Well… it has been a very busy two weeks and I haven’t had the time to sit down and update the blog, so my apologies for not making an entry before now. Earlier last week I had gotten into a conversation with a friend on instant messenger and the subject of my faith came up. Now I still have not figured out why, but it seems that every time the subject comes up, especially with friends, people have this incredible need to justify their lives and apologize to me for things they may have said or done that would not agree with my belief system. I find it humorous to a degree, yet I also find it sad. You see I don’t believe people apologize for their actions because they are concerned about having offended me. Although this can be a part of it, I believe that the Lord has written His law on our hearts; we know it is wrong to do the things we do (lying, stealing, cheating, cursing, etc.) and Christ is the Light that came into the world that exposes our darkness. When a person identifies him/herself as a Christian, we instinctively begin to justify our lives and excuse our behavior, this is because our deeds have been exposed by the Light. At any rate, there can only be one truth, and truth is not relative. If I say I don’t believe in gravity, (I can’t see it, touch it, or smell it) but if I go to the top of the Empire State Building and jump… guess what…? SPLATTT! Just because I say I don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. There are consequences for our actions regardless of what we believe. Most people treat Christianity as a buffet faith, picking what agrees with their personal belief system and discarding what doesn’t fit well or is uncomfortable. What, you may be asking, would be uncomfortable…? Well… the existence of hell and who goes there and why? Another thing I find is people make a god of their understanding… for example, they will say “Well my god doesn’t send people to hell” Oh no? well where is Hitler? What about a guy who commits a heinous rape and murder and gets away with it? Where does he go… heaven? I have heard people say “Well those people would go to hell, but not the average person.” Oh really? Who sets the standard… us? Well that would be convenient for us now wouldn’t. Let’s use some logic here. If there is an all knowing, all powerful God doesn’t make sense that He would be perfect? To say that He is not perfect is to say that there is something more perfect out there which would mean He is not God. There can be only one perfect God, one Authority on everything. So if He is perfect, doesn’t it make sense that He is going to hold us accountable for our lawlessness? Now I know you may be thinking… what lawlessness? Think about it like this… if a man commits a rape and murder 20 years ago, he is never caught, and then lives the next 20 years as a “good” law-abiding, upstanding citizen… he is then caught through some DNA evidence that comes to light… should he be held accountable? Should he be arrested, and tried by his peers? Is he still a rapist? Is he still a murderer? Should a judge just wink at his past lawlessness and let him go just because he has lived a “good” life from that point on? NO! No judge would just let him go. He must pay for his crimes. What about a thief? Same scenario… should he pay for his crime…? What about a liar? Well… you say, murderers, rapist, and thieves should pay for their crimes… but liars, adulterers, slanderers… that doesn’t rise to the level of being a “serious” offense and therefore should be overlooked… but remember what I said earlier… if God is perfect, and I think we’ve established that God must be perfect or He wouldn’t and couldn’t be God, then He cannot and will not allow imperfection around Himself. In other words, we all must pay for our crimes and God doesn’t view lawlessness in terms of one crime being worse than another… in fact He views lying to be as bad as murder. Listen to this from Revelation 21:8 from the New American Standard Bible "But for the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and immoral persons and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." God has told us that He “changes not”, He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. For to long people have mistaken the idea of God’s grace for being a weak limp wristed Jesus. To them I say, read the Book of Revelation. John, the beloved Apostle who held his head on Christ’s bosom, when he seen him fell at His feet as a dead man. Read this from Revelation 1:9-18
9“I, John, your brother and fellow partaker in the tribulation and kingdom and perseverance which are in Jesus, was on the island called Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.
10I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like the sound of a trumpet,
11saying, "Write in a book what you see, and send it to the seven churches: to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea."
12Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking with me. And having turned I saw seven golden lampstands;
13and in the middle of the lampstands I saw one like a son of man, clothed in a robe reaching to the feet, and girded across His chest with a golden sash.
14His head and His hair were white like white wool, like snow; and His eyes were like a flame of fire.
15His feet were like burnished bronze, when it has been made to glow in a furnace, and His voice was like the sound of many waters.
16In His right hand He held seven stars, and out of His mouth came a sharp two-edged sword; and His face was like the sun shining in its strength.
17When I saw Him, I fell at His feet like a dead man And He placed His right hand on me, saying, "Do not be afraid; I am the first and the last,
18and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.
God has given us grace because He knew we were hopeless and helpless… we would always choose the evils of this world and the desires of our flesh over Him. We are like children on Christmas opening our most treasured gift and loving the gift more than the giver. It was the giver of the gift that had our happiness in mind when giving the gift, yet we are quick to forget them and become engrossed with the gift. We’ve seen our own children behave this way… why is it so difficult to see ourselves in the same light? Let’s take sex for example. Now I am not trying to come across as a holier than thou Christian because I have had more than my share of indiscreet relationships with many women, and I still struggle with lust. I love women. I believe they are God’s absolute best creation. However, I also know that sex was created to be a gift to a man and his wife. Yet, we try on each other like trying on a new pair of shoes, trying to find a “good fit”. Let’s face it folks, some people have athletes foot and sometimes we try on an infected pair of shoes! That’s why STD’s are rampant in the world! This is but one example. The Bible says we are all like sheep, gone astray, and the Lord has laid our iniquity on Him.
Sheep are not very bright animals. They are easily misled and are devoured by predators. Jesus came to lead us back to the sheepfold. He came to protect us, and love us. He is God in the flesh. He knew we couldn’t handle the heavy price required for our sins and decided it was a price He was willing to pay for us. This is the gift we so easily abuse, forgetting the Giver and His incredibly high sacrifice. So… what can we do? Believe in him, believe that God raised Him from the dead, cry out to Him to forgive us of our sins, which means we must see our sins the way He does, as vile, and filthy. Trust Him the way we would a parachute in a plane that is about to crash and we must jump, holding onto Him, believing He will deliver us from the certain death to come. What else? Well, Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will obey My commands.” We don’t obey God out of duty, but rather out of love. He died for us, so we must live for Him. We owe Him our very lives… We will falter but we can overcome the sin in our lives by and through His strength.
So the question remains… what will you do?
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