light, but (unknown to you) with dimmable lights with a very high resolutions (many shades in between) and you dimmed it 1 shade at a time over hours, when would you notice it is actually dimmed?  Your pupils would dilate to a maximum at some point and if you were able to compare tasks you have done in your past to the now state, you might begin to assume something is wrong.  But with no task to compare to the past (I was able to read fine but now I have trouble) you probably not be able to tell with certainty until 70% darker?  And even then, with nothing to compare it to, if gradual enough, you might forget what it looked like to look at your hand with great detail.  You might forget that you had a mole that you can no longer see, and if you can’t see it, did you ever have that mole?  I have to assume some massive gas-lighting and physiological effects would occur as well.  Especially if there where people planted in there that swear they could never read that sign, there is just a blank sign there, this is how well you read/see or can’t (in the dark) normally.  But the point being, you need a reference point far from where you are, to be able to know where you are. Satan is rarely going to turn the lights out on you, it is too obvious and noticeable.  What Satan will do, is slowly dim the lights at imperceptible levels, He is in the long game.  He doesn’t care how much you are furthering God’s kingdom and glorifying God today or 1 week from now, if he can only get you to do it less over time, it’s a win for him, whose whole purpose is to steal the more glory from God as possible.  But God gave us His Spirit, His word, other brothers in Christ, the Church.  So many ways to see His light through those things and strive for that white, ask Him to help you achieve that pureness, so you can give Him glory for helping you achieve it.  Paul doesn’t say, “look at the shade 2 or 5 or 10 paces towards whiteness”  He says, focus on what is pure (whiteness).  Because if you look to compare to others, you will never know how dark of a gray you are, or how dark gray the person is who you are looking towards.  And just because you are whiter than the one to your left, it doesn’t by any means mean you are pretty dark gray yourself.  And you also should not live in ignorance and never reflect on the shade that you are for you will always move to the darkness that way.  Some dark gray probably looked at something light gray at some point and thought how dark that light gray was, and now that light gray is light to them.  You must always focus on the white, the only pure, HOLY God!  And ask this amazing God to help you achieve purity, and know that you can only achieve it with His help, and they to give Him the glory when you do achieve it, for all glory belongs to Him!  And when you shine pure bright white light, the darker shades will see you and the light you emit and how bright it is.  And you can tell them, this light is no created by you, rather you are just a mirror reflecting this light from God to man, and they can also reflect this light and help others which glorifies God.

And one unfortunate caveat I must include, as this is the society we live in….My reference to white is biblical and a representation of purity, as in no darkness or blackness in it.  This has nothing to do with race what so ever.  The pigmentation or melanin levels in you skin is a biological trait, that has no bearing on your value as a human.  The white man is not ideal or superior in any way, or valued by God any more or less than one with darker or black skin.  All humans are valued greatly and the same by God.

Yes!  Is it good? No, but it is OK.  I saw yes because we know the standard, we have a goal, we are hoping to not sin.  Just like one who decides to diet has a goal of losing 100 lbs, or the athlete has a goal to run a 4 min mile.  Both are attainable, but they also both might take 10 years to achieve.  So should the athlete beat themselves up if they run a 9 min mile on day 1?  Of course not.  They have a goal and intent of getting their one day, but it’s OK to fail the standard you hope to achieve. 

When we sin, we are failing.  Is it OK? Yes!  God knows we are dust, we are frail humans, He created us as such.   I don’t think He wants perfect people (or He probably would have created us that way), but He does seem to enjoy growth.  Just like when you have a child.  You don’t expect them to write a doctoral dissertation when they are 1 month or year old.  Nor are you disappointed in them when they can’t even say more than 1 word.  You see them growing, and it brings you joy to watch them grow.  Is it OK to not be able to write essays at one week old?  Is it OK to sin as a Christian?

If you focus on how bad you are or how much you fail, you are only going to waste time and energy and health.  Focus on what is whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable–if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–think about such things.  The past is done, it cannot be changed, it no longer affects you.  If the runner beat themselves up for not running 4 min mile this time, they might not ever achieve it.  Some might even give up and say “well I just can’t do it”, or “I did even slower this time (failed greater) than I did last month”.   Growth can be like the stock market with ups and downs, but the important thing is the trend up.  Life can be the same way.  It is possible that you might not ever reach that 4 min mile goal.  You might only get to a 4:30 or 5 min mile (which is still pretty fast), but you might get to the 4 min mile or even faster if you train for it!  But if you beat yourself up and give up, I guarantee you won’t be able to run a 4 min mile, and probably won’t even be able to keep the 9 min mile you started at.  God wants to use you in the future, based off of the now, not your past!

We make sin and God into such a game almost, with all these rules.  Sin is not this terrible thing that cleaned off by following rules and making proclamations.  Sin is as simple as you stealing glory from God.  When you do what you think is best, you are saying that you are the god of your universe and you are able to make your own decisions and you should receive glory as this god.  But all glory belongs to God.  Taking glory from God not only attempts to defame God’s holiness, but it hurts us also.  God wants to fix that problem we created. 

When your child screws something up or breaks one of your rules, you don’t want, or require suffering of them to satisfy you.  But you can’t do nothing, there is a problem that needs fixed.  There are multiple ways of fixing things, but punishment is one of the tools used to fix things.  Sometimes revealing or explaining to them the gravity of their flaw is enough for them to change, or more importantly, want to change. 

I am sure God could stop a murderer’s arms from stabbing another person.  But what would that accomplish?  The man’s life is saved for now, but the evil heart and intent of the other is still there.  God wants to fix that heart.  And there are times that God does stop things from happening.  But for the most part, God uses the current situation ultimately for His glory and wants to transform that persons heart, not just stop that murder attempt. 

I don’t believe that God cannot violate our free will, or why the fact is that so many believe we have such a things free will, that God cannot control.  I do think that 99% of the time, God lets us keep our free will, just like 99% of the time, miracles don’t happen in a supernatural sense where God pauses physics as we understand it and amends/manipulates it.  But He does do that, and to me I have read verses where it appears that God controls people or takes away their free will.  But it seems to me that God doesn’t like to violate man’s free will, nor does God like to pause our physics.  I would guess that if He ‘intervened’ too much, He might as well just create robots.  But to me it seems He intervenes just enough to maximize His glory, and work through His creation, instead of around it.

