http://bibleforums.org/blog.php/23470-tango A free online Christian Community. Active, moderated Christian Message Board. en Wed, 19 Jun 2013 13:40:30 GMT vBulletin 60 http://bibleforums.org/images/misc/rss.jpg http://bibleforums.org/blog.php/23470-tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1589-Gently-guided-off-course Mon, 20 Jul 2009 22:36:09 GMT I got to thinking about asteroids, and the possibility of an asteroid or comet striking the earth. It seemed relevant, so I thought I'd share it.

If such an asteroid were spotted the process to save the earth would be pretty clear. We send a spacecraft to intercept it, plant some kind of charge against it, and divert its path by a tiny amount - possibly a small fraction of a degree. The difference is minimal, but by the time the comet reaches the earth's orbit it's moved far enough that it passes by instead of slamming into us.

So what's that got to do with our walk with God?

If Satan were to stand right in front of us and try to push us backwards we'd see him coming, know what was going on and fight back. We have that authority over him in the name of Jesus (Luke 10:19).

But what if he stood beside us, guiding us very gently off the path, by such a small amount we barely noticed? Everything looks fine, we're still walking towards God, everything's fine, we take a slight sidestep to avoid a minor obstacle, until suddenly we realise we are lost and God is nowhere to be seen.

My primary thought on this is that the "little sins" that we commit with barely a thought are just as insidious, and maybe more so, than the "big sins" that we immediately regret and repent. ]]> tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1589-Gently-guided-off-course http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1394-Being-available Wed, 13 May 2009 19:01:19 GMT I got to thinking, it's very easy to look at ourselves and think that we'll be ready to serve God, once we've got that one specific thing out of our lives. That specific thing might be a thought pattern, it might be a behaviour pattern, it might be a specific sin we are very conscious of.

So we fight on and on and on against it, praying for help to overcome whatever it is, and in the meantime we're just waiting for victory over it so we can get on with serving God more fully.

But if we follow that path we end up never actually getting on with the serving. When there are things like this in our lives God needs to break them away from us, and when one area is defeated another will come to light, and then another, and so on. For as long as we are human we are imperfect.

When we realise that some of the great names of the Bible - Isaiah, Jeremiah, Elijah, Ezekiel, Peter, Paul - were all mortal men and therefore all sinned, if God can use them then God can use us if we are only willing to obey.

The only person who ever walked this earth without committing any sin at all was Jesus Christ. What God is seeking is that we obey him and walk with him, not that we are perfect before we begin the walk in earnest. ]]> tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1394-Being-available http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1159-Battle-plans Tue, 06 Jan 2009 18:55:17 GMT We all know that we are in a spiritual battle - Eph 6 tells us as much, and describes the armour of God in some detail.

It's interesting to note that we have several pieces of armour, but only one weapon. That weapon, of course, is the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. This is indeed a mighty weapon, as we see in Hebrews:

Heb 4:12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

So let us take a look at battle strategies our enemy, the devil, might use against us.

It seems to me that if your enemy has no weapon, he cannot fight back. We might be heavily armoured, but with no weapon the best we can do is fend off an attack - we cannot fight back, we cannot counterattack, we cannot gain ground from our enemy. We can see that in the name of Jesus we have authority over the devil and all his minions (Luke 10:19). But what if the devil were to persuade us that we were unworthy of calling on the name of Jesus? A small sin here, a slightly bigger sin there, a lot of reminders of how bad we are whispered in our ears, and perhaps he can persuade us not to draw our sword. With our swords firmly in their (metaphorical) sheaths we cannot fight back.

Perhaps he will keep us busy, there are all sorts of things we can usually find to occupy our time, and it's very easy for a quick few Bible verses at the end of the day to be all we manage. In the context of a battle, we can think of this as failing to look after our sword so that when we need it, it is dull and rusty. We cannot fight back with God's word unless we know what the word says.

