Today I’m chea…

Today I’m cheating on the media fast. I’ve embarked on an 18 week journey through the Well House of Prayer that is an 18 week discipleship training. There are a few commitments that must be kept, some daily, or nearly daily. First we meet every Saturday morning at 8am for some teaching. Also, we are fasting from media- internet (with exceptions) non-christian music, movies, video games, that kind of thing. We also are journaling. And one of my favorite things is exercising our faith. We do this by practicing the presence of God. What that means is to be aware of his presence, because he is here, and focus on our relationship to him. There are different ways we do this, we walk with him, speak with him constantly. Sometimes in faith God holds my hand. It’s in the simple gestures that communicate so much affection that I run into God.

Anyway, the point of this post is not to talk about ADI, arise discipleship intensive, but to talk about my summer. This is now the second summer I have not been at Thousand Oaks Youth Camp- if it even still goes by that name. I want to go back. Not for any camp session, those were fun, but just to be there and watch the sunrise like I have so many times before and thank God for the love he showed me there, and thank him for how far he’s carried me. I think the winter of 2008, at the top of a particular hill looking out toward the sunrise on a terribly overcast day is the first time God spoke to me. Not the first time he communicated, but the first time he was direct, and clear. Or perhaps I should say it’s the first time I was listening.

The summer of 2010 was amazing. I got the opportunity to go to Colorado and serve the homeless there. I realize now that I didn’t do much for the homeless. How could I? And wether they were housed or not seems irrelevant now. What I did in Colorado was meet friends- people made in the image of God, and I saw them as they were in God’s eyes, or at least tried to. In Colorado I learned to follow the Spirit. I’d heard about that growing up in church, but we never really talked about it. I thought following Jesus and being guided by the Spirit was all about living a pious life. It’s not. NOT AT ALL! But I learned about just sitting and listening to God, and then doing. Being reckless and unreserved and willing at a moments notice to follow the impulse of the Spirit.

The week after Colorado I went to Thousand Oaks. I was the First Aid Coordinator’s Assistant. So pretty much I counted out and handed out pills, and helped anyone who got hurt. It was awesome. But I didn’t really have a lot to do. What I did was important, you know, can’t screw up some kids medication, but it didn’t require a massive amount of time like being a counselor would. So I spent time doing activities with the campers, and working in the Kitchen and reading the word, and praying out by the lake. And in those moments of prayer I pleaded to be led by the Spirit. In short, I was and learned some things that if I was willing to run recklessly out in the night and make myself present that I would have never learned. At once God strengthened my faith while man murdered it. I was crushed that week, but God drew me near to him and turned me into an intercessor before I even knew what an intercessor is. He also gave me an affection for the lake, taught me to forgive, and to be in reverence to him.

I suppose I write this to say I won’t get over Thousand Oaks. I don’t want to move on, and think it would be foolish to have any desire to. But, I’m somewhere else now. and it’s sweet. I’ve spent the entire summer between Highland Village and Denton, with only a short trip to San Angelo for my brother’s wedding. I feel good. I’m not closer to God than I’ve ever been before. It seems like that something people say after they experience something like Church Camp or a mission trip. I’m not. But I’m completely invested in God. I’m present, and he’s present. Lord, make us one.

Prayer Questions

“The prayer of a righteous person has great power” James 5:16

I wonder, since I sin so stinking much, how powerful is my prayer? I can’t really talk a lot about this topic without this scripture in context. It’s sooooo Good!

¹³ Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. ¹⁴ Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. ¹⁵ And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. ¹⁶ Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.^[b]17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. ¹⁸  Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.

¹⁹ My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, ²⁰ let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.

Prayer is very powerful, but if we get too caught up in one little phrase out of all of this we can begin to think our prayers are only as powerful and we are righteous. I want to explain how this is both true and false at the same time, and of course when something is as confusing and contradictory as that, Jesus is smack dab in the middle of it. And he’s saying, “Really guys, you still don’t get it?”

