When I'm board with the crossword...

Counterfeit love is restless sleep,
Muckraking the pain buried underneath
Years of rusty ships with foul-mouthed sailors.
Tomorrows come and go and the wake darkens
Like sandpaper bandaging an open wound

Why do you ferret trash for roses,
To uncover rotten petals among decadent odors?
When camouflaged is a beauty
Under guise of a heart trodden black
Lusting for recognition
But barred by your premonition
That your white knight will heal your self inflicted scars
And tend to your wounds.
But inside is armor rusted and serrated;
His pale body beaten and integrity faded.
If not defeated, he will be soon
Like you're kissing the floor of a gas station bathroom

Wow

God is amazing. Everytime I think I know what's going on, he humbles me so that I have no choice but to worship Him. So today I realized something that could literaly change my life. Recently, I've been asking for God to show me his will. Okay. Cool. Aren't we supposed to do that? That's what I thought until this morning. Apparently I've been looking at this from the completely wrong perspective. First, the Bible is the word of God; it's His will. If anything I do contradicts what the Bible says, it's sin, and there's no way around it. But at the same time the Bible doesn't cover everything I'm going through - specifically, I mean. Should I go to China this summer, or back to VA? What about being a counselor for Impact? Was I supposed to apply? I thought the answer would come through prayer- asking about God's will. That's not bad, but sometimes we focus to much on the planning and not the doing. If I want to go to China, and God doesn't tell me not to go, and there's nothing against it in the Bible, then it's Okay for me to go. It is His will because he put a desire in my heart to go, and he hasn't told me not to. I've been caught up lately with "seeking his will" expecting a revelation about the future, so I know for sure what's going to happen, but I guess God doesn't work that way. For those of you who know me, I haven't decided to do the Camp China thing, I just used it as an example to show my point. I very well could be in Van Alstyne working at EZ-seal.
Another thing. I've been reading Romans and it's really opened my eyes to a lot of things. I find it funny that the bible and bathroom readers are the only books that we open up to a random point and start reading. The Bible was never meant to be like that; it's really hard to see the whole picture when starting at the middle. Try reading a book of the bible in one sitting, or at least enough to know what's going on. For school I'll sit down and read a textbook for an hour or two; after that I've got a pretty good understanding of what's going on. If I read a page everyday in a novel would I know what's going on after a week or two? Probably not. Or if I opened up my thermodynamics book to a random page and started reading, it'd be greek to me. I'm so guilty of doing that with my Bible, just letting the pages fall to Collosians 3:14 (random verse) and starting to read. It's so hard to get anything out of that when you don't know what's going on. I'd say that's it's better to read the bible one day a week for an hour and really understand it than for 10 minutes a day right before bed when everything that was just read slumbers in the back of your mind. So many times we put such a huge emphasis on reading the bible every day, because you've got to to be a good Christian. I'm not saying that's it's not important, but the reason for a daily bible study is to understand God more, and if that's not happening, something's wrong. God never meant for us to be bound by a quota. Freedom in Christ is being set free from the Law, so that you are not bound by silly rules and regulations that make you "better."
A note to the reader - most of these ramblings are complaints I have with myself, even though I'm writing as to give advise to a general audience. My hope is that you will learn through my struggles, so that you can glorify God more through your words and actions.

Hopefully I'll write more frequently now.

John 3:16 ruined Christianity?

It's not too hard to see that American Christianity is not at all what it should be. Every month or so headlines around the country tell of a new church scandal; embezzlement, suicide, or pedophile bishops. We can't get away from some big controversy that seems to be the same story with different characters. The pastor that gets too involved with his secretary, the Christian artist that turns to drugs and alcohol, the youth group leader that ends up pregnant from her beloved Christ-like boyfriend. We have all seen these situations, and probably know some of the characters. You don't have to look too far to find a Christian that stumbles and doesn't get back up. It happens all the time.

Is this just status quo, then? Did Christ intend for so many people to misunderstand His will for their lives, and end up turning away to a life with no convictions? When I look at the early church, in the first few chapters of Acts, these problems are almost nonexistent. Granted, as the New Testament progresses more perversion comes about, but in the first 10 or so years true Christians were disciples, not mere believers. And now, in America, most people see Jesus as an action-figure, a swear word, or their homeboy. So what could have brought on such a dramatic change in the church? Don’t get too upset, but I think it was John 3:16.

