Aloha
Happy Monday! Beat those 'back to school/work blues' by watching this catchy (and very cheesy 80's) video!
Favourite lines:
"He loves me when I'm right
He loves me when I'm wrong
He loves when I waste my time
By writing silly songs"
*Zap!*
Monday, 29 September 2008
Thursday, 18 September 2008
Relevance
Aloha (again!)
We just keep on giving this week!
Here's what we discussed last night in the student housegroup. It's part 1 of our 'Discipleship' course...
Relevance
Let’s talk about relevance tonight. We talked earlier in the year about the relevance of the church and what it meant to us and how God sees it. I want to pick that up again and explore more.
When I was becoming a Christian – for me, it wasn’t a decision or moment – it was a journey. I asked “God, if you’re there – reveal yourself to me” and thus began a journey where God would reveal himself to me.
I began to notice change, I began to pray and all the while in secret. I wasn’t going to throw all my cards in until I was certain. At the time, Linkin Park had a song out called ‘Somewhere I Belong’ which really spoke to me, as I was looking for who I was and where I fitted into life. Hungover in a coffee shop on valentine’s day 2003 – I decided I didn’t like who I was or where I was going or what I stood for. I didn’t know the answer, but I knew it wasn’t where I was, so I had to look for it.
5 years later, I can say that God is real, alive, involved and relevant in my life – so let’s try and explore some issues surrounding it.
Why is Jesus relevant?
Some people will have different opinions on this. And for every reason there is a million ideas of how to express it. But for me, the Relevance of Jesus is not rooted in His message of love, or how we can write songs about Him, make art in His name, have pictures, audio, multimedia etc…those are just means of telling people about Jesus.
There are churches that say “We’re post-Jesus. We don’t need to teach Jesus. Let’s just live better, try to all get along and live in peace.” Wrong. That is not God’s vision for His church. In John 12 Jesus reveals that He is “The way, the truth and life” and that “NO one comes to the Father except through me.”
We can’t get around Jesus. We can’t get to Heaven, be right with God, be able to serve or love God or even confess that God is Lord without Jesus.
But instead of asking; “How do we make Jesus relevant to people?” let’s ask ourselves; “Why? Why is Jesus relevant in my life?”
I believe the answer is found in Hebrews…
“Since He himself has gone through suffering and testing, He is able to help us when we are being tested.”
Hebrews 2:18
Are you a parent? He knows how hard that is.
Are you alone? He’s been there.
Are you sick? He made you, so he knows how to cure you.
Are you suffering? Persecuted? Beaten Up or just broken? He has firsthand experience of all of those things.
Are you tempted to do wrong? So was He.
Does the world ever feel like it’s too much to handle? Yeah.
Jesus is relevant – because he was willing to become like us. He isn’t some impersonal, distant but caring God. The religious leaders of the day, couldn’t believe that Jesus was who He said He was, because they thought they were getting a self-righteous King, a warrior, but one that bowed to tradition and law and reverence.
No, He got down in the mud with us. He didn’t wear whiter-than-white clothing. He was a meek and humble individual. He slept under the stars, dined with the broken, ordinary people and hung out with a rag-tag bunch of fishermen and a tax collector. He spent his days walking around with the sick and even dared to touch them. He suffered from persecution, betrayal, heartache, temptation and tremendous pain. He was even willing to become sin itself, to be separated from the Father and take the fullness of God’s wrath upon himself.
God had to turn his back, because He cannot look on sin. His own Son, willing to take our punishment, so that we could be found right with God. So that we can enjoy a relationship with him. So we don’t have to be alone…
Jesus is relevant because no matter what century we live in, no matter what technology brings or what kind of economic or political culture we live in – we are people. We feel. We hurt. We get sad. We fail. He came to fix all that. He became like us, and He won the victory.
Hebrews 4:15 says:
“This High Priest [Jesus] of ours understands our weaknesses, for He faced all of the same testings we do, yet He did not sin.”
He didn’t fail in His mission. He didn’t succumb to the pain, or the temptation or the sorrow – but He felt it. You wouldn’t believe how he felt it. But He endured it. And He won.
The Relevance of the Gospel
So what makes this gospel relevant?
The stories of Jesus have not lived on because he was a good man. He is not just a model of how we should be. Nor is he just some symbol of goodness that we should strive to ascertain. His wisdom is not why we believe in him, nor is it because of his prophecies.
No, we love, believe, trust, serve and try to obey Jesus is the simple fact of his gospel – the most fundamental part of the gospel. He rose from the dead.