It seems to me in the OT God would end sin fairly often, by killing the people, ending their ability to keep perverting His creation.  God speaks of punishing the people for the sins of them and their offspring for generations.  I don’t see that as God making the offspring suffer for the sins committed by the fathers.  But rather, if you sin, and keep sinning, and teach you kids to sin, it will always be punished.  And by punished, again, I don’t mean, making those suffer for acts committed or thoughts had.  Rather, to fix the problem of the sin.  Again in the OT, it seems the fix was to just end that person.  But we don’t see a lot of ending of people for their sin in the NT.  I would kind of say God ‘changed’ up His strategy, but it’s more than that.  Though in the NT, God no longer seems to end people, rather He wants to transform them.  End the sin by transforming them.

This was not an audible God called last min though.  The plan of transforming man was known since the Garden of Eden, when it is prophesized that God would crush the serpent.  It seems the entire 4000ish thousand years before Jesus, God was building up the song for that crescendo that was the death of Jesus on the cross.  It was God’s will to crush Jesus.  I think God wanted to show His love to man, and the greatest way was to enter His creation and serve it, put it first, live for it, and die for it, and for God’s glory.  The OT had to be the way it was to build up to what Jesus came to represent.  The lamb as a sacrifice couldn’t have come without the Passover, and that couldn’t have come without becoming slaves ect.

We know there is no magic when the priest would tell the goats the sins of the people so the scape goat ‘held’ the sins of the people and they could watch their sins walk away and disappear.  That is clearly for the benefit of man.  We like to “get things off our chest”.  So God provided a way for us to get things off our chest where it is remembered no more, separated as far as the east is from the west.  Jesus did this for us.  We also feel dirty from sin and bogged down by it, and cleansing language makes us feel clean.  Once you bathe, you are no longer concerned with the dirt going down the drain.  So why do we beat ourselves up about sin of the past?  The priest also were a mediator between God and man, and helper of man to achieve that goal of not sinning.  Jesus became that.  Once you are saved, once your eyes are opened to the err or your ways, we now are on that training mission, trying to achieve that goal of maybe one day not sinning.  Like to runner above who wants to run a 4 min mile, we are going to sin, and it is OK.  I do think that God has the powers to make us not sin, using supernatural means or controlling us, but I don’t think He wants to do that.  He wants us to grow, like children.  He doesn’t want that doctoral dissertation because He doesn’t need it.  There is nothing we can do or give that is new to Him, and everything we do know or share, came from Him!  He doesn’t need us to be perfect on day 1 of our transformation (or He would make us that way).  Just think of you own children and how God uses life to echo Himself to us.  Like marriage is a great representation of His love for us, the parent child relationship is a great one too!  Just like you would not be disappointed if you child came out of the womb dancing, God is not disappointed when we sin daily.  You might even be disappointed and feel unneeded if your child came out of the womb dancing and doing high level algebra.  You enjoy watching your child grow, and helping them do that.  I am not saying God needs us like a parent wants to feel needed by their children, but it seems to maximize the glory received by God, He wants us to grow and more importantly to help us grow and be a part of it.  And since God is a major part of it and everything we do we owe to Him, He should get the glory for it.    

I have heard this used many times by those who claim this is the main reason they are atheist.  Someone does some bad things for less than 100 years and is punished an eternity for it.  They see that is unfair, and unjust.

There is a parable of the unmerciful servant which has multiple meanings to it, but one I learned recently I thought was quite interesting.  The servant owes his master 10 thousand talents, and 1 single talent is about 20 years of wages.  So basically the servant owes 20 x 10,000 years, or 200,000 years.  Not even Methuselah lived anywhere close to that, which the reason those words are used is to basically say, impossible to pay back, or it will take an eternity to pay it back.   

I think I have said before that I don’t believe there will be anyone is heaven who doesn’t want to be there and hades will be full of people that want to be there.  So back to that parable.  When you take glory or credit from God (as to which all glory and credit belong), this is a sin, and occurs with all sins.  When you do anything against God’s will, you are saying I know better than you God, so I chose to do mine, not your will.  That is stealing glory, and exulting yourself above the High and Mighty God.  So when you steal that ‘tiny bit of glory’ (even one tiny sin) that ‘tiny’ bit is worth 10,000 talents, or an eternity of human wages.  So if you want to pay it back, God will allow you to….it is just going to take an eternity attempt to pay it back yourself.  Even insulting Him to attempt to say that you have the ability to pay it back is stealing of His glory.  I believe that is the unforgivable sin.  Which I believe the only unforgivable sin, is the unrepentant one, the one with no remorse for stealing the Glory of/from God.

The good news is that God offers to allow Him to cancel he debt (to forgive of us this theft), and the only requirement is to acknowledge that you can’t pay it back yourself, and be resentful that you stole the glory in the first place.  To realize how grave of a problem that was, and to desire to never do it again.  Almost to want hell, to desire to burn for an eternity, to realize how terrible of an act that one ‘tiny’ thing you did (and truthfully, the many large things you did).  In my mind, a Christian (on some level) doesn’t want to go to heaven to be with God for eternity, rather wants hell so God isn’t in the presence of such filth that we are.  I say on some level because on every other level, the transforming Holy Spirit inside us knows the forgiving power of God and how loved we are by God and wants nothing more than an eternity in the presence of God, knowing He forgave our debts in His mercy.

This is also why I believe that it is possible for those in hades to be saved.  Right after the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, this great divide, which no man can cross (of his own efforts, much like a man could never pay 10k talents of his own effort), God says, with man things are impossible, BUT with God all things are possible.  I do believe that with God, if or when man (even those in Hades) realizes the error of his ways and thanks God for the punishment they deserve, He will be rescued by God and brought to Heaven.  I think that all will stand before the judgement seat of God in the final days (it says Hades will spit out all that was in it) and they will be asked “Who is to pay this debt”  And if man wants to ask God to, they will be granted the Holy Spirit and accepted in Heaven, and if man wants to attempt to pay it off themselves or to continue to try to, God knows how long an eternity is and doesn’t want them to waste life doing that, and removes their life from them, consumes their lives in the eternal fire, removes from them the blessing of life, removes the Breath of God from them, strips them of the possibility to bear the image of God (the greatest blessing possible we are given), and consumes that potential for eternity, annihilates them.  Because He wants an eternity with those who want Him as their King, and it doesn’t benefit Him to have anyone suffer eternally.  The entire reason for this life and after it Hades, is to fix that problem.  That is what punishment is for, fixing the problem.  There is no more chances after judgment day, all of first creation occurred to attempt to fix that problem and the second creation will not have that problem.

