Stumbling Blocks

A lot of my posts lately have been light and fluffy.  Their purpose is to encourage and warm the heart.  They have their place.  I’ll just preface by saying that this post is not one of those.  Sometimes as Christians we need to encourage and lift up and sometimes we need to speak the truth even if it’s hard to say or doesn’t sound pretty.

I had a conversation recently with my Dad that I’m going to share.  I’m fairly sure he won’t mind.  As a child my father worked in a position where he often had public speaking engagements and stories about my sister and I were numerous (and usually slightly embellished).  Likewise my Dad published a book that has content about me.  So he owes me one.  He reads my blog so he will read this ; )  Love you Dad!

Anyway, my Dad and I were talking deep spiritual stuff.  We mostly agree when it comes to our faith, but occasionally we don’t and on this particular topic we have not always seen eye to eye.  The topic was about hell.  Essentially my father struggles with the idea that if you don’t prescribe to the belief that Jesus died for your sins you will go to hell.  After much discussion he said to me, “So you’re basically saying that if you’re gay, or Buddhist, for example, you deserve to go to hell?”  You know what?  That is a really good and really tough question.  I recently heard a response to the likes of this question that I thought was a good one.  The answer I heard and one that I personally intend to give should this kind of question be asked of me again is this:  It’s not that someone who is gay deserves to go to hell, or someone who is Buddhist.  The fact is, we ALL deserve to go to hell.  I do and you do.  We’ve all fallen short of perfection.  Generally speaking in secular American society, while most people believe in a god and an existence of heaven and hell; the over arching belief is that if you lead a good life you go to heaven; a bad life you go to hell.  The Christian however believes that no one can measure up to the perfection of God.  No line in the sand can be drawn between ‘good’ and ‘evil’.  The Christian believes that we all fall into the category deserving hell, but we believe the good news that God paved a way for us through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. 

When I accepted that, I didn’t walk into my relationship with God feeling like everything that He says is wrong, really is.  But I surrendered my life to Him and over time He showed me something important.  He showed me that my feelings towards something He says don’t matter.  Something might seem right to me, it might feel right to me, but if He says it’s wrong, then it is.  To this day I don’t look at all sin and have a feeling of detest towards it in my natural sense.  Some sins I do, but others I just don’t.  But that doesn’t matter.  I don’t trust in my feelings to determine right from wrong.  I believe that my mind is infinitely smaller and less capable of understanding anything compared to the creator of the whole universe.   That said, only God gets to determine right from wrong.  We do not.  We are not called to pick apart others or point or shake a finger at them.  We are called to share God’s love and to share the truth that we have all fallen short and point the way towards the cross.

So for anyone reading this who believes in God, but not in anything else I just wrote, consider this:  Is it possible that the way you feel about God and the truths you have established for yourself might be wrong?  Is it plausible that God is bigger than who you’ve created him to be?  Maybe there is a supreme authority that trumps your beliefs?  Maybe your feelings don’t matter? 

For me the bible is my authority.  It is accurate.  It is inspired by God.  The seeming contradictions do not actually contradict each other.  It answers big life questions.  It is worth reading, studying, learning, knowing, and following, even the parts that don’t make you ‘feel’ warm and fuzzy.  

"For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength."   - 1 Corinthians 1:25 NIV84

Not the exact verse I used, but this cartoon sums up a lot of what I was saying:

www.joyfultunes.com

Proof for the Doubters

Lately I've been struck by any amazing desire to prove the existence of God.  Why?  Partly because I'm a panicky doubter by nature and those doubts about the existence of God creep into my mind often.  And partly because deep down inside I know He's real and I know people who I care for deeply who believe He's not.  I want the proof for them and for myself.