Perhaps the most effective strategy of all is for him to persuade us to use our swords against each other. He knows he cannot stand against us, but if we are busy fighting each other we are not fighting the enemy. There are so many things where we differ, but these are trivial compared to what unites us. Sticking with the battle analogy, we can imagine an army that turned its weapons on itself because individual soldiers couldn't agree on which toothpaste was best.

So let us never lay down our swords, and let us remember who our enemy is. ]]> tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1159-Battle-plans http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1155-Evolution-vs-Creation Mon, 05 Jan 2009 11:36:29 GMT I've posted this a few times in response to questions in CA. To keep it somewhere I can find it easily, I figured I'd post it here too.

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If scientists could conclusively prove that life evolved from nothing by chance the Church would die out very quickly. Likewise if Christians could conclusively prove that God exists then the theory of evolution would soon be forgotten. Therefore we have to work with what we can observe and draw our own conclusions, since it is clear that neither side has conclusively proven their case.

So let's look at what we can see and look at how the two approaches (creation or evolution) stacks up against it.

I was created by my parents, who in turn were created by their parents, and so on. If we trace that line back we end up with some entity that was not created, a point of singularity if you will. The question then boils down to whether that something is God (with or without the capital G) or random evolution.

If we accept that the something is God then everything else falls into place. We can read the book of Genesis to see how we all got here.

If we wish to believe that the something is a random process of evolution we have a number of further steps of faith to take. Firstly we must believe that something came of nothing (defying all known laws of physics). Then we must assume that living matter appeared spontaneously from non-living matter (never duplicated in a laboratory). We must also assume that at no point during the life of these early organisms did anything happen to squash them (when only a single living thing exists on a planet it takes very little to qualify as an extinction level event).

Unfortunately believing in random evolution requires further leaps of faith. We have to believe, with no evidence at all, that fully functioning organs could develop almost instantly. For example, vision requires some kind of visual receptors, an optic nerve, and an area of the brain to process the signals (this is even before any form of focussing mechanism comes into play). A retina is no use without an optic nerve, an optic nerve is useless without a retina, and so on. So a working eye would have to appear in a single generation, otherwise it would serve no purpose and be "evolved out".

We would also have to accept that related species appeared at the same time. We can see how insects pollinate flowers - in the absence of insects then flowers are not pollinated, and in the absence of flowers insects have no food source. So how would a plant know to produce a flower unless it knew there was something there that would pollinate it? If it was ahead of the evolutionary curve the flower would serve no purpose and die, if it were behind the curve then the insects would have been and gone, and the flower would serve no purpose.

Frankly, I find it takes less faith to believe in creation than in evolution. ]]> tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1155-Evolution-vs-Creation http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1146-The-metal-thing-under-the-seat-in-front Fri, 02 Jan 2009 18:01:59 GMT Why do airlines put metal blocks under the seats?

It's infuriating when you're trying to stretch into what little space there is, only to find that actually there isn't. There's a metal box there instead. It won't move, and you can't get your feet around it. So you spend the flight with your knees in someone's back because the airline couldn't figure out that people have legs...

It's obviously not necessary, because some airlines don't put them there. ]]> tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1146-The-metal-thing-under-the-seat-in-front http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1145-I-can-t-do-this Fri, 02 Jan 2009 15:02:47 GMT I've often found that when the events of life get to me it can be very difficult to live in a way that is pleasing to God. Whether those events are someone pushing and shoving on a packed commuter train, or getting frustrated at the day-to-day trials we all face, it's very easy to come to a simple conclusion, namely "I can't do this, I just can't live as God intended". We started out with such grand intentions but when it came to the crunch we just couldn't follow through with it.

The disciple Peter was a classic example of someone doing exactly that, but then being fully restored by Jesus. After his restoration Peter had learned a valuable lesson.

Let's look at the narrative behind Peter's fall and restoration:

Firstly, John 13:36-38 shows Peter assuring Jesus that he would lay down his life, and Jesus telling Peter that this wasn't going to be the case:

Joh 13:36 Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, where are You going?" Jesus answered him, "Where I am going you cannot follow Me now, but you shall follow Me afterward."
Joh 13:37 Peter said to Him, "Lord, why can I not follow You now? I will lay down my life for Your sake."
Joh 13:38 Jesus answered him, "Will you lay down your life for My sake? Most assuredly, I say to you, the rooster shall not crow till you have denied Me three times.