Before a mob forms screaming “heresy” with lit torches and pitchforks, let me explain my point. To do so, I’ll go back to a fundamental question, why did Jesus decide to die on the cross? Even though this is a very simple and elementary concept of Christianity, it is amazing how many people just don’t get it. There are many ways to answer this question, because Christ died and rose again for many reasons. Atonement for sin, to show God’s power, to take away livestock sacrifices, to save the world, and I’m sure that there are more that we won’t know until after we die. But until then, the Bible gives us a clear reason for Jesus’ death that all the other answers stem from. Jesus died so that God could be worshiped. That’s it. He didn’t die so that we could get into heaven and have eternal life. He wasn’t thinking of the joy we would have in worshiping Him, or our fulfillment from serving God. In fact, He wasn’t thinking of us at all. When Adam and Eve first sinned, God was not their Lord anymore. They had relied on their own intuition and lusts to make their decisions, making themselves rulers. God can not be worshiped by beings that do not acknowledge His Lordship, so Jesus had to come and take our sins so that we can worship God as he is supposed to be worshiped. God’s perfect plan for the world is to further His glory, and not to make us feel tingly and all mushy inside. All too often, though, as self-centered creatures we take Jesus’ death and put the focus on ourselves, which takes away the real purpose.

Being self-centered, we tend to focus on self-centered things. So many people decide to get saved on the premise of getting into heaven, and I am one of them. Thankfully, I found that that was not a good reason to give Jesus reign over my life, because I wanted to get into heaven, I wanted to live for eternity, it was my desire that motivated my conversion, not God’s love for me.

But being allowed a place in heaven makes me feel good, as it should. It gives a security for the rest of my life to know that if I died at this instant, it wouldn’t be the end. I’d be in heaven worshiping my God, my soul’s thirst quenched. And what a great way to convert others to Christianity! Everyone is unsure of the future after death, so why not appeal to that? That would be the easiest way.

This is where John 3:16 comes into play. I’m sure you know it. It was probably the first verse you completely memorized, and can recite backwards and forwards, maybe even in Spanish. But for those of you that might not have been raised in church, here it is:

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life.”

So what could possibly be wrong with this verse? In this case, it’s not what’s in the verse, but what it doesn’t include that counts. John 3:16 is just a part of a whole. When just reading this verse, it seems that the reason God sent his Son to die was because he loved us. But this is not the case at all. As it was discussed earlier, Jesus came to give God glory, not us. So when this verse is taken out of context, it totally contradicts what Jesus actually did.

Don’t get me wrong, this is a great verse, and I love the true meaning behind it. Can you imagine the creator of the universe sacrificing His Son for us? It’s a beautiful picture of God’s love for us, but at the same time, and more importantly, it’s a beautiful picture of God’s love for His glory. It seems to be saying that, “God loved us and therefore His Son died so that we can go to heaven,” but really the point behind it is that, ”God loved his glory so much that he loved us and sent his Son to die, so that we can go to heaven.” So it is not a bad verse. In fact, it is perfectly aligned with the rest of the Bible. Only when taken out of context and presented alone is it a problem.

As self-serving people, it is much easier to focus on someone’s love for yourself than that person’s desire for your love. Christians have made John 3:16 into the anthem of Christianity, supposedly summing up the gospel in a few sentences. And because of this we have overlooked an integral part of the story, that eternal life is a byproduct of God’s perfect desire for worship, not the main point. This is where some of the problems in religion come from. As Christians, it is our duty to worship God for who He is, and not because it feels good.

John 3:16 is not the root of the problem; it’s just a symbol of it. American Christianity needs a lot of work, and in some cases it seems detrimental to Jesus’ goals as a whole. We need to pray that God will awaken us, and bring us back to true worship.

Lessons from a Love Bug

College Station in under a plague of Love Bugs. Yes, those sexually inclined insects that fly about connected at the (insert noun here) with little regard for modesty or personal privacy. A walk through a parking lot shows the final fate of many, smashed against a grill; countless corpses clinging to the one they love. Recently while driving on the highway the smush of each bug was so frequent Ryan compared it to popcorn popping. But in the annoyance the popping spured a conversation. Before restating the progression of the converstion, thought, I'll start with a brief summary of a Love Bug's life. The Bug is born to two loving parents, but eagerly awaits the hour when he will leave the stagnant pond and rush into the rest of the world. Thankfully, this is only a few hours away. After waiting what seems like forever and now finally free to roam the world, the young insect finds love at first sight, and they stick together for the rest of their lives (which is only a mere two weeks). Then, tragdey strikes. In a mere instant, the insects' life is gone, plastered to a windshield and then washed into a drain at Five Star Car Wash. So here's the serious part. While me and Ryan were talking about this, he made the point that we aren't that much different from these bugs. Most people live a life of pleasure, not caring about anyone but themselves. As we look at these insects, we can see how futile their life is, ended by a 70 mile-per-hour splatter. No one cares about them. They're just bugs anyways. Now I'm not trying to make a statement about enviromental protection - I really don't care about the bugs. But if we look at the situation from God's standpoint, as a creature infinitly stronger and wiser than humankind could ever be, it seems like a good illustation of ourselves. After I die, people may remember me about 50 years. After that, photographs and memories will fade, erasing my exsitence to an inkspot on Social Security Records. Now, it's true that some people's memories last a little longer, say about Billy Idol or Ghandi or Alexander the Great, but at best their personallity and acomplishments are decided generations later by some archeanthropogeologist featured on the History Channel who specializes in making up little known facts. To really get something out of life we need to understand that we can't get anything out of this life. Solmon wrote all about that in Ecclesiastes. Everything is useless, like chasing after the wind. The only hope we have is in Jesus, who already took care of our goofups and will reward us for the good things we do. If I live my life for myself and don't invest time and effort into a relationship with God, I might as well be lifelessly stuck on a bumper with everyone else. Thankfully that's not the case.

