I watched this pretty cool video about who God is today... it relates to music and our understanding of having a relationship with God and why Jesus helps us understand who He is. Pretty interesting. The myspace profile that posted the video may be a bit sketchy, but after doing some research I found out that this video isn't produced by the person who posted it. Rather it is from a video series called NOOMA. I'd recommend going to NOOMA and seeing what they are all about, they are on the fringe of some pretty interesting spiritual stuff that really relates to our post modern society.

embryonic excess

doctrine, eh?

By this all people will know you are my disciples, by our doctrine.

opps wait, let's re-think that.

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. John 13:34-35

I have been reading different church's doctrine for the past few days. Where in the bible does it say that we have to hold strong to this perfect doctrine? Don't get me wrong it is important to have a statement of faith but no one has the perfect doctrine. Not one church that I can think of, not one doctrine that I have read. Each one tho, has had peices of what I have found to be true of our Father in heaven. That is encouraging.

I think the apostle Paul would be really, really angry at us right now. If he saw how we are taking his letters, which are really just his testimony to what he knows to be true of the living God, and splitting his words, fighting over them and making them this doctrinal thing he probably wouldn't have even written them. I can only imagine what type of letter he would be writting to the church today. And who said that the bible is this almighty thing we are supposed to fallow? Wait, rethink that. I know and believe the bible to be true, and it is God given to us for a purpose. But the New Testiment isn't over. We are the New Testiment. The "bible" ie testimony of God's faithfulness to us, isn't done being written. Each and every one of us is writting our testimony as we fallow God when he speaks to us. Paul wasn't looking at the old testiment (at least not often since it was tough to get your hands on a scroll) as he wrote his letters to the churchs however many years ago. He was hearing from God. Because yes, we have a God that speaks.

God affirms us through the bible, but He also says things that can't be found in the bible. Example would be me saying, "Hey God, I really want to get that 2003 pontiac vibe. Is that cool?" If God only said things that are found in the bible it would go something like this... "_______________." Yea He would say nothing because there arn't cars in the bible. But here's the thing... just because it cant be found in the bible doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Scary, isn't it? God is a black and white God, but we live in a grey world that we have to allow Him to speak into. There are things now that weren't found back when Paul was around. God is the same God but we are a different time, and He will speak to us. If we hold onto this "only if it's in the bible thing" then we are missing what God might have for us, and really we are just guessing. But if we fallow what Jesus says in the gospel of John "my sheep will hear My voice" we will begin to come into the fullness of what our Father in heaven has for us.

So let's get rid of this doctrinal thing. Let's love God, desire to hear Him (or ask Him to instill in us a desire to hear Him) and love eachother. Let's fallow the things He speaks to us, whether that be through the bible or through His voice unto our hearts.

ephesians

I read the book of Ephesians tonight at guess where? Starbucks. Mmm that grande 2 pump no water chai was delicious... oh yea back to the blog. I'm just going to throw up some notes I have here and let you sort through them how you see fit. Oh, and for you who care tonight I am reading out of the New Living Translation.

Ephesians 1:3-4 speaks plainly of God's soverignty in our lives. If you skip ahead to 1:13 you see it says "And now you have heard the truth, and the Good News that God saves you. And when you believe in Christ, he identified you as his own by giving you the Holy Spirit, whom he promised long ago." A proof of receiving adoption by God through His son Jesus is by recieving the Holy Spirit in our lives. I also find it interesting that the three; Father, Son and Holy Spirit show up here in form of the trinity, being together yet completely seperate. But you notice you do not have one without the other.

One of my favorite verses in the bible that I have read thus far is found in Ephesians 3:12; "Because of Christ and our faith in Him, we can now come fearlessly into God's presence assured of His glad welcome." I don't know why I love it so much. It's just great to know that I can through reconciliation by Christ with the power of the Holy Spirit meet with God and experiance a taste of His presence. It astonishes and bewilders me to think of this privledge. A Kevin Prosch song says it best. "A father who loves me, a Son who forgives me, a Spirit who guides me, that's who You are." Because of the trinity and the power of God in each part of that we can come to know Him more, and that is one of the great mysteries of the trinity revealed to me.

Ephesians 4:14-16a,17-27 talks about growing in maturity; to be no longer like a child who is wishy-washy and believes lies as truthes, but rather to be mature and knowledgable as we have recieved the fullness of God through Jesus.

