Read This Post or I'll Shoot My Cat

Just take a look at this big, fat ball of hair (the cat, not me). You wouldn't want his death on your conscience, would you? I'm completely serious. Have you ever seen Boondock Saints?

OK, so, now that I've got your attention, I'll go ahead and let you know that I have absolutely zero intention of hurting Deputy. He's my cat. Come on. I'm not gonna shoot my cat. If the post had been about me shooting my sister's dog, you would have had legitimate reason for concern, but I would never purposefully bring even the slightest harm to Deputy, so you can go ahead and stop writing your angry e-mails to the ASPCA and just pay attention.

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The Life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the Eternal Life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son, Jesus Christ. We write this to make our joy complete.

- I John 1:1-4

That's the prologue to the first of John's epistles. It's a beautifully expressed declaration of the tangible reality of both the person and the divinity of Jesus Christ, and opens up one of my favorite books of the Bible. But for the purposes of this post, I really just want to focus on verse 4: "We write this to make our joy complete."

Proselytizing, evangelizing, whatever you wanna call it - spreading the Gospel, telling others about Jesus, and bringing people into God's presence is an absolutely undeniable part of Christianity. If you're not sharing your Christianity, you're not actually doing your Christianity.

It doesn't have to be so overt as this blog, or so obliviously ineffective as standing on a street corner in a sandwich board and shouting at passers-by, but it's got to happen. That's made perfectly clear throughout the entire New Testament.

But why?

"...to make our joy complete."

I'm sorry to resort to such a low-down dirty trick as pretending to threaten my cat, but I'm just trying to do whatever I can to get you to notice this stuff. It's not so much because I crave an audience as much as it is that I just want to talk to you for a few minutes. I have something to say that I think you would benefit from hearing. I actually think it's important enough that I'm willing to play whatever cards I've got at my disposal just to get you to read at least ONE of these posts, hopefully more. And it's not like I've got any kind of ad revenue coming to me off of this. Facebook definitely ain't payin' me, even though it alone is at least a part-time job just based on the hours I put in each week...

But I do get something from it. I get something of a completion of my joy. I get the thrill of knowing that I've helped people focus on God, maybe even in a way that they never had before. That is awesome for me. And not because it's got anything to do with me, but because it's entirely about you, the one reading this. If you are reading this, I am thrilled. I'm even more thrilled if you're actually absorbing any of it. I'm elated if it challenges you to think about your relationship with Christ and the improvements you can make to it. I'm overjoyed beyond the limitations of the English language to express if, by some movement of the Holy Spirit through me and my keyboard, you - the actual YOU reading this right now, not the general "not me" version of "you" - take a step closer to God that you'd never taken before, whether you've been going to church your whole life or you've never once heard a word of the Bible.

And it doesn't give me all those warm fuzzies because I'm the one that wrote whatever words changed your life. It rocks my gypsy soul for the same reason that the shepherd rejoiced when he found his lost sheep, the woman rejoiced when she found her lost coin, the father rejoiced when his lost son came home, and the Father and all the hosts of angels rejoice when one repentant sinner accepts the Grace of God and steps into the Light.

It makes my joy complete.

If I can be the instrument God chooses to use to bring you, in any way, closer to Him, hey - that's awesome. You will not find me complaining about that. I try not to complain about God using me in general, but that specific use would be pretty solid.

But why? Why does it even matter to me?

Because I fully believe that everybody's life - and I mean everybody-everybody - could be improved by better knowing the Majesty, the Splendor, the Glory, the Holiness, the Power, the Presence, and the unfailing, unending, unmistakable Love of God.

Look, folks... God is... the best. The. Best. Imagine the best thing you've ever experienced. Now go infinitely better. That's a rough picture of the goodness of God. I cannot possibly explain to you in enough detail how good God is. 1) I don't have the words to convey it all, and 2) you don't have the patience to read my futile attempt, which would be so overly verbose that Google would shut me down for clogging up the internet.

I don't know what your relationship with God is like. I hope it's incredible. I hope that whatever you're getting is anything like what I'm getting, because folks, I ain't lying when I tell you that what is happening in my life is so very good that I cannot possibly keep it to myself.

It's Oreos and Led Zeppelin and good Batman comics and perfect air conditioning and the comfiest couch in the world and every other possibility of anything GOOD in this world all rolled up into one inexpressibly perfect thing, and I would feel like an absolute jerk if I kept it to myself.

If you eat at an awesome restaurant, you tell your friends, right?

If you see a mind-blowingly good movie, you tell your friends, right?

If you have goodness, you share it with the people you love, right?

That's what I want to do.

I want to tell you how awesome God is for me, because I know that when you let Him, He will be every bit as awesome for you. I mean that, no matter where you are in your walk with Him. If you're a staunch atheist, I want to talk to you about God. If you've never missed a church service in your life, I want to talk to you about God. If you just don't know where you fit in, I want to talk to you about God.

And I am totally willing to cheat in order to get that done.

Why else would I have been writing posts openly drawing comparisons between God and Batman or God and Eric Clapton?

It's not (exclusively) because of my inability to escape my own nerdiness, but it is because I am trying to do anything I can to get people to read this. I want to talk to you about God. That is my goal. If this means I lure you in with sensationalist headlines about killing my cat, so be it.

Jesus performed miracles for a reason - to get people to listen to Him. The Holy Spirit manifested miraculous gifts in the early church for the exact same reason - to get people's attention and show them the glory of God. Whatever gifts I do have from the Spirit, I have not as yet been able to heal a lame man with my shadow, so I will have to do what I can to bring people in, because I can think of absolutely nothing in existence that could ever be any more fulfilling than to encourage those around me (and, through the magic of the interwebs, those nowhere near me) into a closer relationship with God.

It makes my joy complete.

But here's the twist.

I jokingly threatened my cat just to get you to read this. It's an absurd example, but it worked, right? I mean, you are, after all, reading this...

How would you have responded if this week's entry had instead been titled "Live Your Life By My Rules or I'll Shoot You"?

I don't think there's any point in being bashful about my intentions. Yes, I want to encourage you to grow closer to God. That's my goal. Again, I don't care if you're already a very strong Christian or if you're a very strong atheist or if you're just very strongly confused. I want to talk to you about God. And my ideal outcome of any conversation that we should ever have about God is that we both walk away with refreshed spirits, renewed minds, and rejoicing hearts.

