(The direct link, if you prefer to bookmark it that way, is http://m.ScriptureMenu.com)
Friday, March 25, 2011
ScriptureMenu.com Mobile Site Launches
(The direct link, if you prefer to bookmark it that way, is http://m.ScriptureMenu.com)
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Hope
Last night in church my pastor taught on Colossians chapter 1, verses 1-6. As he was reading the passage, one thing in particular stood out to me. I guess I sometimes tend to try to figure out cause and effect when I'm reading the Bible, and in that few sentences I see the following causes and effects: first, the Gospel was bearing fruit and growing across the world. The people of Colossae heard the message, and they understood it, and it began to grow and bear fruit in them as well. One of the first fruits of this was the "hope of Heaven" in their hearts; once the hope of Heaven had taken hold inside of them, they began to have faith (confidence) in Christ Jesus, and also love for each other. Faith, hope, and love... just like in 1 Corinthians 13:13! It reminds me of the Parable of the Sower (Mark 4:2-9, Luke 8:5-8) where Jesus compared the Word of God to a seed which could grow and produce fruit under the right conditions. Obviously those conditions existed in Colossae, because the fruit was certainly happening!
Easter is almost here again; last Easter I posted a video from a VeggieTales Easter video in which an angel character explains that "the hope of Easter" is something the world cannot do without. When hope is absent, the world becomes a nasty place. When I first saw that VeggieTales, I thought it was odd to emphasize "hope" as being what the story of Jesus' death and resurrection are all about, but tonight as I thought about those first six verses in Colossians, I realized that the talking vegetables were right... hope is central to the story of Christ! (We're not talking about "hope" in the sense that you "hope" something will happen but it may not; we're talking about "hope" in the sense that you are in a ship at midnight on the ocean in a raging storm, and you are about to drown and die, and you see the lights of a rescue ship, and suddenly you have hope.)
After church I was talking to a friend who is in the middle of a very rough time in his life. He has been having painful health problems, and he is having a difficult time financially as well. He sounded like he was having a hard time seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. I reminded him of a story in 2 Kings 6:24-7:20 in which the salvation of God comes suddenly and unexpectedly. The capitol city of Israel, Samaria, was under siege, and food was running so low that people were resorting to incredibly desperate measures just to stay alive. Some men with a deadly, contagious skin disease who were just outside the city had an idea. They knew their options were to starve where they were, to go into the city and probably starve there, or to go into the enemy camp and see if the enemy would give them some food, so they decided to go to the enemy camp and take their chances. But God had miraculously scared the entire enemy army away, and the diseased men had everything they wanted! When they went back to the city and told the people, suddenly the entire situation went from famine to feasting as they plundered the camp of their enemy. God had turned things around in less than a day, with no effort at all on the part of the Israelites. That's the kind of God that we serve!
My friend knew that story already, but as I reminded him of it, I could see that hope was beginning to dawn in him. There are no health problems or financial problems in Heaven, and he is a citizen of Heaven! The Gospel message that gives us hope is that even when it seems like the sun is going down on your situation and things are getting bleak, God will send the salvation you need. Ultimately, the hope of Heaven means that we will spend eternity in the presence of God, but in the shorter term, in this present life, no matter how bad things may look to you, God is very able to make the situation turn out in your favor!
Easter is almost here again; last Easter I posted a video from a VeggieTales Easter video in which an angel character explains that "the hope of Easter" is something the world cannot do without. When hope is absent, the world becomes a nasty place. When I first saw that VeggieTales, I thought it was odd to emphasize "hope" as being what the story of Jesus' death and resurrection are all about, but tonight as I thought about those first six verses in Colossians, I realized that the talking vegetables were right... hope is central to the story of Christ! (We're not talking about "hope" in the sense that you "hope" something will happen but it may not; we're talking about "hope" in the sense that you are in a ship at midnight on the ocean in a raging storm, and you are about to drown and die, and you see the lights of a rescue ship, and suddenly you have hope.)