 Today I was reading in Joshua about the Israelites finally crossing the Jordan River and entering the land God had promised them.  When the first priest's toe touched the water of the Jordan (which was at it's flood stage level) God parted the waters and all of the Israelites crossed over.  While the waters were parted Joshua collected 12 stones from the river and set them up at a place called Gilgal.  Why?  Here's what the bible says, "He said to the Israelites, “In the future when your descendants ask their fathers, ‘What do these stones mean?’ tell them, ‘Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’ For the Lord your God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over. The Lord your God did to the Jordan just what he had done to the Red Sea when he dried it up before us until we had crossed over."(Joshua 4:21-23 NIV84). So it was a memorial of sorts for the Israelites so they would remember it was God who had brought them there.  But the bible says more.  "He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful and so that you might always fear the Lord your God.” (Joshua 4:24 NIV84). The rocks are the proof for all people that God is real.  He knows us.  He knows we will wonder and doubt His existence.  So He sets things up so that we can find the proof of Him if we go looking for it.

 I know what you might be wondering because I did too.  Where are those rocks now?  If God is real then why can't we locate those rocks?  If He wanted us to find them then why aren't they still where they were left?  That's a really good question.  The truth is however that there is proof of God's existence all around us. The bible says, "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." (Romans 1:20 NIV84). In my searching I stumbled across a great website that discusses six straight forward reasons for the existence of God.  The author of the list was once an atheist which I think gives her an interesting perspective. www.everystudent.com/features/isthere.html  I hope if you're a doubter you will check it out.  If you're not and you already believe you might want to check it out too because surely you know someone who is.

Have a great day!

Big Questions Part 2

I am certain one of the biggest roadblocks to many people becoming Christians is a misconception about what being a Christian is.  I’m going to focus on two of these misconceptions.

The first misconception is that being a Christian means belonging to a church.   I’ve had friends worry that making a decision to follow Christ would mean having to attend a certain church or follow a set of rules.  This is highly inaccurate.  They’ve asked me, “Do I have to go to church to become a Christian?" Becoming a Christian is actually quite simple.  It means believing that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that He was sent to redeem us from all the mistakes we have made or will ever make, and that by believing in Him we will be made right by God.  It also means acknowledging our own personal mistakes and our own need of God and accepting the free gift that God has given us in Christ.  The changes He will affect in us after accepting that gift will come as we allow Him to work in us, but attending church is not a requirement to become a Christian.  Being around others who have also made this determination is something we will desire to do to gain insight into understanding Him better, but I believe there will certainly be people in heaven who have never done this.  Look at the thief on the cross.  Jesus promised Him that he would be with Christ in heaven, yet he never attended a meeting where Jesus taught or was baptized (as many wrongly assume you need to do in order to be right with God).  Likewise there are parts of the world where it is dangerous to meet together in the name of Christ.  People either do so in secret or they are unable to meet at all.  Certainly God does not fault them for this.  The sheer fact that there are believers around the world who don’t have the freedom to meet publicly should inspire us to meet ourselves, but we shouldn’t look at church as a requirement.  Don’t get me wrong; I’m not suggesting that being part of a church is not a positive thing.  The bible is clear that we should gather, “Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another…” (Hebrews 10:25 NIV84)  However, attending church is not a requirement for our salvation and hopefully not a hindrance in forming a relationship with Jesus.  Being a Christian is just that, a relationship with Christ and a desire for Him to shape our lives to be more like His.

 The second misconception has to do with a belief that becoming a Christian means aligning yourself with many people who have done horrible things in the name of Christianity.  Why would they want to be part of something like that?  This becomes a huge roadblock.  I recently read an amazing article on this.  Instead of attempting my own take on this, I’m going to link the article itself.  It is definitely worth the read.

http://www.skepticalchristian.com/evilchristianity.htm

Lastly, to those of us who have already made the decision to follow Christ, we need to consider how the previously mentioned roadblock applies to ourselves.  We might not be Hitler or killed people in the name of Jesus, but how we live our lives is a picture to many of what being a Christian is.  Whether or not we do a good job representing Him can impact others decision to follow Him or not.  This verse really struck me when I read it this morning, “As it is written: “God’s name is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.”” (Romans 2:24 NIV84)  Essentially this was referring to the way the Jewish people, who had God’s law of right and wrong, were living their lives.  Instead of preaching the laws and following them, they were preaching them with their mouths and then not acting in accordance with what they were saying.  In so doing they were making a mockery of God and the Gentiles who watched this, chose also to mock God.  But we know that while this verse in context was referring specifically to the Jewish people of that time, it is really meant for all of us who believe.  If we profess to be a follower of Christ and then act in ways that do not reflect Him, we become a mockery to those watching us, and so does He.  We need to ask God to guide our actions and to refine our hearts so that when people look at us they are drawn to Christ, and not turned off.