But the last thing I want to do is bully you into accepting what I believe.

I do believe, fully, that Christianity is the best possible way to live your life. I also believe, with every bit the same fullness, that the Christian life that I'm living is the best I can do with the knowledge and understanding that I currently have. In other words - yeah, I think I'm right. Of course I think I'm right. If I didn't think I was right, why would I continue to think things that I thought were wrong? That's dumb.

But there is a gigantic difference between my telling you that I feel that the truths behind my beliefs would be of great benefit in your own life if you applied them the same way I do and my telling you that you're evil and stupid for believing something other than what I believe and should immediately recognize the rightness of my beliefs and just stop your silly questioning because how could a fool like you ever know anything worth saying in the first place.

Put a bit more simply: there is a HUGE difference between sharing the Gospel through Love and forcing the Gospel down people's throats through arrogant moral superiority.

I'm perfectly willing to trick you into a conversation about God. I don't feel bad about that.

I'm also completely at peace with the idea of using whatever connections I might have with you or anyone else I ever encounter to find a way to get my foot in the door and then get to that conversation about God. It's worth working towards. In my work towards connecting people to God, I'm willing to be a downright snake in the grass, if I have to.

So that's what I've got this week. I've got nothing to hide - my mission, my purpose, my goal is to talk to you about God. I don't care where you stand with Him, I fully believe that both of us have everything to gain from striving for a more perfect understanding of the infinite goodness of God.

It is to that end, then, that I would like to close this post with an especially heartfelt encouragement and sincere exhortation: talk back. I have always wanted this bloggery business to be a conversation more than a sermon. I would LOVE to hear from you - no matter who you are, no matter what you believe. Ask questions. Debate points of doctrine. Drop a truthbomb on me with a scripture I might not have thought of that shows things in a different light. Whatever it is, please... do it. I want to be better at this, and a lot of the learning comes from feedback.

I do sincerely appreciate those of you who do comment and write me and everything else. It definitely means a lot, and please don't feel that I don't value your input - I do. I just want more. Is that so bad?

God bless you... And hopefully we'll talk soon.

Album Cuts and Lactose Intolerance in the Name of the Faith

I love me some Jimi Hendrix, but Experience Hendrix: The Best of Jimi Hendrix just makes me mad to no end.

Yeah, yeah, it's got "Foxey Lady" and "Purple Haze" as well as all the other Hendrix songs you're gonna hear on any classic rock station across the country in any given day. And if you've somehow managed to go through your whole life to this point never hearing a single Jimi Hendrix song, Experience Hendrix would definitely be a decent start, but if that's the only Hendrix you ever hear... Oh, you just don't know Jimi Hendrix.

Where's "Third Stone from the Sun"? Where's "Wait Until Tomorrow"? Where's "Burning of the Midnight Lamp"?

If you actually want to experience Hendrix, Experience Hendrix is not the place to go. Go pick up Are You Experienced?, Axis: Bold as Love, and Electric Ladyland, give those a listen, and then you can say that you've scratched the surface of knowing what Jimi Hendrix's music really meant. But even that's really just a start. You still haven't heard Band of Gypsys, or the Live at Woodstock recording, or any of the hundreds of hours of material available outside of the confines of those original three studio albums.

And again, it's not like there's anything on Experience Hendrix that isn't good. It's just that it's missing the crazy awesome stuff. The only way to hear the crazy awesome is to really get into the original albums and live recordings and rare bonus material and all of that. That's when you can know Hendrix.

As you may have gathered, I am also kind of a fan of God. But there's a sort of "greatest hits of God" mentality out there that I'm not really comfortable with.

Don't get me wrong, salvation is pretty awesome. Heaven will be better than I can imagine, and I've got a pretty awesome idea or three about how it's gonna be up there. But there is more to the story. There is more to this faith than the simple ideas of sin and redemption, Heaven and Hell, good and evil...

We have much to say about this, but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.

Therefore let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God, instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And God permitting, we will do so.

- Hebrews 5:11-6:3

Did you catch that? Repentance from sin, faith in God, eternal judgment... child's play. Infantile material. Milk.

I am ready for some meat.

It has become painfully obvious to me that there are a great many people in today's Christianity who are complacent with their faith. They may have a far better grasp than some (including myself) on the idea of approaching strangers with the Gospel of the Death, Burial and Resurrection of Jesus Christ of Nazareth... but that's kinda where it stops for a lot of people.

That's not where it stops for me, and I don't think that's where it stops for God, either.

In a way I quite understand why some people are put off by Theology. I remember once when I had been giving a talk... an old, hard-bitten officer got up and said, "I've no use for all that stuff. But mind you, I'm a religious man too, I know there's a God, I've felt Him: out alone in the desert at night; the tremendous mystery. And that's just why I don't believe all your neat little dogmas and formulas about Him. To anyone who's met the real thing they all seem so petty and pedantic and unreal!"

Now in a sense I quite agree with that man. I think he probably had a real experience of God in the desert. And when he turned from that experience to the Christian creeds, I think he really was turning from something real to something less real. In the same way, if a man has once looked at the Atlantic from the beach, and then goes and looks at a map of the Atlantic, he will also be turning from something real to something less real: turning from real waves to a bit of colored paper.

But here comes the point. The map is admittedly only colored paper, but there are two things you have to remember about it. In the first place, it is based on what hundreds and thousands of people have found out by sailing the real Atlantic. In that way it has behind it masses of experience just as real as the one you could have from the beach; only, while yours would only be a single isolated glimpse, the map fits all those different experiences together. In the second place, if you want to go anywhere, the map is absolutely necessary. As long as you are content with walks on the beach, your own glimpses are far more fun than looking at a map. But the map is going to be more use than walks on the beach if you want to get to America.

Now, Theology is like that map. Merely learning and thinking about Christian doctrines, if you stop there, is less real and exciting than the sort of thing my friend got in the desert. Doctrines are not God: they are only a kind of map. But that map is based on the experiences of hundreds of people who really were in touch with God--experiences compared with which any thrills or pious feelings you and I are likely to get on our own are very elementary and very confused.

