Always Learning

Always Learning

We Should Always Be Learning: Pay attention and turn your ear to the sayings of the wise; apply your heart to what I teach...." Proverbs 22:17.

A few days ago I posted the question on my Facebook wall asking what you would tell yourself if you could go back in time. What piece of wisdom would you feel would have changed your life?  I received several unique and interesting replies.

Here's a list of some of the feed back:

---I would say "be careful who you marry
---Really appreciate your parents, because they will be gone one day and that                 emptiness is a horrible feeling
---The choices I make are the choices I live with
---Taken my education more seriously
--- That sex outside of marriage is a sin
--- I wish I had known that  Jesus is God
--- If he drinks a lot BEFORE marriage, it will NOT get better after you are married


Think of all the pain, heartache, and sorrow that could be avoided if we would listen to the words of wisdom...if we listen to those who have walked the path before us.

The Bible is filled with wisdom; matter of fact a whole book is dedicated to the teaching of wisdom. The one place that we need to start in our quest for wisdom is coming into a right relationship with God the author of all wisdom, see Proverbs 1:7 " “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.”


Things to ponder:

--- One must know the God of all wisdom in order to see and operate spiritually
--- It is a biblical principle that we learn from others who have walked before us
--- The sinful choices that we make WILL bear fruit later in life
--- The family is the  incubation and life school that God has instituted for the imparting of wisdom
---Don't think that your present mate will change just because you marry him/her...you get what you see in most cases
--- Sex is more than just getting under the sheets...sex outside of marriage has a myriad of negative consequences

The balance between doctrinal truth and being relational.

The whole of the Christian life is about balance. Now, just to be clear, I'm not talking about any metaphysical or ethereal balance. I'm talking about a steady and stabilized understanding of the principles that we are to walk by as followers of Christ.

The Bible is both a hard book and an easy book. The Scriptures give us many truths that need to be kept in balance or held equally at the same time. Many of these truths seem to be contradictory or unfriendly to each other and it becomes the job of the exegete to keep these truths together, and keep them friends.

In today's church climate the two truths that have the hardest job at staying friends is the truth of being relational and doctrinally correct. We know that the Scripture is filled with principles of how the church is to interact with each other in the body; we are to love each other....care for each other... meet each others needs...and pray continually for each others conformity to Christ.

In addition to how we are to treat each other within the body of Christ we are also given instruction on how we are to relate to the lost or those outside of the body of Christ. We are to be salt and light. We are to practice justice and have compassion on this lost and dying world.

The Apostle Paul gives us this instruction in Galatians 6:10 where he says, "Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers." So, without a doubt, we see that there is a necessity for the follower of Christ to be relational...no one can practice the Scripture's injunctions to be doing good to others without being relational.

Which brings me to a question ... can the church in being relational lose the balance of doctrinal truth in her efforts of practicing good works and reaching out to others? This here is the conundrum. Being relational and holding doctrinal truth at the same time is indeed a tall order for the church or the individual follower of Christ.

We know unequivocally that Scriptural truth offends, and can cut deeply into the consciences of both those in the body of Christ, and the lost world. If anyone thinks that by being a disciple of Christ you will be the first one picked at recess for tag, or kickball, think again...the disciple of Christ will not be the popular one in our culture. Nay, the follower of Christ will be like his master...remember he told us, if they hated me, they will hate you.

How do we keep these two truths friends in our lives as we minister to those around us? Wisdom...prayer....experience, and lots of self examination. For certain there will be times that those in the body of Christ will be offended, hurt, and possibly even cut us off. And among the lost it can be much worse...the truth can breed hatred toward us and even in some cases death, take note of the Middle East and history.

What we do know is that these two truths must live deep inside us. We know that at times truth will have to be spoken and the results we be lose of relationship, but we speak the truth because we love truth...we speak the truth because our master is truth...we speak the truth because we know that the truth of the gospel can set the sinner free and bring hope to the body of Christ.

The Dangers of a Low View of Scripture

The one danger that I come across while conversing with a wide variety of Christians is the danger of having a low view of Scripture; why do I ascribe having a low view of Scripture as being a danger, and what is a low view of Scripture?