Big Questions Part 1

How can a loving God let bad things happen to innocent people (I.e.children)?  This a big question and one that I believe keeps many people from putting their faith and trust in Him.  They just cannot resolve this question for themselves.  I've been thinking about this question lately and doing some research for a project I am working on that has drawn me to try and tackle it.

 First and foremost I think it's inherently important to understand that when God created us He gave us free will. We have the ability in ourselves to make decisions.  We can choose to do right or we can choose to do wrong.  Why did God give us this ability?  Why not just make people always choose to do the right thing?  Because if He did this then He would have a planet full of robots.  God created people in order to be able to have a genuine relationship with them.  He had to give us free will so that we could choose to have that relationship with Him or decide not to.

 So with the ability to choose to do the right thing, maybe a question we need to be asking ourselves along with the title of this entry is: Why do PEOPLE do bad things to innocent people ( i.e. children)?  As I mentioned I've been working on a project and in so doing have been reading about the practice of infanticide in the ancient world.  Infanticide was the common practice of drowning or abandoning to the elements, a baby who either by their female gender or by some deformity, was deemed unacceptable by the family or community.  Apparently to my ignorance and quite frankly horror, this happened ALL the time in the ancient world and was perfectly acceptable.  As a mother I just cannot wrap my mind around this.  How could a mother lay eyes on her child and then think nothing to lay her tiny baby out on a cold road to die?  Did the baby's cries not pierce her?  But they did this frequently. 

The Old Testament is actually chalk full of Godless people doing all sorts of awful things.  Many people look at Old Testament scriptures as examples of a cruel God raining down anger and punishment.  But the actuality of His anger was due in cause to the actions of people who were making really evil choices.  Here are just some examples that are referenced in the bible, "Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God‑haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless." (Romans 1:28-31 NIV84)

 Interestingly enough in regards to the practice of infanticide, the one culture in the ancient world that actually abhorred it were the Jews.  Why?  Because God had given them laws, rules to help them determine what was right and what was wrong.  He chose them to receive His laws as well as the knowledge of the consequences for not following them.  Eventually this manual of sorts was spread far and wide, and with the spread of Christianity, the bible has helped form our moral code.  In present day Judeo-Christian nations the practice of infanticide is no longer, while it is still practiced in other parts of the world. 

 Why is this illustration important?  We are born with an innate sense of right and wrong.  We could choose to do right, but inevitably we all choose at some point to do wrong.   Clearly those of you reading this would never kill a baby, but where is the right and wrong line drawn?  Where does your wrongdoing go from baby killer bad to somewhat acceptable?  The fact is: sin is sin no matter how small.  God is the only one who determines what is considered wrong and he has done so very specifically.  So if God intervened every time a person makes a choice to do something horrific, then He would need to intervene for even the tiniest transgression.  And that brings us back to the problem of us not being robots and Him giving us free will.  If He stopped us every time we were about to do something wrong then we would never actually be choosing to do anything out of free will.

 The problem therefore is not God.  He is good and perfect.  The problem is us.  The bible says, "All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one...All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God... (Romans 3:12,23 NIV84). Not just those who kill babies.  All of us.  So where does that leave us?  If God is not to blame and we are, then what do we do?   We keep reading that verse:  "...and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished– (Romans 3:24, 25 NIV84). There in God solves the problem of sin.  

 Does that make it easy to read stories about horrible things happening to those who don't deserve it?  No it doesn't.  But someday He will make things right.  He will come back and wipe out all the evil in the world.  In the meantime He is waiting to do so. Why?  He is waiting because He wants to save as many as He can.  We clearly can't be right before Him based on our own choices.  But we can if we do so through His Son.