And secondly, if you want to get any further, you have to use the map. You see, what happened to that man in the desert may have been real, and was certainly exciting, but nothing comes of it. It leads nowhere. There is nothing to do about it. In fact, that is just why a vague religion--all about feeling God in nature, and so on--is so attractive. It is all thrills and no work; like watching waves from the beach. But you will not get to Newfoundland by studying the Atlantic that way, and you will not get eternal life by simply feeling the presence of God in flowers or music. Neither will you get anywhere by looking at maps without going to sea. Nor will you be very safe if you go to sea without a map.

- C.S. Lewis, from Mere Christianity

As I've been looking for work in a church setting, I've come across an oft-quoted statistic that says that anywhere between one-half to two-thirds to seven-tenths of the kids who grow up in church wind up leaving by the time they're out on their own. Why is that? I think it's largely due to the fact that the church at large is promoting a type of mentally hollow Christianity.

I've been to the big youth rallies and the late night communion services and the sunrise devotionals... And I'm not about to say that those are not good things. They are wonderful. There is absolutely nothing wrong with those... Unless they're simply attempts to emotionally manipulate the audience into feeling a connection with God.

If a youth minister delivers a devotional thought that has all of the kids in his youth group crying their eyes out but doesn't actually engage their minds, what good does it do? As soon as there's something funny to distract from the emotional manipulation, the focus on God is completely gone.

I don't feel a connection between two and two that feels like four. I know it. So, in the same way, I want people - myself very much included - to know God.

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

- II Corinthians 10:3-5

It seems to me that we have come to a point in modern Christendom where we've stopped trying to KNOW more about God. We've become content with the things we already think we understand, confident that we've studied enough to pass the test, and conceited to the point of blindness to any further understanding of what the Bible is actually talking about.

Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes.

- Romans 10:1-4

Paul's beef with the Israelites was that they had become complacent in their knowledge of God. Their hearts - their feelings - were all ablaze for God, and that's definitely a commendable thing But their minds had become closed off to true understanding of the deeper truth of who God is and who He wants us to be, and so they wound up condemning themselves.

Let's not do that.

It seems to me that the only way to really get this is to go deeper. Deeper into the Bible, deeper into the understanding of God, deeper into theology... Deeper. Just go deeper.

We're not meant to keep repeating the same things over and over and over.

Yes, Jesus died for our sins.

Yes, adultery is bad. So are murder and car theft.

Yes, faith in God is essential.

Let's get past that.

That's infantile material in the growth of a Christian. Those are elementary steps. We should all be way, way, WAY past that.

I'm not saying we've all got to sit down together and start reading the works of Kierkegaard, although that would definitely put a smile on my face (and an ache in my head). But can't we maybe start looking at the true definition of righteousness? Can't we start working towards a deeper understanding of the nature of God? Can't we start looking at the eschatological framework of the repatriation of post-exilic Israel and how the rebuilding of the temple is meant to show us a glimpse into the forgiving nature of God?

Can't we get past the easy stuff?

We aren't making mountains out of molehills - we're making sermon series out of simple elementary truths that we all should have understood once we actually became Christians. So why do we wind up running over these things again and again and again?

Look, all I'm saying is that the foot-washing devo can only be done so many times before it starts to be repetitive. (So many times = once.)

There is MORE TO THIS than most people are willing to accept. Why? Are they happy with where their faith is? Do they think that it's good enough to just accept Jesus and move on with life?

Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

- Romans 12:2

In Deuteronomy 6:5, Moses tells Israel to "Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength." However, in Matthew 22:37, Mark 12:30, and Luke 10:27, Jesus adds one... "Love the Lord your God... with all your mind."

Christianity is not a religion of stupid faith. We are called to a higher understanding, a deeper knowledge. There are some hard things in the Bible. Don't be afraid of them, but embrace them openly that you may become better acquainted with the whole of who God is, and then be able to distinguish - for yourself - the difference between good and evil.

The World - like, the evil thing we're supposed to be in but not of - says that Christianity is a religion that suppresses reason and education and learning and wisdom and free thought. My Bible says fairly differently. I'd like for us to all start proving the World wrong.

May God bless your mind as you seek Him with your whole being. Amen.

Knowing My Father

My Dad's favorite band is Led Zeppelin.

His favorite movie is the one with cowboys in it. Just about doesn't matter which one.

A day spent with a motorcycle is better than most days not spent with a motorcycle.

He likes his cheddar cheese exceptionally sharp.

It should come as no surprise to you, then, that I am also a quite public fan of Led Zeppelin, a whole lot of cowboy movies, Harley-Davidson shirts, and Black Diamond Special Reserve Extra Sharp Cheddar (aged 18 months).

Especially the Led Zeppelin and the cheese.

Is it just because I was brought up around those things? I've got vivid memories of listening to Led Zeppelin II at something like 8 years old. I could barely comprehend what was happening to my ears most of the time, but I know I liked it. Cheese... Well... It's cheese, and cheese is awesome.

I think I've listened to enough Led Zeppelin (and eaten enough cheese) on my own to know that I really, really like Led Zeppelin independently of any childhood memories. (And yes, of course, the cheese.) But there's no denying that I was brought up in an environment that probably prepared me for that outlook. Not like I'm complaining.

Especially not since the same father who brought me up to know and love "Ramble On" also brought me up to know and love my Father.

I was definitely placed on the path that led me to where I am today by my dad. I have been given an example of what it looks like to be a man who is dedicated to following and understanding God.

I think those two parts - following and understanding - are important to have together. It is possible on some level to follow God without understanding Him, just as it is possible on some level to understand God without following Him. But the fullness of each is brought in by the other. If you are dedicated to following God, you will find that it is easier to do once you understand more about God, and every time you understand something else about God, you see new ways in which you can follow His paths.

So I want to understand my Father in the ways I understand my dad. I understand why my dad likes Led Zeppelin. They're good. I understand why my dad likes extra sharp cheddar. It is delicious.

I also understand why he showed me, at age 3, my cat Oatmeal, laying in the middle of a highway in Judsonia. It taught me to stay out of the road.

I have such a pathological fear about getting my eyes poked out that I can't wear contacts (also, they are itchy), but at least I've still got both of my eyes. After all, "THEY DON'T GROW BACK." Thanks, dad.

I understand where my dad's coming from, so I can understand what He taught me, and that means I can better live it out. Not only can I live it out, I can pass it on to my own children.

I want to understand where God's coming from. I want to understand how God works so I can better understand how He wants me to work.

Everything God does is right, right? Maybe not pleasant, but it's RIGHT.