After church I was talking to a friend who is in the middle of a very rough time in his life. He has been having painful health problems, and he is having a difficult time financially as well. He sounded like he was having a hard time seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. I reminded him of a story in 2 Kings 6:24-7:20 in which the salvation of God comes suddenly and unexpectedly. The capitol city of Israel, Samaria, was under siege, and food was running so low that people were resorting to incredibly desperate measures just to stay alive. Some men with a deadly, contagious skin disease who were just outside the city had an idea. They knew their options were to starve where they were, to go into the city and probably starve there, or to go into the enemy camp and see if the enemy would give them some food, so they decided to go to the enemy camp and take their chances. But God had miraculously scared the entire enemy army away, and the diseased men had everything they wanted! When they went back to the city and told the people, suddenly the entire situation went from famine to feasting as they plundered the camp of their enemy. God had turned things around in less than a day, with no effort at all on the part of the Israelites. That's the kind of God that we serve!
My friend knew that story already, but as I reminded him of it, I could see that hope was beginning to dawn in him. There are no health problems or financial problems in Heaven, and he is a citizen of Heaven! The Gospel message that gives us hope is that even when it seems like the sun is going down on your situation and things are getting bleak, God will send the salvation you need. Ultimately, the hope of Heaven means that we will spend eternity in the presence of God, but in the shorter term, in this present life, no matter how bad things may look to you, God is very able to make the situation turn out in your favor!
Monday, March 7, 2011
Lamp
So, not too long ago I inherited a cell phone. My wife wanted a snazzy new Android phone, and I wanted to get her one, and I found a company with a nice phone on sale and a dynamite no-contract deal. So she got the new phone, and I inherited her old one; I've never carried a cell phone before, but we were under contract anyway so I decided to just take over her old phone until the contract runs out.
So this old phone isn't an Android, and it isn't an iPhone. It isn't a Blackberry or Windows Mobile. This is what they call a "messaging phone," and it can run apps, but they have to be written in the Java language. Java apps are generally pretty simple, and I loaded up some that work and some that didn't, but I really wanted a Bible app, just so I'd have it. YouVersion has a Java app, but because this particular phone is pretty restrictive as far as what you can do and the YouVersion app requires data access to work (plus, I don't have a data plan) I wanted something self-contained.
The Go Bible Java App
What I found works quite nicely! The app is called "Go Bible" (not to be confused with this device called GoBible). You can see a picture of it on the right. It has the entire KJV Bible in it, and the whole thing fits on the phone with no need for data access. It's searchable, and it's quite easy to figure out and use. If you have a very simple phone that can only run Java .jar apps, I highly recommend it! (If I had known about it when I wrote this post, I certainly would have mentioned it!)
One thing I found out very quickly when I started carrying this phone was something everyone seems to discover right away: a cell phone is almost without fail going to be used as a flashlight sooner or later. One problem for me was that I'm using a sort of dark wallpaper (this one... Buzz FTW!) so I have to pull up the contact list or something with a white background if I want maximum light from the phone. Problem is, some of the screens on the phone time out and the screen dims and then turns off to save power, which means I have to keep pushing a button to get my "flashlight" to come back on. I downloaded a couple of "flashlight" apps, but they don't really have anything to recommend them, and the ones I tried are kind of messy software anyway. But I did find out that when Go Bible is running, the screen never shuts off. Hello, KJV flashlight app!
So this old phone isn't an Android, and it isn't an iPhone. It isn't a Blackberry or Windows Mobile. This is what they call a "messaging phone," and it can run apps, but they have to be written in the Java language. Java apps are generally pretty simple, and I loaded up some that work and some that didn't, but I really wanted a Bible app, just so I'd have it. YouVersion has a Java app, but because this particular phone is pretty restrictive as far as what you can do and the YouVersion app requires data access to work (plus, I don't have a data plan) I wanted something self-contained.
The Go Bible Java App
One thing I found out very quickly when I started carrying this phone was something everyone seems to discover right away: a cell phone is almost without fail going to be used as a flashlight sooner or later. One problem for me was that I'm using a sort of dark wallpaper (this one... Buzz FTW!) so I have to pull up the contact list or something with a white background if I want maximum light from the phone. Problem is, some of the screens on the phone time out and the screen dims and then turns off to save power, which means I have to keep pushing a button to get my "flashlight" to come back on. I downloaded a couple of "flashlight" apps, but they don't really have anything to recommend them, and the ones I tried are kind of messy software anyway. But I did find out that when Go Bible is running, the screen never shuts off. Hello, KJV flashlight app!
Your word is a lamp to my feet
and a light to my path.