Let me use my buddy Chris as an example. Chris is probably the best prayer I know, or have prayed with at length many times. He’s very open to the Spirit and let’s God speak through him. Often times he strings together 50 different passages of the bible from Genesis through Revelation and it sounds like he added a chapter to Isaiah. But more impressive to me is that he’s a righteous dude. He lives out his prayers and is  blameless. I on the other hand stumble through words grabbing on to anything that completes a sentence and barely do anything right, much less live righteously. (That doesn’t mean I’m okay with my faults; I’m just being honest). When we pray “O beloved, return to rest. And you exploited, return to rest.” Does God hear Chis louder and clearer than me? Do Chris’ prayers carry more weight?
I don’t think so. Because it’s not about the one praying, it’s about through whom we’re praying. See, we both pray in Jesus’ name. See, all fall short of righteousness, but Jesus came to pick us back up. He came and lived a sinless life, breaking the Satan’s dominion of the earth by overcoming it, and then became an atonement for our sins. In doing so Jesus became that stairway between heaven and earth like Jacob saw in his vision (Genesis 28:12) and Jesus said himself in John 1:51. I could quote scripture all day, it’s easy if you’ve read John, about Jesus being the way to the father. It’s Jesus’ righteousness that overcomes our sin and he intercedes for us, so that we may intercede for others. He is the great intercessor and now we are an extension of his work interceding for the lost and brokenhearted.
That being said, yes a righteous prayer is more powerful than an unrighteous prayer. But no prayer is more righteous than the prayer said in Jesus’ name, and a prayer said in any other name does not go to the father, for no one goes to the father except through the son. I do want to note that our own guilt and shame can hinder us from being praying powerful prayers. When I lead worship I like to do a song where I sing “The shame can’t hold me, the guilt has no grip.” If for nothing else than to prepare my mind for open worship and prayer to the father through the grace of God, and the sacrifice of Jesus.

“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing” 1 Thessalonians 5:16,17

Because I Love Women…

Let me preface this by saying I don’t want to be aggressive or attacking any individual, yet I am waging war no less. This topic is deeply personal on a lot of various levels. I use strong language because it’s necessary to communicate my passion. I have to say in all honesty that it’s my love for women that excites my hatred, and not the other way around. Rather, it’s my love for people. My buddy Chris is to blame for putting together this list and wording it aptly to communicate accurately. Last I must say, this list is made to encourage conversation. These ideas are meant to be chewed and digested slowly in our minds and hearts, and pulled apart, mulled over, and hopefully instigate a change in perception. Please talk them out a coffee shop or online with me or your friends or whatever. Please don’t read and disregard after your first impression, keep this talk going.

I hate porn because…

It is violent and inhumane
It normalizes rape
It is racist
It is addictive
It is misogynistic
It is an exploitative multibillion dollar industry
It nurtures sex trafficking and child abuse
It limits sexual imagination
and because I LOVE WOMEN

Facebook.com/rrdentonchapter

Jesus is Unclean

I’ve heard a lot of discussion about Mark 1:40-45. That’s the one where Jesus heals a leper by touching him. Remember the whole “If you are willing…” “I am willing”… talk. After Jesus heals the leper he says not to tell anyone, but go and do what the law says (Which is pretty absurd if you read the law). So this is what I’ve heard about that scripture, why Jesus told him not to tell anyone, a new idea, and what the implications are.

I’ve been told that Jesus wants everyone to come to their own faith, and thusly told the leper not to tell people so they would be able to believe Jesus was God based on their own experiences and not the testimony of others. I don’t like that idea, because the ministry of Jesus and his disciples is deeply rooted in testimony. I mean, the samaritan woman at the well told and entire town about Jesus and he was pretty happy with that. Moreover he sent out the seventy-two, and he gave the “Great commission” to go tell everyone about who he is.