If that's correct, why is what God does right? Is it because everything God does is right because God did it, and therefore it is right, or is it because God did it and God only does things that are right?

And if what God does is right because He's God, what impact does that have on our morality? And if what God does is right because God only does right, what then? What does that say about who we are meant to be?

Is there room for moral relativism in the pursuit of an Absolute Truth?

Are all sins the same? Is one sin worse than another? Is there such a thing as an unforgivable sin?

Just what does a mustard seed worth of faith actually look like?

I'm incredibly lucky to have the father I have. Because of the family I was raised in, I have learned that I honor my father by honoring my Father. I hope to one day be able to pass on the things I've learned to my children, setting an example for them in my faith the same way that my dad set an example for me in his faith. Not that their faith would be mine, just as my dad doesn't want my faith to be his, but that they can see a man - just as I did and do - who is dedicated on living a life of righteousness and passing it on to his children.

Train a child in the way he should go,
and when he is old, he will not turn from it.

- Proverbs 22:6

Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

- Ephesians 6:4

In the days of my youth, I was told what it means to be a man.
Now I've reached that age and try to do all those things the best I can.

- Led Zeppelin, "Good Times, Bad Times," from Led Zeppelin (1969)

Happy Father's Day, Dad. I love you.

Learning from Balaam (and avoiding the easy jokes), part IV

So here we go with Balaam, one more time...

In the first part, I talked about how it is possible to know who God is and still worship him wrong. In Balaam's case, he knew enough about God that God spoke directly to him, and he also knew that he would not be able to do or say anything other than what God told him to say. But just because he knew God, that didn't mean that he worshiped God. Balaam tried - three times - to go directly against the Will of God, even after God specifically told Balaam what His Will was.

In the second part, I talked about how we can fall into a trap sometimes where we focus so much on the Word of God that we neglect the Will of God. A comprehensive knowledge of the Bible is a wonderful thing for a Christian to have, and there are all sorts of benefits to studying the Word with other Christians as well as on your own. The Bible is here for a reason - but that reason is to give us a guide to God, not to be God. The Bible is our primary source for understanding on who God is and what He has to say to us, but it is not our only source, nor the ultimate source, for knowing who God wants us to be. God is the ultimate source for that. The Bible is filled with the wisdom of centuries' worth of people who hungered after God's righteousness. But a lot of that wisdom is very clearly saying that we have the opportunity to develop an intimate, open, personal relationship with God Himself, a relationship through which He speaks TO US through the Holy Spirit. In the drive to understand the Scriptures, it is important that we don't forget what the Scriptures are actually about. The same Holy Spirit that led everyone from Moses to Jeremiah to Matthew to Paul to John to write their portions of what we have now collected as the Holy Bible is the same Holy Spirit that is eagerly hoping to speak to each of us today.

And that's what the third part was all about: how the workings of the Spirit will produce changes in your life beyond those which you can produce in yourself. The circumcision of the heart does not come from knowing the Bible from cover to cover. It comes from opening up to the presence of God's Holy Spirit. That presence is very powerful and very real, but it is still up to us to decide to let that Spirit work in our lives.

There's one last little thing I want to look at from the story of Balaam that ties it all together.

Then Balak said to Balaam, "Neither curse them at all nor bless them at all!"

Balaam answered, "Did I not tell you I must do whatever the LORD says?"

Then Balak said to Balaam, "Come, let me take you to another place. Perhaps it will please God to let you curse them for me from there."

And Balak took Balaam to the top of Peor, overlooking the wasteland.

Balaam said, "Build me seven altars here, and prepare seven bulls and seven rams for me." Balak did as Balaam had said, and offered a bull and a ram on each altar.

Now when Balaam saw that it pleased the LORD to bless Israel, he did not resort to sorcery as at other times, but turned his face toward the desert.

- Numbers 23:25-24:1 (emphasis added)

What does that sorcery part mean? What was Balaam trying to do?

Balaam offered sacrifices to God - seven rams and seven bulls each of the three times, on seven separate altars - in an effort to receive a favor from God in the form of a curse on Israel, but God instead blessed Israel through Balaam's mouth each time.

So it seems obvious to me that God rejected Balaam's sacrifices. Not because they were improper sacrifices, but because the motivation behind the sacrifice - defying the directly spoken Will of God - was contrary to what God desired.

And that's what I want to talk about.

Now for some time a man named Simon had practiced sorcery in the city and amazed all the people of Samaria. He boasted that he was someone great, and all the people, both high and low, gave him their attention and exclaimed, "This man is the divine power known as the Great Power." They followed him because he had amazed them for a long time with his magic. But when they believed Philip as he preached the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. Simon himself believed and was baptized. And he followed Philip everywhere, astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw. When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. When they arrived, they prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them; they had simply been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

When Simon saw that the Spirit was given at the laying on of the apostles' hands, he offered them money and said, "Give me also this ability so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit."

Peter answered: "May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! You have no part or share in this ministry, because your heart is not right before God. Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord. Perhaps he will forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin."

Then Simon answered, "Pray to the Lord for me so that nothing you have said may happen to me."

- Acts 8:9-24

Simon knew that God is powerful. He had witnessed Philip working miracles through the power of the Holy Spirit. Simon knew that the Holy Spirit was being given to the Christians in Samaria, and - being one of those Christians - he wanted to be a part of that power. But his understanding of sorcery rubbed off on his understanding of God.

Simon, like Balaam, had fallen into a trap of believing that the power of God was a commodity to be used, something to be controlled, a force that could be turned to his advantage, bringing him wealth, power, and notoriety before men.

Peter sets Simon straight, rebuking him for trying to buy the power of God for his own use. Simon wasn't wrong to want the Holy Spirit. And really, I don't think he was wrong for wanting to spread the Holy Spirit. Notice again that he asks Peter and John to give him the Holy Spirit so that he could also spread the Holy Spirit himself in the same way that they did.

But that's where the flaw comes into his thinking - he wants power, even though it is a good and Holy power, for his own ends.

Balaam's entire existence was centered around using the power of God to further his own ends. And apparently it worked sometimes! In Numbers 22:6, Balak says of Balaam, "I know that those you bless are blessed, and those you curse are cursed." Balaam apparently had some kind of working relationship with God... But it was a relationship based on Balaam's short-sighted desire to use God's power for his own personal gain instead of a desire to let God's power be used in him to further God's own agenda.