Let me start with providing three views that one can take on Scripture. Depending on what view one holds will affect the whole of his Christian worldview.

First view: Liberalism: This view has other names such as limited inerrancy and modernism, but we will use the word liberal or liberalism to describe this first view.This view states that only some parts of the Bible are inspired or from God...while other parts of the Bible are just the mere words of men. The overall danger of this view is that the reader sits in judgement over the Bible. The reader is the one who decides what is inspired and what is not from God.

Second view: this view is called Neo-Orthodoxy, or the new modernism. This view is very deceiving and is held by many Protestant Christians today. It is taught in our seminaries and preached from our pulpits on a regular basis.

This view is sometimes called Barthianism (after a famous theologian, Karl Barth). This view teaches that the whole Bible is the word of man. This view goes further in that it teaches that when people read the Bible, God somehow uses these words to speak to their hearts, and the message they receives becomes the word of God.

In this view the Bible in not the final authority...it is the person who receives its message. In this view you can have different people reading the same text and receive contradicting messages, and all the messages are true and  equally valid.

Third View: There are many names that are given for this view....Reformed view...Orthodox view...Historical view etc. This view teaches that every single word is the truth of God. No part of the Scriptures are not inspired (God breathed). Even if an Atheist would read the Scriptures, it would still be the word of God, even if it was believed or not, accepted or rejected...it would remain the objective word of God.

The one screaming danger of having a low view of Scripture that I have witnessed is that the individual becomes the authority as to all matters of spiritual life, God, and faith. In the end, it is the individual who decides what God has said.

When in my debates with those who hold a low view of Scripture the one characteristic that I see them display is they put a great emphasis on their emotions. You will hear for example: "How could a loving God let people go to hell?...or they will cherry pick texts of Scripture to fit their narrative of who God is...or you will see an unbalanced emphasis on relationship and unity over-against holding to the teachings of the Sacred Scriptures.

My admonition to the body of Christ is to follow the charge laid out by Jude in 1:3, "I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to God's holy people."

Boundaries

                      

Why are boundaries so important to our spiritual and emotional health? It is really easy to answer; because they protect us. They protect us from the dysfunction of others and from our own dysfunctions. Think back to the myriad of prohibitions in the Old Testament...God gave them to His chosen people Israel, to keep them safe so they would reflect His glory to the nations that surrounded them.

You might ask, what is a boundary anyway? Think of a boundary as an invisible property line. When we were thinking of a way to keep our new puppy safe outside someone suggested an underground fence. They bury a thin wire underground and the puppy wears a receiving collar and receives a low shock when he gets to close to the underground wire...thus teaching him to stay in the boundaries. On our property there is a busy road to the one side our house; so the purpose was to keep our new puppy from getting hurt or killed by traffic.

The boundaries that we set in our life define us and help us to guard our souls, see Proverbs 4:23 "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. One aspect of setting up healthy boundaries is that they show us where our responsibilities end and someone else's begins.

One danger in any relationship is crossing over into interpersonal boundaries. When person A continually does for person B what person B should do for him/herself a dependency, and co- dependence is created, and nobody wins.

One of the bedrock foundations of life is knowing what we are to take responsibility for in life...this gives the individual as sense of autonomy and freedom. How many people do you know that have fallen into the victim role? They go through life blaming others (parents, society,) for their failures in life. When this happens the individual’s options in life become limited and failure is inevitable.

The Christian life is one of continued repentance. We are continually getting rid of sin and the weights that so easily slow us down in our race toward Christ-likeness. We are bringing into our lives those things that spur us on toward Christian maturity and Christ-likeness...it is the putting on of Christ and putting off of the old-man that the Apostle Paul talks about in his epistles.

This concept of boundaries should not be foreign to the Christian...for God is a God of boundaries. One can hardly go through the Scriptures without coming across a prohibition or a directive. God is holy, and by the very nature of His holiness God has set boundaries against sin.

It is our responsibility to know the boundaries that God has set for us. Once we know these boundaries we can erect mile high fences so we can stay within the will and plan of God for our lives.

My Christian friends...get out your hammer and wood; and build those boundaries in your life to the glory of God.

