The Dumbing Down of Today's Christians

Just yesterday, at church, our pastor announced that in the Fall, our church will begin an in-depth and comprehensive series, on Christian doctrine and foundational beliefs. I was so pleased to hear this, and it is yet another affirmation that God brought us to the right place, when we changed churches earlier this year (we were at our previous church for 13 years).

This got me thinking last night when I went to bed. I wonder how a typical church nowadays would think of a regular course on doctrine. Though I am not a betting man, I would bet that many churches would not be on board with such a course. You see, when you talk doctrine, you are starting to talk in absolute terms, and I think that the overall church community (at least in North America) has covertly fought against this for years. Even at our new church, as I have become more integrated into it, I found out that it wasn't even five years ago that our church had a major church split, losing 400+ members (who incidentally went and formed their own church). The sticking point? There was a segment of people who did not like the fact that the denomination specifically brought in a sound-doctrine Bible teacher who teaches only from the Word of God (the Bible) and will not compromise on this - this was in response to concerns that the church's former pastor was watering down the teaching of God's Word). Needless to say, this rather large splinter group ended up forming their own church (which like many "contemporary" churches nowadays, don't even use the word "Church" in their name anymore). Now, even before I knew anything about this splinter "church", I suspected that this church had as part of its philosophy one or more (if not all) of the following items:

a) come as you are - no dress code or no expectations of dress
b) this is a non-threatening environment
c) the music here is cool
d) we strive to redefine church - you may be surprised by what you see
e) we have or are open to women in ministry
f) we don't use "stuffy" versions of the Bible, it's Eugene Peterson's "The Message" that is for us, baby!
g) it doesn't matter where you are or what you have done, God loves you

Now, the last point is sticky - it is technically true, but most of these churches don't teach this Biblically; that is, they don't discuss this from a sin and salvation and a forgiveness overall standpoint, but from a "we all have hangups, it's not a big deal and God cares more about you coming to Him than what you are doing"). More on this later.

Now, I took an opportunity to actually visit the splinter church's website and lo and behold, everything on it confirmed my suspicions. I happen to have had some spare time that day, so I thought I'd give them a call and chat with one of the pastors there just to ask some curiosity questions. I asked them some hypothetical questions that if I was looking for a new church, why would I feel welcome there. His answers confirmed all the above criteria of the standard "seeker-friendly" type of church. So there ya go.

Now, what is my problem with all this? Well, I see that such churches are in large part, contributing to a "dumbing down" of Christianity and by extension, of Christians, in today's world (at least in North America, where this phenomenon of the "seeker friendly" church is rampant. This is a big deal for me, since if, as Christians, we are supposed to bear witness to the world of the gospel of Christ, using God's Word as our sole evidentiary mechanism, it is imperative that we get to know the Word intimately, and by this I mean understanding it properly and in context. Is it no wonder that most Christians would poop their pants at seeing a Mormon or a Jehovah's Witness at their door, since their recognize that their lack of familiarity with their Bible would not make them ideal candidates to have a frank discussion about theological differences with these groups.

Years ago, I attended a memorial/funeral for a colleague of mine. It was quite a long drive, but I wanted to show my support for him at this difficult time. It so happened that one of my other colleagues, a Christian gal, tagged along for the ride. Now, she is of a completely different denomination than me, but I don't consider our denominational differences to be major - I know she is saved and she loves the Lord and she is a really strong believer. Anyway, on the car ride, we talked about what was then all the rage in modern Christiandom, Rick Warren's "The Purpose Drive Life." She didn't read it yet, but had some reservations about the book based on the title itself (I don't remember exactly what her objections were, since it was many years ago). She asked me if I had read it and I simply said yes. She asked me to elaborate, and so I did. Now, that book, while most of it may be technically correct, is not theologically sound. Just like my above comment on criteria G, while God loves you, there is still action on our part we must take. If we are in sinful behaviour, we must go to God and repent (a word you never hear anymore in churches) and ask Him for forvigness. In fact, in order to be saved, one has to repent and turn away from their sins and accept Jesus Christ as Saviour. It's our sins that put Christ on the cross in the first place! Yet many churches seem to conveniently sweep that one under the carpet, opting to focus on one side of the equation, which is God's grace and love and forgiveness, while ignoring the other, which is our sin and depravity and our response to God. See what I'm saying here? If you teach half the doctrine, you're going to get some misled and confused people. Check out the latest rage in Christian circles (well at least last year), that book called "The Shack" that is making the rounds. If new Christians are being exposed to this, there is no way on God's green earth that they will ever be exposed to the full gospel message, in this politically-correct, spiritually unoffending, feel-good treastise. This sells in volumes on the Christian and non-Christian market because of its lack of discussion about sin and hell and the righteousness of God. It is again, a one-sided "God is love" approach to things, which, if you examine the Bible in its entirety, is not telling the whole story.