If Jesus was still dead, there would be no church. The disciples would have returned to being fishermen, perhaps more polite than they were or maybe even a little more inclined to help someone than before – but there would be no transformational power.
The crowds of people that gathered to hear him speak would have long forgotten his words and scattered. The next fad would have come up. Maybe it would be yo-yo’s this time. Or pogs.
No, the reason for our lives, our beliefs and our values is all built on the Resurrection.
“If Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless and your faith is useless” (1 Corinthians 15:14).
Let’s also read 1 Corinthians 15:3-8.
Paul is explicit here in the timeline of events.
Other religions will say “He was a prophet” or “A wise teacher”. Some say “He fainted on the cross” or that “They found the wrong tomb on the Sunday”. Let’s dispose of some of these myths…
• Jesus was flogged, beaten and whipped. Some people didn’t even make it this far. Some men died before even being crucified.
• Jesus, tired, starving, beaten beyond recognition was nailed to a cross that impaled his body and ripped it open.
• Next, Jesus says “It is done” and dies.
• He is pronounced dead by the executioner. He is a trained, and skilled man. His job is to kill people. Every day. If he says someone is dead, they are dead. Final.
• Luke testifies in his Gospel that Jesus is dead. What was Luke’s profession? He was a doctor. He knows what a dead person looks like.
• Next, to speed things up, a spear (or javelin) is thrust into Jesus’ side. It says in scripture that ‘blood and water flowed out’ – water came from his heart. This method pierces the skin under the rib cage and pierces the heart, causing it to burst and leaks water and blood. Without a heart – he is dead.
• Next, Jesus is taken from the cross and wrapped in hundreds of pounds of cloth. He is in a near mummified state and left in a tomb for 3 days. No water, no medical attention, no food, no air, no heart.
• Now, the tomb – was from a rich man, Joseph of Arimathea. Being a wealthy man his tomb would have had prominence, position and place. It would be distinguishable from the others. When Mary came and told the disciples the news, it says that John and Peter RAN there. They didn’t need to ask directions, or work out where it was – they ran. They knew the way.
So what happens then?
Jesus’ tomb does not become a place of worship or prominence – because why worship an empty tomb?
Jesus starts appearing to disciples, crowds of up to 500 people at a time and not as a spirit – Jesus wasn’t raised a spirit of himself – he was a physical being. He ate, drank, touched, embraced, walked, everything…He rose again to a perfected, glorified body and walked the Earth for 40 days after the resurrection, enough time for people to make accounts, history books dating back to the 1st Century depict that Jesus rose again and told the disciples of stuff like the Gethsemane prayer that no one else was around to hear.
Let’s go back to Hebrews: the writer records
“But because Jesus lives forever, his priesthood lives forever. Therefore, He is able, once and for all to save those who come to God through Him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf.” (Hebrews 7:24-25)
Our Gospel is relevant because it is different to everyone else’s. All those ‘all roads lead to heaven’ are going the wrong way. No other God died for his people. No other prophet dared to call themselves God’s son. No one else rose from the dead to lead the way to someone else. And it’s relevant to people, because of what we said earlier about Jesus’ relevance.
Maybe you get that.
Maybe that’s all old news.
But there’s another piece of the puzzle:
Why am I relevant?
John 15:16 says this:
“You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for in my name”
Church today has the ‘Jesus loves me’ down. We’ve got ‘God’s my provider, God’s planned my life, more than a conqueror’ stuff down. These are true, important and encouraging. But there’s more.
• God chose to make man and woman (Genesis 1) Before that, he made them an inhabitable world.
• He made them a paradise and made them to live with Him.
• When they sinned, he cast them out the garden for their own good. Because, the tree of life gave wisdom and understanding that only God should have. If God hadn’t cast them out, they would have ‘become like us’ [Gods] and much chaos would have ensued.
• God made plans to reconcile them to himself. He chose Jesus to do all that we said before about becoming like us to free us and save us, then came back from the dead to guide us to the Father and to intercede for us.
But what else? God chose us to spread the Good News. In the verse we read above it doesn’t say “I chose you because I like you and you deserve to get everything you want. Just ask and you’ll get it”. It says ‘I appointed you to GO and PRODUCE lasting fruit.”
You are part of the plan. Your actions and words are important and can shape those of the people around you. If you are brave enough to take this Christian life seriously, then God will use your appointment to make you more like him. Now, you’ll be the one feeding the poor, living with the ordinary and speaking out against injustice and religion. Why can’t God do it himself? He did.