  

How our Main Stream Media shows their true colors

                                 

Here we go again; another fire-storm of controversy is being stoked by our leftist/progressive MSM. We just came off the heels of the Martin/Zimmerman case where in the beginning if you remember had Zimmerman guilty of not just murder, but also of being a full-blown racist.

The misleading media coverage in that case was first the media putting up a mug shot of Zimmerman, and a very young picture of Martin. The media continued to run their narrative that this was a raced based shooting to the point where NBC edited part of the Zimmerman 911 call, making it sound as if Zimmerman was a racist.

NBC later apologized for the editing "error" in the dialogue in George Zimmerman's taped 911 call during a segment on the Today Show.

On Today, the conversation with the dispatcher ran as follows:

Zimmerman: This guy looks like he's up to no good. He looks black.

This is the call in context:

Zimmerman: This guy looks like he's up to no good. Or he's on drugs or something. It's raining and he's just walking around, looking about.

Dispatcher: OK, and this guy - is he black, white or Hispanic?

Zimmerman: He looks black.

The misleading media continued right up to the trial and all the way through the trial. Ever so slightly slanting their reporting and conveniently leaving out key and relevant facts, so as to run their narrative that this was a race-based murder.

Now to August 9, 2014, an 18-year-old black male was shot and killed by a white Ferguson County police officer. Tragedy no matter how the case plays out. But let's look at how the MSM ran their narrative: First, we're told that Brown was shot in the back while fleeing police officer Darrin Wilson. When the autopsy report was concluded, it was determined that Mr. Brown was shot not in the back, but in the front.

We're told that Mr. Brown was just an ordinary teen who was soon heading off to college. Next, surveillance video comes out showing this young man strong arming a convenience store. In addition, the toxicology report determined that Mr. Brown had drugs in his system.

Now, we are not to make a determination from this information on the guilt or innocence of police officer Darren Wilson...my only point in presenting this perspective is to show how the leftist/progressive MSM run their narrative.

The MSM walked out witness that testified they saw Brown running from Darrin Wilson when he was shot...that has since been proven false after autopsy reports showed that Brown was shot not in the back, but in the front. There is other testimony of a struggle between Brown and Police officer Darrin Wilson, and that Mr. Wilson acted in self defense, sadly, this was not reported in the immediate opening of this story by the MSM.

Let me digress one more time. How many remember when in 2011 Gabrielle Gifford’s was shot by Jared Lee Loughner? The first reports by the leftist/progressive MSM was that the shooting was linked to a radical right-winged Tea Party group.

Nothing could have been further from the truth. Jared Lee Loughner was nothing more than a deranged man who acted solely on his own. But be damned with the facts....get the seeds planted and then retract. The seeds in this case were that if you are a Tea Party member, one who stands for low taxes and small government, you are a fringe person of society to be feared.

This case will play out...the wheels of justice will turn. But if it was left in the hands of the MSM, both Zimmerman, the Tea Party, and police officer Darren Wilson would all be guilty of murder.

           

I have a deep concern for the body of Christ

I have a deep concern for the body of Christ. My concern is the constant and steady drift I see taking place in the body of Christ as she moves away from divine revealed truth. I see human logic and gut-emotion reigning and squeezing out the authority of God's absolute truth.

As I reflect on this drift, it dawns on me that this is nothing new. The revealed truth of God as revealed to the Church has been under attack from the time the canon of Scripture was compiled. God's authority was under attack way back in the Garden of Eden, as we hear the serpent whisper in the ear of Eve "hath God said."

I remember back in 2008, while earning my masters degree in an evangelical college the professor's opening statement to the class was that some in this college think that I'm dangerous. I thought, "What an odd statement to make." As I sat in this professors class...Theological Foundations for Christian Ministry, he told the class that he believed in limited inerrancy.

As the class progressed it came time to start work on my position paper, can you guess what I did my position paper on? You got it, "the inerrancy of Scripture." The paper was one of my few B's, I only got two others...my paper was marked up with the professor's ideas and soft rebukes against holding to the inerrancy of Scripture.