At the root of that thinking is the idea that God can be bought off. The idea - common to Balaam and Simon - is that by performing certain rituals, by acting a certain way, by going through certain motions, they could get God to do them a favor. They thought they could put God in their pocket. This flawed view of how God works was shared by Jephthah, as well.

Bad news is... It didn't stop with Balaam, Jephthah, or Simon.

It's actually still around today.

Let's say you're at work (or school or whatever) and the day is over. You head outside, keys in hand, you get to your car, open it up, sit down, and just before you start it up, you realize that there's someone sitting in the passenger seat...

And it's that cranky lady from the DMV.

The one who failed you for your license test.

Twice.

She's already got a scowl on her face. The pencil is sharp and the clipboard is ready to take her incessant abuses as she marks every little failure for your drive home.

You start the car. You hear a slight "Hmph." She furiously scribbles a note and marks a big X somewhere on the top of the form.

That's when you remember to put your seatbelt on. Searching for some vague clue of approval in her face, you realize there is none to be had, and you put the car into gear.

As you come to the four-way stop in the parking lot (it's a big parking lot, OK?), the car to your right stops just a half-second before you do. As you sit there, waiting for the other car to go, you realize that its driver is applying make-up, talking on the phone, flossing, and steering with her knees all at once. After a minute passes, you finally decide to just go ahead and go through the stop sign. This is met with another quiet grunt of disapproval from Ms. Crankietta McCrabbybritches riding shotgun over there, who once again scribbles furiously.

This process continues as you begin your drive home. Reaching down to turn up the stereo? Scribble-grunt-scribble. Driving with one hand on the steering wheel? Grunt-scribble-scribble. Going 47 in a 45? Scribble-scribble-grunt-scribble-grunt-scoff-scribble.

By the time you're actually on the main road back to the house, you're so unnerved, you're so shaken, you're so paranoid about every little thing you do being met with the horrid disapproval of the horrid woman sitting next to you. You're sweating bullets, but you don't DARE take your hands from 10 and 2 to adjust the A/C. You're so fixed on the speedometer that you're distracted from the road, which of course leads to all sorts of sharp turns and slam-on-the-brakes stops at red lights.

It becomes the most miserable driving experience of your entire life, and it takes you twice as long as usual to get home - not because you're being forced to obey the law, but because you're so focused on nothing BUT obeying the law that you actually forget where you're going and how to get there. And when you DO get home, she hands you a list a mile long of all of your infractions, major and minor, moving and parking, down to the last detail - like using your turn signal at 998 feet from the turn instead of the full 1,000. She tells you that it is because - and only because - she's in a good mood that you actually passed and get to keep your license. If she had chosen to actually be fair in judging you, you'd be taking the bus everywhere you went for the rest of your life.

Far too many people view their relationship with God like the relationship with that DMV lady. It's as if God is constantly looking down on us, grunting His disapproval and jotting down notes for every little mistake we make, champing at the bit to tell us how badly we messed up once we finally get Home. They're convinced that God looks at us all and sees how badly we're all messing up, and it's only because of the mysterious force of God's Grace that we're even allowed to keep on living, much less eventually enter Heaven. And that trickles down into how those people see others. They wouldn't dare dream of judging anyone, for as they very well know, the Bible says, "Judge not lest ye be judged." But even in their not-judging, they're still pretty sure that everybody at that liberal church up the road is going to hell, and they know for a FACT that the long-haired guy walking down the road on Sunday morning with a lit cigarette in his lips is going to hell.

That mindset comes from the same stock as Balaam's belief that if he made the right sacrifices, he could get God to go against His own Will. It shares the same root as Jephthah's belief that if he paid God off in lip service and sacrifices, then God owed him one. It's the same fault that Simon had in thinking that if he gave somebody else the right stuff, then God would give him what he wanted.

There's this idea that if we go to the right church and read the right Bible and have the right friends and pray the right prayers and wear the right clothes and have the right haircut and say the right words and do the right whatever it is you want to do, then God will do you a big favor and let you into Heaven. But the only way that'll work is if you go to the EXACT right church and read the EXACT right Bible and have the EXACT right friends and do everything else EXACTLY right.

What that idea misses is that it's still just going through the motions. And when you're focused on the motions instead of the destination, you are bound to get lost.

In our walk with God, we are not meant to be focused on the path itself - we are meant to be focused on God.

And when we are truly focused on God, we realize that Christianity is not something we can do. Christianity is what we have to be.

If I were to put paint to a canvas, I would only produce an unmitigated disaster. I am not an artist.

My sister? People seriously pay solid cash money for her paintings. She is an artist. It's what she does because it's who she is. She can't stop. She doesn't know any other way to live. She didn't take classes to become an artist - she took classes to become a more skilled and refined artist. She didn't decide to be an artist - she decided to focus exclusively on art because it already took up so much of her life to begin with.

I am getting to a point where I don't know how to be anything else but a Christian, and that's because I finally stopped trying to do the right Christian thing and instead focused on being the right Christian man. My nature defines my actions, and my nature is defined by the Holy Spirit that lives in me, by the redemption I have found in Jesus Christ, and by the complete renewal of everything that makes me who I am by God Almighty.

I've learned a lot from Balaam. I've learned that I've got to be sure that I'm not just saying that God leads my life, but that I am actually putting my will aside to allow God to replace my will with His.

I've learned that I've got to let God's Holy Spirit work in me in such a way that when I read God's Word, I actually understand what He's saying to me, not just what I want Him to say to me. God's Will is my ultimate goal - God's Word is another step in getting me there.

I've learned that when I actually do get everything in me out of the way, God can do some pretty amazing stuff through me. I can take NO credit for any of the things He does - I was only tangentially involved at best.

And I've learned that it's not about what I do. It's not about what you do. It's not about what they do.

It's about who we are.

You can't do church.

You have to be church.

Go, then.

Be church.

Learning from Balaam (and avoiding the easy jokes), part III

Beginning in the 22nd chapter of Numbers, we see the story of Balaam. From that story, there are three things that stuck out to me as being true:

1. It is possible to know who God is and worship Him wrong.
2. It is possible to earnestly seek the Word of God and still disobey Him.
3. It is possible for God to speak through you, even when you don't know what to say.

