so i have been thinking a lot about this emergent church thing. i have read about it, heard a message on it, as well as a long answer about it in a Q&A that i happened to download (it was off topic to and that made it ironic to me). it would seem that for some reason God has put this movement into my sight for the last two days in a row. so i have pondered the things i have heard both Good and bad and thought i would give my thoughts. i think and hope that Christians who are so against the emergents are so because of a total lack of biblical truth in the movement and not because of the way someone might dress or because of the style of worship that goes on. i really believe that there are things we should never depart from, and then there are things that the bible just does not talk about that i think comes down culture and personal likes and dislikes. i see nothing wrong with diverse styles of dress all worshiping together as long as everyone in the congregation is ok with that. i see nothing wrong with using video or modern music in worship. i do not have any problems with there being a different style of Christian. if that where a problem then all the world would have to become Americans to please God. and i think thats hog wash. the bible does not tell us what style to use, or what kind of music (other then psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs). i have to believe that God left the door open on some of these things for a very good reason.
now when it comes to the bible being the word of God, doctrine, and statements of faith i have to lean toward the conservative with a heavy lean. i think there is no room to question the gospel, or God's word. i think there is no room to question how man kind is saved, how we are to serve, and the lives we are to live. the bible is clear about sin, hell, and Jesus Christ being the only cure. for me i think this is where the emergent church has stepped out of Christianity compleatly.
is there a middle ground?
i hope so! and im starting to believe there is. i just heard about a congregation tonight for the first time that is a mix of both. there statement of faith would give most of the Christians i know a heart attack. yet i do not see anything that is against the word of God. also, they believe it is the word they believe in hell, and sin. they seek to live for Christ everyday. yet they will have rock shows on the stage there, and let people come as they are to worship. still they believe in living a moral God exulting life. im not going to say i agree with everything they do but i think we can learn from the way they seek to look past the outward, in order to get to peoples heart. the place where God is concerned with.
here is a clip out of the "who we are" section of their web site. im not going to say who they are for the sake of not promotoing something i don't 100% agree with.
"What We Believe
When it comes to doctrine, culture, preferences, traditions, lifestyles, politics, behavior, etc., blank Church takes a “closed-hand/open-hand” approach. The closed hand hangs onto the non-negotiable tenets of Christian orthodoxy: sin is the problem, Jesus is the answer, the Bible is true, and Hell is hot.
The open hand, however, allows room for differences when it comes to secondary matters; we liberally allow freedom for conscience and wisdom to guide where the Bible is silent. The open hand fosters unity among the diversity of expressions found in the congregation: Democrats and Republicans, soccer moms and indie rockers, carnivores and vegans, trendy bohemians and Microsoft nerds.
Hence,(enter name of church) is in favor of good beer (in moderation), great sex (in marriage), and even tattoos (Jesus has one). But our goal must always be love and concern for our friends so that we don’t enjoy our freedom at the expense of their faith.
In this way, we are seeking to simultaneously heed the Bible’s commands to have sound doctrine (1Timothy 4:16; Titus 1:9, 2:1), to love our Christian brothers and sisters (1 Peter 4:8; 1 John 4:7-21), and to avoid unnecessary divisions (Romans 16:17; 1 Corinthians 1:10, 12:25; Titus 3:10)."
something to think about....
maybe we just need to except that not everyone is like us, and maybe just maybe we might not have the only way. my pastor once said this. "when i was young i thought we had the only way, as i got older i started to think we have the best way, after a few more years i thought we had a good way, and now i realize we have a way." i know he was not talking about there being another way to salvation. he was talking about how we do church. and i think he is right, as long as you have the big things right you have "a way"
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
do you know him?, or just know him
you know your wife, most would say they know their wives better then most 0ther people. what if i where to say that i bet i know a stranger who knows her better then you. you would more then likely think i was crazy. well i do, you see just about any doctor worth his or her salt knows your wife better then you. they know her circulatory system, her bone structure, how she digests food, even how to fix her when she breaks. they know her better then you. BUT! they don't know anything about her. i think a lot of us end up in that kind of relationship with God. we study theology and eschatology and so on. we read book after book studying about God but never getting to know a single thing about him. what a tragic thing this can be. to wake up one day and realize you spent all those hours in the books, in the class, at the church, and you never met Him. i think this happens most times because we do not see God and we think to study about him is getting to know him. it is a simple enough mistake. God does not want us to only know what he does, he wants us to know who he is. God wants to be the biggest part of your life, the closest of any one to you. don't get caught up as a med student for the rest of your life just learning about how a women works, Get married!