To those who may be too prideful to accept God’s help, to want to do it on their own, who would prefer suffering with pride over humility.  I don’t think the bad part of Hades will be the fire or physical pain inflicted.  Or pain of their soul however pain will work when we don’t have bodies.  I am not sure if fire is real or metaphorical.  But real pain and suffering will be when you realize you are alone, you are not loved or accepted unconditionally by anyone and that void of despair has to be worse than anything.  People go through fires, they get burn and it hurts, but life for them goes on even in extreme pain, pain is bearable or possible to continue living life.  You can be distracted from that pain, you can enjoy things and blessings of God in the midst of pain.  But what cannot be escaped is despair.  So many people cannot escape despair, so much so that they kill themselves in attempt to end it.  You could offer the greatest food or most awestruck view or the strongest drug high or anything to someone in despair, and they will always chose to kill themselves.  The ONLY thing that pulls someone back from the pit of despair, that they will chose to continue to live on, is HOPE.  But in hell, there is no hope, it is full of despair and it is unending, you can’t even kill yourself to rid of it.  That has to be 10,000 times worse than the pain of a fire.  I am not sure if there is going to be any hope or glimpse of hope in hell.  It is void of the presence of God or the love of God through the people of God.  That could be why eternal hell is a certain thing for those who die now and go to Hades.  But I think it might be possible for people to have memories, to remember the hope they heard about on earth that they pridefully refused.  I don’t know the answer, but the good news is God is in control and is loving, merciful, righteous, just, and sovereign.  I don’t need to have the answers, but I am just to live my life loving God first and most and others more than myself.  Attempting to share the blessings of God with others for His glory, and giving thanks for those blessings, for in all things to God belongs the glory!

This will be one of my shorter posts, as I do not have the answer to it and I hope anyone who does have advice or wisdom to share is able to comment or email me and let me know their thoughts. But until I have answers, I will continue to serve God to the best of my ability with His help and give Him the glory for all things.

Does Jesus give advice to the flesh rather than the spirit?  Or to the unsaved and not the saved?  Jesus tells many parables that seem to have advice that is only beneficial to the unsaved, to those without the transforming Holy Spirit inside them.  

For example when Jesus speaks the many parables of the master returning at an unknown hour, so the servant is to always be prepared.  It is almost like the servant is living under the motivation of being caught, and never wanted to get caught doing the wrong thing, so they live a life motivated by fear and obedience rather than a transformed heart.  Shouldn’t the servant with a transformed heart want the will of the master and the success of the master’s business be their motivation?  The have the same mind (being transformed) of the master, and just as the master is in the “business” of sharing the love of God with the world, the servant wants the same.  The servant doesn’t care if the master is coming back today or after they die, they aren’t living to appease the master potential wrath of not doing the masters work, rather they want to help in the masters work.

If you were a boss and you had an employee that did everything the job description required perfectly (though clearly we can’t, but even if we could) but their heart wasn’t there.  They only did the job description because they wanted the raise or they wanted to take over your job when you left or any selfish ambition.  And at the end of the day, they would ask you “is there anything else you need before I leave” and in their heart, they said “man I hope this guy says nothing needs done and I can go home, I hate this job”.  Or, you had an employee who messed up fairly often, and didn’t complete al items on the job description.  But at the end of the day, he would also ask “is there anything else you need before I leave”.  And in their heart, they were thinking “I really want this business to succeed, the boss is a great leader and this business is helping so many people, I am so lucky to have the opportunity to work for him, I hope he says there is more work needed so I can have the honor of helping him more”.  Which employee would you rather have?

Does the latter servant need a reminder that the boss could come back at any time?  Or does the former need that reminder?  Why does Jesus seem to speak advice to the untransformed?  I hate to denounce the wisdom of Jesus, but doesn’t this seem like needless advice to those with the Holy Spirit transforming them?  Why give advice to those who don’t have the Spirit?  Is it help they need, and will advice help them live well?  This almost seems like an advocate of works based salvation/advice?  Once we are saved, can we ignore this advice or does it have any benefit for us?

Or the parable of sitting at the dinner table.  We are told not to sit at the seat of honor, rather sit at the lowest seat.  That is advice I can understand.  But then further, we are told because the one who takes the highest seat will be made a fool in front of others and placed lower, and the one who seats lowly will be exulted in front of others.   This is wise advice to the worldly or unsaved.  But shouldn’t we want to sit at the lowest because we genuinely believe that God created us all of great value equal to another and showed us one way to show the love of God is to not only treat others as valued equals, rather higher than ourselves.  The motivation for sitting low should be to love others and have them valued over us, not to be exulted in front of others and placed higher?

I don’t know the answer to these, but I am just sharing some thoughts I have that I can’t figure out.  Why does Jesus seemingly give us fleshly advice or advice to those who haven’t been transformed by the Holy Spirit? I am aware that the God I call King and choose to serve is the One I am kind of questioning here. I know Jacob was blessed when he decided to wrestle with God, and I guess I am doing the same. I am not doing it for a blessing though, just to know God more, which I guess would be a blessing. I assure you my faith is not shaken or weakened in any way because I don’t have the answers, and I might not ever on this earth.

In the words of a singer Danny Gokey. “Keep it real simple….Love God and love people”. The two greatest commandments.

Unfortunately there are so many unnecessary and complex conditions and formulas of what makes a Christian or how they should act, who gets into heaven, who goes to hell, what beliefs one must ascribe to, what words one must say ect. when it is (and should be) so much simpler).  The sad things is none of the above questions/statements are even about God, they are about us.  How did becoming Christians have to become about us?  The very essence of Christianity is about God, because everything came from God.  So I need to add extreme caution when I say next only to be understood in full context, but all you need to do is want God.  No, I am not saying by any stretch of the imagination that anyone is saved by their own deeds or effort.  But basically, if you want God to be your God, your King, that is really all a Christian is.  The literal root of the word is to be a disciple of Jesus, and Jesus wanted nothing more than God to be rightly where He is as God and King of existence/the universe.