(Psalm 119:105 ESV)
Monday, February 28, 2011
Happiness
Oh, happinessIn Christian circles we throw the word "joy" around a lot. Joy to the world, the Lord has come. Joy unspeakable and full of glory, full of glory, full of glory. I've got the joy joy joy joy down in my heart. (Where?) "The joy of the Lord is your strength," the Word says. Joy is something that is in the core of you as a human being when you've invited God to be in charge of your life. It's the thing that is missing when you leave Him out of your life. You can even have joy when you aren't actually happy at all! I've seen this happen many times at funerals when you know the person who died is at home with Jesus. Joy is not at all the same thing as happiness.
There is grace
Enough for us and the whole human race...
-David Crowder Band
But what about happiness? Do we have any reason to be happy? Of course we do! How about being saved from eternal separation from God? How about God reconciling us to Himself? How about "grace?" Grace is simply the word we use to describe God's reason for making it possible for human beings to avoid the Hell we deserve and obtain the Heaven we do not deserve. So: if you've accepted Jesus into your heart, you get to go to Heaven, and you didn't do a single thing to deserve it... it's a free gift from God. Doesn't that make you happy?
Friday, February 25, 2011
I don't believe in atheists II
Several years ago, I blogged that I don't believe in the existence of atheists. I still hold to my theory, partly because of the reasons I mentioned in that blog post, but since then I've obtained evidence to back me up from the Bible. Observe:
Let's think about science for a moment. Science tells us that everything has a start and a finish. I, for example, was born one day (this occurred nine to ten months after I was conceived), and one day, if the pattern of all of recorded history holds, I can expect to die. Animals are born and die. Science even tells us that planets and stars have a beginning and an ending. Science is all about trying to find a cause and effect for things, because science tells us that everything has a beginning, and everything has a cause.
Now, let's rewind backwards. Let's rewind WAY backwards. I don't care how far you go... go back to the very beginning. Let's say the "Big Bang" theory is correct and the entire cosmos started from a catastrophic explosion. Science tells us that the explosion has a cause. What was the cause? Tell you what, I won't go the obvious route... let's go with space aliens. Let's say they used technology to seed the cosmos, which didn't exist before.
What caused the space aliens?
You can see that this logic is going to go on and on forever, and become more and more outrageous and convoluted, until eventually you give up and come to a brick wall. Everything has a cause, but one thing is the cause of everything. Something started it all in the first place, and that thing did not have a cause. It existed outside of the rules of cause and effect. In fact, it created cause and effect. That thing, whatever form it takes, is the definition of "god."
This argument does not prove the identity of the God of the Bible by any means, but I think the rules of logic point, as clearly as the laws of nature mentioned in the Scripture from Romans, at the existence of God. If someone calls himself or herself an atheist, I would like to submit that either he has not thought his beliefs through to their logical conclusion, or that he is deliberately concealing what he already knows, deep down, to be true.
There IS a God. It's only logical.
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.Did you catch that? The Bible says that everybody knows there is a God. It's obvious, based on the evidence of God's creation - the creation points to a creator. But did you notice the sinister plot that's mentioned? It says that the unrighteous know the truth, but try to suppress it (which is a fool's errand, since according to this Scripture, deep down everybody knows the truth anyway). Don't try to pull this Scripture on one of them, of course, because their folly runs so deep that they certainly won't listen to the clear truth of God's Word, but I have a little bit of logic you could try.
(Romans 1:18-23 ESV)
Let's think about science for a moment. Science tells us that everything has a start and a finish. I, for example, was born one day (this occurred nine to ten months after I was conceived), and one day, if the pattern of all of recorded history holds, I can expect to die. Animals are born and die. Science even tells us that planets and stars have a beginning and an ending. Science is all about trying to find a cause and effect for things, because science tells us that everything has a beginning, and everything has a cause.
Now, let's rewind backwards. Let's rewind WAY backwards. I don't care how far you go... go back to the very beginning. Let's say the "Big Bang" theory is correct and the entire cosmos started from a catastrophic explosion. Science tells us that the explosion has a cause. What was the cause? Tell you what, I won't go the obvious route... let's go with space aliens. Let's say they used technology to seed the cosmos, which didn't exist before.
What caused the space aliens?
You can see that this logic is going to go on and on forever, and become more and more outrageous and convoluted, until eventually you give up and come to a brick wall. Everything has a cause, but one thing is the cause of everything. Something started it all in the first place, and that thing did not have a cause. It existed outside of the rules of cause and effect. In fact, it created cause and effect. That thing, whatever form it takes, is the definition of "god."
