Thoughts of a young Christian

The question of evil

2009-10-01T09:17:00.003+02:00

I'm preparing a talk for a youth week-end away in Pierrefonds concerning the question of evil. Toughie.

I was asked the same question a while back by a member of my youth group, and this is the e-mail that I sent her. I re-read it preparing for this talk... Here it is. (Yes, I do like writing long, theological articles.

Hello!

Comme promis, here's what my answer is concerning the question of evil.

Now at the university where I studied, they would teach us that the Bible doesn't give us a theoretical explanation to the question of evil. God is sovereign, so everything happens according to his plan for humankind, and yet God is good and there is no evil in him. And yet evil does exist. How these three things come together in one is the only real incomprehensible mystery inside the Bible. They call it "le mystère opaque", whereas things such as the Trinity or the dual nature of Christ (the fact that he is fully man and fully God) are called "mystères de lumière": they aren't fully graspable, but you can put into words how it works, without totally managing to get your head around it. You can understand what the mystery is not, even if you can't understand what the mystery is. With evil, they say, you can't even say what the mystery is not. There is no humanly conceptualisable answer. And the Bible, although it doesn't give a theoretical answer to the question of evil, gives a practical one in the person of Jesus Christ, and his death on the cross, defeating sin, illness and evil. You can find a thorough explanation of this position in a book called "le mal et la croix" (or "evil and the cross": it was written in both languages), by Henri Blocher.

Now this doesn't satisfy me. Maybe it's my sinful nature that's desperately trying to find an answer, and not managing to let go of a question that bugs me, and simply lay it in God's hands, admitting the impossibility of knowledge. But I think that somehow, the Bible does give an answer to the question of evil, and it is most eloquently exposed in the line of thinking and theologizing of John Calvin. John Calvin, and his disciples recognize in the Bible a pattern which points to God's glory as being of primary importance. God IS glorious. If there is one word to describe God, it is his glory (in the sense of his ultimate greatness, unfathomableness, radient beauty and compellingness that shine through all that he is and all that he does), and that glory comprizes all of the other important attributes of God such as his holiness and his love and his infinity and his unknowableness. And therefore, as God in his glory is the ultimate truth, the ultimate good, the ultimate reason for existence (Calvin's followers coigned up this incredible phrase in the Westminster shorter catechism: "the chief end of man [meaning the main purpose of man] is to glorify God and enjoy him forever") it is God in his glory that must be pursued in order for the ultimate good to be pursued. We were created to reflect back to God his own glory. Because that is the ultimate good. That is the most noble thing possible. It is the only thing that is pleasing to Holy God: that he be glorified. Does he need us to glorify him in order for him to be glorious? Certainly not! Is his glory incomplete if we fail in our task? By no means! God remains glorious whether we admit it or not. But God takes the most pleasure in us when we take pleasure in him, and therefore give him the most glory. It is by admitting that God is the most glorious, worthy of praise, and desireable thing in this universe that God is the most glorified.

And it is good, not evil, that God be so radically God-centered, because for God to not be God-centered would magnify a lie: it would be accepting the lie that there is something more worthy of focus and interest and praise than almighty God, which of course is a heresy! For God to not be heretic he needs to love God above all things, and want him to be praised and seen as glorious. In fact, not only is it good, it is the most good thing in the universe, and anything that must be judged as to whether it is good or not must be measured up to how glorifying to God it is, in intent as well as in deed (therefore 10 000 € given to a poor man, with all good intentions in the world, except for the intention of glorifying God is not as worthy a deed as 10 € given to a poor man with completely pure motives, including the desire to glorify God). So God, to be good, has to desire his glory in all things.

So that is the basic theology of calvinist thinking: radically God-centered theology. God is not first and foremost for Man, he is first and foremost for God. Even his death was not first and foremost for Man, it was first and foremost for the Glory of God. Christ died to redeem for God people of every tribe and tongue and nation, that God might have for himself a redeemed people. And not only is Christ's work at the cross for God's glory first of all: the whole plan behind the salvation of mankind is for God's glory: it all happened in such a way that God may get all the glory. Indeed, we are saved by grace, through faith, not by works, so that we may not boast of deserving God's heaven. It is God who gives it all to undeserving men. And I believe, as a proponent of predestination, that our faith does not come from our own free choice of God: we were dead to God in our sinfulness, and God, through the work of his Holy Spirit, out of sovereign grace, irrespective of the man's primary condition, brought believers out of the darkness, and into the glorious light of saving faith in Christ. It is not ourselves, by any superior spirituality, who save ourselves, and accept Christ by faith. It is God who gives us faith, so that none may boast, and so that all the glory go back to God. And because predestination to faith in Christ is the only system which fits totally with biblical data concerning salvation, and which totally magnifes God's glory, that is why I believe in it, and that is why Calvin was such a staunch defender of predestination.

Now to your question: why does evil happen? Now, imagine a world that had remained perfect, bearing in mind that the ultimate good, and the ultimate reason why man was made is so that God may be glorified, and he is most glorified when men reflect his glory back to him, through our praise and by displaying his works. In a world that had remained perfect, God would have been able to reveal to us his love, his goodness, his perfect logic and wisdom, his infinity, and other such attributes. But there are many other ones of his attriutes that we would never have known. We would not have known his wrath which is an essential part of understanding God's love. And most of all, we would not have understood grace. If there was no reason to save us, God would not have had to become flesh, he would not have had to die. The mass of redeemed sinners who will one day worship in heaven will make God's praise so much greater than anything that a blissfully edenic Adam and Eve could have mustered, because we were lost in the pits of our own sinfulness, and we have been saved, washed clean by the only great God. God is revealed in all his fullness in a world which contains evil. And so he not only let evil happen, he ordained that evil be. He ordained that Adam and Eve might fall, and that he would put on a rescue plan.

Now this may seem like a great impiety to many. And I myself struggle with it. But I do believe that it would be more evil of God to not display his full Glory to men, because the ultimate good is when God is glorified, and the most loving thing for God to do, if his Glory is indeed the most enjoyable thing on this earth, is to display it for us to gaze upon it in all of its wonder. If God's glory is conceeled in any way by God, he is not allowing himself to be glorified, and he therefore isn't good, and if God is to conceal from us any elements of his glory to us, then he is not being loving, because he is not giving us that which is the most delightful thing in the world. So I don't believe that it is an impiety, but it is a very fine balance.

So that is why evil happens, if you want my full, blunt and honest answer. I may be a heretic, and I know that I am treading on very Holy ground here. But I think that it is the truth. May God give me his grace for any false teaching that I may utter concerning him, and may he have mercy on me for not understanding him enough. I pray that on this particular issue, he has given me the grace to see clearly.

Now there are a few questions that you may have, that this type of theology will necessarily raise. If you have any further questions, feel free to ask them to me, and I'll do my best to answer them:

- "How can a Holy God ordain that evil be? Doesn't the Bible say that there is no evil in God?". Yes, the Bible does say that. And anybody who claims the opposite is committing a horrendous impiety! God, bad? Never! However, I do not believe that God ordaining, through an unimpeachable decree, that evil be is the same thing as God comitting evil. The Bible says that God hardened Pharoh's heart. God did it! But it is Pharoh who is responsible. Simply because of this: when put in front of a choice, man can ALWAYS do what he wants to do. Our freedom in our choices, from God's point of view, is never totally free. But from our point of view, it is our decision. I can choose to say no to something. So even if God decrees that I will say yes, when I am in front of the situation, I don't know God's decree, and I can choose yes or no. And therefore I am responsible for it. The ultimate reason is God. But in the thick and fast of life, I know that the responsibility is mine. And so it is the same with Satan's fall, and Adam and Eve's. But that is also the case for good deeds. When in front of a choice, I can choose, from my point of view, to do good or evil. There is nothing stopping me from either option. So even if God has ordained for us good works that he's prepared in advance for us to do, when it comes to the thick and fast, I am responsible for my good choice. And it is the same for a decision of faith. I do not believe that predestination means that God zaps our brain and short circuits us as robots to obey his command. My responsibility and choice are real. Anti predestinationists have coined up the phrase: "whoever wants to come to God can come to God". A predestinationist will answer: "yes, but how does the person want to come in the first place, when he is in all ways fallen and unable to desire God?". So God's active and efficient decrees mean that whatever God wants comes to pass. However, it happens through the medium of man's responsible, albeit not absolutely free choice. So God doesn't do evil, even though he decrees that evil be. And that does not make God a sinner.

- "If God does whatever he wants, to his praise and glory, how do you explain passages that say that God hates evil, and does not want it to happen?" Again, these passages are true. And this objection is a real tricky one. I would answer, along with a theological hypothesis devised by Jonathan Edwards, which makes perfect sense of the biblical data: God has a kind of "two level view" on reality. There is the ultimate, panoramic view, in which everything that God wants to happen will happen, to his praise and glory, and this delights God! He loves his plan for history, because it is the only plan through which he will get all the Glory and be fully displayed and enjoyed by the Men who follow him. However he also has a close-up view, which saddens God. He hates wars, famine etc. He hates it when families break up, when sin happens, when his only Son is nailed to a cross. On that day, at Golgotha, God the Father must have had such mixed feelings: pain, sorrow, distress at the loss of his Son, and yet overflowing joy, delight, rapture and uproaring of sheer gladness that his plan for history was so great, and perfect and glorifying to Him. That is why the Bible says that it was the Father's good-pleasure to bruise the Son (I don't have time to look up all of these references... If you really want me to give them to you, get back to me, and I'll take more time to research this. Otherwise, you can use a concordance to look up these passages, or use www.biblegateway.com). And the internal dilemna inside the Son was the same: he was in utter anguish and pain and sorrow to be separated from his Father, cruelly nailed to a cross by these people that he loved so much. And yet Hebrews 12.2 tells us that it is with confidence and joy that Christ went to the cross. It is the same for the whole of history.

Voila.

I hope that you are not shocked by my answer. I even hope that it is compelling to you, and that you would embrace the God-centred God of the Bible (as far as I can understand it) that I'vetried to write about here. If I'm wrong, may God forgive me, because as I said earlier, I have trodden holy, holy ground in this e-mail.

Hope you have a great week,

In Christ,

Nathan

God to Nathan, can you read me?

2009-07-17T23:45:00.003+02:00

Hey all!

Good being back! I've had really awesome holidays, and I feel so fresh and ready for an awesome year, and I feel that the youth group year is really going to kick off to a massive start with Soul Survivor. We've got a lot on this year, and it's going to be such a fun ride! Bring it on, and please help us, Lord!!