In fact, God doesn’t ask us to do anything that He didn’t already do for himself.
Why can’t God just make everyone believe Him? He could, but He doesn’t want people forced into loving him. You can accept and reject his love at any time. Just like anyone else. Would you want to be at a party where everyone is forced to like you? No. You want to be around people who choose to appreciate and love you. People who respect you and trust you. We are relevant, because God has included us in the plan.
Y’know, we have it so easy, have so much freedom that we spend our lives praying “God! What do you want me to do? I don’t want to anything unless it’s Your will! Absolutely nothing! Nope, not a thing!” We have so much freedom, we don’t know what to do with it. So we waste it. We indulge in sin, in religion, in time-wasting relationships and other activities.
Start walking – and God will soon tell you you’re going in the wrong direction. Jesus said “Go!” He was OK with the disciples all going in different directions to spread the news – it got done. And that was the important thing. He guided their steps and they showed willingness to move.
Pastor Andrew said to me, when I was becoming more involved in church that my greatest ability – was availability. Making time to do whatever God needed me to.
So to wrap up:
Jesus is relevant. He suffered, cried, felt and was tempted just like you and me – but he didn’t sin. That said, because He didn’t means that he even knows the way to deal with that. Identify with him, trust in him – he’s been to hell and back for you.
The Gospel is relevant – because no other faith has a God who died for them. None will tell you that we can have resurrection and new birth NOW. That eternal life begins when you believe. This is not a multi-faith gospel, or even a crowd-pleasing gospel. It’s revolutionary, radical and relevant to everyone. Everyone needs a saviour.
And we are relevant – because God has chosen the weak things of this earth to confuse the wise and put them to shame. You and me were accepted as we were, but are daily changed into who we can become. Children of grace, ordinary and with a face and a mortgage and kids and responsibilities and feelings and failures. But we have a saviour, an intercessor helping us out who promises to give us what we need in this journey to spread the good news.
We just keep on giving this week!
Here's what we discussed last night in the student housegroup. It's part 1 of our 'Discipleship' course...
Relevance
Let’s talk about relevance tonight. We talked earlier in the year about the relevance of the church and what it meant to us and how God sees it. I want to pick that up again and explore more.
When I was becoming a Christian – for me, it wasn’t a decision or moment – it was a journey. I asked “God, if you’re there – reveal yourself to me” and thus began a journey where God would reveal himself to me.
I began to notice change, I began to pray and all the while in secret. I wasn’t going to throw all my cards in until I was certain. At the time, Linkin Park had a song out called ‘Somewhere I Belong’ which really spoke to me, as I was looking for who I was and where I fitted into life. Hungover in a coffee shop on valentine’s day 2003 – I decided I didn’t like who I was or where I was going or what I stood for. I didn’t know the answer, but I knew it wasn’t where I was, so I had to look for it.
5 years later, I can say that God is real, alive, involved and relevant in my life – so let’s try and explore some issues surrounding it.
Why is Jesus relevant?
Some people will have different opinions on this. And for every reason there is a million ideas of how to express it. But for me, the Relevance of Jesus is not rooted in His message of love, or how we can write songs about Him, make art in His name, have pictures, audio, multimedia etc…those are just means of telling people about Jesus.
There are churches that say “We’re post-Jesus. We don’t need to teach Jesus. Let’s just live better, try to all get along and live in peace.” Wrong. That is not God’s vision for His church. In John 12 Jesus reveals that He is “The way, the truth and life” and that “NO one comes to the Father except through me.”
We can’t get around Jesus. We can’t get to Heaven, be right with God, be able to serve or love God or even confess that God is Lord without Jesus.
But instead of asking; “How do we make Jesus relevant to people?” let’s ask ourselves; “Why? Why is Jesus relevant in my life?”
I believe the answer is found in Hebrews…
“Since He himself has gone through suffering and testing, He is able to help us when we are being tested.”
Hebrews 2:18
Are you a parent? He knows how hard that is.
Are you alone? He’s been there.
Are you sick? He made you, so he knows how to cure you.
Are you suffering? Persecuted? Beaten Up or just broken? He has firsthand experience of all of those things.
Are you tempted to do wrong? So was He.
Does the world ever feel like it’s too much to handle? Yeah.
Jesus is relevant – because he was willing to become like us. He isn’t some impersonal, distant but caring God. The religious leaders of the day, couldn’t believe that Jesus was who He said He was, because they thought they were getting a self-righteous King, a warrior, but one that bowed to tradition and law and reverence.