Churches like the splinter church described above don't believe in "rules". That's good, because I don't either, at least when it comes to faith in Christ. However, I think that churches like the one I described above miss the mark when it comes to this - they are pushing away from a works-based understanding of the Christian life, which is good in a sense, since that's what Jesus railed against when he criticized the Pharisees; however, as many of the epistles will show us (Corinthians, Timothy, Ephesians, Philippians, etc.), and especially James, the Christian, in his or her new life, should, by virtue of his/her obedience to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, show fruit from his/her faith. I think this is what James is saying - while what you do will not save you, your actions as a result of living a new life in Christ, should show some evidence of your new life. Now, I am the first to admit that it is easy to ignore the promptings of the Spirit. Sometimes it's just easier to just do what you want to do, according to the flesh. Heck, I've been guilty of that for years. But over the last little while, I've really given my life back to God for Him to repair, and He has really changed my heart to quite a large degree and I am happy for that; I am still far from perfect (just ask my wife!) but doing better now, thanks!

You know, it's amazing, one of the things which will always elicit a reaction as asking Christians about John MacArthur, who is considered one of the top Bible teachers in the world today and is Pastor and Bible teacher for Grace Community Church in California. Do I agree with everything he says? No. But I think that for one to argue against him, it is necessary to exercise the same amount (or more) of Biblical literacy that he has. Which means that Christians need to go into their Bibles more if you want to counter a point of contention - it's not good enough to just say, "well, I just don't feel...". For the past two months, I've been listening to a Bible Questions and Answers series, which features Pastor MacArthur answering Bible and Chrsitianity-related questions posed from MacArthur's congregation of about 10,000. The Bible Q&A sessions are unscripted and are based over 37 years (there's 55 CDs and counting of pure Bible questions and answers). I love listening to these, not because I like hearing MacArthur's voice, but because he always answers his questions with Biblical support and I learn something new. It also points me back to Scripture and gets me into the Word more than I've been for years. None of his questions are responded with "I think..." unless there is no clear Biblical reference to it. MacArthur has 40+ years of sermons available for download and study and has written 70+ books. To me, this is the kind of love and interest in God's Word that I'd like to have in my own life. Yet, you know, there are a lot of people who don't like MacArthur, which is fine, since I don't expect everyone to agree on everything, but it's always for one of the following reasons: a) he's boring. b) it's too indepth and c) not much contemporary application.

You see what I'm saying here? Today's Christians will find expository preaching boring, you know why? As the Bible says, they are infant Christians in their understanding, and infants drink, what? Infant milk! If these Christians go to a church in which in-depth expository and contextual Bible study is hardly contemplated, much less practiced, they are going to turn out to be not very well grounded on their doctrinal foundations, if at all.

Based on the complaints noted above regarding MacArthur, I have found the reverse to be true when it comes to in-depth Bible study recently in my life. If the study is done properly in understanding the historical context and cultural context and religious context, it really can and does bring the passage to life in that we better understand why it was said the way it was said and why it was said. People nowadays can take any verse out of context from the Bible. Of course, when this is done, no one has any clue as to why this archaic Bible verse is quoted, but their motivation to find out is stymied by their culturally-taught desire not to question anything - so they blindly recite verses without any passion and understanding behind it. A quick example - 1 Corinthians 3:16 is often used on me to tell me that I should have never gotten my tattoos. It says that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit and if one destroys the body, God will destroy him. There are two problems with this: a) this verse is not saying this (even though for years I thought it did). If you look at the context of this passage (ie. the chapter before and after as well as the historical context of the Corintian church at the time), you'll see that Paul was writing to the Corinthian church (the body of believers as referenced) about divisions in the church and how some in that church at that time was thinking that Paul was the head of the church or Apollos was, etc.) The church is what is referenced to by the word "body" (and this is confirmed by examining the Greek word's origins and meaning). Based on what the topic was before and after that passage, it makes absolutely not sense why Paul would all of the sudden stop what he is saying and talk about the physical body, when in the context of that passage, body mean "the church". b) I did my tattoos before I was a Christian, so it's not like I knew any better. But regardless, my personal opinion of tattoos is neither here nor there since I don't see it as a paramount theological issue, but I would question Christians who get tattoos of things that are obviously not pleasing to God (such as evil symbols, witchcraft things, sexual things, etc.).