I guess the best analogy I can think of would be to imagine an island or a planet (some isolated place with no possible way of escaping from within or of our own efforts or actions).  But God can pluck us out at any time, but out of respect for His nature and holiness, He only decides to pluck out those who acknowledge that He is the only salvation.  Not just the only salvation from this island of misery, but more importantly acknowledge the truth of who God is, and wanting His will above all else.  Like a man with a blindfold on who is strapped to a bed and has earphones on (senses basically removed).  The world still exist around you, even it you can’t sense it, it is still there, that is the truth, whether you can perceive it, sense it, acknowledge it, like it, or want it.  It is still there. Though we have 5 senses to perceive our physical world, we have our spirit and the Holy Spirit to enable us to perceive the truth of God.  I can’t explain the ‘certainty’ I feel (some may refer to this feeling as faith) of the truth of God any other way than the Spirit.

But the truths of God aren’t conditional or circumstantial.  So even if I don’t end up in heaven, the truth of who God is, is still true.  Or even if I end up in eternal torment, the truth of God still is, and I will praise Him for who He is forever and always.  Jesus did say that He was the Truth.

So back to this island of misery.  If God reveals to my spirit His truth, and I understand it as such and want His will, He will pluck me off of this island.  Though even if He didn’t, I still can’t unknow the truth I know of Him.  He is good, loving, merciful, and just.  Myself, and every human choses to be on this island by rejecting His will and He would be just banishing me from existence or doing whatever He wants.  The Potter can rightly do whatever they want to the clay, and He is still the Potter.  That is a truth of the One who molds the clay.  What He decides to do with the clay has no effect on that title.  But, thankfully we have a loving, just, merciful, and good creator, who not only blessed us with life and the honor to glorify Him with that life and those blessings, but who has no malice towards those who reject Him and the truth of who He is.  There is no action or thought that you can do that can lose the love of God for you and the second you turn to Him, you are reconciled.  He will pluck you from that island of misery (which I can’t think of any worse place to be and would equate it to hell), and welcome you with open arms into His kingdom.

Imagine God built a bridge to cross from misery island to God’s Kingdom, because He wanted those who believed in Him to come and live in His Kingdom.  Well, God did build that bridge, and He called it Jesus.  But Jesus was So much more than just that bridge, He was also the Holy Spirit coming to us, to speak and reveal the truth of who He is to our spirits.  This is again, why Jesus refers to Himself as the Truth.  He told us the truth of who God is, and to anyone who acknowledges that and desires for God to be their King, He built a bridge for them to cross over.  Now all analogies have their flaws, and for this one I generally don’t like to use this analogy as it could convey that it is some effort of mine (crossing the bridge) that get me in His Kingdom.  It could also lead one to almost worship the bridge the savior that rescued them from misery.  Now if I am blindfolded, and someone takes of my blindfold and allows me to see the most beautiful artwork ever, will I worship the one who removed the blindfold, or the artist?  Don’t get me wrong, I would be very grateful of the one who removed it, but it is the Artist I would worship.

Now it gets kind of tricky that the Artist is the same One who removed the blindfold.  The One who removed the blindfold is the best representation or image of the Artist and would give the Artist the greatest glory in demonstrating the level of love for us that we can attempt to fathom or perceive, and that is why it was done that way.  In fact, the entire history of our human existence was orchestrated for this very crescendo that occurs the moment the bridge was built/opened that allowed us to inhabit the Kingdom of God.

The beautiful part, is how different it is from anything of this world.  Since there is nothing you can do to earn it, there is also nothing you could do or could have done that can lose it.  But I don’t even like to refer to it as an objective thing.  God loves you, He wants what is best for you, He wants to bless you, and the rest of His creation through you.  And no matter what you have done in the past, no matter how many times you have rejected His will, He only sees the future, a present of you choosing Him now, and the blessed future you will have through Him due to that choice.

If a billionaire gives you a few million and you brag about having a million to all those who don’t have that much, are you really impressing the billionaire?  Do you think you can compart to the billionaire with your measly millions?  It wasn’t of your effort or merit you got that million.  I would say the same to anyone who is a ‘godly’ person or a ‘good Christian’, or anyone who simply knows the truth of God.  The only reason you know anything is because God chose for you to know it.

Those who work hard and have earthly success, was that from their hard work?  Should they receive any credit?  No, no one other than God deserves any credit or glory for anything!  What if that born paraplegic wanted to work just as hard but couldn’t?  Are they of any less value?  What if that guy in prison was not raised by good parents, that instilled these values and told them to work hard.  Is that person of any less value?  Did that success person ‘earn’ those good parents?  Or the finances to help them out, to admit them to good education, surround them with other successful people?  We used to say it take a village to raise a child and a it does, a village of God fearing people.  Now we have even taken that credit away from them and take all the credit of our own merit.  But again, who are you going to impress?  Do you really think the God who gave you those blessings is impressed by what you have achieved?  Who gave you that mental ability or that drive to be successful?  Can you attain the status of god?  It isn’t that God is an egomaniac or a narcissist and needs attention or praise to feel good.  It is literally where all glory belongs though.  Everything you have is because of God and that is why God deserves all glory.  It would be dishonest of God to give anyone glory for anything.  Just like the billionaire couldn’t honestly praise the millionaire for their money.  Even if the millionaire become a billionaire, it wasn’t from nothing, they started with a million.  And even if they could start form nothing, they had health to help them work hard or brains to outsmart, and life to even live.   You can’t impress or out-do God, nor can any achievement you have be attributed to your efforts.