On holiday I took the time to read three books that I've really wanted to read for a while: Wild at Heart by John Eldredge, an absolutely awesome book about rediscovering what it means to be a man. Great stuff. Then Incomparable by Andrew Wilson, an awe inspiring book about the character of God: thirty or so little chapters on who God is, revealing him in as much fullness and glory and splendour as a human being possibly could, aside inspiration. And finally Come, Holy Spirit by David Pytches, a kind of guide book to ministering in the Spirit.

And God has been speaking to me, and really pouring some of himself into the way that he wants to shape me in my heart of hearts, in my character, in my life and in my ministry. Over the past few weeks, and for the first time in a while, I've felt God calling me to various specific realms of ministry. Which is quite exciting, because I'm used to being a bit of an all-rounder, doing a bit of preaching, some worship leading, Bible studies here and there, a bit of graphic designing, soirée organising etc. It's all fairly intense stuff, and I tend to lose myself in the ocean of stuff there is to do as someone who's committed to see revival happen in my time, in my land and for my God...

There are two things which God really spoke to me about as a result of the books that I read.

The first one is that I should equip myself for spiritual battle a lot more than I do. I have been challenged to not only pray for Beki as I do right now, but to actually enter with full force and brutality into the enemy of her soul, who is trying to bring her down, to set our relationship asunder and to destroy her. She is my princess in a high tower, and captive to a blood thirsty dragon in so many ways, and I need to rise up and enter into warfare with the devil over my wife.

But for that I need to prepare myself for battle more. I was about to go and declare war unto the devil yesterday evening over the areas of Beki's life that he still has a hold on, and I felt the most merciful of rescues from God, who said to me: "wait just a second! He will destroy you considering the state of your armour. Do NOT go by your own strength just because you are a bloke and that that's your job. A wise man takes all the help that he can: take me!" And I felt that there are some areas of my life that Satan will exploit so ruthlessly if I don't deal with them. So I am committed to confess my sins to Beki more often, to really open up to her in a way I've never done before. I know that that's what I need to do to get anywhere in this momentous battle for the wellfare of my beloved princess. It's all very exciting stuff, and I feel that I am walking in the ways that I have been called to ever since God endowed me with a "Y" chromosome.

The second thing that I feel that God has been calling me to, is to develop my gifts as an evangelist and as a prophet. David Pytches makes a distinction between two types of prophecy: foretelling (listening into God to hear what is in store for the future) and forthtelling (listening to God and speaking what he is saying and thinking about the present). Passages in the prophets where God condemns the actions of his people and reveals who he is and how he is to be worshipped is forthtelling prophecy, and passages concerning the liberation of the people or the coming of the Messiah is foretelling.

And I have felt God more than ever calling me into a kind of forthtelling approach to evangelism. A ministry of bringing the Gospel to the world not by arguing finely for the existence of God and hoping for the best (which is something that I love doing and have been training myself to do since I was 16 or so), but rather by telling the world how great their God is, how awesome are his works, how manifest his glory is, if only they will see it. I want to speak forth how brilliant our Lord is and bring people, with the help of the Holy Spirit, to a recognition that there is a God, and he is mighty and is to be reckoned with, and they must realise this, because it is just so self-evident and obvious and the consequences of this truth are so deep and far fetching. It doesn't sound like a popular approach, but this is something which God has been telling me for a while now. I know that my way isn't to be a popular way. A few prophetic words that have been spoken over me over the past few years have pictured me as a kind of Jeremiah figure, and I really relate to him in a few ways, not least the young age at which God has called me to ministry and the stick that I've had to face, and continue to face for that. But I've also had sadness, sorrow and misery predicted as my lot because of my task as a prophet. Not in a bad way though, because of the joy that will result from the sufferings endured for the Gospel of Christ, the blessing that comes with the pains of the ministry of proclaiming on the mountains that our God reigns. So I'm also resolute to dig into the writings and biography of the prophet Jeremiah and hear from God through him, and let him continue to shape me through the life of this incredible man.

So that's what I got out of time with God on holiday. It's all fairly intense, and I'm starting to realise how inadequate I am for the task in front of me, as God continues to strip me of my pride. He still has a lot of work to do in me, but I'm encouraged by how hard I reckon the task of leading the youth group of St. Mark's is going to be this year. It means that God has to step in! And I'm looking forward to it so much.

And there's another thing which God had started to call me towards very specifically just before leaving for Tunisia: to redevelop the artistic skills which he gave me. I believe that God created a specific and blessed personality type that are the artists and that they generally have a grasp on the deep things of the world that others maybe don't have, and have a perspective on the world and on God which the church needs to hear in order to fully express God's glory through the diversity of human beings that he brings into his church.

I've talked to Paul Kenchington about the possibility of starting up a kind of artistic ministry at St. Mark's, and the possibility to expose some work of some of the artists in the coffee area to provide encouragement and challenge to the congregation, as well a forum of spiritual artistic expression to those with an arty bent.

So voila... A lot to think about and act upon as I start up work once again, and try and get into gear for Soul Survivor and click into gear even more for the coming year.

Hope the summer is treating you all very well.

'Til the next time people! And remember: keep blogging! (slightly inside reference to Captain Converter there...)

It's about real life! (Lamentations of J.)

2009-06-23T23:58:00.004+02:00

Hello. You can refer to me as "stranger" if you like. I'm going to try and keep my blog up to date... On va voir...

In any case, here's something I'd like to share with y'all:

It's difficult sometimes to know how to take the Bible, what to look for in it etc... I think that we often approach all of Scripture as one of Paul's letters: a kind of reasonable, systematic, precise account of what God is like, what he has done and how we should act in consequence.

It isn't at all so simple in practice. For example, which stories are told to serve as examples for us to follow and which ones are there to show that not even the greatest heroes are perfect bar Jesus? Let's take the life of David for example. He has a heart after God's own. A clear goody! Let's follow his example. He sleeps with Uriah's wife. Baddy! Let's recognize that Jesus alone is perfect and that God is so gracious in redeeming even the toughest of situations. However when the arch of the covenant arrives into Jerusalem and that David greets it with wild joy and dancing, I've always taken it as a call for us to be undignified before the world for the glory of God. However, there are a few things in this passage which seem to suggest to us that it is not a precedent for us to follow, not least the way that he speaks to his wife.

I'm not entirely sure what to think of that one, but I will continue in the mean time to dance for God, because the Psalms urge me to, and I will not seek to glory in this world but in Christ alone, at the expense of ridicule. But it still remains tough to know how to read this passage.

But what is even harder is the Lament! I mean these people are moaning before God, and it sometimes really comes very close to impiousness! Read Lamentations of Jeremiah, as I did the other day, and notice how Jeremiah ascribes all of the evils that have happened to Israel as God's fault! I personally love it, and find that the theology of Jeremiah is so spot on (it would be, as an inspired and inerrant Bible author!) and it states a case for the sovereignty of God as opposed to the free-will of man. But I mean it sometimes sounds like Jeremiah is saying: "what were you thinking God? Are you crazy?! Look what you've done now! Did you have to go and pull off a stunt like that? Control yourself for heaven's sake (quite literally!)" I mean, he is really worked up.

And I don't know if this is a theologically correct way of speaking, and not every word uttered in Scripture in theologically correct (take Job's comforters for example). So the question is: "what's the point? Why does God include this in his revealed Word for us?" Is God saying: "go on, have a go at me!"? I'm not sure if God is so much commending the exact content of Jeremiah's words as much as the nature of the prophet and his relationship with God and to the world. The point of the whole Bible, as exemplified perfectly in the Lament is that a relationship with God is to be lived out in the real world, in real life, for real! And life sucks! And we get fed up of it! And we don't understand it! "Why did she have to leave me?" "Why can't I get anything right at work?" "Why do I struggle with this sin which I can't shake clear of?" These are real questions, in the real world, and in all of these, God is THERE! He isn't only orchestrating from far off, he's there in it with us. He's sharing our pain, and listening intently to our complaints.

We've got to stop living as Christians pretending that everything' s OK. That is not biblical. It simply isn't. Simple trust in God doesn't mean that we should suppress feelings of doubt or of failure or of hurt. Trust in God is knowing that he is there with us. He cares about us, and will listen even to our sourest gripes. These may be sinful at times, and sometimes fringe on the heretic, but God is determined to be there. He prefers an open relationship with a worked up man than a closed, fake, smooth relationship with a seemingly perfect, all-is-well Christian. That's why Jesus went for the down-and-outs. Ever been in one of those uncomfortable situations when you're waiting at the bus stop, or at the station, or simply enjoying an afternoon read in mid-summer's sunshine and all of a sudden a bad-smelling, poorly-shaven homeless person starts complaining to you about how life sucks, and this society is all bad, and the government, and Sarkozy and bladibladibla... Well God loves those conversations! They're real! They're the people that Jesus chose to hang out with. He loves reality more than we do (agreed, he does have the slight advantage of knowing where it's all going, and being glorified by it all)...

You want to know God? Let him know you. Open up to Him. He wants you to tell him where it hurts. He doesn't want a fake relationship where you remain politely distant. He doesn't do politely distant! He leans close to your dirty, sweaty, stubbly, sinful face in all of its wretchedness and whispers in your ear: "speak to me, I want to know you. Use the swear words if they are what you really feel. Don't suppress them, we're going to work on them. I'm here to sculpt you big time to bring about big time change. So you've got to let me know you big time. The is real life. And in your real life, I'm here with you."

"¹⁹Arise, cry out in the night, as the watches of the night begin; pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord. Lift up your hands to him for the lives of your children, who faint from hunger at the head of every street. ²⁰ "Look, O LORD, and consider: Whom have you ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the children they have cared for? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord? ²¹ "Young and old lie together in the dust of the streets; my young men and maidens have fallen by the sword. You have slain them in the day of your anger; you have slaughtered them without pity. ²² "As you summon to a feast day, so you summoned against me terrors on every side. In the day of the LORD's anger no one escaped or survived; those I cared for and reared, my enemy has destroyed." (Lamentations of Jeremiah 2.19-22)

I'm loving Jesus instead (to the tune of Robbie Williams' great song "Angels")

2009-01-30T09:29:00.003+01:00

Over the past few months, I've noticed that there's a fairly big resurgence of Angelology in a few of the Christian circles that I'm part of... And it's been disturbing me without being able to put my finger exactly on what it was.

I would often try to shift my uneasiness aside and blame it on me lacking faith and being too rationalistic. But now I've actually realised what it is that bugs me, and I think that my unease was justified.