Sunday, October 21, 2007
secularism and atheism kills
have you ever heard that more people have died in the name of religion then any other. i have to, the thing is this is just not true. a fast look into history will revel the truth. militant atheism and secularism have always been behind the worlds most horrific massacres. though it is often said to be religion that has been the guilty party. again history proves other wise. according to World Christian Trends AD 30 - AD 2200, by David Barrett and Todd Johnson, the number of Christians killed by atheists is up about one hundred million, that does not include Jewish and other non Christians they have slaughtered. in fact Ravi Zacharias has said that you could take all the people who have been killed by all religions from the start of history till now and it would not exceed the number of people killed by atheists in the last one hundred years. that i can not prove but just knowing who Ravi is i will take him at his word. it is a staggering statement though. history proves over and over that when a government is run by atheists, they come looking for the Christians and kill them.
we know what the bible has to say about the end of days, we know this will not get better. DR.R.C.Sproul says that he believes the time is coming and the church needs to get ready for another large scale persecution. i do not know if that is true but i do know that the more you look around the more you see it's not only ok to hate God..... it's become cool.
this is just a glance at what has become common place in our day. advertisements like this one are printed in your city's papers and all over the web. at what point will we take a stand and say this has become to much!
we know what the bible has to say about the end of days, we know this will not get better. DR.R.C.Sproul says that he believes the time is coming and the church needs to get ready for another large scale persecution. i do not know if that is true but i do know that the more you look around the more you see it's not only ok to hate God..... it's become cool.
this is just a glance at what has become common place in our day. advertisements like this one are printed in your city's papers and all over the web. at what point will we take a stand and say this has become to much!
Thursday, October 11, 2007
vanity
Ecc 2:17 - Therefore I hated life; because the work that is wrought under the sun [is] grievous unto me: for all [is] vanity and vexation of spirit.
this whole chapter is great! it does a really good job of reminding us that only a life lived for God is a full life. all else is empty and vain...
this whole chapter is great! it does a really good job of reminding us that only a life lived for God is a full life. all else is empty and vain...
Monday, October 1, 2007
ye who have forgotten ye where clean
2Pe 1:2-11 Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue: Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins. Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall: For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall; or "sin", as the Latin Vulgate version rendered it. all men at some time or other fall in this sense of the word, this does in no way imply a final and total fall from grace. for though they fall, they shall rise again by faith and repentance, through the grace and power of Christ, who is able to keep them from falling: also, while they were exercising the graces within the text, and doing those duties, they will not fall; for these are the means of final perseverance.
perseverance also implied here in Ephesians,
Eph 1:14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.
the earnest (down payment) of our inheritance being the Holy Ghost, meaning he lives within us keeping us until he comes for us or we go to him hence, "the redemption of the purchased possession". the Christian being the purchased possession a purchase made with his own blood.
now, lest we forget the awful case the man is in while he is not performing these graces let us look again to the text as it reads, "he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins". the blind fall in the ditch, they are bankrupt, they have to beg for money just to eat (this may have been true in the new testament days for the blind man as apposed to today, but the spiritual application applies in any time period) and can not prosper in any way. they have forgotten, forgotten they where clean of the former sins. forgotten what God has done in them, they have gone a whoring after strange God's.
Psa 44:20 -21 If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god; shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.
he shall search it out, for though we may forget. the LORD forgettest not! let us then praise he who does not forget us, he who has grace enough to forgive us. who goes past just forgiving to actively seeking his sheep and calling them, though they forget him from time to time.
finally, let us think on this; " Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure"
diligence will make our election sure, diligence in what? how do we make our election sure?
" giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity".
a check list of sorts, can your election be sure? it can, but we must give diligence to these things. it would be a worth while study to find out the biblical meaning of each one of these words... don't ya think.
for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall; or "sin", as the Latin Vulgate version rendered it. all men at some time or other fall in this sense of the word, this does in no way imply a final and total fall from grace. for though they fall, they shall rise again by faith and repentance, through the grace and power of Christ, who is able to keep them from falling: also, while they were exercising the graces within the text, and doing those duties, they will not fall; for these are the means of final perseverance.
perseverance also implied here in Ephesians,
Eph 1:14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.
the earnest (down payment) of our inheritance being the Holy Ghost, meaning he lives within us keeping us until he comes for us or we go to him hence, "the redemption of the purchased possession". the Christian being the purchased possession a purchase made with his own blood.
now, lest we forget the awful case the man is in while he is not performing these graces let us look again to the text as it reads, "he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins". the blind fall in the ditch, they are bankrupt, they have to beg for money just to eat (this may have been true in the new testament days for the blind man as apposed to today, but the spiritual application applies in any time period) and can not prosper in any way. they have forgotten, forgotten they where clean of the former sins. forgotten what God has done in them, they have gone a whoring after strange God's.
Psa 44:20 -21 If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god; shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.
he shall search it out, for though we may forget. the LORD forgettest not! let us then praise he who does not forget us, he who has grace enough to forgive us. who goes past just forgiving to actively seeking his sheep and calling them, though they forget him from time to time.
finally, let us think on this; " Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure"
diligence will make our election sure, diligence in what? how do we make our election sure?
" giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity".
a check list of sorts, can your election be sure? it can, but we must give diligence to these things. it would be a worth while study to find out the biblical meaning of each one of these words... don't ya think.
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