Eternity

I can still distinctly remember when I first realized that someday I was going to die.  I was maybe 7 or 8 years old and while I had an understanding of what death was, I had devised a plan in my mind of how I was going to avoid dying all together.  For some reason, probably from some Christmas time special I had watched on T.V., I had the idea in my head that elves living at the North Pole lived forever.  So naturally when I got older and closer to when most people die, I would just make my way up there and become an elf.  Unfortunately this plan of mine came to a crashing halt when I discovered the Christmas gifts from “Santa” in our basement weeks before Christmas.  Inevitably I was saddened to learn that Santa wasn’t real, but more earth shattering for me was the sudden realization that at some point my life would end.  Then what?  The only thing I could conceive was that my life would be snuffed out, total blackness, nothingness.  I’d be gone and I would cease to exist.  The thought of it gave me a dark pit in my stomach feeling that made me sick.  It completely overwhelmed me. 

Over the years when I would think about death those same thoughts would creep back into my mind, the same sick feeling.  I quickly brushed them away by trying to fill my mind and time with other things.  I imagine many other people have done/do the same thing.  I mean it’s the fate we all face.  It’s something we will all experience.  At some point in each of our lives we have run the sentence through our head “Someday I will die.”  Where we differ, is what we decide to believe about what happens next. 

We first must decide where we stand on the existence of a God.  We can determine for ourselves that He exists or that He does not.  Bear in mind, we can’t really make one or the other true, the best we can do is take a stance.  If we decide that there is no God, then we essentially must believe that when our life ends it’s final and our existence is like a flame being snuffed out.  I guess some people are cool with that.  I’m not totally sure how, but for me I just have a really hard time with that, and I always have. 

If we decided that God is real and that there is something more for us after we take our last breath, then we need to decide Who God is.  Which set of beliefs is true?  We can’t say that everything is true and all religions have their own way to God, each being valid.  We can’t say that because religions contradict one another.  We must decide for ourselves which truth we believe is true.  We can’t say nothing is absolutely true because in saying that we obliterate our own statement as well.  So if God is real, then there has to be a way of finding Him and knowing Him.  We must decide what way that is.  I think it’s fairly obvious at this point where I stand on this.  But my basis for believing that the way to God is through Christ is based on some pretty strong factual evidence.  If you’re at all interested into looking into it for yourself, try reading The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel or The Case for Faith by the same guy.   If you’re not much into reading he made two documentaries by the same names that are available on Netflix instant view. 

I can’t say that now as a believer in Christ I don’t have moments where I truly wonder what will happen to me after I die. Even though the bible tells me; I’m a doubter by nature and there is a teeny tiny part of me that wonders if everything I believe is true.  I believe with all my heart that God is okay with that.  My doubts are what keep me on a constant quest to seek Him out, to find the facts, to arm myself with example after example of how real He is.  I think it would be foolish for the little doubt in my head to cause me to throw all of my eggs from this basket into the one that says, “There is no God.”  After all, if they are right and I am wrong then it is what it is.  We will both just cease to exist. But if I’m right and they are wrong, then they will miss out greatly on an eternal life with God and I will not. 

I’ve been reading a book entitled Heaven by Randy Alcorn and I’ve been reading it because plain and simple, I have a ton of questions about what life will be like after I die.  Eternity.  That means forever.  I can’t even really wrap my mind about that.  Everything we know on this earth has a beginning and an ending.  Eternity is not something we can really conceptualize and I personally struggle with the idea of it.  Even if heaven is amazing, will it still be good if it goes on without end?  I believe the answer is yes.  Our pastor said something today that for some reason gave me a lot more peace about eternity in heaven.  He said, “We are in time and God is in eternity.”  I think the meaning of this is:  Time is all we understand.  Our entire framework for understanding everything is framed around time.  But God is in an eternal state.  He always was.  He always is.  He says, “I AM that I AM” Exodus 3:14.  Someday we will understand this.  For now we must deal with our stance on eternity.  Time passes.  Life passes quickly and then the part happens after we die.  Each of us has to deal with this reality and each of us must take a stance or leave it all up to chance.  I know where I stand.