In fact there are two things, and here is the main one: the main moments where I've heard people talking about the angelic, have been in contexts of powerful worship or prayer times. I've heard these kinds of comments: "and there were even angels here this evening as we worshipped" or "I really feel that there are angelic forces moving around us as we pray". Todd Bentley was very much into angelology and this may well be what is fueling this, along with a lot of the content on God TV and other Christian channels. And it is disturbing for this one reason: angels are not creatures of God that are created to be the center of our attention. Angels are creatures of God that are created for one single purpose: worshipping God and giving glory to Him.

So when we're singing: "when the music fades, and I simply come, longing just to bring something that will bless your heart, as it's all about you Jesus", and you realise at the end of the worship session that people have been concentrating their awe on the fact that there are angels in the room, something's not right. There may well be a whole host of angelic beings, and dryads and nyads and fawns and dwarfs (not that I believe that the last 4 actually exist) in the room. But I'm focussing on Jesus! And I don't care if the earth is heaving beneath my feet and dragons and fairies and cherubs and seraphs (not that I believe in the first two of these) appear dancing around a campfire, I'm soulset on meeting with the living God tonight! The only reason why I feel excited about the fact that such extraordinary creatures even exist is because I know that they, even in all of their awesomeness, can but fall flat on the ground and cover their faces with their wings before the throne of God above. The Bible does not call us to centre on angels during worship, when there is so much more to be contemplated: Jesus-Christ is so high above any host of archangels all clad in shining silver. Just read Hebrews 1. I mean there is a passage in Revelation 22.9 where John falls flat before an angel. And the angel rebukes him and says to him: "no! Worship God!" So that's the first and primary reason why it bugs me.

The second reason why it bugs me is because of the great amount of speculation that surrounds angelology. The Bible doesn't actually say all that much concerning angels. And the catholic church in particular has created a ridiculous amount of mythology around angels. But protestants, and evangelicals of the more charismatic bent in particular are very much prone to the same kind of nonesense as well. The Bible is very clear about what we should do with speculation: have none of it (1 Timothy 1.4). Don't centre your attention on invented stories. The truth revealed in Scriptures is sufficient to fuel awe for a life-time: Christ, God incarnate, died for our sins that we may be raised to new life in Him, and live in once-broken fellowship with Almighty-and-Everlasting-God. If you need extra speculation and more in your life than these truths, then that is because these truths have not yet hit you with enough power! You have not let the magnificence of God sink into your most inner being enough, or you haven't realised the extent of the impossibility of our realtionship with God prior to Christ's death, or you haven't been sufficiently moved to kneel by contemplating the pain, suffering and hardships that Christ endured for your eternal salvation.

Please, leave aside these pointless speculations. If in the next life they are helpful to us, God will allow us to know more. But for now, let us centre our focus on what is attested and sure, and worthy of faith, and truly great: God-Almighty. Not the creature, but the incredible, unfathomable Creator-Lord-Redeemer-Friend of our souls!

Anthem to grace

2009-01-26T03:01:00.003+01:00

Wow! Haven't posted in an age!! Sorry...

Here's something which I wrote this evening as I couldn't sleep... All I've got to do is find a killer tune, and I'll be singing this in church. 16 verse long hymn! Well, if I group together 2 verses at a time, it's only 8 verses long... And if I group 4 together, it's only 4 verses long. Oooh! And if I group 8 verses together, it's only 2 verses long!

Hear the tears and see this blood
Mingled as a stream, a flood.
This river like a hammer thud
Washing clean this heart of mud.

Dark the picture of the tree
Bleeding all its sap for me,
Rending heaven, earth and sea
All to see the slaves go free.

Souls have wrenched before these tears,
Sweetest melody to ears
Bereft of shame and guilt and fears
All gathered up throughout the years.

How could a man killed as a thief
Rejected as the sinners’ chief
Make claim to ever bring relief
To this earth’s sorrow, pain and grief?

How could it be that there is grace
Poured out upon the human race?
How could it be that in this place
A beaming smile forms on His face?

A smile and laugh so plain to see
Amidst the fears and mockery;
A laugh into eternity
That wreaks of heaven’s victory.

For it is finished, it is done.
Death defeated, Christ has won.
Only sinless, perfect one,
Now revealed as God’s own Son.

Holiness so plain and strong,
Substitute for all our wrongs,
Ever free from Satan’s throngs,
Saints will praise Him with this song:

“Holy is our Lord of might
Crowned with praise and clothed in light,
Brilliant king and God so bright
Who once endured this fearsome plight.

To know the everlasting joy
Of being Father God’s envoy
Into this earth – a fragile boy
To live with us and here employ

His love for God in such a way,
To hear and follow every day
His voice and always to obey
Each word that He would hear Him say.

Unto that cross He heard Him lead
And tell Him that He had to bleed,
Atone for each of our misdeeds,
And sow the reconciling seed.

Slain He was and there he died,
God’s good pleasure satisfied
That every man who here confides
May run to God and there reside.

In dying He was glorified,
For every human justified
Cannot in his own strength abide,
Nor dare to nurture any pride."

It’s all by You, most glorious Lord
That anyone could e’er afford
To not die from your blazing sword.
High King, forever be adored.

O awesome treasure, great delight,
Our souls no longer live in night.
But let us ever keep in sight
The price you paid for our birthright.

Aaaah, the Holidays!!

2009-01-03T09:05:00.003+01:00

Helo everyone!!

I've just come back from 10 days in England, visiting my parents. It was SO good to do nothing. Beki forced me to not use my computer (I still managed to negociate the rights to write a 5000 word talk and checked my e-mails a bit too much. I just can't stop...), which was really awesome. Well we'd kind of decided beforehand that we wouldn't do any computering... I'm just saying that Beki forced me to make it sound better. Which isn't very cool for her... Sorry Beki!

Anyway, was just blogging to say that I feel so relaxed, and the holidays have really had the effect that they are supposed to have: give you the energy to go back even stronger...

And what's reaally great is that I've come back from holiday missing two things, mainly: my cat, Gaufre, whom I was reunited with yesterday, to Beki and my great joy and pleasure, and the second thing is the youth group, whom I'll see tomorrow!! It's awesome that I feel that way, because I've never been like that before. I really think that there's a fairly good dynamic in the group, as far as youth groups go, and I just love every single member of it.

I'd also like to use this time to recommend a great film: Madagascar 2! It is absolutely legendary. I went to see it with some of the youth not long before the holidays, and found it awesome, but not all that quotable... And then I went to see it a second time with my family, and in fact, there are loads of really funny things to quote. The best part is when King Julian tries to convince animals in the savana that they need to give a live sacrifice to the gods in the volcano to allow water to return to the reserve. "Now, who would like to be eaten by gods? Any hands?" Well, you've really got to see it to find it funny, but it's actually hilarious.

"I don't understand why the sacrifice didn't work! The science was so solid!"

Opportunities missed

2008-12-19T09:17:00.002+01:00

I was chatting with Beki this morning about an article that I read in YouthWork Magazine which really challenged me in the way that I was doing youth work. It was basically about radical living, and it got us talking about when we were younger, and how ashamed we were of being Christians when we were younger (if you want to know: Beki not at all, and me very much so... Shameful, I know!).

A few months ago, a lot of my friends from when I was in 4ème and 3ème added me on Facebook, and we chatted about what was up in our respective lives. As I told them that I was planning to become a pastor, and that all this time I was a Christian but never really spoke about it or even admitted to it, a lot of them told me that they were in fact devote catholics as well and still are involved in their churches (which is just awesome!). And I was thinking this morning: what an opportunity missed! This school that I went to was a catholic school, not a public school, and so there may well have been the possibility to start a Bible study group or some kind of Christian union, if any of us had had the guts to do it. And then think of the chance to reach out and really make a difference in the lives of the other kids around us!! The school was maybe 200 people strong, and if 10 or 15 of us had met up to pray and talk about God together, the sky really could have been the limit. It would have had a big impact on the world around us, especially as the people who were Christians were fairly high-profile, quite popular people in the school. We would have had the two best basket-ball players (and basket-ball was big in my school), two italian twins who were the first to grow beards (at age 14! Insane! I'm still struggling to put together a half-decent goatie at age 21!), and the best artist in the school, whom everybody found hilarious... We really could have made a difference, but we snuffed it.

We snuffed it because of shame, because of self-image, because of a desire to conform and a refusal to suffer for the cause of Christ. And I will have to account for that on the last day. I know it.

Guys, we have a limitted amount of time on this earth. Do you know that, despite what church gatherings seem to suggest, Christianity isn't for the sissies?! It's not for the wimps! You want to follow Christ? You've got to ask God to give you the courage that goes with that calling! Because Jesus promised us that we would suffer, be mocked, rejected and jeered because we follow him and not all that this world holds dear.

We've got to redeem Christianity in order to redeem this world! Bring on the warriors, the people who aren't scared to stand up, fight and die for the Lord that they swear allegiance to. The Bible asks for no less. We live in a world where courage is totally forgotten. Instead of it being a reason for us to feel depressed concerning our need to reach our world, let's count it a blessing: the current state of affairs, with the serious lack of courage in our fellow men, means that as Christians we will really stick out if we demonstrate courage and guts. And that is the best opportunity we have to make a difference. We have the chance to really grab people's attention if we live the life that Jesus wants us to live. It's now or never: you won't always be in this world. We've got to re-ignite a passion for missions, on our home soil, in France, and in nations, tribes and tongues that are unreached by the gospel.

What do you suggest we do? Are you ready to live and die for the Lord that you swear allegiance to?

God's Providence

2008-12-11T20:58:00.008+01:00

Yeah, I know, I can't resist a challenge. It's awful.

I've been thinking for a while about doing this, so the answer by "anonymous" to my previous blog on predestination has spurred me to go for it.

In it, he stated that we can't be as black and white as I was when it comes to free-will and predestination. A more nuanced approach would be closer to the truth. Now first of all, let me say that I am a strong proponent of the happy medium. I think that it is healthy, and most often the closest answer in complexity to difficult questions. However, I believe that the tension between man's will and God's is not a tension between God's will being totally free and sovereign and ours being totally free and independant rather than one between God's will being totally sovereign - the prinicple cause behind every effect in this universe - and the fact that we humans have a responsibility for our actions. I won't go into trying to tie up the knots of the tension between Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility. I'll leave such a task for Donald A. Carson, in his book called (fitingly) Divine Sovereignty and Human Responsibility.