I’ve also been told it was so he could enter the towns and minister personally, almost like a ninja, moving unnoticed rather than being surrounded by crowds like Miley Cyrus in a middle school. That’s an alright idea, I can dig it.

But! What I’ve learned recently is from Leviticus 5:2 that says “If they touch anything that is ceremonially unclean… they will be unclean and guilty”. If you know your Leviticus 13 and 14 then you know that a person with a skin disease like leprosy cannot touch anyone, can’t go into a town, and it’s even their legal obligation to keep people away from them. Jesus went up to the leper in Mark and touched him. By the law he was ceremonially unclean. Mark 1 in the NetBible, and translations without interpretation are similar, says “But as the man went out he began to announce it publicly and spread the story widely, so that Jesus was no longer able to enter any town openly but stayed outside in remote places”. Perhaps Jesus being now unclean was not able to enter towns, by law. I like that understanding much better.

But what does this imply? Well, obviously Jesus wasn’t inflicted with leprosy. He in fact made the unclean clean. This is an allegory for Jesus relationship to both sin and to the law. Where the law impresses uncleanliness, Jesus impresses cleanliness. Where the law condemns Jesus reconciles. In the law we are convicted, in Jesus we are pardoned. With a place or person inflicted with sin, nearness to it is to be near to sin. For Jesus to be near sinful people and places, they are made righteous. His light goes with him into otherwise dark places. The implications are immense. Through Jesus’ relationship to sin and the law he abolished the law, and pardoned sin, even to those unworthy (everyone; Romans 5:8).

So what does this mean for the believer, and for the nonbeliever? For the believer, it means we do not have to avoid dark places. It means we don’t have to shun evil places, but we can go to them and bring the light of Jesus to those dark places. To unclean places and people, if we take Christ with us, He can make them clean. But, if we don’t take Christ there, they will remain dark and unclean. Each person must decide for his/herself where they are going to go, or where they can go without being suffocated in darkness-be wise. For the nonbeliever, I think it’s hope. I mean, if Jesus died for the unworthy, and healed those who didn’t deserve to be healed, when applied to eternal consequences, who says the cut off time for salvation is death/rapture? I hear all the time the question of: “If I die before I repent do I go to hell?” I don’t know. But I do like to believe in grace, and know I am no better than the most sinful of men in respect to deserving grace. Perhaps Jesus makes clean the souls of men who don’t want it, and don’t repent. Or perhaps one must first admit need, and confess Jesus is able, then find out He’s willing. I really don’t know. But there is some hope there.
In conclusion: the bible is really cool. Read it sometime. And go to dark places: bring God’s Kingdom to places given to darkness.

Porn is Plastic

I’ve been researching a lot about porn and have a lot of very specific ideas in mind. As I’ve researched I’ve noticed two attitudes that I disagree with. One I think is flat out wrong, and the other I think needs to be flipped on it’s head to be realistic about pornography.

The first though is that porn is normal.  This quote is from a comment on a blog post entitled “Internet Pornography Stats: Parents Should be Concerned”.
“Sex and pornography are the most normal things in the world. An interest in sex for a 15 year old boy is completely healthy, you should be worried if he WASN’T interested in porn.”

This attitude needs to change for very specific reasons. First off, Porn is not sex. From “7 Surprising and Negative Effects of Porn”: “3. Porn Turns Sex Into Masturbation./ Sex becomes self-serving. It becomes about your pleasure and not the self-giving, mutually reciprocating intimacy that it was designed for.”  If you’ve ever watched porn, as I have, looking back you can see how it’s not at all like real sex. Women don’t become slaves to men. Men are not just erect objects to the woman-turned-object on screen. Real life is not a “do whatever pleases me” situation. Porn is a plastic version of bad sex. Secondly, pornography isn’t healthy. I would agree that an interest in sex is healthy, that doesn’t mean delve into it, but be interested for sure. Pornography is not healthy. It is fake and dressed up for a reason. It is designed to be addictive. It’s a marketing scheme, and it’s effective. Unfortunately the cost is not only monetary. Porn addictions destroy relationships within families and friendships and make coping with life long relationships nearly impossible. Porn rewires your brain, in the pavlovian sense, to be turned on in specific situations that don’t occur within most sexual relationships or any long-term relationships.