Two views  that seem to be making a strong resurgence today among evangelicals is Annihilationism and Universalism. In Annihilationism there are slight variations that are held by those who put forth this erroneous teaching, but it essentially teaches God will eventually snuff every unbeliever out of existence. Some Annihilationists make room for divine wrath, but they don’t allow it to extend beyond the lake of fire. In other words, they won’t allow God the full force of His judgment, which is eternal, conscious torment. For them, the lake of fire is what completely consumes and finally destroys sinners. Whether they see death as the end, or whether they see hell’s torments as limited in duration, the result is the same—a denial of the endlessness of hell .1







In the false and erroneous teaching of universalism we have all men being saved and being guaranteed heaven; since Christ died for all men, then all men will ultimately be saved. This teaching is based on Christ's merits, but they miss the mark in that Christ did not die for all men ... they assume that a loving God will not condemn any man to an eternity in hell to suffer for his sins.

Rob Bell the popular writer and author came out with a book recently titled "love wins." Bell pushes this notion that in the end a loving God will rescue all men from hell. There are many others who teach that in the end all men will be brought into heaven through what Christ did on the cross.

In Christianity Universalism can be traced for the most part to an early church father named Origen (182- 251 AD). Much like today’s Catholic purgatory, he taught that the unsaved are tortured in Hell temporarily, with a series of graded punishments. When they are sufficiently cleansed they can be accepted into Heaven. He believed that God would receive all people (even demons) into heaven. This is the historical Universalist belief. It was condemned as a heresy in the early church and should be condemned today.2

Christian, study, study, and study a little more. Pray, pray, and pray some more. Seek out Godly men who love God' word and hold to Sola Scriptura and discuss the truths of God's word with them.

"I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock" Acts 20:29.

(1) http://www.gty.org/resources/print/blog/B110506
(2) http://www.letusreason.org/Curren31.htm

Woe to them that call evil good and good evil!

How many have heard of the slippery slope? If you’ve ever been on the crest of a hill and got too far on one-side or the other you know you could find yourself on the bottom of the hill.

For those who have been following the recent scandal between the Los Angles Clippers owner Donald Sterling, the racist and adulterer that he is, you know that he made some very disturbing remarks about blacks. It seems as more information is coming out that he was set-up by his low-life mistress lover.

But for my article today that’s not my topic. I’d like to focus on the slippery slope that Mark Cuban referred to when he was asked for his thoughts of the league banning Sterling for life before game four of the Dallas Mavericks and San Antonio Spurs , he said, "… I think you've got to be very, very careful when you start making blanket statements about what people say and think, as opposed to what they do. It's a very, very slippery slope.

Now for the slippery slope that Cuban referred to….Orlando Magic's Rich DeVos may be the next owner to be scrutinized for his stance that is considered biased and bigoted by some in this world? Mr. Devos is a supporter of traditional marriage, he has in the past supported political candidates who support marriage between and man and a woman.

Here’s what Cuban feared: Mike Bianchi, writing for the Orlando Sentinel says “there is also this difference between Sterling and DeVos: Sterling is a racist in a sport where the work force is 80 percent black. If 80 percent of NBA players were gay, DeVos would no doubt be the owner that NBA Commissioner Adam Silver banned from the league.

We know that those thirty NBA owners have to be thinking who will be the next among us to stumble and fall and slide down the slippery slope?

The bigger picture is the selective outrage by the elites in our society. It is these selective moral monsters who set the rules for culture of what should be attacked and what can be left alone.

What we are witnessing is a society that has no moorings. A society that is adrift on the sea of moral relativism. We are experiencing what a prophet from long ago describes when a society drifts away from moral absolutes, he shouted out, “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter” (Isaiah 5:20).

Robert Anton is the epitome of this ugly plague of moral relativism…listen to his summation of morality, ““Is," "is," "is"—the idiocy of the word haunts me. If it were abolished, human thought might begin to make sense. I don't know what anything "is"; I only know how it seems to me at this moment.”



Another old prophet described what a society looks like when absolute morality is a forgotten way to live one’s life…. The Prophet Samuel describes it like this, “… all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes (Judges 21:25).

There is only one solution to our cultures coming demise…it is for Americans to repent of their sins and turn to Jesus Christ the Messiah. Only in Him can America find healing and true peace and hope. It is not a moral transformation that is needed, no, that will be the result of lives that have been captures by the grace and mercy of the cross.

Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God's wrath remains on them John 3:36.