This argument does not prove the identity of the God of the Bible by any means, but I think the rules of logic point, as clearly as the laws of nature mentioned in the Scripture from Romans, at the existence of God. If someone calls himself or herself an atheist, I would like to submit that either he has not thought his beliefs through to their logical conclusion, or that he is deliberately concealing what he already knows, deep down, to be true.
There IS a God. It's only logical.
Monday, February 21, 2011
All I Need?
Last night at Winter Jam I heard a band play a song called "All I Need." As they were singing that God is all they need, I thought.. really? Is God REALLY all you need? If you were standing out on the street outside this building and you had nothing but God... no money, no food, no clothes, no nothing... would you REALLY be okay?
Last week I heard about something unique that's going on online. A humanitarian organization in New York City bought prepaid cell phones for three homeless men and set them up to use Twitter - the idea is that they can tweet about what's going on in their lives and raise awareness of what homelessness is like. You can read their tweets here if you like. These three guys count things as victories that I, and you too if you have a place to sleep at night, don't think twice about. If you've never done a dance of joy to learn that you managed to be selected to get to sleep on a bed, or if you've never had to know which shelters are "safe" to sleep in and which ones might not be, or if a hot meal has never been a highlight of your week, then reading some of the things they tweet might be a bit of a shock. And every once in a while, one of these guys mentions his faith in God! I don't know if they are Christian believers or not, but assuming some or all of them are, they've got God, but they have some other quite pressing needs. "All they need?" Not exactly!
Do you ever pray? I hope you do. When you pray, do you ask for things? Most people do, and that is of course a valid reason to pray. When I pray, I ask for wisdom raising my kids and wisdom in my marriage, or I ask for health if I'm sick, or I ask for favorable results in a financial situation, or whatever. I ask God for stuff. I need that stuff. I may already have more than those homeless guys... I've got a house, a job, meals, even a car. I have a terrific church and a beautiful wife. I've got two great kids. I even have luxuries like cable TV, a video game console, and Internet right in my house. And yet, I still have needs. Is God "all I need?" Apparently not!
King Solomon had everything a person could ever want. He was celebrated for his wisdom, and he was also fabulously rich. He had homes, servants, food, drink, sex... anything he wanted, he could have, immediately. And yet he wrote over and over in the book of Ecclesiastes that it was all like a puff of smoke that is there and then it's gone. Solomon concluded that the only thing we can do in this life that matters is to "fear God and keep his commandments".
And I think there we've approached the crux of the matter. Solomon needed nothing. He had everything... and yet he found that there was something he did not yet have: a proper relationship with God. You can't buy that. It can't be given to you as a gift from another person. You can't inherit it or be born with it. And yet, we all need it desperately.
God is not all that you need. But you know what? God is all that you need that you can't get for yourself. You can live your whole life apart from God if you so choose, and if you do, it's possible that you will live for many healthy years. You may have a wonderful family and love them all very much. You may be financially stable, or even well-off. Your career might be stellar, and then you might retire and live many years in comfort. But no matter what you manage to accomplish for yourself in this life, it's not enough. There's something you need that you can't earn and you can't buy. That thing is only obtained one way: through Jesus. In the process of chasing after things that look good in this life, don't miss out on the one thing that you truly do need!
Last week I heard about something unique that's going on online. A humanitarian organization in New York City bought prepaid cell phones for three homeless men and set them up to use Twitter - the idea is that they can tweet about what's going on in their lives and raise awareness of what homelessness is like. You can read their tweets here if you like. These three guys count things as victories that I, and you too if you have a place to sleep at night, don't think twice about. If you've never done a dance of joy to learn that you managed to be selected to get to sleep on a bed, or if you've never had to know which shelters are "safe" to sleep in and which ones might not be, or if a hot meal has never been a highlight of your week, then reading some of the things they tweet might be a bit of a shock. And every once in a while, one of these guys mentions his faith in God! I don't know if they are Christian believers or not, but assuming some or all of them are, they've got God, but they have some other quite pressing needs. "All they need?" Not exactly!