 I don’t believe that free will is an unbreakable rule by God, nor do I see any verses that support any such commonly believed statement.  I see where God hardened the heart of Pharaoh and humbled the heart of Nebuchadnezzar.  I think God mostly like to allow us to have free will, because it seems it would bring more glory to Him for us to have it.  But just like the laws of physics and matter are generally followed by God most of the time, He clearly manipulates and outright violates them.  I think many athiest (rightly so) use the argument of the the tyrant that says, do this or die.  You don’t really have a choice, that is just the illusion of free will.  Some may ask if God desires everyone to be in heaven, then why not ‘manipulate’ the free will to get them there like He clearly does at times.  Or the only ones that will be in heaven are those who God choses, so how can God chose to bring everyone?  The Bible says God wants none to perish. For one, we can’t know the mind of God, and who is the clay to question the potter?  But I don’t desire God to be my King to save me, I desire His will because He deserves all glory, and my spirit knows that truth.

So why does God let some God to hell?   That is a question of someone who is trying to ‘prove God wrong’, not of one who wants to know God.  The only way I can answer that questions is to say that the Creator of everything, knows you, and created you to do amazing things with His help and blessings/gifts, despite the things you have done or amount of times you rejected Him or attempted to steal glory from Him.  If you stopped distracting yourself with the things of this world and began to reflect on yourself, and who you are, if you were stripped of your status, wealth, health, family, friends, talents, intelligence (whatever it is that you define yourself by) who would you be, what would be your value, what is the purpose of living.   You would begin to see the emptiness of this world, how you assign value to temporary things that could be removed and you would feel as if you have no value.  And know that you are still more than valued by that Creator who you rejected, you are a child of God, no matter what, you are loved and highly valued!  Would you want to know that God and have a relationship with Him?  If the answer is yes, then you will be transformed with an eternal joy that is indescribable.  You will be given life.  You will be given life eternally, eternal purpose to glorify and eternal God.  And then you can understand either the answer to that question, or understand how you don’t need to know the answer to that question.  You can realize that you were in hell, you had no purpose, you had no life, you were just dust, a vapor, here today, gone tomorrow, with so much potential value.

It is funny how this is titled simple, yet it becomes so complex I could probably write a book about it.  I don’t really want to write a book about it because unfortunately people could treat this like a new religion like the Mormons.  I would be the new Joseph Smith and this book would be the ‘golden book of revelation from God’ that people would follow and worship me or hold me to high esteem?  I exist for the glory of our Creator.  If God uses me to open the eyes of people, praise Him for that.  Everything I said can easily be understood to have been said in the Bible.  If you can see the ‘wisdom’ of my words in the Bible, then internalize that, allow the Spirit to guide you to know truths of God through the Bible.  But much more importantly than knowing things, live them. 

Give God the glory in all you do and desire His will above all else.  Again, very simple.

Many Christians repeat that statement, and I would guess that it is probably because of some of the statements Paul makes through the NT.  Like Rom 8:18 or 2 Tim 4:7.  But I don’t even think Paul would agree with how people use his words.  There are better things to come, and the suffering here is nothing compared to the glory that is to come, those are truths. BUT, I don’t think they were meant to be taken as a motivation, rather a truth spoken. 

Are we really supposed to suffer here, but it is ok, because heaven will be a reward?  Is that really supposed to be our motivation, an eternal reward? 

I will start off first by saying that the things I say are easier said than done, the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak, I am by no means perfect.  But when I am spending time with God, I feel as if I could walk on water, as if I am in heaven now, and there is a spiritual clarify I feel I have, and the ‘truths’ of the flesh don’t make any sense.  I am not sure why the church focuses on the flesh so much like with statements like that.   So my below statement I feel is something we should strive for and preach, and quit preaching the motivations of the flesh and using scriptures to back that up.

But my reward is for God to receive glory.  All glory/credit belongs to God.  Nothing good is possible without God, it all came from God, and any time anyone wants to give any credit/glory, it belongs to God.  To give God glory is the only reason we do anything.  We exist to bless the world with the gifts God gave us.  He blesses the world through us, and we praise Him and others who are blessed through us praise Him too.

To me, there is no “better things to come”, I am in heaven now, or that is where I rest when I spend time with God.  The only difference to me between now and after my flesh passes, is that I won’t get distracted in heaven, where as here, I get distracted.  This is with regards to Peter, who was looking at Jesus, was able to walk on water, but when the waves and wind distracted him, he began to sink. 

Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah were about as ‘earthly’ painful as it gets, they were in fire.  But they were also with God.  With God, our spirit is whole, there is no such thing as suffering.  When Peter walked on water, he was focused on God. 

What is a curse?  It is used almost magically like the words one speaks can negatively affect the one with whom they speak it to.  There is no such thing as magical curses.  I could believe that one could request demonic assistance, and if God allows, that person may feel the ‘curse’ with which it was spoken about.  But the truth of a curse is very simple, it is the opposite of a blessing.

What is a blessing?  This is also not some magical words spoken that positively affects the one is is spoken about.  The only blessing is from Num 6:24-26.  So a curse is the opposite.  To have the Lord not keep you safe, be stingy and merciless towards you, turn His face away from you and let you do your own thing, which will result in hate, restlessness and war. 

I don’t believe there was a “curse” after the fall of man, it don’t think God changed His creation so that thorns now appeared, the ground gave up less food, the sun got any hotter, lions or mosquitoes or wasps or locust or carnivores appeared, and flesh became a finite thing, or child bearing had biologically changed.  These are all realities, much like if you tried to walk on water you would drown, or if you tried to walk in fire, you would burn.  But this is a reality, not a curse/magical words of God.  I believe that just like Azariah, who was able to stand in the fire unharmed and in no pain, and as Peter was able to walk on water, childbirth could have been painless, and thorns wouldn’t bother us and food would have been plentiful and lions would not eat us….if/when we were in the presence of God.  But when man sinned and rejected God, we were absolutely under a curse, and not because God turned His face on us, rather because we turned our face on Him.  So without the presence of God, not lions try to eat us, child bearing is painful, fire hurts us ect.  The curse isn’t some magic change to God’s creation, rather a truth realized.

But if we return to God, acknowledge His supremacy, ask forgiveness, repent, be atoned by the blood of Christ, our spirit is blessed, we are in heaven.  I still get distracted and screw up and sadly at the time of doing it, I don’t mind or I don’t realize, but in hindsight, it is realized as such a wretched  thing I have done.  And in heaven I won’t have moments of screw ups, and that will be great, because God won’t be robbed of glory ever, where as I do that from time to time while on earth when I get distracted and my gaze wonders from God’s face.