Two weeks ago, I discussed the first point, using the example from my own life experience of the church that was more focused on following the letter of the law than the truth of the Spirit. By focusing on one of the small things that divide us (instrumental worship) instead of the large things that unite us (the love we share for God, the redemption we have in Jesus Christ, and the common workings of the same Holy Spirit in all of our lives), this church missed an opportunity to serve its community in a very real, immediate, and tangible sense. In their efforts to live out the perfect definition of God's Will, their focus became caught up in the smaller concerns that only matter for about three hours out of any given week, instead of focusing on the larger things that would have carried ramifications throughout the rest of this life and all of the next one. In their quest for God, they missed the point of serving Him.

When Jesus, on the Sabbath, healed the man born blind in John 9, the Pharisees called Him a sinner. In Matthew 12, the disciples were hungry on the Sabbath and began to pick grains from a field so they could eat. The Pharisees again accused Jesus and His disciples of sin because they broke the Sabbath - but Jesus rebukes them, telling them that their focus was in the wrong place, quoting scripture to them to prove His point:

For I desire mercy, not sacrifice,

and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.

- Hosea 6:6

Even David, reeling in the guilt and shame of his sins with Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah, knows what God truly wants from us:

You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;

You do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;

a broken and contrite heart,

O God, You will not despise.

- Psalm 51:16-17

Last week, I talked about how that Pharisaical mindset - the view that the Bible itself is the Will of God - should be transformed into an understanding that God's Will transcends anything we can ever know here on Earth, and that the Bible is still just part of God's approach to help us better see Him.

Now, understand me here... It is an enormous, indispensable, undeniable, and absolutely true part of that approach! I firmly believe God has given us the Bible that we have in the form that it is in today for a reason, and that reason is that we may come to better know Him.

But it is important to understand that the Bible alone is not enough to ensure a good relationship with God.

Just like the Ethiopian eunuch was reading Isaiah without understanding what it meant until the Holy Spirit led Philip to step in, it is possible for us to read Scripture all day long without it changing our lives, even if we're open to its message, without some interaction from the Holy Spirit. And just like Isaac Asimov wrote his Guide to the Bible without any faith behind it, it is even possible for us to fully understand the Bible and still not encounter God.

It is only through the movement of the Holy Spirit in our lives that we can grow closer to God.

"There are two ways to live your life - one is as though nothing is a miracle, the other is as though everything is a miracle." - Albert Einstein

I'm really trying to make moves towards seeing everything in my life as a miracle. I'm doing a pretty decent job of it, too, I think.

And I'm sure you've heard people say, "Well, of course God still works miracles today! Every sunrise is a miracle!" And... yeah... but at the same time... no, not really. That kind of answer is a justification, an attempt to understand the idea that God still works miracles in today's world, despite the apparent lack of "Lazarus, come out!" type miracles.

Don't get me wrong - sunrises are amazing. I have seen some that reduced me to tears, they were so beautiful.

But the really miraculous part of some of those sunrises was the coming of the new day - the marker that told me and whoever I was with that we had survived the night, had made it through the darkness into the new morning, and that the nine-hour discussion we'd just had was worth it, because we were coming through intact on the other side.

And you know what... There are plenty of stories that I've heard - even a few that are directly in my life - about people who, by all scientific and medical reasoning and understanding, should have died, but God chose to intervene in their lives and restore their bodies to a livable health, at least for a little while. And yeah, those miracles are amazing too.

But that's still not quite as amazing to me as the miracles I've heard about, seen, and - above all - experienced in which God chooses to intervene and restore a person's spiritual health.

The body? It will eventually expire. It doesn't matter how many push-ups you can do, it doesn't matter how many push-ups you can't do. Your body is temporary.

Your soul? That's eternal. That's forever. That's important.

The power of God made manifest in the otherwise inexplicable removal of someone's cancer... Yes, that's amazing. Yes, that's powerful. Yes, that's real! But it's a lot like trying to bail water out of a boat with a Coke can when the hole in the bottom is the size of a basketball. Yeah, you might slow the process a bit, but in the end, there's no way that boat ain't goin' down sooner or later.

But the power of God shown in the miraculous transformation of my heart, soul, and mind... That's the good stuff. That's the stuff that really matters. That's what God is after - and it is what we should be after, too.

(At this point I feel that it is important for me to point out that taking care of your body is still a good idea - smoking is bad for you, it's OK to have a vegetarian meal every once in a while, thirty minutes of exercise every day is a really solid idea, and always make sure the door to your microwave is fully sealed while it is in operation.)

The LORD your God will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, so that you may love Him with all your heart and with all your soul, and live.

- Deuteronomy 30:6

A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise is not from men, but from God.

- Romans 2:28-29

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority. In Him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried with Him in baptism and raised with Him through your faith in the power of God, who raised Him from the dead.

- Colossians 2:9-12

The circumcision of the heart - much like the original circumcision of the not-heart - can be a painful process. But it is through the workings of the Holy Spirit in our lives that we find our own selves being peeled back, exposing more of Christ in us. When we enter our relationship with God through His Son, we begin a journey that leads us closer and closer to His true nature with - hopefully - every step. I say hopefully because it is still entirely possible for us to thwart the Will of God here by ignoring the works of the Spirit within our lives.

And I don't think that many of us ever necessarily choose to ignore the Spirit, but it's awfully easy to do in today's World. We live in a World that tells us that we can't ever do anything unless we do it ourselves. We are surrounded by a World that wants us to look into ourselves and see who we really are so we can be the best we can be on our own.

And what we've got to remember is that we're not part of this World. We can't do it on our own. No matter how good our own personal best is, it's still not anything worth calling good. Good in our lives only comes from God. We - on our own - are not righteous.

But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

- Romans 3:21-24, emphasis added

Our righteousness - all of it - depends entirely upon our faith in Jesus. Without that faith, without that connection to God, we are nothing, and any perceived righteousness on our part is empty, because it is not connected to the source of true righteousness - it does not come into our lives from the Spirit.

So I say all that to say this.

In Numbers 22:38, 23:12, 23:26, and 24:13, Balaam asks Balak, king of Moab, "Didn't I tell you I can only say what God puts in my mouth?"

And it is on that point that I want to be a lot more like Balaam.

I want to be so in tune with the Holy Spirit that when I open my mouth, I do not speak - God speaks through me. I want to know that what I am saying is the truth - I want to know it undeniably comes from God.

I have moments of that. Not many. But they're there.

