Brutal Honesty

Why are Christians so judgemental?

I heard a joke about this man, who had a horrible character. He was rude, he was alwas dirty, he didn't have much and that lead him to be selfish, and even to start stealing. But then, one day, he became a Christian.

So he was no longer rude, dirty and selfish... he was rude, dirty, selfish and judgemental.

Unfortunately, this is quite often the case. And I know that I'm not a perfect exception either. Christians seem to be more judgemental. Perhaps it's because they know what's right and what's wrong, or perhaps it's just Western Christians, and so it's from the comfort of their cultures affluence...

But surely shouldn't Christians be the least judgemental of all? The heart of the Christian faith is the admission that we are part of that sinful humanity which we seem to love to judge.

We should be admitting we're sinners, so why be ashamed of our flaws? So shouldn't we be the most brutally honest people?

"was that your fault?"
"yep."

"did you do that on purpose?"
"yep"

"why did you do that?"
"I'm sorry, I have no excuse."

We've already accepted judgement on ourselves, and we're deserving of death, but have been given life.

So why are we convinced that what other people need is condemnation, rather than eternal life?

So, be brutally honest.

Are you judgemental?

...

Thanks to Mark Driscoll for the inspiration for this post.

New Blog

I'm slowly moving all my blogging over to my new site: postulatesandpoetry.wordpress.com

I'll still be putting posts up here, but my efforts on editing, design and coments etc, will be on that site.

The End of the World?

Is the end of the world just around the corner?
Yes.
It is.

Recently there have been floods in Queensland, birds dropping out of the sky, and other natural disasters around the world.
Are these a sign that the end is near?

A group in america is claiming that the world will be destroyed in fire on the 21st of October this year (4 days before my birthday... devastated!).

But, how can we be sure?

"Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man."
Matthew 24:35-37

Wait, hang on? Jesus says that the end will be like the days of Noah... does that mean there will be floods?

The LORD saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time.
Genesis 6:5

Genesis 6 tells us that the world was corrupted, and that God was going to destroy all people and the earth because the evil inclinations of the human heart had corrputed everything. So this is what Jesus is referring to, when Jesus returns the earth will be consumed by its own evil.

But Jesus also said, "that day or hour no one knows", so then how can I claim that the world is going to end?

If I claim that the end will come on a certain date, then won't I just be like one of those terrifying cults?

For complete and utter exegetical fallacies, look at what the ebible fellowship have to say on the end of the world.
Sometimes I feel that we, as Christians, look at what the bible says, and pull profound meaning out of passages, because that's what we feel God's word must be. But we forget that God gave us His word so that we could know Him, that is, He didn't write a cryptic crossword, He wrote a letter to all of His creation.

We read plainly in this 'letter' that we are in the end days, the days in which we wait for the coming of Christ in all His glory. We are to wait in expectation of His return with every moment, but to understand that He will come like a thief in the night. We do not know the day or the hour of His coming, but we know that it is soon.

The end is near. It may not be in my lifetime, it may not be in the lifetime of your children, but Christ will return.
So expect His coming.

Wake Up

Do you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning?
I know I do. Whether it's due to staying up late the night before, or just a lack of brain function that early in the morning, I usually take a while to muster up the energy to get out of bed.

I'm reading through Isaiah at the moment, and this morning this verse struck me.

LORD, be gracious to us;
we long for you.
Be our strength every morning,
our salvation in time of distress.
Isaiah 33:2

When I wake up in the morning, what is the first thing I think of? The impending day? How long I can stay in bed and still get to work, or to uni?

But what I should really be doing, every morning when I wake up, is looking to God.

we long for you.
Is it a longing of God that gets us up in the morning?

Be our strength
Is it God's strength that we rely on every day?

our salvation
When we find things hard, when we're "in times of distress" where do we look for salvation?

Maybe I should put this verse on my bedside cupboard, so that it's what greets me when I wake up. Maybe it will help remind me why I get up every morning.

Maybe it will help me be quicker to get out of bed in the morning.
Or maybe I should just get earlier nights.

Blog Away!

A friend and I are trying to increase how much we write.

And as they say, to write more, write more. So we have both have made the intention to post once every week, with something serious, or at least well thought out, every month.

You can check out her AWESOME blog here.

And you can read mine here. But hopefully you know that, or else I’m not sure how you found this…

So, please, read. Because we will be writing.

What Do You Say?

Sometimes it can be tempting to impress.
It doesn't matter if it's 100% true, so long as it sounds impressive.

Sometimes when we are challenged about our faith, we feel that coming up with any answer is better than not knowing.
When we do those things we are fools.

For fools speak folly,
their hearts are bent on evil:
They practice ungodliness
and spread error concerning the LORD;
the hungry they leave empty
and from the thirsty they withhold water.
Isaiah 32:6

If people come to us for knowledge and we speak as a fool, we are worse than if we just shared in their ignorance. We are offering water to the thirsty, but giving them bottles of dust.

But a time is coming when we will no longer have to live in ignorance, when we let Jesus rule as our Lord, when we let him take our foolishness, when we give him our lives.

See, a king will reign in righteousness
and rulers will rule with justice.
Each one will be like a shelter from the wind
and a refuge from the storm,
like streams of water in the desert
and the shadow of a great rock in a thirsty land.
Then the eyes of those who see will no longer be closed,
and the ears of those who hear will listen.
The fearful heart will know and understand,
and the stammering tongue will be fluent and clear.
Isaiah 32:1-4

Treasure

A relationship we enjoy is a relationship that we spend time in, and a relationship that we spend time in is one that we come to treasure.

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18