No, He got down in the mud with us. He didn’t wear whiter-than-white clothing. He was a meek and humble individual. He slept under the stars, dined with the broken, ordinary people and hung out with a rag-tag bunch of fishermen and a tax collector. He spent his days walking around with the sick and even dared to touch them. He suffered from persecution, betrayal, heartache, temptation and tremendous pain. He was even willing to become sin itself, to be separated from the Father and take the fullness of God’s wrath upon himself.
God had to turn his back, because He cannot look on sin. His own Son, willing to take our punishment, so that we could be found right with God. So that we can enjoy a relationship with him. So we don’t have to be alone…
Jesus is relevant because no matter what century we live in, no matter what technology brings or what kind of economic or political culture we live in – we are people. We feel. We hurt. We get sad. We fail. He came to fix all that. He became like us, and He won the victory.
Hebrews 4:15 says:
“This High Priest [Jesus] of ours understands our weaknesses, for He faced all of the same testings we do, yet He did not sin.”
He didn’t fail in His mission. He didn’t succumb to the pain, or the temptation or the sorrow – but He felt it. You wouldn’t believe how he felt it. But He endured it. And He won.
The Relevance of the Gospel
So what makes this gospel relevant?
The stories of Jesus have not lived on because he was a good man. He is not just a model of how we should be. Nor is he just some symbol of goodness that we should strive to ascertain. His wisdom is not why we believe in him, nor is it because of his prophecies.
No, we love, believe, trust, serve and try to obey Jesus is the simple fact of his gospel – the most fundamental part of the gospel. He rose from the dead.
If Jesus was still dead, there would be no church. The disciples would have returned to being fishermen, perhaps more polite than they were or maybe even a little more inclined to help someone than before – but there would be no transformational power.
The crowds of people that gathered to hear him speak would have long forgotten his words and scattered. The next fad would have come up. Maybe it would be yo-yo’s this time. Or pogs.
No, the reason for our lives, our beliefs and our values is all built on the Resurrection.
“If Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless and your faith is useless” (1 Corinthians 15:14).
Let’s also read 1 Corinthians 15:3-8.
Paul is explicit here in the timeline of events.
Other religions will say “He was a prophet” or “A wise teacher”. Some say “He fainted on the cross” or that “They found the wrong tomb on the Sunday”. Let’s dispose of some of these myths…
• Jesus was flogged, beaten and whipped. Some people didn’t even make it this far. Some men died before even being crucified.
• Jesus, tired, starving, beaten beyond recognition was nailed to a cross that impaled his body and ripped it open.
• Next, Jesus says “It is done” and dies.
• He is pronounced dead by the executioner. He is a trained, and skilled man. His job is to kill people. Every day. If he says someone is dead, they are dead. Final.
• Luke testifies in his Gospel that Jesus is dead. What was Luke’s profession? He was a doctor. He knows what a dead person looks like.
• Next, to speed things up, a spear (or javelin) is thrust into Jesus’ side. It says in scripture that ‘blood and water flowed out’ – water came from his heart. This method pierces the skin under the rib cage and pierces the heart, causing it to burst and leaks water and blood. Without a heart – he is dead.
• Next, Jesus is taken from the cross and wrapped in hundreds of pounds of cloth. He is in a near mummified state and left in a tomb for 3 days. No water, no medical attention, no food, no air, no heart.
• Now, the tomb – was from a rich man, Joseph of Arimathea. Being a wealthy man his tomb would have had prominence, position and place. It would be distinguishable from the others. When Mary came and told the disciples the news, it says that John and Peter RAN there. They didn’t need to ask directions, or work out where it was – they ran. They knew the way.
So what happens then?
Jesus’ tomb does not become a place of worship or prominence – because why worship an empty tomb?
Jesus starts appearing to disciples, crowds of up to 500 people at a time and not as a spirit – Jesus wasn’t raised a spirit of himself – he was a physical being. He ate, drank, touched, embraced, walked, everything…He rose again to a perfected, glorified body and walked the Earth for 40 days after the resurrection, enough time for people to make accounts, history books dating back to the 1st Century depict that Jesus rose again and told the disciples of stuff like the Gethsemane prayer that no one else was around to hear.
Let’s go back to Hebrews: the writer records
“But because Jesus lives forever, his priesthood lives forever. Therefore, He is able, once and for all to save those who come to God through Him. He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf.” (Hebrews 7:24-25)
Our Gospel is relevant because it is different to everyone else’s. All those ‘all roads lead to heaven’ are going the wrong way. No other God died for his people. No other prophet dared to call themselves God’s son. No one else rose from the dead to lead the way to someone else. And it’s relevant to people, because of what we said earlier about Jesus’ relevance.