A few weeks ago, I felt the gentle nudge inside me that said, "You need to send that message." I ignored it, because I didn't want to rock the boat. I didn't want to come on too strong. I didn't want to be seen as a weirder guy than I already am. I didn't want to stick my nose where it didn't belong.

But I still felt that nudge. "You really need to send that message." And I ignored it again. I didn't want to overstep my bounds. I didn't want to risk alienating a friend. I didn't want to take any risks, because risks meant I could lose everything.

But the nudge was getting so strong I couldn't ignore it. "No, Aaron... You really need to send that message." I couldn't distract myself. I couldn't sleep. I just couldn't say no anymore.

So I sent the message. I felt two things once it was out of my hands - fear and relief. I felt fear that I was wrong, that I had been deluding myself, convincing myself that I needed to step in to something that wasn't my place, fear that I was going to mess up a friendship I care about. But I felt relief - relief that I had done what the undeniable voice in me had asked of me. And I fully believe that this voice was, and is, the Holy Spirit, working within my life.

A few days later, I got a reply. The very first thing I saw in that reply was "I needed this Aaron, and I don't know how you knew it." It was at that moment that I was overcome with tears, joy, and an unstoppable desire to sing my humble praise and adoration to God.

That message was not from me. It was from God. It was the Holy Spirit moving in me to send that message. My friend didn't know how I knew to send that message. And here's the thing - I didn't know, either! I had no way of knowing, other than God telling me.

Do not put out the Spirit's fire; do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid every kind of evil.

- I Thessalonians 5:19-22

When I tell you that God speaks to me, what is your reaction? Do you believe it, or do you picture me wearing an aluminum foil hat to keep out the government's rays?

Is it really so crazy to think that God might actually still be active - in a HUGE way - in the world today?

Is it really so crazy to think that God might be active in your life if you'll let Him?

I promise you... I am nothing special. I haven't got much of anything figured out. But I am slowly, slowly, slowly learning more of how to truly listen to God. His voice is sometimes still the gentle whisper after the earthquake and the fire... And sometimes He's the loud, commanding voice telling the storms to be still.

I've not perfected the skill of listening to the Spirit with a completely open heart. I still mess up. I still mess up a lot. But I've started to notice that my slip-ups come when I focus more on myself, on my own desires, on getting MY way instead of patiently, prayerfully, and purposefully listening for the words of the Holy Spirit in my heart, soul, and mind.

But the one truth I've managed to grasp is that the only way you're going to hear the Spirit is if you listen. It is my prayer for you that God opens your ears - your heart, your soul, your mind - and lets you hear what He's really got to say to YOU, because I promise you - it's worth hearing.

I've got one more thing I want to get out of Balaam next week. I'm looking forward to it. Hope you are, too.

Pray for an open spirit.

Learning from Balaam (and avoiding the easy jokes) part II

So last week I started talking about Balaam. From the story of Balaam, I pulled out three ideas that I believe to be true:

1. It is possible to know who God is and worship Him wrong.
2. It is possible to earnestly seek the Word of God and still disobey Him.
3. It is possible for God to speak through you, even when you don't know what to say.

Last week's post was about the first point. Sometimes, in our zeal to please God (which is a righteous thing) we cling so strongly to our own idea of who God is and what He wants that we don't allow Him to change our minds and hearts so that we can actually SEE Him and show Him to those around us. We may know God - but we don't quite understand Him, sometimes. When our desire to be right beats out our desire to be righteous, we start to mess things up.

And that has a lot to do with our attitude towards the means through which God reaches us.

How is it that there are so many people in this world who can quote the Bible, chapter and verse, for hours on end... and yet have no idea what it actually means?

Isaac Asimov was a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant man. My goodness, was that guy smart. He was a professor of biochemistry at Boston University, was vice-president of Mensa, president of the American Humanist Association, and has published works in nine of the ten major categories of the Dewey Decimal System. If that isn't some nerd cred, I don't know what is.

Among his published works are some incredible pieces of science-fiction, as well as non-fiction, history, the three-volume set Understanding Physics, and his world-renowned guides to Shakespeare and the Bible. If you're a serious student of Shakespeare, you can't go without Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare. And if you're a serious student of the Bible... Well, yeah, Asimov's pretty tough to beat there, too.

The interesting thing is that Isaac Asimov was an atheist.

I would dare say that Isaac Asimov knew the Bible better than most people. Certainly better than me! You guys have no idea how much time I spend writing these entries just reading entire books of the Bible, trying to remember where that one verse was... about the thing... where God said something... to someone...

I wouldn't expect Asimov to have the same reaction to the Bible as I do. He didn't believe in it. He didn't believe in it before he wrote his Guide, and he didn't believe in it after he wrote his Guide, either.

But within Christianity... Yeah, OK, I'll admit I kinda expect people to have the at least a similar reaction to the Bible as my own. And that reaction is an understanding that my own understanding is entirely secondary to the wisdom and truth contained within the Word of God.

Let us consider, for a moment, sex. Sex is kind of a big deal. I understand it's pretty fantastic. There is, in fact, an entire book of the Bible that focuses pretty strongly on sex.

But God has made it clear through the Bible that sex is meant for - reserved for - marriage. One man, one woman, one relationship. That's the point.

But I've come in contact with this idea that sex outside of marriage is OK so long as you're not married - because then, well, obviously, you're not cheating on your spouse. How can you cheat on a spouse you don't have? Brilliant!

Except oh wait that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.

You remember that verse that says "God cannot be mocked"? This counts as mocking God. God doesn't have loopholes. You're not gonna pull a fast one on ol' God.

God is not a man that He should lie,

nor a son of man, that He should change His mind.

Does He speak and then not act?

Does He promise and not fulfill?

- Numbers 23:19

That little tidbit comes from Balaam's second oracle- the blessing he poured out on Israel in his second attempt to curse them. Earlier - like, 11 verses earlier - God said through Balaam, "How can I curse those whom God has not cursed?" And yet Balaam insists on cursing those whom God has not cursed, whom God has specifically told Balaam not to curse.

And sometimes we insist on our own understanding, as well, even though God is right in front of us, screaming in our ears, telling us that we're missing the picture.

Let's go back to sex (since it's such an interesting topic): how did Jesus deal with people whose sins were of a sexual nature?

But Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. At dawn he appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, "Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?" They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"

"No one, sir," she said.

"Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin."