But I don’t want to go to heaven now, I am not waiting for this amazing prize.  Calling what happens to my flesh and mind here as suffering, but saying it is ok because it will get better or I will get a reward.  I am in heaven now, I realize who God is and He is my only rest, if only I wouldn’t get distracted. 

God number one priority is not for us to be perfect or sanctified.  If it was, He could easily achieve that and we would be in heaven now being that.  God wants us here on earth for a greater reason.   And I will gladly try to glorify Him in all I do while here, which is the exact same thing I will do in heaven (with no failures there).  But if He has you here now for a reason, why/how could anyone want to be anywhere else?  I want to be here on earth more than in heaven, because this is where God wants me, and I want to do His will.  Even though I would be able to do it more perfectly in heaven, He has me here for a reason, and I thank Him and glorify Him for that.

I have heard it said that how difficult it would be to invest so much of your live into good (biblical things even), and to never see any fruit come from that.  If you invested 20 years of your time into discipling a person only to have that person turn from the faith or even betray you.  First of all, to call that 20 years “your time” is incorrect, but I would say that even expecting to see fruit of your labor in a way you would desire is where you went wrong.  If you live your life for Christ live your live how Jesus wants us to/showed us to, you would be living your life to honor the Father and nothing more.  I understand that at the moment of betrayal, you wouldn’t shout for joy, but it shouldn’t crush you either and you shouldn’t be hurt from “wasting 20 years of your life”.  If over those past 20 years, you did what you did in attempt to honor God, then I would say it was 20 years that couldn’t have been better spent.

God is sovereign, He can and will accomplish anything and everything He desires, and He doesn’t need us to get it done.  It is a great privilege and a pleasure that He wants to use us, and He gave us gifts and blessings to share with the world to see His will done.  But we need to stop living for outcomes, or wanting to see fruit.  Fruit cannot be grown through effort or will, it needs time and the right nutrients.  When you deny yourself, your desire for outcome, and take up your cross, live a life Jesus demonstrated, strive to honor God in all you do, that is the fruit.  God being glorified is the fruit.

This I believe is the main danger of evangelism and apologetics and ‘the great commission’.  It has great intentions, even biblically motivated reasons behind it, but they create a false goal or a desired outcome.  We need to quite equating ourselves to Paul.  He was a great man of God, I could assure you that he wouldn’t want any glory for his life or actions, he wouldn’t want us to be like him.  If God personally calls you, hallelujah!  Go, and preach, but if God doesn’t, then you keep trying to glorify Him in where He has you.  Don’t live exhaust yourself for outcomes, or endure suffering and keep telling yourself “it will be worth it in heaven”.   If you have the Holy Spirit inside you, you are in heaven now, this is as good as it gets!  You are exactly where God wants you to be right now, and you have the opportunity to be doing exactly what He wants you to be doing right now.  There is blessing, there spirit is so blessed and in heaven, who cares if the flesh is suffering.  Not because the suffering is worth it for a reward, but because the flesh is a temporary (but necessary blessing of God), and our spirit can have rest in Him NOW, not after our flesh expires.

The weak scaffolding that has become modern Christian doctrine, instead of the foundation of God in truth.

I read an article about Rhett and Link, who were well known in the Christian community growing up, the probably still know the Bible better than I do.  The article was about them “falling away from the faith”.  There have been renowned apologist who have attempted to challenge them and their views using the ‘almighty’ Word of God, and they (Rhett and Link) are able to refute it all too often.  This is actually part of the reason for their falling away.  They just couldn’t reconcile with the mighty building of doctrine the Christians created and when challenged, it topples, leaving them with a mess.  Ask yourself, what parcel of knowledge is mandatory for a Christian to believe?  If one challenges that, you might become defensive, wanting to keep up your weak scaffolding, but when someone hits it hard enough, you begin to wonder yourself and it all collapses.  What someone told you Jesus wasn’t the Son of God, and they had proof of this?  I would guess you wouldn’t believe their proof, and your proof is the Bible says so.  But what if they challenge the Bible?  Your answer is the Bible says it is right?  What if they just challenged a few things of ‘standard’ doctrine?  What if they challenged evolution?  Or the possibility that the flood was not global?  What if they ask how God could allow or command the killing of innocent children and women?  I have seen so many apologetic videos and sermons defending those various topics.  But why do we need to defend them?  If those things are proven to be not what we thought, is it all a lie?  Like one domino can topple the entire building?  There really doesn’t seem to be a foundation, or it doesn’t sound to me like a firm foundation. 

As much as these two and many more “fallen Christians” knew, ( which is probably way more than me about the Bible), I highly doubt the truth of God was known by them.  They even claim to be agnostics now, which believe in a higher power of sorts, but aren’t sure.  If you look at true Christianity, if you read about the character of God in the Bible, Christianity is actually the most common sense, logical choice.  If you are prideful, and want credit for anything, then it can be the most difficult choice, but the best of all religions if you break it down.  There is a higher power, who loves you unconditionaly

This is the amazing thing that God showed us in Jesus, the Author of love, and truth.  Unconditional love.  God has this towards us.  There is nothing we can do, no condition we can attain, that He will not love us.  No action of your past, gives God a negative bias towards you, nor will sway His mind to do something negative or to spite you.  Every second you live is love coming from Him.  Many Christians know this, but what I feel often forget is that THIS God lives inside us.  We have that unconditional love in us too!  This isn’t just love towards man, which I am sure most Christians would at least claim to attempt or desire.  But unconditional love towards God!  We praise God so often in songs, the Bible is filled with praises, “worthy is the lamb who was slain”, “worthy is the one who spread the seas”, “thanks be to God who protects us”.  And praise is good, don’t get me wrong, but God deserves all praise always.  One of my favorite passages from Job “the Lord gives and takes, blessed be the Lord”, or “Our God can save us, BUT even if He doesn’t, we worship Him”.  These are amazing verses of unconditional love and faith in God.  I believe we too often reflect on the true things of God, like sending His Son Jesus to die for us, but then I think we forget and almost make that a conditional statement, that we love Him because He did this.  What if God didn’t send Jesus, do you still love Him?  What if God sent you to hell, would you still love Him? 