Maybe you get that.
Maybe that’s all old news.
But there’s another piece of the puzzle:
Why am I relevant?
John 15:16 says this:
“You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for in my name”
Church today has the ‘Jesus loves me’ down. We’ve got ‘God’s my provider, God’s planned my life, more than a conqueror’ stuff down. These are true, important and encouraging. But there’s more.
• God chose to make man and woman (Genesis 1) Before that, he made them an inhabitable world.
• He made them a paradise and made them to live with Him.
• When they sinned, he cast them out the garden for their own good. Because, the tree of life gave wisdom and understanding that only God should have. If God hadn’t cast them out, they would have ‘become like us’ [Gods] and much chaos would have ensued.
• God made plans to reconcile them to himself. He chose Jesus to do all that we said before about becoming like us to free us and save us, then came back from the dead to guide us to the Father and to intercede for us.
But what else? God chose us to spread the Good News. In the verse we read above it doesn’t say “I chose you because I like you and you deserve to get everything you want. Just ask and you’ll get it”. It says ‘I appointed you to GO and PRODUCE lasting fruit.”
You are part of the plan. Your actions and words are important and can shape those of the people around you. If you are brave enough to take this Christian life seriously, then God will use your appointment to make you more like him. Now, you’ll be the one feeding the poor, living with the ordinary and speaking out against injustice and religion. Why can’t God do it himself? He did.
In fact, God doesn’t ask us to do anything that He didn’t already do for himself.
Why can’t God just make everyone believe Him? He could, but He doesn’t want people forced into loving him. You can accept and reject his love at any time. Just like anyone else. Would you want to be at a party where everyone is forced to like you? No. You want to be around people who choose to appreciate and love you. People who respect you and trust you. We are relevant, because God has included us in the plan.
Y’know, we have it so easy, have so much freedom that we spend our lives praying “God! What do you want me to do? I don’t want to anything unless it’s Your will! Absolutely nothing! Nope, not a thing!” We have so much freedom, we don’t know what to do with it. So we waste it. We indulge in sin, in religion, in time-wasting relationships and other activities.
Start walking – and God will soon tell you you’re going in the wrong direction. Jesus said “Go!” He was OK with the disciples all going in different directions to spread the news – it got done. And that was the important thing. He guided their steps and they showed willingness to move.
Pastor Andrew said to me, when I was becoming more involved in church that my greatest ability – was availability. Making time to do whatever God needed me to.
So to wrap up:
Jesus is relevant. He suffered, cried, felt and was tempted just like you and me – but he didn’t sin. That said, because He didn’t means that he even knows the way to deal with that. Identify with him, trust in him – he’s been to hell and back for you.
The Gospel is relevant – because no other faith has a God who died for them. None will tell you that we can have resurrection and new birth NOW. That eternal life begins when you believe. This is not a multi-faith gospel, or even a crowd-pleasing gospel. It’s revolutionary, radical and relevant to everyone. Everyone needs a saviour.
And we are relevant – because God has chosen the weak things of this earth to confuse the wise and put them to shame. You and me were accepted as we were, but are daily changed into who we can become. Children of grace, ordinary and with a face and a mortgage and kids and responsibilities and feelings and failures. But we have a saviour, an intercessor helping us out who promises to give us what we need in this journey to spread the good news.
Another thought...
Aloha
After speaking last night, I read some more of Rob Bell's awesome book and something very cool was revealed:
Y'know the first 5 books of the Bible? (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers & Deuteronomy?) Well, they were written by Moses, and considered as 'the law' and the standard for everyone. Kids even had to learn all 5 books by heart at around age 10!
Anyways, these 5 books were known as 'The Torah'. And 'Torah' has lots of different meanings...one of them being 'Way'.
So, when Jesus announced in John 12 (I think) "I am the WAY, the truth and the life" he was saying "That was me who wrote that. I was there, I am the law."
Wow.
Just thought I'd share.
Be blessed!
-AG
After speaking last night, I read some more of Rob Bell's awesome book and something very cool was revealed:
Y'know the first 5 books of the Bible? (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers & Deuteronomy?) Well, they were written by Moses, and considered as 'the law' and the standard for everyone. Kids even had to learn all 5 books by heart at around age 10!
Anyways, these 5 books were known as 'The Torah'. And 'Torah' has lots of different meanings...one of them being 'Way'.