What I want to do is simply show that man can't determine himself if God is sovereign.

Let's get one thing clear first: the Bible displays tension in many areas. God is three persons in one being, Jesus-Christ is a sinless God come into a decaying human world, born of a woman. The Bible is both human and divine in authorship. These are tensions but they are never contradictions. God is not three and one in the same way. He is not three persons and yet one person at the same time. When it comes to his being, he is one. There is only one God. When it comes to his personhood he is three (not the forms which he takes on, not the different characteristics that he has but rather the physical - or metaphysical - entities in which he exists). The greek word hypostasis (that which stands under) is helpful to understand the concept of personhood. So God is three and God is one. But not on the same level. If God were both three and one in being or both three and one in personhood, it would be a contradiction. It just can't happen!

It's the same with free-will and divine sovereignty. You can't say: "man can determin himself freely and God has control over him". It just doesn't work. It's a contradiction! Either man is totally free or God is totally determining. I'll try to show this with the help of pictures, trying to put the doctrine into practise:

The common position that I meet in anglican church (who just love to compromise, sometimes at the expense of reason) is that God has a general movement to history that he wants to give. And he will make history come to a point where Christ reigns and the whole earth is under his dominion. And this reign is going to come in with the assistance of free, self-determining agents.

But that can't work. Because this is what happens in a totally free universe (the "universe" that I'm depicting is the universe on its historical level, not its spacial level - obviously, as men can't go everywhere in the unvierse. It is the universe as far as man's ideas go and as far as history goes. There is a historical point which needs to be atteigned through the ideas, wills, movements and actions of men. This is what I've tried to depict here. It is a kind of "metaphysical" universe if you will. I am not quite happy with the word "metaphysical" but it comes close enough):

If man is free, God can't do anything with man whatsoever. Because man's freedom and God's freedom are on the same level (in the same way that God being 1 person and yet 3 persons would be on the same level), they can't both coexist. If man is free, self-determining, ultimate, then God can't make sure that history will lead towards a specific conclusion at all because he is not the determining factor: man is. This is black and white because shades of grey can't be allowed lest we be contradictory, like saying "oh, there's got to be a way to make a square circle. Just take a circle and make it a little more angular... That's not a circle any more! OK then well take a square and just curve the edges round a bit... That's not a square any more!

Now what most common theologians hold is that, OK, God restricts man's free-will and directs it in a way that will ultimately lead to the conclusion of history.

This, first of all, means that man isn't in fact free. He is simply given the illusion of freedom. Because this is now what the universe looks like:

If God starts determining man in any way whatsoever, man no longer has free-will. He can't have a little bit of free will, because with this little bit of free will he could will to have more free-will. And more. And more. Like Aladdin wishing for more wishes if Aladdin was ultimate and determining and the Genie was relative and determined. Man doesn't in fact have free-will at all: if he had free-will, he could just by-pass God's vortex and get out of it, because he would be self-determining. What God is saying is this: "you may move around as much as you want, but you can't go out of the vortex. Because you're not free to. I don't allow it". So already, we've erased the possibility of free-will, if God is sovereign. Because they are on the same level, man can't determine himself and also have God determine him. It does not compute! It is a contradiction!!

Now the next problem, as is illustrated on this graph is that even if God allows man to move around only within the limitations of the vortex, leaving man totally free within this vortex, how can he be sure that man will head towards the point where Christ is ready to let his reign break in? It doesn't make sense of the certitude of God's promises.

So how about God reduces man's will a bit more, letting him go "freely" inside a square inside the vortex and slowly edging him towards the point of Christ's reign? Basically, concretely, saying: your day to day decisions are free, but I am actually taking you on a ride, taking you slowly into different regions of the vortex which will ultimately lead you to the end of times where my full will is done". Something like this:

Now again, the issue for God is: "so that I can move on to the next section, I need man to go to point "x", with things like, for example, the death of Christ". And so God creates a smaller section in the vortex that man moves around in. And then a smaller one because still that one doesn't fit. And then a smaller one, until every one of man's details and minutes is predestined in every which way possible.

It is common sense that every action, however small has mass consequences, given time. I really enjoyed the film "Stranger than fiction" in which Will Ferrell, playing the role of Harold Crick, had unwittingly put his watch back by three minutes, which meant that he was a bit late for his bus, which made him cross the road at the exact right time to save a boy and get knocked over by a bus. And of course if the boy on the bike was there at that exact time it was because of the hug that he had given his dad before leaving his home. And if the bus arrived at that exact time it was because of all the minute details of the bus driver's morning leading up to her driving the bus. Everything has consequences, and leads to mass events, some of them dramatic. Think of the thousands of factors that must have been put together that meant that Christ would be crucified when he went up to Jerusalem around 27 a.d. It is just mind boggling. And then think of the millions of reasons why these things were the way they were. And the gazillion reasons why those previous things happened the way they happened. It is all too intricate for it to be the fruit of randomness, as far as God is concerned. There must be a sovereign ruler, designer, God up there making things happen.

Two last statements: the first one concerning randomness. Steven, in your very interesting answer to my blog post, you said that because man is rational, the fact that he is free to do what he wants won't lead to randomness and the order that we can see in this world is explained by the ordering virtues that man's mind has. Agreed. I just didn't express myself well enough when talking about randomness. I meant total "out of controlness" from God's point of view. I was speaking about God answering prayers. If man has free-will, he is totally out of God's control. Most christians will agree that God can intervene in history to make certain things happen. However, if God has no control over things in the first place, if he is to bring about a certain event, with, as a starting point, a world of mass complexity that he has no control over, there is no way, apart from through very weird and suspect turns of events (such as teleportation or the breaking in of freak randomness in someone's situation leading up to an answer to prayer) that God could answer our prayers. Our world is too complex to allow that, unless God has control and is the one intricately designing this complexity within the total control of his good will.

The second one concerns my first diagram. I know some people who will want to hold on hard as can be to the fact that man has free-will and that the first diagram must therefore be correct. This means that if God's will for this universe is to be done, and if we are to reach that point in history where man brings in the reign of Christ, that means that man is good enough, by himself, to make that happen. And I've been reading Genesis in my devotional time lately. And it depicts man's foolishness in such graphic terms: Adam and Eve, Cain, the population of the world before Noah, Ham, the people building the tower of Babel, Lot, Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot's daughters... It just never stops!!! it is just a whirlwind or man rebelling against God and God being gracious and working out his perfect plan for the salvation of mankind through the election of certain people, leading up to Christ, a Christ who is announced and proclaimed in typological imagery pretty much everywhere, from the creation of the earth, to the clothing of Adam and Eve, to Noah, to Melchizedek, to the Lamb slain in the place of Isaac. This is the main message of Genesis as far as I can see it so far: man is bad and God is in control, making things right. And man doesn't choose good. If history is to go anywhere positive (and it is: the cross tells me so, the promises of the second coming tell me so) then it has to be because God is in the business of determining history, not man!

So voilà. What do you think?

What's wrong with me??

2008-12-01T10:33:00.002+01:00

I've been reading a book called "How to Read the Bible for all its Worth" by Gordon Fee and Gordon Stuart lately, and they say that to read the Bible well, you have to ask the question, constantly: "what's the point?". I think that I've never struggled with this, because that's what I do with everything. And one of my greatest wonderings has been: "What's the point of the church service? What's its focal point and what is to be sought through it?". I started by believing for a long time that it was all about oly Communion. Holy Communion was to be the central point of the service, and everything should lead up to it. We shouldn't have a service without Holy Communion, because it defeats the object. That was mainly taken from the fact that "church gatherings" in the New Testament were based around communities "breaking bread together". But that was much more a "bring and share" meal than Holy Communion, when one reads the texts properly (Paul reprimands the Corinthians for not sharing with the poor, and just eating what each person had taken along). And the idea of Holy Communion as the focus of the service has slowly slipped away, and I now think that whenever Christians are eating together and that bread ond wine are at the table, they should eat and drink in rememberance that Christ died for them. I try to do that, but often forget.

Next, I thought that it must be "worship" that is the center of a church service. Thankfully, very shortly after that, I came to a deeper understanding of worship, as being a constant attitude of reverance to God, and a constant desire to make his name high in everything that we do. Songs at church are just a moment to especially focus on that, like Sunday is a moment to especially focus on God, and only God, when our whole lives should be focussed on God in all that we do. So in a sense, the end of a service is to worship God, as should everything else in our lives. But the songs aren't the focal point of the service. They aren't the main reason why we "do church".

Then I moved on to another conception: the traditional evangelical conception, which says that the point of a church service is to edify God's people. The focal point of the service is the sermon, and everything should serve the purpose of building up people's knowledge of God. When the early churches met up, they were taught by the apostles. Could that be the main focus of the service? I have always struggled with the idea that songs are made to edify people. Of course, they musn't carry false theology and lead people into error, but they are made to bring people to an expression of a heartfelt love and admiration of God rather than for edification. For myself, it is the more "wordy" songs that do that most (In Christ Alone, Before the Throne of God Above, Crown Him with Many Crowns etc. have just extraordinary lyrics). But sometimes, just a simple: "Oh how I love you Lord, you've won my heart" (that's the pre-chorus from Paul Oakley's "Majesty", a song that I don't sing enough. It's just great!) carries me into unequaled adoration for God. I just don't see edification as the main purpose of the church service. There should be edification, but t isn't the main purpose.

So what's left? Well right now, I think that the community side of it is so important. It is one of the two focusses of church as far as I can see, for now. We need to be united in singing when we come to church, and that is what needs to give it an extra dimension, otherwise, you might as well stay at home and sing on your own. There is power in all declaring together: "Our God Saves!!" over and over again, as in the chorus of Paul Baloche's great song. It is the together that makes it different. There is greatness in all being together and shouting out Amen in our hearts or aloud when the preacher faithfully exposes God's word. Otherwise, why not just use podcasts and be content with listening to sermons on the train? And I'm not saying that one shouldn't do that! I myself am a sermon podcast junkie! I've listened to a great proportion of John Piper's sermons, available at DesiringGod.com and I recommend them to you. But that can't replace corporate teaching. And there is something about being taught and lead by the spirit-inspired sermons which are specific to each church. And then Holy Communion: I've already tried Holy Communion in places where I wasn't in communion with the people, and was pretty convinced of the absence of true faith in a lot of the people receiving the bread and wine (how judgemental of me, I know...). And I hated it so much that I stopped taking communion there. Since moving to St Mark's, where community is so strong, and where the value of saving faith is an essential part of church membership, communion has just put on a whole new meaning for me. It is just spine-tingling stuff to be with this band of brothers and sisters who all love the Lord and all share in his salvation, and to share in the bread and wine together. So community is something that is the essential part of a church service. One of the two main focal points.

