Monday, July 8, 2013
To Know God
Believers, Christians, Christ-followers - whatever name you adhere to…
We should be on a quest to know God deeper and deeper. Because we love Him - why wouldn’t we genuinely and passionately want to know as much as we possibly could about Him then share that?
The purpose of the cross is that we could know HIm - that’s what Jesus defines as eternal life in John 17:3. It thus begins on earth and is finished in heaven, but that doesn’t mean we can’t fully engage in the process now.
Being with God is knowing God, which breeds within us a greater and better capacity to love. Knowing God - all about Him - opens the door to us becoming more like Him. For how can we be like someone who we don’t know?
So I say we keep striving to know all we can about God - no to say we will ever fully understand Him, but maybe actually we can, for we believe that all God Goes, He does out of love, for good and His will - His will being that all are reconciled to Him. Knowing that is full understanding of God right there. We understand that He is love and that He wants us with Him, thus all He does points to that.
I think resigning to not knowing what God esteems in a certain situation can be dangerous, because it could provide a blockade in our love or lead us acting out in a way very counter to His will. So I say strive to know all we can about the One whom we love most. I can’t understand why we wouldn’t. I don’t strive to know all I can about and of God in an attempt to conquer Him in anyway or to bring Him down to a mere human level of understanding, so so I can better use Him for my own power and control, but simply because I love Him and He’s my everything, so my appetite for Him is insatiable.
I need all of Him, all the time and want to keep embedding myself deeper and deeper into Him and fully know Him so I can be totally consumed and immersed by Him.
Thus the reason behind my obsession with critically and constantly approaching theology. The drive of my analyzing, my constant seeking and questioning. I just want to know Him more. And what He wants of me and for all.
Friday, July 5, 2013
Why I Left My Church and some personal theology
I feel like to an extent, the modern, common expression of church encourages spiritual laziness. Though teaching is good and especially in the life of the new believer, necessary, a church culture has been created where the congregation takes and accepts the truth of their pastor as their own without testing that supposed truth for themselves. Subsequent review and Bible reading are done in a light to affirm what has already been implanted unto them.
But we are encouraged to work out our salvation with fear and trembling and given the Holy Spirit as our Teacher (everyone is given Him in equal capacity as well). And 1 John 2:27 boldly says, "But the anointing that you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as His anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie - just as it has taught you, abide in Him."
I guess one of my issues with my former church/pastor is there was this very implicit haughtiness in his sermons. Sure he admits to struggling with sin, which is awesome, but as far as his actual words, there's this feeling I discerned of "what I say is truth, and if you don't agree, you're wrong." And it's a position that most of the congregation seems to adopt as they elevate him almost in a way that they worship him. But the thing is, he is ultimately preaching his personal, biased opinion based on Biblical passages. His jumping off point is certainly Scriptural, but often times his conclusion is technically and ultimately his own. Not to say that's wrong or that that's not what we all do - personal opinions and interpretations can be right, just like they can be wrong. In humility, we accept the duality of that and thus when someone views something differently than us, though we don't agree, we also don't immediately condemn them as wrong, thus pridefully exalting ourselves as right with no room for any difference.
And I'm not bound to the authority of men. I'm just not. I've been given the exact same Holy Spirit as everyone else, and I am near constantly engaging with God through Him - so who's to say that my conclusions are any less valid than an ordained pastor? Just because another man ordained him? We've all been ordained by the Holy Spirit! There just seems to be a case of pastor worship at my former church - but the paster is not infallible. Only Christ is - Christ abides in us. I'm saying we don't have to agree with our pastor or take what he says at absolute truth - we're allowed to use the Spirt in us to come to our own conclusions about what Scripture says. And we shouldn't be shamed for this. Perhaps this wouldn't be such an unbelievable and radical notion if our church culture hadn't created such a lazy, second-hand Christianity.
But pretty much, the pastor uses different verses in the Bible to come to a conclusion, but the conclusion isn't blatantly stated itself in the Bible. The conclusion may have merit - often times I agree with one or like the conclusion, but the conclusion in itself isn't Biblically stated, but rather Biblically inspired but ultimately formed by man. It certainly isn't absolute truth. I think that's why Paul implores us to work out our own salvation - there's potential danger in accepting another's words as our own truth, just because he's been elevated in our minds.