- John 8:1-11

So that's Jesus. And there are other examples worth considering - the Samaritan woman at the well, for starters, plus the "sinful" woman who wiped Jesus' feet with her hair.

But what about us?

How do we deal with people - especially women - when we find out they've made mistakes of a sexual nature?

Do we smile with tears in our eyes and embrace them with the love of Jesus Christ and His church, and tell them that God will forgive their sins, just as He forgave our own sins?

Or do we look down on them? Do we call them names? Do we heap scorn and rejection on them, ostracize them from the family of God, and then have the audacity to tell them that they earned the reputation they now carry?

May God have mercy on you and comfort you if you wind up pregnant outside of marriage in most of the churches I have known in my life, because the people that God has called to be the ones who show you mercy and comfort certainly aren't going to be the ones to do it.

And we don't just do that with sex. Yeah, we blow sexual sins WAY out of proportion (lying is just as much of a sin as anything sexual [Revelation 21:8, look it up], but you don't see radical protest groups at military funerals with signs that read "GOD HATES POLITICIANS," do you?), but they're not the only thing people completely lose their minds over.

Sin is bad. I get it.

But you know what beats sin, every time? Grace. Truth. Mercy. Love.

Yelling does not make sin go away. Changing the Constitution does not make sin go away. Bombing does not make sin go away.

Christ makes sin go away.

And I meet so many people - so, so, so many people! - who say that they "love the sinner, hate the sin..." And I can't say that they don't. But I think I can say that their distinction between sinner/sin might be a little blurry.

And I think that problem comes from a misunderstanding of the Bible on a fundamental level.

Before I go any further... No, I don't have a Bible degree. No, I can't read Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic. No, I can't really tell you a lot about the Elohist/Jahwist sources in the Old Testament or the "Q" source for the New Testament. I realize that all of those are important things, and if I am seeing further, it is only because I am standing on the shoulders of people who had better luck with Machen than I did.

But I don't for a second believe that the Bible is an incomprehensible text that only the highly-educated few can ever hope to even begin to understand, and I very much doubt that any of you reading this believe that, either.

And yet, far too often, we live our lives with this sort of fear of the Bible. There are things we don't understand and questions we don't have answers to that the Bible is painfully silent over. And so, in our attempts to seize righteousness, we do exactly what we've been told not to do - we make the Bible a list of rules. We make the Bible the ultimate truth of the universe. We make the Bible the focus.

Folks - I love the Bible. But I do not follow the Bible. I follow Christ. The Bible is not God. It is about God. It is not the ultimate expression of the Will of God. God's Will is the ultimate expression of itself. The Bible is not the only way God speaks to us in today's world - it's just the only one that all of us can read at the same time.

I want to make sure that this is clearly understood. I do believe, fully, that "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work." (II Timothy 3:16-17)

But I also believe that there are still plenty of "ignorant and unstable people" who "distort... the Scriptures... to their own destruction." (II Peter 3:16)

It has become painfully obvious to me that a knowledge of the Bible is not enough. After all, Satan, tempting Christ in the wilderness, quoted Scripture. (I fully realize that it's just as possible for me to be Satan quoting Scripture here as anything, but bear with me, I promise I have a point that's actually backed by Scripture.)

Let us consider a few things.

Every man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head.

- I Corinthians 11:4

So, guys, you take off your hat when you pray, right? When I went to Uplift with the Heritage Place youth group last summer, I saw way, way, waaaaaaaaay too many youth ministers who didn't. Is that just a Southern thing? Or is that a God thing? I mean, it is pretty plainly stated in the Bible, isn't it? And then right after that...

And every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her head—it is just as though her head were shaved. If a woman does not cover her head, she should have her hair cut off; and if it is a disgrace for a woman to have her hair cut or shaved off, she should cover her head.

- I Corinthians 11:5-6

So, ladies... How many of you still cover your heads when you pray? How many of you are rockin' a short haircut? How do you feel about your relationship with God? Is it tied into the length of your hair, or is it something a bit more internal than that? And then there's...

I also want women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.

- I Timothy 2:9-10

So braided hair is sinful? Oh, man. My sister is going to hell. Especially from Kindergarten to 6th grade. Gold? Pearls? Expensive clothes? Apparently Paul's got it out for my Grandmother, too!

Or maybe... Maybe maybe maybe...

Just maybe...

Maybe we should consider that the Bible is not written to us.

It is written for us, but it is not written to us. It is written to people who lived, ate, drank, worked, slept, married, worshiped and died some 18-19 centuries before we were even born. It's a product of a culture that we don't live in - that we can't live in!

Whether we like it or not, the world has changed since the time of Christ. The message written to a church in Corinth in the latter half of the first century is not the message for the church in the United States at the dawn of the 21st century. Can we learn from their message? Absolutely! Does it contain truth? Undoubtedly! Is it the ultimate truth?

No!

God is the ultimate truth!

The Bible is God's letter to us, and it's all about Him. In its pages, God reveals to us portions of His nature so that we can know what we're pursuing. He shares with us select stories of His works in the world so we can look around us now and see His hands in every aspect of our lives. He tells us about His Son so we can encounter holiness. He tells us about His Spirit - the Spirit which now lives in all who accept Christ! The same Spirit that inspired the Scriptures! The same Spirit that healed the sick, raised the dead, and spread the Gospel throughout the Roman world!

He tells us about His Spirit because He gave it to us!

The Bible is what the Bible is. It's probably not going to change any time soon. That doesn't discount a word in it! It just means that we've got to start following the Voice that is dynamic, actively working, and speaks to us in our lives! Speaks to us in our settings! Speaks to us, as individuals, in our own hearts, minds, and souls!

The Holy Spirit is here! It is now! It is forever!

The Bible is a book. It can be destroyed.

The Holy Spirit is the eternal Spirit of God, placed inside every one of us when we take on Christ in baptism. Our souls become intertwined with the very Soul of God, leading us into further understanding of God's Word, yes, but also of God's Will.

The Bible contains God's Will in the grand sweeping arcs. And that's an absolutely indispensable guide for living the life we're called to live.

But when it comes down to the details? When it comes down to the hard decisions that just aren't covered in the Bible? When it comes down to seeing what God has in store for us, here, 2000 years removed from the final Amen of Revelation?

I think God is still talking to me. I've just got to be willing to listen.

And that's where next week's entry comes in (if I still have any readers by then).