After all, pornography works in the most basic of ways on the brain: It is Pavlovian. An orgasm is one of the biggest reinforcers imaginable. If you associate orgasm with your wife, a kiss, a scent, a body, that is what, over time, will turn you on; if you open your focus to an endless stream of ever-more-transgressive images of cybersex slaves, that is what it will take to turn you on. The ubiquity of sexual images does not free eros but dilutes it.  -Naomi Wolf, “The Porn Myth”

Source Here.

The idea I would like to flip on it’s head is best said by Sean McDowell in an article: “Pornography is tearing apart the fabric of our society.” He’s not the only one who has said something like this, and he acknowledges the dramatization within his article. I would rather say that our torn society is producing pornography. Porn is a product of an over sexualized society. We thrive on sexy. It’s a life force beating all around controlling our advertisements, and our media. It’s hard to find a video game these days that don’t hint at sexuality in a casual (and gross) kind of way, as if it’s no big deal to have free sex with whomever sparks one’s interest. And I’m sure that a lot of you reading this are thinking, “that’s true, it is no big deal.” Point proven. Our social ideals and pornography are growing more and more perverse in correlation with each other. Porn will only be as gross as the consumers allow it to be. Apparently we don’t have limits.

I’d like to end with the same words Namoi Wolf does in her article, and talk a little about what I want in a marriage. Among other things I want sex. I want fun uninhibited sex with one woman from the moment we say our vows till the moment we die. I want to cherish her as if she’s the only woman in the world. I want to glorify her in her sexual beauty. I want to be surprised on my wedding day at the fulfillment of sex, at the pleasure, and the intimacy. I want to be surprised on my wedding day at the I don’t know what, it’s surprise. But I’m afraid that with pornography I will want something other than sex, that I will be inhibited and unfaithful, not just in my mind and heart but in actions. I’m afraid I will see other women as sexual creatures, and I will lust after more beautiful women. I’m afraid sex on our wedding night will be a mundane practice, just a repeated action: muscle memory. I’m afraid that “Sex has no mystery”.

So, what’s wrong with gay sex?

I hope the title caught your attention. For a long while I was holding out hope that homosexuality isn’t so clearly defined as a sin as it is being proclaimed. I’ve come to some interesting conclusion, and I think I’ve got a pretty good train of thought going. Please, stick with this, because I make the argument for why it’s wrong, then for why it’s not so wrong, and then why that second argument is not so right.

The argument for homosexuality being ‘wrong’ or as those Jesus lovers like to call it, “sinful” is short, but also extensive. It’s short in that there’s not much explaining to do, but extensive in that the listing of little explanations can run long.
1. God says no to homosexuality (Actually the bible just always calls it a sin).
2. Biology. Look at your body and figure it out.
3. It is a lie, Galations 1.
4. Adam was in need and thus provided Eve, a distinctly different creature by way of sex.
5. Homosexuality would end humanity from lack of pregnancy if practiced to the maxim, following Kant’s categorical imperative it is both immoral and irrational.
6. It is a flourishing sexual play ground of disease that would kill of pockets of the population; Again Kant would say irrational.
…the list goes on…