Another day...another job

So today I started my summer job. My hopes of finding employment with great pay and high wages skidded to a stop as I drove my car up to Romano's Pizza. Now I guess there are jobs that could be worse, and I don't need to complain, so I won't. Just keep me in your prayers so that I can look though the dirty dishwater and see the money God is providing until the end of the summer. He's put me there for a reason, I know that. Not really sure what that reason is, but thats the way God works most of the time. A little shorter this time, I'm tired and want to sleep. Until sometime later...

Nathan

My First

So this is my first time to do this. Here's a couple of things that have been on my mind lately. First, school is winding down and I just realized the other day that I will be leaving in a matter of days to go back home. Kinda strange, really. This semester has gone by so fast I can barely recall what I've done...it seems to be a mix of insomatic nights and studying. And now it's almost over with just one more final to go. I've made a few awesome friends this semester, and I'm gonna miss talking to them everyday. I'm gonna miss the college life of spontanity (a word?) and doing whatever I want, and instead having to live with my parents again. But change is a good thing, and there is a time for everything, so I'll just have to wait and see what God has in store for me this summer.
God has been revealing himself to me so much in the last couple of days. I'll start at the begining. I've been reading a lot of financial books about starting buisnesses and investing, and all of them talk about goals. They say that to have goals that acually permeate through your mind and into reality you need to write them down and look at them everyday. Now, I know that these are secular books and don't say anything about any spiritual issue, but I thought that I should incorporate my goals in Christianity. So I decided to make a goal of reading my bible at least 15 minutes a day. Pretty simple, but I've been struggleing with this for awhile. So I started...first with the book of Jerimiah. And even through that first chapter God showed me something. God was telling Jerimiah to go and prophesy in the local church, but he didn't want to because he was too young and couldn't speak well. God reafirmed His love for him, though, and Jerimaih went anyways. What's cool is this is what I have been convicted about myself. I know God, but I don't really know God. It's hard to explain and maybe impossible to explain. Moving on though...
So I started reading my bible everyday, and God filled me with his joy everyday of last week. I'd get up excited about that day and what it held. So then God started showing me more of his plan. Well, I guess just that there is a plan for my life.
On Saturday my Upstream group was supposed to meet for an end of the year party at 9 in the morning. I had been up late the night before but I still wanted to go, so at 4 I slid under my covers and dosed into dreamland. As the alarm went off 5 hours later, my fatigue-ridden eyes haphazardly slapped open as my alarm buzzed in the background. I had overslept. I thought that I should get dressed real quit and hurry onto the party, but something happened. As I thought, I really felt God telling me not to go for some reason. If this had happened a week earlier, I might not have thought anything about it. I decided not to go and curled back into bed. Shortly afterward, I was playing pogs with Colin Powell and The Olsen Twins when Ryan opened the door to my room. "Are you naked?" he asked. With a shake of my head and a strech his finger motioned outside the room for everybody come in. Ten people, acually. My whole Upstream group had come over to see why I didn't show up at the party. It was really cool. It's nice to have friends in a bible study that are around more than just at the bible study, so that you really know them. Anyways, so they stayed awhile and it was cool, we played Halo and then they went on their way.
Nathan Harvey, though, asked me to come to a free lunch, with just a little bit of work involved. Since I have no money anyways, i thought what the heck. So I drove to this lady's house to find that we're helping her move to Bryan. I didn't really mind cause I'd probably just end up getting on IM and not doing anything with my Saturday. When I was helping pack up some books, I found out that she's into alot of the same finanial books that I like. After talking for awhile, she really likes financial things and was really open about her business ventures. So it's really cool to find someone here at college that I can talk to about those things.

So you're asking, what's the point? Well...because God told me not to go to the party, now I have a great memory about my Upstream group and have gained a new friend, along with the experience of helping her move. It's just one of those things that just kinda works out that you could never have planned or even imagine. And in those times when I'm struggling with God I can look back on this Saturday and know that he does have a plan for my life and he's watching out for me. I've still got some more stuff but that will have to come later. God's done some awesome things lately and it's hard to put them in just one post.