The second thing is so obvious and in front of my eyes that I forgot to see it for so long: why is church on a Sunday? Because Sunday commemorates Christ's resurrection, our salvation from sin, our reconciliation with the Father, our hope of life everlasting. Sunday is PARTY-TIME!!! We've been saved from our sins. We were slaves to the enemy of our souls, and Christ died to grab us out of the grasp of darkness, and bring us into his glorious light! Church services are supposed to be parties. Birthday parties are yearly, because they a bit of a little deal. Christ's cross and resurrection is a MASSIVE deal, so we celebrate it every week. Church service are supposed to be the weekly gathering of the saved, redeemed, overflowing-with-joy, party animalesque community! We're coming here to party. In the words of Kool and the Gang, "We're gonna celebrate and have a good time!"

And so as I said in my title: "what's wrong with me??" Because over the past few weeks, I'd been planning last Sunday evening's service at St. Mark's. And I'd decided to have it as a chilled, relaxed, mellow service, with candles and calm music. I mean what kind of a party is that?? That's the kind of party where people go out saying: "well that sucked!!" It was beautiful, and very awe-inspiring, but it was just another ritual. A service for the sake of having a service. It wasn't a celebration of the all-singing-all-dancing comunity of the redeemed. And I'm just annoyed at myself for having done that, because as far as I'm concerned, church shouldn't be like that. It is remainders of paganism that have introduced icons, candles, choirs etc. into the church. That is not what heaven will be like. It is not what the New Testament church was like.

So next time I lead worship, I'm comitted to start with this remix of Kool and the Gang's classic:

There's a party going on right here:

A celebration that's been going throughout the years

So bring your good times, and your laughter too,

We're gonna celebrate salvation anew!

(Come on now!) Celebration! We're gonna celebrate and have a good time!

Celebration! We're going to celebrate and have a good time!

It's time to come together, And dance along, that's our pleasure!

Everyone around the world, Come on!

Celebrate the Christ, come on!

It's time to come together, and shout to God, our great treasure:

"Our Lord reigns and our Lord saves!" Come on!

Celebrate the Christ, come on!

That's what church should be all about, in my opinion.

The anchor and the roc.

2008-11-20T11:00:00.002+01:00

Isn't God good? Isn't God amazing?

I was writing down a prayer this morning (I find that when I'm praying, writing it down helps me to concentrate more on what I'm saying), and I was thanking God for being the anchor which holds me down to the roc (same old classic christian crap, which sounds religious but is just a bit cheesy...). And then I thought: "Wow: and the roc that the anchor is holding me too is God as well". God the Holy Spirit is the anchor, who keeps me firmly rooted in faith in God, who is my roc and my fortress. It is so good to know that God never fails us in the sense that he is the unmovable roc, and he never fails us because he is the anchor that will not let us stray from the roc.

Have a great day. Delight in God. Make Him your treasure.

5 reasons why I don't like the concept of free-will

2008-11-19T09:53:00.003+01:00

OK, this is going to be my first really controversial piece, for most people reading me (yeah, you thought I had been controversial up until now? You've got another thing coming), because the idea of free-will is so engrained into people's minds. People know that some Christians are against abortion or same-sex marriage. But so many people have no clue that the concept of free-will is even contested by anybody except by weirdos who also happen to be into cultivating cannabis and wearing shoes that curl up at the end, like those that a dwarf would wear...

But the fact is that about half of the Christian evangelical spectrum belong to a church who historically, or to this day, reject the idea of free-will. Amongst church members, this position isn't so strong, but among pastors, and especially among scholars, the idea is very common. A good majority of baptist, reformed or presyterian churches reject the idea of free-will, as did their founders. The founder of the lutheran church, Martin Luther, also held that position, but soon after his death, lutheran churches and lutheran theologians drifted away from Luther's position. More recently, churches like New Frontiers reject the idea of free-will, as do a vast amount of well respected authors and theologians, including Charles Spurgeon, John Piper, John Stott, J.I. Packer and many, many others. Most people who don't believe in free-will consider themselves "calvinists" on this issue. John Calvin's name has been attached to this position because it is something that he talked about a lot, but many of these ideas were upheld and defended a fair amount of years before his time by Martin Luther, and a long time before that by St. Augustine, and before that still, I do believe, by the Bible authors, and this is what I want to show in my first point.

But first, we need to define free-will: in the philiosophical sense (which is also the sense in which most common people understand it), free-will is a fact concerning a human's being, which states that he can make a decision by himself, totally free of any control by God. When man makes a decision, he is not predetermined by anybody, and God can not, or chooses not to have any influence on this person's choice. His will is absolutely free.

1. Now my first point, and the most important point of all is that I believe that the Bible does not consider man as having free-will. Look at these biblical passages:

a. "In your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them" (Ps 139.16) This means that God not only knew what was going to happen to us in our every day lives, but that he had written them before the foundations of the world. In the same idea, here's Job 14.5: "Man's days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his bounds that he cannot pass" Man can't outplay God's detailed plan for our days and months.

b. Look at what Proverbs 21.1 says about the will of even a king, the man supposed to have the most liberty of will on this earth: "The King's heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord, he turns it wherever he will." He doesn't seem to have too much free will. God hardens Pharaoh's heart (Exodus 4.21; 7.3), he "turned the heart of the king of Assyria", and "stirred up the spirit of Cyrus, king of Persia". These three were all the most powerful man in the world at their times, and yet God controls their will totally.

c. And it is the same for every human being on this planet. Check out Psalm 33.14-15: "From his dwelling place he looks out on all the inhabitants of the earth, he that fashions the heart of them all." I think that the Bible is clear enough: we make decisions, have responsibilty and our actions have consequences, but we are not free of God's will. We are not free. The Bible says so. And if the Bible says so, I want to believe it. That's why I don't like the concept of free-will.

(For a more detailed explanation of what I believe on God's sovereignty, check out this post on the blog of my old home group in Maisons-Laffitte, Passion Fruit.)

2. My next two points go hand in hand. This is the aim of humanism: to make man more like God, and to make God more like man. It is classic, and yet the church has fallen for it!!

First of all, the deification of man. As we have seen, the Bible doesn't really seem to give that much freedom of will to man. Man's will is in bondage to sin or to righteousness, God chooses us, we do not choose God. This is clear throughout the Bible. And yet man refuses to see that. He wants to be autonomous. He wants to be free. He doesn't want to be determined by God, because man wants to be God. That's exactly the sin that led to Satan's downfall, and it's exactly the sin that the serpent entangled Adam and Eve with: "you will be like gods". That is a basic, sinful, human aspiration: to be like God, to have a free-will. So we just say that we are free, that our choices are beyond the extent of God's power. We choose to come to God. We are glorious. We are free. We are like the gods. And it is just such basic sinfulness, and that's why I don't like the concept of free-will.

3. And going hand in hand with the idea of man being like a god, the idea of free-will makes God more human that he is. And again, that is basic, basic sin. It is one of the core sins of the Old Testament, idolatry, described in the New Testament in these words: "Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles." (Romans 1.22-24). Man can't deal with God being so big. They can't deal with a God who has absolute control over everything, who deals with man according to his will, and whose judgements are right, and absolute. They just can't deal with it. So they go for smaller gods, gods closer to themselves. These are idols, and that is what humanism has done to God. It has humanised God, making him none other that a mere idol: a divinity that is to be looked up to, but who doesn't have the power to tamper with our will. And let me tell you: not only is that not the God of the Bible, it is not a God at all! It is a play thing! If God is to be God, he must be glorious! He must be ultimate! He must be the only reason by which we can live, and breathe, and talk and walk, and do anything at all. He must have power over our will! Otherwise he is not God at all! And I hate it when almighty God is made into a play thing, something that we can dispose of by the power of our own will! That's why I don't like the concept of free-will.

4. Now the fourth thing is the worst. It's the one that gets to me the most, even more than point number 2. The Bible, as has been believed by the protestant church since the reformation and as was believed by Paul and all the apostles, makes it abundantly clear that it is by grace that we have been saved. Here are a few references in the Bible which make this very plain (these are only quotes from the apostle Paul. There are many other in other parts of the Bible: Ac 15.11; Ro 3.24; 4.16; 5.2; 5.20; 11.6; 2 Co 8.9; Ga 1.6; 1.15; 4.7; Ep 1.7; 2.5; 2.8; Col 1.6; 2 Ti 1.9; Tit 3.7). What is grace? Grace is "salvation brought to us by God's initiative and by his works and given to us through faith in Christ, so that we don't have to do any works to save ourselves". Grace is salvation by faith, not by works. Check out Romans 11.6: "And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.". For grace to be grace, it needs to no longer involve our works. Why did God ordain that things happen this way? So that none may boast! (Ephesians 2.8-9). Our salvation is not down to us, but down to God. He saved us. It is God who saved us. He did the works, so that we may not boast of deserving our salvation. We are the beggars, God the generous giver. For such a long time, the Church tried to make salvation be by our own works. That is the main thing that the reformation changed, with Luther and Calvin and Zwingli and others preaching grace above all other things. Man wants to be able to come to God and say: "I am strong. It is by my strength and efforts that I am saved. I deserve to be accepted in". Luther and Calvin, backed by the Bible, said "no!" to that. And yet the protestant church still found a way to glorify itself in its salvation, by bringing in free-will. It is by faith that we are saved. Yes! But who gives us this faith? Proponents of free-will will say that as man is totally free to choose, it is man who gives himself faith. He is responsible for his own salvation. But that is no longer grace. If man, by some superior strength, or intellect or spirituality can come to faith in God, then he will be able to boast: "I was better than these non-believers, and I chose you, God, by my own free-will." THAT IS NOT GRACE, THAT IS WORKS ALL OVER AGAIN!!! Saving ourselves by our own efforts. Not relying on God for grace. God saves us by grace, through faith in Christ. And this faith is not ours! It is God who gives it to us! It's all over the Bible! Philippians 2.13: "For it is God who works in you to will and act according to his good pleasure"! It couldn't be clearer: we choose God, through God's work in us. He makes us will. He makes us work. I mean how can man believe that he can choose God by his own strength? Jesus himself said that for a rich man to get into the kingdom of heaven, it is as impossible as trying to thread a camel through the eye of a needle! So the disciples answer: "So who can be saved?" implying "well if even the rich, who have a comfy, worry free life, can't accept God, then we're surely all buggered!" And Jesus says: "to man, it is impossible. But to God, all things are possible." If you think that you got your faith by yourself, then let me tell you: you have just performed the impossible!! Quick! Call the newspapers! You are an amazing, amazing person! But the likelyhood is, actually, that it was God working in you to give you faith, and you didn't have the humility to recongize it, explaining your faith in God by your own free-will! It's man trying to get salvation by works all over again! I really believe that it is very, very close to heresy. It undermines God's grace in almost as strong terms as Jehovah's witnesses' unbelief in Jesus Christ's divinity does. It is man trying to come to God with pride in his own ability! And God hates that. And that is why I don't like (in fact, I'm quite close to hating) the concept of free-will.