YOU CAN SKIP THIS.
This next section refutes 6-4. It’s kind of boring.
Why this is crap. Let’s start from the bible and work our way up. 6-> disease from sex is a circumstance of an action not related to the action directly but to ‘other-than’ factors. In other words, sex is possible to occur without killing everyone. Promiscuity while disease is so rampant as in our time is irrational, but that also applies to heterosexuals. 5-> there are other ways to impregnate than inserting a penis into a vagina. Also, assume only 3% of the population is gay (it is), then we just saved the world. It’s not being practiced to the maxim. Moreover If  homosexuality is hereditary [big if people] then the population will at least decrease with time, perhaps hundreds of years to see significant change depending on the tendencies of the gene, it’s penetration and so on.  4-> It depends on the way Genesis is interpreted. If one interprets it to be absolutely literal, then there’s a chance of accepting that. However, most likely Genesis is a poetic allegorical metaphor. Have you ever read those stories like “how the zebra got it’s stripes” or something like that? That’s the way I like to look at Genesis 2-3. It’s the story of how women came about, and why people sin even though God doesn’t want them to, and how we got to earth, and why men work in the fields, and why women have labor pains. Convenient, huh? So yeah, Eve was made for Adam, in a poetic allegory that reflected the already existing heterosexual culture.

I have answers for 1 and 3 as well. If they are proved incorrect 2 is becomes an “oh well”, right?
3 is contingent of 1, so let’s chat about God always hating on homos. In the bible homosexuality is never mentioned, at all, in any other way than as awful. Among the worst sins ever! It’s always grouped with extreme sexuality and rape, and pagan worship, and all kinds of evil. Gay sex is up there with rapping to death, as far as the bible is concerned. The conclusion is clear, homosexuality is not at all acceptable. It’s bad, right? Well, in the culture I’m immersed in homosexuality is separate from hyper sexuality and raping to death, and even pagan worship. Let the record show that not all acts of gay sex are in devotion to a pagan God. You get what I’m saying? it’s just different. Even heterosexual sex along with hyper sexuality, and rape, and incest, and pagan worship is evil. What about homosexual monogynous relationship? The bible is silent. So maybe, homosexuality isn’t as easily thrown into the same category of evil anymore. We’re talking about something other than what the bible was talking about.

There are some questions that then come up. Such as, can one help being gay. For me, it’s hard to say. I don’t know everything, believe it or not. If you’ve chatted with me on here you’ve probably proven me wrong at least once, probably more. I know I don’t know everything, I’m wrong a lot, and on this one, I don’t know. I do know that for most people it’s a choice. And, everyone can chose what actions they make, but does that change their sexuality?
Another good question: does the bible’s silence make it okay? Answer, hell no. But perhaps we shouldn’t use the bible so flagrantly to say something’s wrong that’s not even in the book! Also, there is a word that’s used as Driscoll says “the junk drawer for sexual sin”. It’s a word that you just drop and it means sexual deviation, and it’s sinful. So, you can’t just redefine things and then they become okay. There is a right or wrong, we have to find it.

Biology sheds some light. As I explored the idea of a spiritual connection of sexuality, and the spiritual is connected to sexuality, I wondered if someone cannot be spiritually fulfilled within heterosex, but could through homosexuality would that not make it okay? It would make it okay, but I’m starting to think that logic is crap. sexually there’s nothing a man offers to a man that a woman doesn’t. Think about the body really quickly. Am I right? The only difference is the blowjob factor. I just don’t see a man not being fully spiritual because he can’t give blowjobs! that’s ridiculous right? and women the converse. All that’s left is an extra-sexual romantic relationship. I believe if a woman is attracted women emotionally, then they should find an effeminate man. That will take care of that. There isn’t a real blocking of the sexuality here right?

Better arguments? Deal. Jesus is my argument for why homosexuality is wrong. Jesus came and rocked a culture. He turned it upside down. He changed religious presuppositions. Since I presuppose sexuality to be a very weighty spiritual topic, I then believe that if a culture was wrong Jesus would have said something about it! Anything! but perhaps, the culture wasn’t too far off from the truth. That coupled with the biology argument is enough for me to say it’s a sin. But I’m not a homosexual. I’m not experiencing spiritual turmoil over my sexuality, and I just don’t know. But for now, yes, it’s a sin, and that’s what’s wrong with gay sex.