So yeah, church frustrates me in how it enabled impersonal, lazy spirituality in a lot of ways. Also, the Sunday establishment of church is not what's necessary in a believer's life - especially at where I'm at right now, I'm honestly missing nothing by not going to listen to one man's take on Scripture for two hours with three friends and 800 strangers who I don't interact with.
I do believe that being apart of a body of believers is important, but I think most church expressions get it wrong - it's such an internal focus there, after all. Christians affirming and teaching Christians, being with Christians, equipping Christians to...be with Christians. Being with believes is about going into the world with them to meet the needs of those around, not to internalize ourselves.
So it's not teachings I crave - that can be completely accomplished without going to church on Sunday. Mainly it's mission with a fellowship. To say Sunday teachings are absolutely necessary bears testament to precisely the lazy spirituality I mentioned previously. Because we don't put the time in during the week to allow the Holy Spirit to teach us, we then relegating such spiritual feeding to Sunday at the hands of another who's done all the learning from the Spirit from us. So I don't think that's "church" - at least not the ultimate purpose of what God intended church to be.
I think the exhortation, correction and what not of believers that the apostles encourage stem not from going to a weekly church sermon, but just ends up being apart of living a life of mission together with a group of believers, when you know each other so well and are so in tune with each other and each other's needs and the Spirit connects you all that you end up constantly shaping each other as you serve and learn together (I've already seen this exemplified in my life with my best friend quite evidently, and we don't go to church together - we live across the country with each other, but we're very intentional and honest in the way we talk about Christ with each other and God uses each of us in the life of the other as a hand in the sanctification process).
I think of the two times I was "rebuked" after I came out - I think these people completely misunderstand their "Christian duty" because those people didn't really know me. One definitely didn't. So to be concerned with my spiritual life when you have no real witness to my spiritual life is ridiculous. You're not there to witness the fruits my life bears and thus have no right to say that my branches need trimming. What they were doing was assuming their opinion and interpretation was infallibly correct and thus better than mine and so from a place of probably unrealized pride came at me to assert themselves as right and me as wrong, though if other than reading my facebook post and responding they'd actually been apart of my life, they'd see that no bad fruit whatsoever was being sprung from my differing opinion. I don't think we're meant to rebuke from a distance, and I don't think a rebuke/correction should be in regards to differing opinions. Like Paul says, pretty much,let each person be fully esteemed in their own convictions.
Ultimately it's about closeness to God,right? What sin does is provide a barrier to that goal. Sin is also esteeming something else (ultimately ourselves in some way) as higher than God, which as a result pushes us from Him because we've knocked Him down a few notches in our priorities.
So if it doesn't interfere with my closeness to God, if it doesn't keep us from Him, if it doesn't esteem something above Him - it's not sin. But then all alternates would be sin.
When you're self-seeking, you're making yourself into your God. But when you're serving others, you are taking on the qualities of Christ in imitation of Him and thus coming close to Him. And then ultimately, we seek Christ in all. We seek and glorify Christ in our love for others. All sin theoretically could be eliminated by taking the focus entirely off of ourselves. The NKJV of 1 Corinthians 13:5 says it all: "love does not seek its own."
God wants us to be with Him because He knows that's what will give us our fulfillment, satisfaction, joy. That He is the best for us. Just thinking about how love is not self-seeking and God is love - everything He does is not for Him but for us. That's pretty incredible.
A lack of faith is self-elevating (thus prideful) because it says our shortcomings are greater than God's provision.
But we are encouraged to work out our salvation with fear and trembling and given the Holy Spirit as our Teacher (everyone is given Him in equal capacity as well). And 1 John 2:27 boldly says, "But the anointing that you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as His anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie - just as it has taught you, abide in Him."
I guess one of my issues with my former church/pastor is there was this very implicit haughtiness in his sermons. Sure he admits to struggling with sin, which is awesome, but as far as his actual words, there's this feeling I discerned of "what I say is truth, and if you don't agree, you're wrong." And it's a position that most of the congregation seems to adopt as they elevate him almost in a way that they worship him. But the thing is, he is ultimately preaching his personal, biased opinion based on Biblical passages. His jumping off point is certainly Scriptural, but often times his conclusion is technically and ultimately his own. Not to say that's wrong or that that's not what we all do - personal opinions and interpretations can be right, just like they can be wrong. In humility, we accept the duality of that and thus when someone views something differently than us, though we don't agree, we also don't immediately condemn them as wrong, thus pridefully exalting ourselves as right with no room for any difference.