5. And my last point is that believing in free-will (and therefore denying God's sovereignty) doesn't make sense if you're a Christian. If you believe that God can answer prayers, then you believe that God is sovereign, and therefore free-will doesn't exist. If free-will exists, then we are all like the massive amount of keys, in Harry Potter, flying around the chamber at random. It is just one massive, random, dissorganised mess. And so if you ask God something in prayer, he has no power to make this prayer come true, if he can't change the free-will of this key, to make it do a specific thing. And even if he could change the key's free-will, only when he decided to, he would have to find a really twisted way to make key A meet key B and say the encouraging word that B needs to hear. Unless it's all part of an intricate plan. And our world would be a lot wierder, and less respectful of natural laws for such answers to prayer to happen. But it's even worse with prophecies. If God says that "such-and-such" is going to happen, you have no way of knowing that it will happen if God doesn't control things. It just doesn't make sense, because every action has an incidence on the world around us, and affects the world around us. If free-will exists, nothing is fixed. Everything is just pure randomness. Prayers can't be answered, prophecies can't come true for sure. It just doesn't make sense of the world that we live in. So that's why I don't like the concept of free-will.

Now I realize that at some points in this post, I got a bit fiery. I regret it if I hurt anybody. It was not my intention. I do respect that the case for free-will also is compelling in some senses. But the Bible just seems so clear to me, most of the time, in rejecting free-will, that when I get writing about it, I just get a bit mad. I do believe everything that I have said in this post to be true. I just wish that I could express it with less fire. To help explain why I get mad from time to time when speaking about predestination and free-will and stuff, this post sums it up fairly well:

More on gay marriage and abortion

2008-11-14T09:51:00.002+01:00

A friend of mine commented on my post concerning Obama and McCain here, so I thought I'd answer him, because he's an intelligent person, who articulates his points really well.

Shmead no1,
I think that the comments made under my blog post allowed me to go further in my thinking, but my positions remain fundamentally the same: someone said that as God is "pro-choice" (he lets us choose between good and evil, faith and disbelief etc.), we should also be pro-choice. This challenged me, but I don't believe that that is correct. I think that God has wills, desires, and moral principles. Yet as sovereign, it is his prerogative to let people choose, and not dictate us. He wants to make us responsible. (This does not imply that we have free-will necessarily. But back to our subject...)

But as his people, and his representatives on earth, humans should be fighting to make God's moral principles be upheld. What God asks of us is to obey and uphold him in all that we do, including in our dealing with our fellow-humans.

If you read Romans 1, Paul makes a link between homosexuality and idolatry: it is the act of loving the person that is similar to you, refusing to confront the differences between men and women which is wrong, because it reminisces Man refusing to face up to the All-Other God, and going for gods closer to their comfort zone, or closer to their ego.

Marriage, in the Bible, is ordained by God so that humans may say something about God, as it is with every institution which God has ordained. We have here the All-Other God, coming into a covenant relationship with Men. And through toil and struggle and pain, he will stick to men, and expects to be stuck to by men. Proof of this point is that God portrays his relationship with Israel in the Old Testament as a marriage. He was cheated on by idolatrous Israel, and yet he remains faithful (cf. Hosea). And in the New Testament, Paul tells men to love our wives as Christ loved the Church, laying down his life for them, and he tells wives to submit to their husbands as the Church submits to Christ, our head. God wants to be spoken of, and reflected throughout his whole creation. And this is correctly displayed only in a heterosexual marriage, be it amongst Christians or not. We need to make sure that God will be reflected here on earth. That is our role as his representatives.

Voila, that's a Calvinist's view on marriage.

Concerning abortion, I think that the Bible makes it clear that "you shall not murder". That's a given. You say that there are cases, like self-defense, where it is legitimate to fight back. Fair enough, perhaps, but again, I think that the Bible makes clear that we are to uphold the defenseless. Pro-choice? Urrr, perhaps. But whose choice? The mother's choice or the baby's? The Bible seems to take the side of the poor and needy, not of the strong, quite generally. I also read a book by Stanley Hauerwas, a methodist ethicist and theologian, who is a big proponent of pacifism. The book is called The Peaceable Kingdom, and in it he says that if confronted by a gun to your head, you should not retaliate, because God asks you not to. But rather you should trust God, in his providence, to do something to get you out of there. Do not be your own judge and defender, but let God do it. I'm not sure if I'm ready to be that extreme yet. But it definately challenges me, and speaks strongly to the pregnant woman, who might die if we don't kill the baby, or who might get post-natal depression. Whereas in aborting, the baby will definately die. Maybe the best thing to do is to go through with the pregnancy, obeying God in this, and trusting that he will do the miracle.

I think that you make some interesting points, and the world, and the Church would be a much better place if Christians traded their characteristic fear and pathological dislike of homosexuality for your positions. I also believe that we should find a way to let homosexuals have the same financial benefits as heterosexuals who are married, without binding them in front of the law in a covenant relationship. Because I don't find that fair. But then I can imagine how tough that could become. I also really believe that heterosexuals sin sexually as much as homosexuals do, maybe even more so. And I also think that we need to learn to have compassion, and care for the mothers who are facing a desire, or felt need for abortion. It really can't be easy, and as a man, I feel so much worse for saying what I say about abortion, as I can't really back up my principles in act. All I can do is remain a faithful husband become a model father. And if I do say these things, it's because I truly, yet humbly believe that it is God's will, and as his prophets, we should speak out in boldness against cultural trends which seem to go counter to the Bible's message.

This world is fallen, and carries tragedies. It is very hard to deal with them pastorally. But I really believe that we should stick to God's will and trust Him to take care of the rest. Simply because He is ultimate and we are relative.

Feeling really good!!

2008-11-10T12:04:00.003+01:00

Yesterday at church was looking like it was going to be a nightmare: I had three major things going: in the morning, our normal youth group activities were planned, then at the five thirty service, I was supposed to be leading worship, and finally we had Fusion on. Two of these three things were looking like they were headed for disaster, on Saturday afternoon. There are three youth leaders at St Mark's, one of which was in Belgium visiting her boyfriend, the other one was on a business trip, and the other one was on holiday in New York, due to come back on Saturday. So she was the only possible option to help out at the morning youth group, and at Fusion. Only issue is that coming back from New York means jet-lag. So she said that she could only commit to one of the two youth activities. I asked her if she could be there in the morning.

But I was still really worried that if I lead worship at the 5.30, and then did the talk at Fusion for the second time running, and did the game and lead the prayer time, that it would just become, or feel like the "Nathan show", which is just not good, not helpful, tiring for me, annoying for the youth. So I asked Beki to organize the game. My talk was bound to be a disaster, because I had felt that I should talk on money, completely forgetting that it was Paul's theme for his sermon this evening at the 5.30. At the beginning of the service I was thinking "oh, it'll be fine, there's so much stuff to say about money, Paul won't cover it all". But he did, pretty much!! It was an awesome sermon, and one of the best sermons on money that I've ever heard... So Fusion was headed for disaster.

In the end, it all went beautifully. I mean really beautifully. I mean really, really beautifully. Beki's game was awesome, and it really went down well. My talk in the end just flowed. There was one thing that I felt needed to be added to Paul's talk, so I spoke on that, which lead into speaking about law and grace. And it was great. And it sparked discussions concerning money among the youth, which was really positive.

And I had a spark of genius. And this is where the sovereignty of God comes into play. Check this:

For a few months, I've been wanting to get some of the young people in youth group and put them into a kind of semi-leadership role. I think that there are some kids who are ready for it, and given proper training, it can really be great. And the leadership team has felt the need to have people from amongst the youth coming through the ranks. And after a few e-mail conversations with the other leaders, and a couple of discussions with Paul, I'd set my mind on four candidates. But I hadn't done anything more beyond that. And at Fusion, I was thinking: well there are no girls to lead the girl's prayer time. Who can do it? Well Anna of course! But then is it asking a lot of her, and would it be weird when I haven't actually announcd to them properly that we're thinking of having a co-leadership team? What do I do? I could tell her now. Yes! And tell the two guys as well who are here today! (the fourth person wasn't around) And ask them what they think about it! And ask the two guys to lead the guys prayer group. Like that I can tidy the room! It's perfect. So I took them aside and asked them if they wanted a leadership role, and what they thought of the idea, and if they wanted to lead the prayer groups. Their reaction was really positive, and I got to pray for them, and off they went! It was awesome!! I love that. But it was really God proding me, forcing my hand.

Because I'm lazy. Getting youth into leadership means organizing training days, it means mentoring. It's a lot of work, and I'm rather unorganised. So I just didn't get around to it. And my commuication with the other leaders over the past few weeks concerning that hasn't been great. So I hope that I'm not undermining their expertise and leadership in taking that initiative, but I really felt that God was severely urging me into doing it. And I think that we had reached a latent conclusion on who to ask. So there you go, the ball is rolling. And God is so good, because he has a plan for these kids, and he won't let my lazyness get in the way of it, and that's awesome.

But my greatest lesson from this Sunday has been grace. Because I've been brought up with the kind of idea that if you're going to do anything for God, you always need to be impeccable in your spiritual disciplines, and you need this and that, and confession and asking for forgiveness. It's all bullcrap. It is not New Testament theology. It is not grace. I, lately, have been awful with my spiritual disciplines. I've been really slack on certain sins. I've been lazy, unfocussed, I haven't been comunicating correctly. And yet GOD, yesterday, was at work. And he was telling me something amazing.