Argument v. Truth

So I mentioned that in our present day we are confusing argument with truth. Debates are perfect examples of this. In school debate is taught as a process of providing evidence, and cited examples, then deriving conclusions that support the given side of the issue. The better debater wins. This is all fine, until you learn that going into a debate the debaters don’t choose which side to support. They are given a topic, and then a viewpoint to support. And it does not matter how true their arguments are as long as they are better than the opponents arguments, they win, and have the final word on the matter- within their debate. THIS CANNOT BE CONFUSED WITH TRUTH. Winning an argument and being right are very different things.

If I were to say murder is just and then prove that over an incompetent fellow who is too dumb to prove that murder by definition is not just it would not make murder just! It’s still wrong people! This is important to know on many accounts. Many times people use the bible, or smart people’s quotes, or whatever they want to make a point, and within their shell of information they sound very right and are convincing. But, if you remove the appeal to the man and authority and the well constructed sentences and look merely at the ideas opposed to other ideas the truth is easier to see.

I once had a friend explain to me how spiritual gifts like the laying on of hands, prophesy and speaking in tongues was all over now because of the completion of the bible. When all you hear is just those words, it’s clearly not acceptable as truth. But, when 5 or 6 scriptures are thrown in there, and the dots are connected just right, and other people who have held similar viewpoints are quoted, it seems like a pretty solid idea. There is a well crafted argument to back that claim. Let me inform you, incase you have held this belief, that argument does not mean absolute truth. There is a possibility that this is not so. I even have a more convincing argument that says otherwise if you want to hear pieces of it, I’d be glad to share. I’ll simply put it that God can do what he wants when He wants with or without a canonical bible. That’s convincing enough if you ask me. Assuming Christianity which seems more true? God can do what He wants (assuming his wants lie within his strict moral code), or the bible means the end of spiritual gifts? By the way, love is included in that list of spiritual gifts. In fact, the scripture in 1 Corinthians 2 where the core of this argument lies is followed by 1 Corinthians 13. Love wins.

Let truth be truth, let argument be argument. Let us not confuse the two and bring some salt to the discussion.

Love Wins

First off, I kind of like Rob Bell. I’m also excited about this book, and once I read it I’m sure it will inspire more thoughts.

Now to analyze.
The interviewer seems to assume that “melting hearts” means eternal salvation. I mean “melting hearts” must mean something, but I wouldn’t assume that Bell is saying that everyone will go to heaven. In fact, just by listening to his comments one would find that he admits the eternal fate of everyone to be speculation.
He says clearly that the actions of people here on earth are relevant. He does not say what they determine, or if they are the only factor. He admits that is speculation. I like Rob Bell’s words because he took God out of a box. The idea is “we don’t concretely know the unknowable”. From the first question asked to Bell you could see that the interviewer was trying to put God in a box. He is either this or that. Bell says it’s a paradox and we can leave as that, just fine. Bell doesn’t seem to concern himself with God’s stand on politically correct use of his omnipotence (which Bell never actually admitted to, though I do believe he would if asked plainly in a non-hostile setting). Instead Bell is focused God’s emotion for the individual. I believe that sums up the point of Love Wins. It’s an individual thing. There is no peg-hole leading into heaven that you have to fit into to. It’s not a check list. There is, perhaps, even an element of “I personally don’t know” to our theological pondering. I have a belief, and I will teach according to it, but if someone disagrees I do not assume that they go to Hell. In fact, I’ve narrowed down what I actually believe without exception to a short list.
1. Jesus is the son of God who lived a holy life on Earth.
2.He died on the cross as a love sacrifice for humanity, and me in particular.
3. Jesus rose from the dead, and for that people will be transformed by God’s love and love others. (not like alien robots, just like people living holy lives and what not.)

Do I have certain beliefs about nit-picky stuff like, should someone be baptized, and is cussing okay? Sure, I do. And, if someone disagrees I will try to persuade them, even learn from them. Perhaps my viewpoint is not entirely correct. But, I will not deny that person salvation.
Why? Because, Love Wins.