Putting Myself Out There

I've debated long and hard about whether I should link these posts to my Facebook page.  I have it hidden in my profile so if you dug for it you could find it and my friend Gabby mentioned it once so it is "there", but I haven't up to this point decided if I should let everyone on Facebook know when I write here.  After all my motivation isn't really so much that everyone would read this.  I'm writing because I feel I have things to say and because I feel like God has been prodding me to do this.  That's it, so why the need to notify?

The reason why I am doing it has to do with one thing, and that is a fear of letting everyone know exactly who I am.  I'm not concerned about my Christian friends.  Most of what I'm writing they can relate to or they've even thought about and articulated themselves.  But the truth is that many of my friends do not really know me.  They don't know specifically what I believe and stand for.  I've kept to myself shall we say.  I mean, most people I know relatively well know my husband works in a church.  So they can assume from that what they want, probably that I am a church attender, believe in God, celebrate Christian holidays.  But what I have failed to do is tell most of them that what I believe completely shapes who I am and how I look at everything.  I don't just attend the church my husband works at; I fully and completely love Jesus Christ.  I love who He is and what He did for me.  I'm zealous.  I'm on fire.  I'm so many things that so many people I know just don't know about.

So why have I been so afraid to let everyone know?  Maybe because when I used to not believe what I do now I thought people like me were nuts.  I don't want the friends I've made to think that about me.  But the bottom line is, I have been called to tell people who I am and what I believe.  I have been told in God's word that people will reject me and reject what I say is the truth.  But I still have to do it.  I have to be true to myself and to my God, even if I lose friendships and respect because of it.  In the end I don't have to answer to anyone other than God Himself.  God has commissioned us all to tell those around us about His love and His salvation.  There is no other reason why we are here.  If you think I'm crazy, I'm okay with that.  I promise I will have no hard feelings.  Ten years ago I would have thought you were crazy too if you had told me the same things about Jesus.  But He was always there and He is real to me now and I'm His follower.

Love,  Kate

Yet another way I know God is real

So lately I have been having these doubts about my faith.  I believe in Him.  I believe His word is true.  But then there are these thoughts and questions that nag at me.  Like sometimes I'll have some huge question about the universe or about things that are eternal and I won't know what I believe the answer is.  Or sometimes I will wonder just for a moment, "What if everything I believe just isn't true?" It's a dark and scary place to be.  I don't like it.  At times I've pushed those thoughts out of my head and avoided them with some sort of distraction.

Lately they've been very overwhelming and I have not been able to just brush them aside.  And instead of pretending like they aren't there, I've been taking all of these questions, all of these thoughts, all of these doubts... to Him.  So what has the outcome been?  I'm still in it right now so I don't have an absolute resolution to it, but ultimately I feel He is drawing me closer to Him.  I see Him working in my life in new ways despite my questions.

 Today was just one example of this.  I've been reading the book of Exodus.  I've been totally intrigued by how weak and doubtful Moses was.  At one point Moses is crying out to God and God asks him, "Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.  Raise up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground." (Exodus 14:15-17 NIV)  Moses heard directly from God and he was still fearful and still had doubts that God would do what He said He would do.  He's a lot like me.  This totally encouraged me.  But what really blew me away was maybe 20 minutes later I picked up a devotional written by Ruth Bell Graham called "Letters from Ruth's Attic" and just randomly flipped to a page in it.  She was writing about how sometimes we have a tendency to pray to God all the time and not doing anything He is asking us to do.  She talked about how sometimes God wants us to stop praying when prompted and obediently step out with our actions.  I was like, "Wow that reminds me of what I just read about Moses."  And I kid you not, a few lines down she quotes the exact verse I had just read on my own.

Coincidence?  Maybe, but I don't think so.  That's what my brain might say, but my heart knows otherwise.  And the truth of it is, I've had thousands of these "coincidences" in my life.  And every other believer I know out there has experienced just as many.  They all add up together, along with the truth and evidence found in the Bible, to lead me to the only conclusion that I can... God is real.  He proves it every single day in my life.  He is very much alive and working and He will fulfill every promise in His word.  I am actually thankful even for the doubts and fears.  They make me seek His face.  They draw me in to Him.  And my greatest prayer today for anyone else who feels the same way, is that they take it to His throne, with an open mind and heart.  He says "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you." (Matthew 7:7 NIV)