"Nathan, it is not by buzzing around, doing stuff by your own strength that you're going to make any difference in these kids lives. You're disciplines have been awful. Your preparation for today has been insufficient. But in all this, what I'm going to do is that I'm going to take these circumstances, and push you to have a word with these kids that you've assessed and deemed fit for leadership training. And in this, I'm displaying my grace. And I'm going to take your failing in preparing (or mispreparing) the talk for Fusion, and I'm going to lead you onto the subject of... grace! It is not by obeying any laws that you are going to please me. It is not by doing stuff that you are going to manage to get anything done. I am the giver, you are the begger. And I give good things. I put you down to the condition of beggar yesterday, and I delivered on demand. I don't condemn, you, I give you grace. Now go and sin no more. Because you love me, and you don't want to grieve me. Go and feed on my Word. Accept to take time in fasting to seek my face. Pray for the young people that I've entrusted in your care. Pray for yourself. Pray for your wife. Because you love me. And work harder at your job. To bring these kids to me by your strength? No! But because you love them and you love me!".

God is so good. He is so gracious. He is so unreligious. Let's imitate him!

I'm so shallow

2008-11-07T09:27:00.002+01:00

Just so you know... I've got a new phone. It's really nice. It's has this awesome function which makes it change theme according to the season of the year and the time of day... It's awesome. I love it. Here's a picture of it:

Coming soon a much more serious blog post of the Chronicles of Narnia...

Yeah, more politics...

2008-11-05T23:30:00.003+01:00

Well I was lying in bed trying to find sleep... And I couldn't. I kept wondering why people would vote for McCain. I'm too european to be able to see their point of view. So I'm a blinkered bigot as well...

So I thought that I'd imagine a discussion with a friend of mine who supports McCain. I know a few of them, some of which are people that I love and respect a lot. I've found that imagining discussions with people (which some people view as the highway to insanity) is a very fruitful method to stretch my mind and help me develop fertile intellectual insight.

Their main point is (because I'm talking about the intelligent, Bible-believing christian guys here, not the "Oh, he's affiliated with terrorists, and his name means he must be Muslim, and it's in his blood stream" kind of people) that the guy doesn't have Christian ethics, namely on matters of family and sexuality etc.

To that, I must conceed: "agreed". I do not think that his positions on abortion (which I do consider homicidal, however unpopular or extreme that position sounds today) are very wrong, and that God does look upon the killing of human beings (however undevelopped) with holy and righteous wrath. God takes out judgement on the purpertrators of these crimes either by nailing an innocent man to a cross 2000 years ago, or through hell at the end of unrepentant people's lives. It sounds awful, but it is what the Bible teaches, I strongly believe. And if one would rather trust human wisdom to the inspired word of God, then that man is a fool. (for a good explanation of my view of why a wrathful God is the only possible good God, check this, it sums up what I believe, pretty much). So yes, agreed on abortion.

On gay mariage, I must conceed: "agreed". I think that the Bible teaches that it is wrong. (More on homosexuality a bit later on this blog. I'm planning to be long here, so I have no time for this). Right, so 2-0 McCain? Not quite, because he wasn't entirely sciptural on his position on these either. But yes, advantage McCain.

Now I get to answer the dude I'm chatting with. One of the main arguments that people, even Christians, hold against Obama is that the guy wants to raise taxes. This is when we get serious. We'll call my friend Bob (because I don't know any Bob's), and I'll be Me.

Bob: In a time of financial crisis, the guy wants to raise taxes? Take more money from the people?

Me: Wowowow, first of all, taxes would be raised only for people earning a certain amount, which will help to spread wealth around, and help things like health care be available to everybody.

Bob: But shouldn't people be aloud to do what they want with their money, instead of being taxed by the state to redistribute the money that WE earned? Isn't that a step towards communism?

Me: Well it may be a step towards communism compared to full blooded capitalism, but who told you that capitalism is more Christian than communism? Wait, sorry, I'll back off a bit here, because I might get slaughtered if I say anything else like that to an american...

Bob: No, let's go there: I think that the Bible promotes the right to private property, and it gives people responsibility for their own wealth. And freedom is like a core christian value.

Me: OK, but the Bible gives responsibility to the state leaders to promote justice (Micah 3, Matthew 23.23 etc. etc. etc.), which is so much more present in the Bible than freedom. Just look into the prophets, and what he has to say about social justice there. It's all over the place. And you say that being able to do what you want with your money is fair, that it promotes freedom because everybody has an equal chance. I'll show how people don't have an equal chance if you don't redistribute money: a little kid whose mum (a single mother) has to juggle between three jobs to make ends meet and to be able to pay for school fees and health fees for her family does not have the same chance to succed as a little girl whose dad owns a big company. Why? Because while a woman does the cooking and cleaning for that little girl, she has time and money to dedicate to homework, leisure and expanding her mind. The boy can't do any of those because he has to shop, cook and wash up. His mum doesn't have time to do these things because she survives by doing the cooking and washing in the little girl's house for a ridiculously low fee. That woman should be able to cook and clean for her own little boy, but she has no time for that, because she's cooking and cleaning for a rich little girl, to survive and allow her boy to live and go to school! It's just wrong!! And then imagine that at school, the boy is in the same class as that girl. Will they consider themselves equals? There is a horrible gulf between human beings that we believe to be equal in the sight of God. They do not have the same chances, because wealth is spread unfairly. Capitalism without state intervention leads to injustice, and absence of freedom and equality for the poorest. And just imagine how easily hate can germ in this little boy when he thinks about the unfairness of it all. It can't lead to anything good. Ever. And nor does God see it as good.

Bob: Right, OK, fair enough, let's back off the taxes, and see what he says about raising gas and electricity prices. How can that work in a time of financial recession?

Me: Well you do know that the energy that we use is wearing the world really thin right now. We've...

Bob: Yeah but we have no money for that kind of crap! We're in a financial recession dude!

Me: Yes, and this world is dying because of what we're doing to it! You cut the crap! Did God tell us: "look after this beautiful planet that I created for you, and called "very good" on the sixth day" or did he say "fill up your pockets with wealth and even more wealth"? Which sounds most biblical? Are you going to benefit the economy and let God's world die? I am 100% behind Obama on this one. Here is guy who understands our responsibility and is ready to make financial sacrifices if it means saving our planet. I mean come on. You don't want to pay more taxes to enable poor people to live decently, you don't want to pay more for your electricity so that we can invest money into sustainable growth! Where's your heart for the last, the least and the lost? This is crazy!

Bob: Right, OK, back off man! I'm not all that bad...

Me: Well you sure sound it! Get your priorities right, or watch out severely to what God's going to say to you on that last day.

Bob: I get your point. But honestly, I think that as a responsible Christian, issues of family ethics are more important than raising taxes. Doesn't the Bible call homosexuality an abomination before the Lord, and "thou shalt not kill" is in the 10 commandments! That sounds pretty hardcore!

Me: Well wait a second, because if I read the Bible, I think that God gets more worked up about issues of injustice than homosexuality. Just read the prophets. It's all over the place. I think that Micah 6.8 sums it up pretty nicely: What does God require of you? That you frown at the two dudes holding hands in the Underground? That you speak out against gay marriage? No! That you act justly and love mercy and walk humbly with your God". Even if I stop at Jesus, he talks about the way that you handle your money and the way you treat the poor so much more than your sex life. And when it does say "don't kill", it also says : "don't steal", and I believe that a Bush/McCain financial policy is robbing, but not only robbing, it is stealing from the poorest of the poor. It is tragic.

Bob: But doesn't abortion make a good claim for McCain?

Me: Well it's true that the point is compelling, but McCain isn't really entirely biblical on that front as well. Palin is, but then she just doesn't have a clue about so much, it's not even funny to get started on her... I really think that Obama isn't a saint, that there are some things that are wrong in his positions, but I really believe that he is the man that America needs right now. Oh, and you might just slaughter me for this, but I think that it's exciting to have a president who'se been under the preaching of Rev. Jeremiah Wright for years. I don't see anything wrong in that guy's statement. For all that America did to it's black people, I think that God is angry, and there have been atrocious things done to human beings throughout your history for which it is only biblical to say: "God damn America". I think that people should take off their blinkers, and be open and honest, and say that for so much that America has done, "God bless America". They are a great nation. Stalwarts in promotion of human rights, benefactors to the world in defeating the nazis, and the soil from which sprung up many, many men and women of God. But let's put being biblical ahead of being patriotic hear and admit that they also have SO MUCH to answer for on so many issues. As do every country, and Britain and France first and foremost. But you can't just say "God bless America" when America is clearly going against the will of God! So there you go, that's why I'm really happy that Obama is the elect president of the USA. Oh, and don't even get me started on their respective positions on foreign policy and the war in Irak.

Bob: Why not? I mean let's go there...

Me: No, let's just not! It's too easy! You're doomed. Just let it go!

That's about as far as I got until I decided to blog it all... It's awesome, because in my mental conversations I always end up being right! Life should always be like that!! God night all.

Barack Obama is the President of the United States!!

2008-11-05T19:47:00.002+01:00

Well you probably knew that already. Even Beki knows that, and watched the videos of the speech with me.

I remember a few years back, when I was a big Will Smith fan (hold the scoffing, you nasty people. God will judge you all!!), he said that if he was elected as president of the United States (one of his career ambitions once his Hollywood stardom has died down, I'll have you warned!), the first thing that he would do is paint the White House black.

One thing I love about Obama is that although he is black, and that he is proud of it, and that it constitutes a part of his identity, it does not affect his politics as such. It is amazing to have an "African-American" finally in the oval office which should have happened long ago if it weren't for bigotry and a rigged democracy in the "land of the free" for decades, but Obama is first and foremost a democratic, honest politician, who wants the good for his country. There isn't, from what I've seen and heard of him, any hate or remorse towards the past horrors that have been inflicted upon the black people of America. He is a forward thinking, loving politician who, although I do not agree with every one of his political ideas is perhaps America's best president since the likes of Abraham Lincoln. I'm a very happy person. But pretty disgusted by the hatred expressed by the Republicans present at McCain's speech last night. They are booing their NEW PRESIDENT! Elected by the people. It's quite terrible to refuse to move forward. But then you know, that's life. There will be haters, there will be bigots and racists. Let's try and make the best of it.

The chick-i-fied church

2008-11-04T14:47:00.003+01:00

Dudes, watch this: it is awesome. I love this guy, Mark Driscoll. Good doctrine, great practise. The guy is kind of the pastor that I would like to be (then again I'd also like to be John Piper, I don't know which to choose).