So, when Jesus announced in John 12 (I think) "I am the WAY, the truth and the life" he was saying "That was me who wrote that. I was there, I am the law."
Wow.
Just thought I'd share.
Be blessed!
-AG
Dispelling 6 Myths of the Bible
Aloha!
As promised, here are my notes from last night's youth talk. Feel free to pick, question, read, share etc!
Major thanks to Mark Driscoll and Rob Bell, and of course God in the writing here...
Dispelling 6 Myths of the Bible
Usually, teaching about the Bible is like when people teach about prayer. It’s all about guilt.
“You don’t read enough”
“You’re not doing it right”
“You’re not cross-referencing everything”
But you shouldn’t read your Bible out of guilt. Nobody should force you to read it. You should because you want to.
Like worship as well – we encourage you to worship, but only because we want you to WANT to worship.
Bible reading should be inspiring, fresh, vibrant and powerful.
You’re not reading a dictionary or instruction manual.
In fact, let’s get rid of two myths right now.
Myth 1. The Bible is an instruction manual for life.
The Bible is not an instruction manual for life.
It’s not a user’s guide for your body. How many people actually read the instruction manual before they play a game? Or build something? How many times have you been inspired to read an instruction manual for your toaster?
Myth 2. The Bible is like a dictionary.
We don’t look up the word ‘faith’ and it gives us an accurate description of what that is.
We don’t look up ‘love’ and it says “God is love, the end.”
No. Not at all.
We get stories, and journals and experiences of these things. We get to see people who have lots of faith, people’s faith failing like when Peter walked on the water, we see bad things to happen to people who have faith and we see great things. We get stories, stories that show us people who have experienced these things and then that helps us understand. We don’t get a description of love, we get to see what love looks like, see people fall in love, out of love, find love, lose love, try love, hate love and die out of love.
I am so glad the Bible is not some formula. If it was just “do this + this – sin = salvation” then it wouldn’t have all the beauty and brokenness that we have.
Let’s look at Acts 8. (26-40)
I love the honesty here. He could have lied and said yes and tried to come up with something. But instead he questioned it, he asked about it, and in return got so much more from it. Was he talking about himself or someone else?
Myth 3. The Bible is just about some old kings and stuff
The Bible is ALL about God.
Explain the Road to Emmaus. In Luke 24:25-26, it says that Jesus explained all the scriptures concerning himself. It all works out as one big timeline. For example, all the Kings that you read about in old testament had great significance, for they were the predecessors of Jesus. They were attacked and had wars and all had to be recorded so we could see just how much God was in control to bring about Jesus. If the enemy could have got one killed before he had a son, then the family line would not have continued and this would have prevented Jesus’ birth. Wow. It’s all connected.
Myth 4. The Bible is not relevant.
The Bible was not coughed up by God, it didn’t just land on the Earth one day and that was that. God spent thousands of years working it through with people and getting them to write it. It is so much more honest and true and relevant because it happened to real people.
Quote some Rob Bell, "Velvet Elvis" page 64-65 from Paragraph 2.
Myth 5. The Bible is a book.
The Bible is not a book, it is a library. There are history books, journals, letters, poems, thoughts…it’s like a scrapbook of humankind, touched by God. We see their lives in pain, misery and regret, and others in happiness, restoration and healing. It’s got romance, war, action, cliff-hangers and multi-coloured characters. And yet, as we said before – it all fits together around God.
If my story was in the Bible, or if yours was – it wouldn’t be perfect. It wouldn’t be eloquently written. It would contain truth and honesty about our brokenness and weakness, and occasionally, a story about our strength. A time where we were obedient and something amazing happened – we connected with God because we dared to either stand up or get on our knees.
When you start reading the Bible as the stories of real people in real situations, suddenly it has a life – because God gave them those lives and He inspired them to record it.
This isn’t an instruction manual or a dictionary. A dictionary does not profess to be anything other than a ‘collection of words alphabetically’ – but even it describes the Bible as an authoritive text.
This Bible is like God, our Father, reading us a bedtime story to comfort us.
Or giving an encouraging speech during a war.
Or a friend giving us some advice because they’ve been there.
It is so much more than just a book.
Myth 6. The Bible is boring
The Bible is not boring.
Have you seen those adverts for the iPhone? You must have. I really wanted to make a video like that for you, but it would be too long. So here’s a live version. I’m going to pitch my advert for the Bible.
• It’s not new – but that’s OK – Retro is in right now. Plus, it’ll never go out of date.
• It never needs an upgrade
• It comes in different languages and whatever style to suit your taste
• It will always tell you the truth.