"Then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe someone has told us something different or because someone has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like truth. Instead, we will hold to the truth in love, becoming more and more in every way like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. Under his direction the whole body is fitted together prefectly...."

"With the Lord's authority let me say this: Live no longer as the ungodly do, for they are hopelessly confused. Their closed minds are full of darknessl they are far away from the life of God because they have shut their minds and hardened their hearts against Him. They dont care anymore about right and wrong, and they have given themselves over to immoral ways. Their lives are filled with all kinds of impurity and greed. But this isn't what you were taught when you learned about Christ. Since you have heard all about him and have learned the truth that is in Jesus, throw off your old evil nature and your former way of life, which is rotten through and throu, full of lust and deception. Instead, there must be a spiritual renewal of your thoughts and attitudes. You must display a new nature becausee you are a new person, created in God's likeness--righteous, holy and true. So put away falsehood and "tell your neighbor the truth" because we belong to eachother. And "don't sin by letting anger gain control over you." Dont let the sun go down while you are still angry..."

It's a lot to read, right? And there sure is a lot of meat in there. But these verses really struck me tonight. There is a point when we meet Jesus and are like children being very immature in our walk with God. But there comes a time when we must "throw off our evil nature" and choose what is God and we can do this through the saving grace of Jesus dying on that cross and by the Power of the Holy Spirit. We are growing in maturity through Christ so we must start making those concious decisions to choose what is good and what is right, and that is God and what He commands for our lives. We also must learn what it is to be transparent with one another--in love. To be truthful and not get angry because of it. These are some things that a lot of christians miss, myself included. There comes a point when the grace card doesn't seem so easy to play. Yes, we will always need grace but we must start acting like mature christians because God does call us to be "not like children" or "living like the ungodly do" but to step it up a notch. Like Paul is doing in this letter--holding the church of Ephuses accountable, we as mature christians must model this to eachother. And what a good model Paul provides for us.

Lastly, a verse that stuck out to me is Ephesians 6:23, "May God give you peace, dear brothers and sisters, and love with Faith, from God the father and the Lord Jesus Christ."

May not seem like a big deal, right? But wait... back it up. Love with faith? Love with faith from God and Jesus? Love requires faith? God grants us love, but it goes hand in hand with faith? And faith is interchangable with trust. So swap those two out... "and love with trust, from our God the father and the Lord Jesus Christ." We are to have trust/faith with out love. It is a command. Love with faith. It takes faith to love. It takes trust to love. And we must do it. It just blew me away for some reason.

and with that... I go to bed.

: )

I like the idea of blogging multiple times a day. See, here at my job I have a lot of time to think, listen to sermons, pray, write, etc., as I do my other tasks so my blog is very accesable. I want to transform it not only into me venting, ranting and raving like a relational lunatic, but into something that is helpful to everyone that reads it.

Christianese

Christianese is the language spoken by Christians. It makes no sense to anyone unfamiliar with biblical texts, but earns you major points in the eyes of other Christians, because it means your words are hella holy. (taken from UrbanDictionary.com)

I've been thinking for a while now, why do we use fancy words that un-believers don't get? Even saying un-believers makes the "christianese" light go off in my head. If part of the call on a fallower of Christ is to reach those who don't know Him why do we use termonology that no one will get? When did that become a standard? For those who are reading this that love to use termonology that would just plain confuse the non-church-goer please feel no offense—I am just playing devils advocate; for I myself use terms that some people wouldn't get. Sometimes those christian terms make me think a person is trying to be "hella holy" and that in and of itself is selfrightousness. This thought did however get me thinking of another example. I mountain bike. I love it. I say things like "rockin' the single speed" or "singletrack", etc. The sport of mountain biking is in fact exclusive to those who do it. The terms used are understood by those who do it, and they arn't wrong terms. I ride a single speed so of course I rock it. And I ride on singletrack—that's just what it's called. So here's my point. Chrisitain termonology—bad? Not entierly. It's totally lame if you say it with the wrong intentions (aka, do you want to sound super sweet when you say your little, pointless terms?) or are you saying them with a right heart?

I charge you who read this today, if you love Jesus and call God your Father check your heart. Is your use of christainese termonology for the benefit of the congregation, and is your heart set on the Father as you say such things, or are you stuck in your christian bubble where everyone says the hot term because it's what the cool jesus lover kids do?