And I'm not bound to the authority of men. I'm just not. I've been given the exact same Holy Spirit as everyone else, and I am near constantly engaging with God through Him - so who's to say that my conclusions are any less valid than an ordained pastor? Just because another man ordained him? We've all been ordained by the Holy Spirit! There just seems to be a case of pastor worship at my former church - but the paster is not infallible. Only Christ is - Christ abides in us. I'm saying we don't have to agree with our pastor or take what he says at absolute truth - we're allowed to use the Spirt in us to come to our own conclusions about what Scripture says. And we shouldn't be shamed for this. Perhaps this wouldn't be such an unbelievable and radical notion if our church culture hadn't created such a lazy, second-hand Christianity.
But pretty much, the pastor uses different verses in the Bible to come to a conclusion, but the conclusion isn't blatantly stated itself in the Bible. The conclusion may have merit - often times I agree with one or like the conclusion, but the conclusion in itself isn't Biblically stated, but rather Biblically inspired but ultimately formed by man. It certainly isn't absolute truth. I think that's why Paul implores us to work out our own salvation - there's potential danger in accepting another's words as our own truth, just because he's been elevated in our minds.
So yeah, church frustrates me in how it enabled impersonal, lazy spirituality in a lot of ways. Also, the Sunday establishment of church is not what's necessary in a believer's life - especially at where I'm at right now, I'm honestly missing nothing by not going to listen to one man's take on Scripture for two hours with three friends and 800 strangers who I don't interact with.
I do believe that being apart of a body of believers is important, but I think most church expressions get it wrong - it's such an internal focus there, after all. Christians affirming and teaching Christians, being with Christians, equipping Christians to...be with Christians. Being with believes is about going into the world with them to meet the needs of those around, not to internalize ourselves.
So it's not teachings I crave - that can be completely accomplished without going to church on Sunday. Mainly it's mission with a fellowship. To say Sunday teachings are absolutely necessary bears testament to precisely the lazy spirituality I mentioned previously. Because we don't put the time in during the week to allow the Holy Spirit to teach us, we then relegating such spiritual feeding to Sunday at the hands of another who's done all the learning from the Spirit from us. So I don't think that's "church" - at least not the ultimate purpose of what God intended church to be.
I think the exhortation, correction and what not of believers that the apostles encourage stem not from going to a weekly church sermon, but just ends up being apart of living a life of mission together with a group of believers, when you know each other so well and are so in tune with each other and each other's needs and the Spirit connects you all that you end up constantly shaping each other as you serve and learn together (I've already seen this exemplified in my life with my best friend quite evidently, and we don't go to church together - we live across the country with each other, but we're very intentional and honest in the way we talk about Christ with each other and God uses each of us in the life of the other as a hand in the sanctification process).
I think of the two times I was "rebuked" after I came out - I think these people completely misunderstand their "Christian duty" because those people didn't really know me. One definitely didn't. So to be concerned with my spiritual life when you have no real witness to my spiritual life is ridiculous. You're not there to witness the fruits my life bears and thus have no right to say that my branches need trimming. What they were doing was assuming their opinion and interpretation was infallibly correct and thus better than mine and so from a place of probably unrealized pride came at me to assert themselves as right and me as wrong, though if other than reading my facebook post and responding they'd actually been apart of my life, they'd see that no bad fruit whatsoever was being sprung from my differing opinion. I don't think we're meant to rebuke from a distance, and I don't think a rebuke/correction should be in regards to differing opinions. Like Paul says, pretty much,let each person be fully esteemed in their own convictions.
Ultimately it's about closeness to God,right? What sin does is provide a barrier to that goal. Sin is also esteeming something else (ultimately ourselves in some way) as higher than God, which as a result pushes us from Him because we've knocked Him down a few notches in our priorities.