• It’s always accurate.
• It’s compatible with all your other technology. In fact, it won’t bother them at all!
• It will give you direction, but you don’t even have to know where you’re going
• No batteries required. It’s always fully charged with power
• No internet connection required.
• Volume control. Sometimes it’s quiet, but it can loud. REALLY LOUD.
• Other audio functions; you can read it, or it can speak to you
• It’s just bigger than your hand – but can come in any size you like
• If colour is your thing, this comes in every single one. Name it.
• It has a lifetime guarantee.
• In fact, it has LOTS of guarantees for your life
• It’ll never break
• Virus proof
• Easy to use
• Always available
• And it’s anti-aging. This can EXTEND. YOUR. LIFE.
In Conclusion....
It’s the only reason I haven’t slipped away.
For fire to burn, you need to throw wood on it. This is your wood.
Man shall not live by bread alone…
Now that you have it – what are you going to do with it?
Will it be your door stop or your soapbox?
If the Bible is really your sword – always know where it is – you’d never lose your actual sword, because what happens when someone attacks you or your faith?
---
Hope you enjoyed it and found it useful!
-AG
As promised, here are my notes from last night's youth talk. Feel free to pick, question, read, share etc!
Major thanks to Mark Driscoll and Rob Bell, and of course God in the writing here...
Dispelling 6 Myths of the Bible
Usually, teaching about the Bible is like when people teach about prayer. It’s all about guilt.
“You don’t read enough”
“You’re not doing it right”
“You’re not cross-referencing everything”
But you shouldn’t read your Bible out of guilt. Nobody should force you to read it. You should because you want to.
Like worship as well – we encourage you to worship, but only because we want you to WANT to worship.
Bible reading should be inspiring, fresh, vibrant and powerful.
You’re not reading a dictionary or instruction manual.
In fact, let’s get rid of two myths right now.
Myth 1. The Bible is an instruction manual for life.
The Bible is not an instruction manual for life.
It’s not a user’s guide for your body. How many people actually read the instruction manual before they play a game? Or build something? How many times have you been inspired to read an instruction manual for your toaster?
Myth 2. The Bible is like a dictionary.
We don’t look up the word ‘faith’ and it gives us an accurate description of what that is.
We don’t look up ‘love’ and it says “God is love, the end.”
No. Not at all.
We get stories, and journals and experiences of these things. We get to see people who have lots of faith, people’s faith failing like when Peter walked on the water, we see bad things to happen to people who have faith and we see great things. We get stories, stories that show us people who have experienced these things and then that helps us understand. We don’t get a description of love, we get to see what love looks like, see people fall in love, out of love, find love, lose love, try love, hate love and die out of love.
I am so glad the Bible is not some formula. If it was just “do this + this – sin = salvation” then it wouldn’t have all the beauty and brokenness that we have.
Let’s look at Acts 8. (26-40)
I love the honesty here. He could have lied and said yes and tried to come up with something. But instead he questioned it, he asked about it, and in return got so much more from it. Was he talking about himself or someone else?
Myth 3. The Bible is just about some old kings and stuff
The Bible is ALL about God.
Explain the Road to Emmaus. In Luke 24:25-26, it says that Jesus explained all the scriptures concerning himself. It all works out as one big timeline. For example, all the Kings that you read about in old testament had great significance, for they were the predecessors of Jesus. They were attacked and had wars and all had to be recorded so we could see just how much God was in control to bring about Jesus. If the enemy could have got one killed before he had a son, then the family line would not have continued and this would have prevented Jesus’ birth. Wow. It’s all connected.
Myth 4. The Bible is not relevant.
The Bible was not coughed up by God, it didn’t just land on the Earth one day and that was that. God spent thousands of years working it through with people and getting them to write it. It is so much more honest and true and relevant because it happened to real people.
Quote some Rob Bell, "Velvet Elvis" page 64-65 from Paragraph 2.
Myth 5. The Bible is a book.
The Bible is not a book, it is a library. There are history books, journals, letters, poems, thoughts…it’s like a scrapbook of humankind, touched by God. We see their lives in pain, misery and regret, and others in happiness, restoration and healing. It’s got romance, war, action, cliff-hangers and multi-coloured characters. And yet, as we said before – it all fits together around God.
If my story was in the Bible, or if yours was – it wouldn’t be perfect. It wouldn’t be eloquently written. It would contain truth and honesty about our brokenness and weakness, and occasionally, a story about our strength. A time where we were obedient and something amazing happened – we connected with God because we dared to either stand up or get on our knees.