Put in more simple terms, Peter is saying to Jesus, "I'll do whatever I have to do, even if I have to die", and Jesus is saying back "Peter, you won't even last until the morning".

Sure enough, Peter went on to deny Jesus three times, just as Jesus had prophesied:

Joh 18:16 But Peter stood at the door outside. Then the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out and spoke to her who kept the door, and brought Peter in.
Joh 18:17 Then the servant girl who kept the door said to Peter, "You are not also one of this Man's disciples, are you?" He said, "I am not."
Joh 18:25 Now Simon Peter stood and warmed himself. Therefore they said to him, "You are not also one of His disciples, are you?" He denied it and said, "I am not!"
Joh 18:26 One of the servants of the high priest, a relative of him whose ear Peter cut off, said, "Did I not see you in the garden with Him?"
Joh 18:27 Peter then denied again; and immediately a rooster crowed.


So despite Peter's grand claims of loyalty, when the chips were down he failed to follow through. Let's roll forward to after Jesus' resurrection and the interaction between Jesus and Peter:

Joh 21:15 So when they had eaten breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me more than these?" He said to Him, "Yes, Lord; You know that I love You." He said to him, "Feed My lambs."
Joh 21:16 He said to him again a second time, "Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?" He said to Him, "Yes, Lord; You know that I love You." He said to him, "Tend My sheep."
Joh 21:17 He said to him the third time, "Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?" Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, "Do you love Me?" And he said to Him, "Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You." Jesus said to him, "Feed My sheep.

In this passage the limitations of the English language mask some of the significance of the exchange. There are two Greek words which are both translated as "love". Firstly is agape - the unconditional love offered by God and, ideally, by us to each other. Secondly is phileo - which is an affectionate love held by friends for each other.

The first two times Jesus asks Peter, his question is "Peter, do you (agape) me", and Peter replies "Lord, you know I (phileo) you". Finally Jesus asks "Peter, do you (phileo) me?" Peter then confirmed "Lord, you know I (phileo) you".

This brief exchange shows us two very important things.

Firstly Peter had realised that he could not offer the unconditional love Jesus was describing when he used agape, so he confirmed he could offer phileo. A few days previously he had promised the earth and failed to deliver, and now he had learned.

Secondly Jesus meets us where we are. He asked Peter twice for agape, and then asked for phileo. In other words he was moving his question so Peter could come to him exactly as he was. He had failed Jesus, he had betrayed Jesus after promising he wouldn't, but here Jesus is giving him the commissions, "Feed my lambs, tend my sheep, feed my sheep"

Jesus then went on to assure Peter that from that point on he would follow Jesus, right to his death:

Joh 21:18 Most assuredly, I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish."
Joh 21:19 This He spoke, signifying by what death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He said to him, "Follow Me."

So what had changed? Peter was clearly the same person, except for knowing he had failed once and couldn't promise what he had once rashly promised.

The difference was that this time Jesus had promised the Holy Spirit to Peter and the disciples. From here on in Peter wasn't doing things in his own strength, he was doing things through the power of Jesus, he was filled with the Holy Spirit.

Joh 14:16 And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—
Joh 14:17 the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.

Jesus also said that we could not achieve anything unless we "abide in him".

Joh 15:4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me.
Joh 15:5 "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.

A disconnected branch cannot bear fruit, so unless we are part of Jesus we will not be successful in following him. The closer we are to Jesus, the better our "branch" is integrated into Jesus as the "vine", the better our fruits will be.

So it's quite right to say "I can't do it", because I can't. But with Christ in me, through the power of the Holy Spirit, we can follow God and live a life pleasing to him.

Php 4:13 I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. ]]> tango http://bibleforums.org/entry.php/1145-I-can-t-do-this