While it is getting a bit off topic, my point about is to demonstrate that most Christians don't even bother (or know how) to look at a passage contextually. And churches nowadays are not teaching this, unfortunately. And I've visted more than a few churches to be able to make this comment with some confidence.

That being said, one of the best sermons I heard at my previous church was preached by the, at the time 30-year-old or so pastoral intern who taught on the passage about the Good Samaritan. I've heard and read that passage many times, but this time, he spent time looking at the context of that passage. At face value, we often read contemporary things into Scirptural text. For me, I always envisioned a straight country road where the guy was attacked. And I just saw that the guys who passed him (except for the Samaritan) were simply arrogant, snobby guys who didn't want to help him. It was until it was told the type of winding angled road and that it was dangerous because of the hiding spots in the areas the road that I started realizing that this was no stroll in the park. And also the relationships that the Jews and Samaritans had was not simply that they didn't associate with one another, but when you discovered why and the societial stigmas that will result, etc., it helps you to appreciate the account better, as well as understand the setting from which our Biblical stories come.

But most churches don't teach this, and if they do they will teach it once in a blue moon. Instead, we get, as I witnessed in 2006 in a church in Alberta, a quick sermon (and these churches always have quick sermons since they seem to think that people have more important things to do rather than study God's Word - if nothing else, they are making their real intentions known) about some lovey-dovey topic that will not cause any offense and uncomfortableness with the congregants. The topic was something like "What If Jesus Had a Blackberry?" What an utterly stupid topic it was, and I remember telling my cousin, who asked me about what I thought of the sermon, that "to be honest, it wasn't very good." Honestly, if you have to start reading your 21st century viewpoint back into the Biblical text, you are in a world of hurt.

The pursuit of a holy life is not taught in most churches today. This is true. I am seeing more and more instances of non married Christian couples vacationing together by themselves. That seems to be OK with other Christians, few of whom speak up. When was the last time you heard of a church talking about waiting until marriage to have sex? Just yesterday, our new church's pastor preached a challenging sermon about integrity and watching what one watches, and watching what they say (ie. slander, lying, gossip). Are those warnings taught in any churches nowadays, especially in light of the fact that the church has historically been a place where such sins are openly practiced? I have found many Christians nowadays to be much more accepting of other Christians who use foul language and swearing - even I have been known to historically use it without anyone really chastizing me. That is not good. As with anything else in the Christian life, it's better to surround yourself in an environment where you don't get exposed to things that are not good for your spiritual health. If you aren't in a good church that encourages you to pursue a life of Godly living, find one that does.

Many churches nowadays are not teaching doctrine (they say it's divisive, which is true, but that's by design - no one will be convicted of anything if there's no objective standard by which to measure their behaviour). Their challenge is whether they will be obedient and submit to God's authority in the Bible, even if it makes them uncomfortable. Case in point - one of the reasons we left our previous church was their hiring of a female pastor. My wife and I felt that God's Word is clear on this issue and while there were many things which we could tolerate (and even that I reflect, is probably not good as we probably should have gone with our convictions earlier), I think this issue was really what did it for us, though it was one of a few other doctrinal and Biblical issues. To me, I think many people on this issue (and not just at our previous church, but in churches around the country) want to appeal to a worldly sense of equality and not offend the feminists out there. They will always tell you that the passages in Timothy and Titus that deal with pastors are outdated or antiquated, or it doesn't fit their secular, feminist interpretation. For us, even when we ultimately did not agree, I think it was more important for us to maintain peaceful relations with our old church and not rail on them but simply say that we disagree and move on and wish them the best. Personally, it has been almost 3 months now and I am glad we made the switch, for our spiritual health's sake.