When you start reading the Bible as the stories of real people in real situations, suddenly it has a life – because God gave them those lives and He inspired them to record it.
This isn’t an instruction manual or a dictionary. A dictionary does not profess to be anything other than a ‘collection of words alphabetically’ – but even it describes the Bible as an authoritive text.
This Bible is like God, our Father, reading us a bedtime story to comfort us.
Or giving an encouraging speech during a war.
Or a friend giving us some advice because they’ve been there.
It is so much more than just a book.
Myth 6. The Bible is boring
The Bible is not boring.
Have you seen those adverts for the iPhone? You must have. I really wanted to make a video like that for you, but it would be too long. So here’s a live version. I’m going to pitch my advert for the Bible.
• It’s not new – but that’s OK – Retro is in right now. Plus, it’ll never go out of date.
• It never needs an upgrade
• It comes in different languages and whatever style to suit your taste
• It will always tell you the truth.
• It’s always accurate.
• It’s compatible with all your other technology. In fact, it won’t bother them at all!
• It will give you direction, but you don’t even have to know where you’re going
• No batteries required. It’s always fully charged with power
• No internet connection required.
• Volume control. Sometimes it’s quiet, but it can loud. REALLY LOUD.
• Other audio functions; you can read it, or it can speak to you
• It’s just bigger than your hand – but can come in any size you like
• If colour is your thing, this comes in every single one. Name it.
• It has a lifetime guarantee.
• In fact, it has LOTS of guarantees for your life
• It’ll never break
• Virus proof
• Easy to use
• Always available
• And it’s anti-aging. This can EXTEND. YOUR. LIFE.
In Conclusion....
It’s the only reason I haven’t slipped away.
For fire to burn, you need to throw wood on it. This is your wood.
Man shall not live by bread alone…
Now that you have it – what are you going to do with it?
Will it be your door stop or your soapbox?
If the Bible is really your sword – always know where it is – you’d never lose your actual sword, because what happens when someone attacks you or your faith?
---
Hope you enjoyed it and found it useful!
-AG
Saturday, 13 September 2008
What's your perspective ??
What do you see in this picture ??Do you see white birds or black ones? Which way are they flying, right or left? Is it day or night ? Are the birds really birds or are they part of the landscape ?
What's your perspective ?
When i first saw this piece of Art i saw the white birds flying to the right, but there was something weird about it, like i wasn't seeing the full picture or something, so i looked in more detail and saw the black ones flying to the left. Then i noticed that some of the birds aren't even birds their just bird shaped fields. And after all that i saw that it's day on one side of the picture and night on the other. Funny isn't it ! How many different ways you can look at something and get a completely different view of it, a different opinion maybe ??
Life is a lot like this picture, there's day and night and in each there are different images. There's light with detail / shadows with outlines. Some things are exactly what they look like, some are just shapes of what we think they are.
Depending on what your focussing on and where your priorities are, will cause you to see things differently to what you may have seen if you looked a bit harder.
First impressions aren't always what they seem ...
It might be like that for you at the moment, are you looking at a situation the wrong way ? Have you only taken a quick glance at it and made up your mind, have you had a little look into it and seen both sets of birds but given up on seeing anything else? Or have you delved into it, inspecting every side, both light and dark, good and bad ?
Sometimes we get so wrapped up in our situations we look at them the wrong way, with the wrong perspective ! We try to find a constant in it and panic and struggle when we don't get one. When things go wrong we look to find comfort in something or someone. Unfortunately there is no constant in life, because everything changes, people, places etc.
But there is 1 constant ... God !
Read through Isaiah 40 v 12 - 31 - Awesome !
Our life is always going to change, we will be challenged and moved around, the direction in our life may change, our family, our careers, our finances, our relationships even, but God remains constant through it all.
You may think that God has changed for you, you used to have a good relationship with him, but its different now. You may be going through tragedy in your life, family circumstances or health issues and you wonder how God can let those bad things happen. You may have made some mistakes over and over again and think God's feelings towards you have changed ...
They havn't !! God is constant - He cannot change !
You just need to change the way your looking at the situation, and how your perceiving it. You will see different things from God at different points in your life, It's not that God is changing, It's that you and your life are changing. We were never meant to stand still, we were born to grow and experience life ! So even when it changes and throws us off balance, God is there, our never changing hero, our constant to keep hold of and find our balance again !
So how are you looking at the situation you're in right now?
Do you need to make God the constant in your life ?
Sammi :)
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