My answer would be yes, because one, my love isn’t conditional, my unconditional loves comes from the author of unconditional love, but I also can’t deny the truth.  My foundation is in God, not some doctrine or condition or promise of God but who He is, which never changes.  If you were to challenge if Jesus really was a man, or really died or was sinless or whatever you want.  I wouldn’t have to frantically search through the scriptures to come up with a defense, lest my scaffold fall. I know that before Jesus came, God loved us, that one event, was I believe God’s greatest way to show us His love. It was the culmination of the entire OT coming to climax at that point, a beautiful crescendo at the middle of an amazing symphony that is human existence.  But the tallest person in the world is still that, even if they are sitting and are never measured.  The truth doesn’t change from different circumstances, it just is.  What if the flood wasn’t real or global?  How could that really shake you faith if it wasn’t?  I don’t know how I came to faith that I have, I would have to answer the Holy Spirit in me, and I am sure the Bible played a role in it, but the conditions in the Bible don’t have to be true for me to have the faith I have in God.  If you learn 1+1=2, and then someone discredits the author of that textbook, I can’t unknow that truth, it just is.  There is a Creator, who created all things for His glory, who created us, to have Him help us glorify Him, who doesn’t have a single negative thought about us because of our past, who loves us, wants to help us.  I don’t believe anyone who knows that, could unknow that, or fall away from that.  Jesus was an incredibly orchestrated masterpiece (from Genesis to the Gospels) to show us the truths of God that we never could understand, to show us the love of God and how He will go to the greatest length possible to show us this love, to show us how treasured He sees each and every one of us and how we can live for His purpose.  There is not a single Bible verse I think I quoted there, but it has the truth and the gospel right there.  This is the truth we need to build our foundation on, not some doctrine or passages.  Things that continue to be true, because they are.

But if you think you have accomplished anything of your own means, I can understand you desire to own that glory.  But I would have to ask you, who gave you that strength to achieve that?  The ability to go to the gym?  Being born in a country that has gyms?  Having a family or government that provided food for you?  Who gave you that strong heart beat, and lungs?  Are you any better than the one who wasn’t born in a country like yours?  One who is war raved, who doesn’t have parents or a government to provide for them.  When you really look at what you have, and you realize you didn’t actually do anything yourself and all glory belongs to God, it is slightly easier to lay down that pride and acknowledge His sovereignty. 

But apart from pride, who wants to belong to a religion that life is a curse, one that the entire purpose is to non-exist, and every time you screw up, don’t achieve non-existence, you must suffer worse than the last.  Or to believe there is no reason to exist at all?  All our achievements will fade, time will forget you, nothing you do will last, you’re a vapor, why try anything, even ‘having fun’ because life is all you have and it’s gone, but you feel empty after everything you try, nothing fulfills you. 

Or a religion that acknowledges you are dust apart from God, that no one is better or worse than you, all that you have is from Him and is to be used to give back to Him, and bless those around you which will also give back to Him.  And even when you screw up and take glory that doesn’t belong to you, that God doesn’t hold it against you.  You started your eternity now, and look forward to more eternity being completely fulfilled and loving only to contribute to the eternal God, because for now, we are but dust. Yet He still loves us!

This is a quote from the book of Judges, but seems to ring true no matter what time epoch we are in.  And at face value, isn’t exactly a bad thing.   There are those (the great minority) who in the words of Alfred “just wanna watch the world burn”.  There are your serial killers, those who must have had something wrong in their upbringing, and they are just void of all love, and want the rest of the world to suffer as they feel they have.  But that is the minority.  Many actually want world peace, and would see that quote above as a potentially good thing (as long it was want they wanted, and not others).  Hitler even wanted world peace.  He wanted the optimum race to be living and their to be peace among the Aryans left.  Obviously he went about achieving it in a horrendous way, and would probably go to the same lengths to maintain it if it was ever achieved.  So doing what is right in your own eyes can be a horrendous thing, even if the want or the end goal would be agreed by all that it would be a great thing.

The political right or left isn’t evil, they simply want what is right in their own eyes. The problem is, when man wants control so they can attempt to influence what they see as right done, rather than allow God to be in control and want His will done.

One could wager that the apostle Paul was a great man for God, converted thousands of folks, and the same could be said about the late Billy Graham or Ravi Zacharias.  But just think of all those they changed in the last 20-40 years of their life, how much more they could have done if they started 20 years earlier, or lived 50 year more?  I would say they wouldn’t have achieved anything different, because they are not in control.  But there is One who is sovereign, who could have allowed them to do these things, so why didn’t He?  If such greatness could have been doubled, then why not?

Could it be because God doesn’t need us?  He doesn’t need us to be at a specific level to get done what He wants done.  He can and will get it done regardless of how great or little we do.  Then one could ask (with the same mindset of Paul in Romans: “should we sin more to allow more grace? May it never be!”) should we all just and do nothing because God doesn’t need us?  May it never be!  Rather we should instead have the mindset of failing.  In our society, we are brought up to set goal and achieve them, then set new goals.  The point being, if you know you could never achieve something, why try?  We tell folks to shoot for the moon, and we don’t expect them to achieve it, but still hope to, and try to with the hopes of potentially achieving them.  But we never shoot for the moon, to fail.  Is that what God wants though?

We shouldn’t act expecting a result, rather act because it brings glory to God.  When we are not doing right in our own eyes, not trying to achieve what we think is good (even if it is something we want that is Biblical and aligns with the Bible or God’s commands), but just act.  Excepting to fail even, not seeing and” fruit of your labor”.  Which I think that is a terrible statement that proves my point that we only act to get things, or expect a result.  Some say, plant seeds, and hopefully one day fruit will come of it, even if you don’t see it.  I would say sowing the seeds IS the fruit.  Planting seeds is what God commands, it’s what we can’t not do, it is the overflowing fountain of love that has filled us up that overflows from us, and that is what glorifies God.  The fruit or the outcome of our labor is that God is glorified through us, that’s it.  We shouldn’t focus or desire ANY outcome, let alone one that we desire, a desire of our own eyes, even if that desire is “godly”.  Knowing that we will fail, but doing it anyways I think is a great demonstration of faith.  One is not doing something to achieve anything, other than know that glory is returning from where it came.  So to answer the question above “should we just not do anything because God is sovereign and what will be done will be done anyway”.  May it never be!  We do what we do, to give Him glory, not so things will be done, but those things would have been done anyway.  If you want to use this as an excuse to do nothing, I would doubt you fully understand the love of God and our purpose to glorify Him in all as all things belong to Him. 