So if it doesn't interfere with my closeness to God, if it doesn't keep us from Him, if it doesn't esteem something above Him - it's not sin. But then all alternates would be sin.
When you're self-seeking, you're making yourself into your God. But when you're serving others, you are taking on the qualities of Christ in imitation of Him and thus coming close to Him. And then ultimately, we seek Christ in all. We seek and glorify Christ in our love for others. All sin theoretically could be eliminated by taking the focus entirely off of ourselves. The NKJV of 1 Corinthians 13:5 says it all: "love does not seek its own."
God wants us to be with Him because He knows that's what will give us our fulfillment, satisfaction, joy. That He is the best for us. Just thinking about how love is not self-seeking and God is love - everything He does is not for Him but for us. That's pretty incredible.
A lack of faith is self-elevating (thus prideful) because it says our shortcomings are greater than God's provision.
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
Religion
Isn't religion ultimately man's attempt to be God? Our age old sin. We seek to set our own parameters, feel like we have some sort of control in the matter. As a result, God was systemized - or attempted to be. When in reality, are those rules and distinctions and neat, man-made organizations really necessary?
"Relationship, not religion" - a cliche that those who are actually quite religious use, not realizing what that statement actually should look like - but it's true in its right realization. If it's truly about being close to God, communing with Him constantly and truly yielding to Him - why do we have to form such strict and certain parameters around that? As if God Himself is not enough for our salvation and holiness, but we feel like we can do Him one better by institutionalizing our union with Him, adding rules and measures - implicitly required to be evaluated as being at a certain level with Him as some sort of validation, neglecting the knowledge that it was all taken care of on the Cross.
Man's effort to be approved by God is an outdated system, necessary before Christ but obsolete now. Just be with God. Really be with God. That's enough. Religion - man's attempt to put his own holiness around the matters of God - has no place here.
"Relationship, not religion" - a cliche that those who are actually quite religious use, not realizing what that statement actually should look like - but it's true in its right realization. If it's truly about being close to God, communing with Him constantly and truly yielding to Him - why do we have to form such strict and certain parameters around that? As if God Himself is not enough for our salvation and holiness, but we feel like we can do Him one better by institutionalizing our union with Him, adding rules and measures - implicitly required to be evaluated as being at a certain level with Him as some sort of validation, neglecting the knowledge that it was all taken care of on the Cross.
Man's effort to be approved by God is an outdated system, necessary before Christ but obsolete now. Just be with God. Really be with God. That's enough. Religion - man's attempt to put his own holiness around the matters of God - has no place here.
In the Beginning
Think about it: in the beginning there was just man (then woman) and God.
If we're going to take a model for life from that, let it not be for what "marriage" should be, but how our relationship with God was intended to be - that's the real intent of Genesis. There was no church, no Bible - just man with God. And they simply spent all their time together.
The original intent for mankind was that we would not need religion or any of its mean to bring us to God, but that we would just always be with Him. Laws weren't necessary, for He was right there. Even the commandment not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was less of a law and more of a choice: "be with Me or apart from Me." The ultimate choice that colors our entire lives: God or self.
If the law is written on our hearts by God, then shouldn't being with Him be enough for our sanctification? I think the issue is that we don't put the time and dedication into spending enough time with Him. So church, the Bible become short cuts, but I suspect that if we just communed with Him enough, we'd learn the same things directly from Him that we depend on pastors to teach us. (We were given the Holy Spirit as a Teacher, after all.) We use Scripture to know what we should do, how we should be, but if we abide in God, God abides in us. Then naturally we will do what we should and be who we should without being told because it just becomes who we are. Being with God makes us more like Him.
We take on more of His qualities - mainly His love. When we experience Him directly and often, we become so sure of who He is. We know Him certainly, breeding a deeper faith because we see no reason to doubt because we known personally who He is. Furthermore, we see no reason to stray from him because we certainly know that He is the best option. I think that's the root of all of our spiritual problems: not knowing God well enough.
This isn't to downplay the importance of His Word. Just that if you left a dedicated person with just the Holy Spirit and devotion to knowing God above all else, he or she would learn from God directly everything he or she would need to know and live out in Godly virtue as a natural result. Is that not what happened with Paul, who spend three years alone (and prior to the writing on the New Testament, which he wrote the majority of) before beginning his ministry?