Do you ever pray? I hope you do. When you pray, do you ask for things? Most people do, and that is of course a valid reason to pray. When I pray, I ask for wisdom raising my kids and wisdom in my marriage, or I ask for health if I'm sick, or I ask for favorable results in a financial situation, or whatever. I ask God for stuff. I need that stuff. I may already have more than those homeless guys... I've got a house, a job, meals, even a car. I have a terrific church and a beautiful wife. I've got two great kids. I even have luxuries like cable TV, a video game console, and Internet right in my house. And yet, I still have needs. Is God "all I need?" Apparently not!
King Solomon had everything a person could ever want. He was celebrated for his wisdom, and he was also fabulously rich. He had homes, servants, food, drink, sex... anything he wanted, he could have, immediately. And yet he wrote over and over in the book of Ecclesiastes that it was all like a puff of smoke that is there and then it's gone. Solomon concluded that the only thing we can do in this life that matters is to "fear God and keep his commandments".
And I think there we've approached the crux of the matter. Solomon needed nothing. He had everything... and yet he found that there was something he did not yet have: a proper relationship with God. You can't buy that. It can't be given to you as a gift from another person. You can't inherit it or be born with it. And yet, we all need it desperately.
God is not all that you need. But you know what? God is all that you need that you can't get for yourself. You can live your whole life apart from God if you so choose, and if you do, it's possible that you will live for many healthy years. You may have a wonderful family and love them all very much. You may be financially stable, or even well-off. Your career might be stellar, and then you might retire and live many years in comfort. But no matter what you manage to accomplish for yourself in this life, it's not enough. There's something you need that you can't earn and you can't buy. That thing is only obtained one way: through Jesus. In the process of chasing after things that look good in this life, don't miss out on the one thing that you truly do need!
Monday, February 14, 2011
You Rule!
Behold, a king will reign in righteousness,In prophecy, often you find that passages have two applications: an immediate application, and a Messianic application. I think this passage actually has at least three different applications, but one really caught my attention, and it's the one I want to focus on, but first I'll mention the other two.
and princes will rule in justice.
Each will be like a hiding place from the wind,
a shelter from the storm,
like streams of water in a dry place,
like the shade of a great rock in a weary land.
Then the eyes of those who see will not be closed,
and the ears of those who hear will give attention.
The heart of the hasty will understand and know,
and the tongue of the stammerers will hasten to speak distinctly.
The fool will no more be called noble,
nor the scoundrel said to be honorable.
For the fool speaks folly,
and his heart is busy with iniquity,
to practice ungodliness,
to utter error concerning the LORD,
to leave the craving of the hungry unsatisfied,
and to deprive the thirsty of drink.
As for the scoundrel—his devices are evil;
he plans wicked schemes
to ruin the poor with lying words,
even when the plea of the needy is right.
But he who is noble plans noble things,
and on noble things he stands.
(Isaiah 32:1-8 ESV)
The king, in all cases, is God. The identity of the princes, though, is sort of up for grabs. The immediate application to Isaiah's time was to rulers over Israel; Godly political leaders (in our time as well as theirs) have a positive effect on the nation they rule. In New Testament times, this could be applied to pastors of churches; they provide the spiritual leadership that a Godly king might have provided in ancient times. A pastor who seeks God with all his heart will see amazing things happening in his congregation.
But the application that really jumped out at me tonight was that each one of us, every Christian, is one of those princes. Although we may not "rule" in a political sense in the spot where we live, each of us has a powerful influence over those around us. If we use that influence "in justice" (let God work through us), certain things will automatically begin to happen around us:
- We will be seen as a safe place to run, "shelter from the storm." People know they can trust a Godly man or woman. They know they can depend on us. Peace follows us, because we follow after peace.
- People will be thirsty for what we've got. In Exodus the people got water in the desert from a rock; 1 Corinthians tells us that the rock was a symbol of Christ.
- We will be like a shady spot to a tired person. The best place to rest is in the presence of God's people. In fact, being in a state of spiritual rest is one of the primary focuses of the Christian life.
- We will begin to bring clarity to the situations around us. God's wisdom will make things clear to even people who have a hard time grasping the obvious. Jesus Himself did this effortlessly at the age of twelve.
- People will begin to be seen for who and what they are: those with evil intentions will be exposed, and those with noble intentions will receive the honor due them. The perfect example of this is in the book of Esther.
Spiritually take charge of the world around you today. Do not allow it to influence you; begin to influence it. "Rule it in justice," God's justice, and see the incredible things that God will cause to happen!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