But this is to encourage those who feel as they have failed, or they are not where the want to be.  You are always exactly where you need to be!  God does not look at our past in a negative bias.  If you are right now, not doing what you think you should be doing, then do it!  Or don’t do it.  Don’t beat yourself up because you are not evangelizing to every person you interact with as you see so and so do (the better Christian).  There is no comparison between man, we are all dust apart from God, and God is sovereign and will do what needs done regardless of what you do.  So don’t worry about not being somewhere.   A person who has never been to the gym cannot beat themselves up over not being able to bench 500 lbs.  There are not there yet.  If God wanted you to lift that, you would regardless of how hard you worked out or for how long.  You are right where He wants you, and that is trying to honor Him in all you do.  Try. But don’t try because you hope to achieve, try because He wants you to, and He wants to help you, even it if it to help you fail.  I know God helps us succeed many times too, but I also believe He helps us ‘fail’.  Because failure in our eyes might be exactly what He wants.

How easy is it to do something and succeed, like positive re-enforcement.  So we see the success and keep on.  But difficult is it to try something and fail, but to keep at it, knowing God is sovereign in all and what His will is will be done regardless of what we do.  That takes faith to do a difficult thing that God calls us to do, and we feel it succeed.  And greater faith to do something we can’t see any effect of at all, but to keep doing it.  Like Thomas feeling the scars of Jesus and believing, and being told greater faith in those who believe but can’t see…the effects.

Why did God create man?  Was it simply to follow some rules?  Do we exist to not do specific things.  If you have read my other posts, you know I believe God created man to honor Him like everything God created.  So we have to look deeper into how we could honor Him.  Do we really honor Him by not doing bad things?  Jesus is often touted as the only perfect human to ever live, and it seems people think it is good to follow that perfect example.  Many think God wants us to simply not do bad things like Jesus did perfectly, but we can’t, but Jesus did for us, so we are ‘off the hook’.  Though I think much of that has truth to it, it seems a little shallow to me.  That would equate the perfect Jesus to nothingness.  If one was to simply not exist, they would be perfect at not violating all of the commandments.  Surely no Christian would dare say Jesus was nothing.  Because He did SO much more! 

This is what Adam and Eve were meant to do too.  To tend to earth and be good stewards of God’s creation.  Basically to bless God’s creation.  Then we are told the descendants of Abraham were to be a blessing to the world, and then Jacob (who became Israel) would bless the world.  All of them failed to do that, until the One Israelite, the perfect One came to actually be that promised blessing.  Sure the Israelites were not perfect, the violated the 10 commandments, and were given the means to atone for those violations.   But if they would have kept all the commandments, would they have been that blessing?

I think yes and no.  I do think they would have been that blessing, BUT not because they followed some rules, but because the reason why those rules were given.  They were given because a sinful man could not be a blessing to the world.  We can do nothing of ourselves, we need God to bless the world through us, and when we turn from God, we cannot do that.  This is what Jesus did.  He did follow the commands, but that wasn’t the point, again, a non-existing person could not violate things.  But He became a blessing to the world, because He remained in God, and He remained in God because He did not violate God’s will.  This is why Jesus revealed the truth behind the commandments.  We cannot bless the world by not murdering, but we must love.  We cannot bless the world by not stealing, but we must give.  Loving and giving is the way to bless the world, and you clearly cannot do those things if you are a murderer or thief.  But we don’t not do those things to be moral people or to impress anyone, we follow those commands to remain in God, and then God allows us to bless the world through Him in His love!     

So if you have the Holy Spirit living in you, then own that, realize that, and bless the world through that.  Look to bless the world, and thank God for allowing you and using you to do that and give Him the glory He deserves for that.  Defy temptations and remain in Him so that you can be used the bless the world.

Even those that believe that Jesus paid for all of our sins and forgiven us of past present and future, don’t not sin to make God happy or out of thanksgiving for what He did for you. I don’t really think not sinning makes God happy.  You could isolate yourself on a stranded island and possibly never sin there, but how does that make you any more useful than one who does not exist.   Don’t sin because you love God and you want to honor Him, and don’t sin because you want to be connected to God so you can be used the bless the world!

If you think Christianity is about following a bunch of rules and trying to not violate them, I would say you are missing the whole point.  Some are turned away from Christianity because they think it is all about following rules.  And I think unfortunately, they are met by a ‘Christian” response that says, you don’t have to follow the rules, because Jesus did that for us, all you need is faith.  And I do believe again there is truth in that, but it is so shallow of a defense of Christianity.  We are free from sin when the Holy Spirit lives in us, we don’t need to struggle to still follow rules.  We actually don’t want violate those rules (the Spirit inside us doesn’t, as the Spirit is willing)  But our flesh wants to indulge in these (the flesh is weak)  And Christians say it is hard to follow the rules, hard to not sin, they need God’s help to not sin.  Of course we need God’s help for anything we do and He gets glory for it all.  But maybe we shouldn’t ask God for help to not sin, rather help blessing others.  Our minds have been transformed by the renewing of our minds!  We now focus on that which is good!  We focus on God and how to allow Him to use us to bless the world.  When we fix our gaze on Jesus, just like Peter did and was able to walk on water, we can bless the world, and not sinning will be an thing that happens, but that won’t be our focus, but and byproduct.

This is why we must meet with God daily and multiple times a day, to remain focused on Him so we can walk on water and we won’t sin.  But when we forget to meet with Him, when our gaze strays from Him, we begin to sink, and begin to sin, and we cannot bless the world, as we are drowning with the rest of them struggling to survive, panicking, flailing.  And wonder why people don’t believe the words we say when we try to share Jesus as they watch us flailing about like they are, angry, wanting their own justice, trying to do what is right in their own eyes, and violating their own conscience with a means to an end of getting that justice they believe needs to be had.  Instead, have faith in God, He will have justice, He wants us to love, to focus on Him, and bless the world.