A natural effect of closeness with God is righteousness. We don't have to stress over following rules, but put that energy into being with Him as a result. We were never meant to attain our own righteousness. The whole point of this was always that we could really be with God. That's why Christ took care of our sins - so we wouldn't have to worry about sin management, but rather enjoy the presence of God uninhibited by such. The issue is that we don't at all spend enough time in the presence of God. Be still and know Him.
If we're going to take a model for life from that, let it not be for what "marriage" should be, but how our relationship with God was intended to be - that's the real intent of Genesis. There was no church, no Bible - just man with God. And they simply spent all their time together.
The original intent for mankind was that we would not need religion or any of its mean to bring us to God, but that we would just always be with Him. Laws weren't necessary, for He was right there. Even the commandment not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was less of a law and more of a choice: "be with Me or apart from Me." The ultimate choice that colors our entire lives: God or self.
If the law is written on our hearts by God, then shouldn't being with Him be enough for our sanctification? I think the issue is that we don't put the time and dedication into spending enough time with Him. So church, the Bible become short cuts, but I suspect that if we just communed with Him enough, we'd learn the same things directly from Him that we depend on pastors to teach us. (We were given the Holy Spirit as a Teacher, after all.) We use Scripture to know what we should do, how we should be, but if we abide in God, God abides in us. Then naturally we will do what we should and be who we should without being told because it just becomes who we are. Being with God makes us more like Him.
We take on more of His qualities - mainly His love. When we experience Him directly and often, we become so sure of who He is. We know Him certainly, breeding a deeper faith because we see no reason to doubt because we known personally who He is. Furthermore, we see no reason to stray from him because we certainly know that He is the best option. I think that's the root of all of our spiritual problems: not knowing God well enough.
This isn't to downplay the importance of His Word. Just that if you left a dedicated person with just the Holy Spirit and devotion to knowing God above all else, he or she would learn from God directly everything he or she would need to know and live out in Godly virtue as a natural result. Is that not what happened with Paul, who spend three years alone (and prior to the writing on the New Testament, which he wrote the majority of) before beginning his ministry?
A natural effect of closeness with God is righteousness. We don't have to stress over following rules, but put that energy into being with Him as a result. We were never meant to attain our own righteousness. The whole point of this was always that we could really be with God. That's why Christ took care of our sins - so we wouldn't have to worry about sin management, but rather enjoy the presence of God uninhibited by such. The issue is that we don't at all spend enough time in the presence of God. Be still and know Him.
Christ and the Fig Tree
The story of Christ and the fig tree attests to many things.
The human and thus relatable elements of Christ - it emphasizes how He became who He sought to save (humanity) in His tiredness, His hunger and His frustration.
But that fig tree was created to bear fruit, and it was going against the nature of its creation by not doing such. It's what we do all the time - go against what we were created for (union with God, love). Such rebellion deserves death - Christ dishes that out to the fig tree. It shows His righteous power against rebellion - that gesture bears testament to whom God is.
But it also exemplifies His mercy. If a mindless fig could justifiably earn that fate, how much more do we for not bearing the fruit we should, for not being who we were really created to be? But instead of cursing us immediately with no second change, we're given mercy and allowed to live still. And thus we are given the fruit we're to bear. God could've very easily made us as that fig tree - it's what we deserve. But He didn't. Be grateful for such undeserved mercy. He really does love us.
The human and thus relatable elements of Christ - it emphasizes how He became who He sought to save (humanity) in His tiredness, His hunger and His frustration.
But that fig tree was created to bear fruit, and it was going against the nature of its creation by not doing such. It's what we do all the time - go against what we were created for (union with God, love). Such rebellion deserves death - Christ dishes that out to the fig tree. It shows His righteous power against rebellion - that gesture bears testament to whom God is.
But it also exemplifies His mercy. If a mindless fig could justifiably earn that fate, how much more do we for not bearing the fruit we should, for not being who we were really created to be? But instead of cursing us immediately with no second change, we're given mercy and allowed to live still. And thus we are given the fruit we're to bear. God could've very easily made us as that fig tree - it's what we deserve. But He didn't. Be grateful for such undeserved mercy. He really does love us.
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