This is so spot on. This guy has hit the nail on the head. There are no guys in church, so no wonder church doesn't appeal to men. So it's a vicious circle. And how do we get men back into church? By offering them something else than a few songs, in a mediocre setting, and a mellow meditation, we're just chasing guys out of church. Our places of worship are full of wussies! I'm sure that I couldn't find a single guy in my church who could beat me in a on on one duel. And I'm pretty sure that no guy in church would want a one on one duel with anybody. Where's the testosterone (which, as far as I'm concerned is a gift of God, not a fruit of the fall)? Where's the agression? Where's the fighting spirit that's going to win us battles in the heavenly realms, bring God's kingdom in by forcefully and brutally wrestling it out of the grasp of the ennemy? Are we praying like there's no tomorrow (because there may not be)? Are we confronting error within the church, in a manly way? No. Why? "Because that's not what Jesus would do" Would be your classic answer. Total nonesense! Look at Jesus in the Temple, turning over the tables. Look at how he speaks about the pharisees. Jesus was a big, in your face, mass of manlyhood. And he was a loving man. He cared for his own. But he was not a mild person. He was buoyant for God, and for his people. And look at Peter: rashness personified. Elijah, David, Moses. They're all frickin' madmen! Where are our madmen? Joe Smart and Terry Meek don't seem to me like they're going to do any mass spiritual damage.

We must go!

2008-11-04T13:35:00.009+01:00

Last Sunday, at the Five Thirty service at St. Mark's, we sang this great Martyn Layzell song (btw, I'd so love to have a name that has 2 "y"s and 1 "z" in it...), so I thought I'd share the lyrics. I've also added the lyrics to a song that I wrote a little while back. I'm really happy with the words, but a few people have told me (and I agree) that it isn't a very good congregational song, so you'll never hear it in church...

We have heard the call to go

Into the world with seed to sow

With living words within our hearts

We will walk as Jesus walked

Live a life of sacrifice

And die to our human desires

To see the poor and not pass by

Is to walk as Jesus walked

Help us walk as Jesus walked

But if not now then when will we

Take up our cross and follow?

And if not us then who will go

And walk as Jesus walked?

Be good news in all we do

Bind up the broken hearted

Heal the sick and raise the dead

Is to walk as Jesus walked

Help us walk as Jesus walked

With passion for the lost compassion for the poor

To every corner of this world we’ll walk as you have walked

A Father to the fatherless

You’re Father to them all

Awesome and challenging words! You can listen to it here:

Here's my song.

Verse 1

You have a heart for broken lives,

That’s why you came on earth to die.

Now make our hearts respond to yours,

As from the depths our spirits cry.

Pre-chorus

Stir up our love o Lord,

Let us hear your call,

Give us hearts like yours,

To live just for your cause.

Chorus

We want to be your workers

Who will go for You,

Let us love the poor,

Fulfil your great command.

We want to be your prophets

Who will speak for you,

Let us go and make a difference in this land,

Let us give to this world mercies from you hand.

Verse 2

Lord make your spirit work in us,

To act like those whom you’ve called just.

And let us weep with those who weep,

And let us lift the poor and weak.

Bridge

This world must know so make us go,

This world must know so let us show.

This world must know so spirit, blow,

This world must know so let us glow.

God make us testify of you,

Let our words and deeds speak the truth.

This world must know so we must go,

We must go, we must go.

Nathan Lambert, 2007

You can listen to it here. Sorry about the poor quality, and the awful singing:

And then last night, at home group, a couple who were in Thailand over the past few weeks, visiting Burmese refugees, gave the testimony of what God was doing there. It was really awesome, and extremely challenging. More about that down the line, I'm sure.

Basically, I've been really challenged over the past few days concerning our Christian mission on earth. These thoughts haven't had time to mature yet, But I'm already thinking about organising a big "compassion" week-end for the youth group at St. Mark's over April or May. We've got Slum Survivor planned on our calendar of activities, and it would be awesome to turn it into a whole week-end, with teaching on the state of world poverty and a presentation of a few societies that the young people could get involved with if they were thinking of doing a gap year. Work in progress, but I feel that God is stiring something. I so happen to be listening to Matt Redman's "Shine" right now. "We'll be exploding into life, like a supernova's flight. Set your holy church on fire, living for your glory". Let's get off our behinds andlove mercy, do justly and walk humbly with God (says the man who plans to spend the rest of his afternoon studying...)

The awesomest plaque in history...

2008-10-31T18:18:00.004+01:00

Walking to the library in Versailles today (as one does when one is a high flying intellectual like myself...), I walked past the "Palais des Congrès", which happens to be on our road, and just outside of the palais, was this amazing plaque which i think I should share with the world... It made me happy!! A plaque for Pink Floyd, outside a place where the greatest musicians in the world have played. Awesome. And proudly donated by EMI Records of all people!! What a world.

How cool is the Bible?!!

2008-10-30T19:37:00.003+01:00

Do you know that the word "cool" appears three times in the NIV translation of the Bible?

Gen 3.8; Jer 18.14; Luk 16.24.

Except that every time they are using the word in the "cold, fresh" sense of the word... Shame. I long to have a version which says: "Cool, cool, cool is the Lord of hosts"!!

You see, that's what happens when I spend time waiting for Beki, with a Bible word search device at arm's reach. I hope that you appreciate the cool little "christianity.com" device on my blog. May I please add that the positions and views expressed on that website are not necessarily mine... Thought I'd put a little disclaimer when I saw who was advertised on the ad banner of the aforementionned. No names. Not my type!! I'd recommend Bible Gateway as a bible research tool. More translations, and less annoying pop-ups.

Here's what I came up with...

2008-10-29T08:28:00.007+01:00

I'm disappointed, but not despairing. I'm not an artist, and in fact, when I wrote that previous article I was hoping to tread new ground, knowing full well that it was very unlikely that I would. I quite like the end result, but as far as creativity goes, it is rather stale. Much too complex to be a logo in any case. It's more of a basis for the poster, and I'll have to rethink logos. So I'm not unhappy, but my standards are low. I'm not nearly creative enough. But some of you out there are, and you have to take up the mantel. [That paragraph was me providing a easy escape for myself...]

Creativity in the image of God

2008-10-28T23:20:00.005+01:00

Yesterday I was speaking at a youth retreat organised by my old church, in Aubergenville. I was to speak on self-image (a subject which I've been asked to speak on lots lately. Is God trying to tell me something there? I haven't worked out what yet, if there is more than mere coincidence) and then on creativity and the arts. I was talking about God's indescribable and awesome creativity in the act of making this world. And all without any models.

All human creation is based upon the model of God's creation. He is the real creator. We are merely imitators. And yet there well and truly is a sense in which Man is made in the image of God, and is able to be creative, inventive, and make beauty spring from places where there is no beauty.

What is sad is that Christians lag behind non-Christians, generally, on the creative scene. Just look at the Christian music industry. We take styles of music that already exist and that seek another purpose than the glory of God, and we try to make it into something that glorifies God. There is no inventiveness per se. Now I'm not saying that this is intrinsically bad, but I would just like to point out that that's the way that Satan works. Anything that the Devil does is distortion and mockery of what God made. God made sex, the devil twisted it to lust and pornography. God ordained that we worship Him, the devil twists us to worship idols. God made music, so that He may be glorified in it, and the evil one twists it to outrage and discredit God. And Christians use the same method, in a sense, on the creative scene. We don't tread new ground, we simply redeem what has been given over to Satan.

So if there is even such a thing as evil music, it is because God created music as good, and the Devil distorted it. So in a way, what Christian bands may be doing is reconquering music that is usually associated with evil and sin and lust and satanism, and giving them back to the glory of God. Nothing speaks with such "umpf" as a hard-Rock metal guitar riff, and this can be a reflexion of God's power. There is massive impetus in a rap flow, enough to vehiculate, more than classical singing, some of the more belligerant and wrathful attributes of God. So what Christian artists are doing is good, and biblical.

And yet I still have this feeling than Christians should be able to soar above this way of living out the creativity that God gave us. God's redemptive work is to be reflected in the redeeming of artistic expressions that have been twisted to serve Satan. But what are Christians doing to create something totally new, something totally fresh, displaying for our world to see that our God is creative, inventive, and that he takes joy in mass diversity of fresh expressions of creativity?

I'm going to be working this week on a design for Pierrefonds 2009, and my greatest desire is to be able to break through the limitations of artistic expressions that are already out there and to tread new ground for the glory of God. And I encourage everybody out there, be you artists, or entrepreneurs, or inventors, or preachers, or anything else, to seek to live out the image of God in your work, and to be inventive, creative in a true sense, to tread new ground and display the wonders and immense possibilities of this incredible world that God has placed us in.

Such a sinner

2008-10-28T19:01:00.000+01:00

It's amazing... I was just reading over my blog post, and then I thought that it painted a picture of myself which, right now, I feel very far of. I don't love my God nearly enough, nor do I spend nearly any time thinking about things that are true, noble or good. I'm deceived by the lies of this fallen world so often, and I can't claim to know much about the "joy of knowing Christ" that Paul refers to in Philippians 3.8. I'm weak and sinful. I don't have a strong enough love for Beki nor for anybody. Not even myself. I've felt awful all day because my thoughts haven't been set on God. Sounds a bit strange for someone who's worked in a church all day.

I need to change.

There, that's the real me.

Why I'm blogging...

2008-10-28T16:23:00.000+01:00

Well the other day, I was reading a blog post on DesiringGod, called: "Six Reasons Pastors Should Blog". And I thought that every point that Abraham Piper made on that post was spot on. And since I'm a pastor of sorts, I thought that I should start blogging.

Beki is always complaining that I don't speak enough. I think that she's right. But my problem is that the things that I think about (and there are lots of those!) never interested normal people. I mean even last night, I was laughed at over dinner, and had a mocking finger pointed at me, and two "L for Loser" fingers stuck against foreheads when I refered to my passion for dinosaurs as a kid. And after dinosaurs it was sea animals. And after sea animals I got into basket-ball and knew the height, weight and statistics for points-per-game average, assists-per-game average and rebounds-per-game average for even the most obsure NBA players, such as Randy Butler or Clarence Weatherspoon. And then the Lord of the Rings. And now flipping theology of all things. I'm interested and passionate about things that people don't care about, quite generally.

And yet I think that this latest passion of mine, who happens to be a person -the great God of this universe - is worth writing about. Even if no-one ever reads this, he is worth writing about. He is worth being made much of in my life. "Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent and praiseworthy - think about such things." (Ph 4.8, NIV) If Paul were writing today, he may add : "and blog about such things". And what is truer, nobler, more right, pure or lovely, more admirable, excellent or praiseworthy then the awesome God that revealed himself to us in Scriptures, and in the flesh of our Lord Jesus-Christ?