Going forward, I don't expect churches across Canada and especially across the USA, to change to a Biblically focussed, expository preaching-based system, where God's Word is studied vigorously and properly. But if there is some encouragement to glean, it can be seen in how the once seeker-friendly Willow Creek church, in the past few years, recognized in a published paper, that they were trying to "run church" all the wrong ways, opting to lure people in by marketing gimmacks and a watered-down gospel, rather than preach the Gospel with all of its challenges to the status quo and its call for changing how one thinks and behaves. People nowadays often cite the situation where a woman who was caught in adultery was brought before Jesus and how Jesus said, "He who is without sin cast the first stone." What these same people conveniently leave out is Jesus' charge to the woman near the end of the discourse, to "Go and sin no more". Jesus challenges our works-based mentality but also indicates that action is required on our part and the first step is to humbly come before God and admit our shortcomings and our sinful actions and attitudes.

Reflections on Being a Christian in 2009 And My Journey To Here

This fall, I celebrate a milestone of sorts in my personal life. It will have been 18 years since I accepted Christ as Lord and Saviour and while 18 years seems like a bit of an arbitrary number, it is significant when you take into the account than I am 36. I have been a born again believer for half of my life, and I guess I can further say that I have been a Christian for most of my conscious life (unlike some people, I don't remember anything from when I was 2 or 4 years old).

Much has changed since I made that original profession in 1991. You know, at the time, I was going through a period of my life which would have probably put me on a head-on collision with death or being arrested. I was a porn dealer, a drug user, had violent tendencies and just was a miserable person. So it is not lost on me that I could have been in much different circumstances had I not have experienced the love of Christ in my life.

The journey of faith in being a follower of Jesus is not without challenges. Of course, little would I have suspected the degree of hardship which I would have experienced over the years. Just like people who think erroneously that once you are married and have kids, everything is a big old fairy tale, being a Christian carries not guarantee that your life will go well (at least your remaining life on this earth). In fact, I'd hazard to say that the guarantee goes the other way - that you will experience much difficulty in your Christian life. Most Sunday schools and churches try to avoid teaching this, since it can be a bit on the depressing side, but that is really the Biblical pattern, if you look at how God's people weren't exactly popular with the world or its standards of happiness. The good news is that this is all very temporary in the whole scheme of God's plan.

So at this juncture of my life, I thought it would be both interesting and somewhat fun to reflect on the past 18 years of my Christian life. I doubt that this would become as popular of a post as the one I wrote about Toronto protests by the Tamils (about 30 responses as of last count - that has been the most popular blog entry here by far), but this is more for me than anyone else - if you get something out of reading this, then great.

I was driving into work this morning, thinking about all this, and thought about the early years. Recently, at our new church (we started attending March 1, after 13 years at our previous church), our family attended a really nice new visitors luncheon. We happened to end up sitting at a table with one of the church's elders, and he was interested in hearing my testimony, so I gave it to him (actually, I'll write about that very shortly in another post). He noted something which I have never thought about; that is, that he found it interesting (not sure in what way) that I ended up enrolling in Bible school (and was accepted) less than a year after becoming a Christian. Yeah, that was kind of weird, considering the fact that I was on a journalism track, but I have absolutely no regrets whatsoever. At the time, I was deeply immersed in the Word, reading my Bible more than a few times a day and just soaking up Christian literature. It's interesting how this sort of comes full circle, since I'm sort of back in that mindset again (thankfully!) after all these years.

I had no idea what to expect in Bible school, and my Dad didn't expect much, so you can imagine both his shock (and mine too) at the fact that I made Dean's list almost every year that I was there, including 1994-95, when I had the highest GPA in residence. Theological school was very rewarding for me as a new Christian, and while I struggle to answer the question that the occasional person poses to me as to why I am not using the theological degree (I really don't have an answer) but instead worked in the IT industry for the past 12 years), I know that no one - including myself - knows God's purposes, so I'll just leave the planning and life direction up to Him).

Back then, like most new Christians, I was fairly legalistic, not in a Jewish sense, not really in a works-based salvation sense, but more in the "I must produce tangible and visible fruit" sense. In other words, I was petrified when I wasn't visibly manifesting my faith. To a degree, it was almost like a holy show, but my intentions were not really Pharissaical, but more wanting to live a life which was different than my non-Christian counterparts. And such was my first fallacy in understanding the Christian life.

It was only a few years ago that I fully understood that Christians aren't all that different than non-Christians, when it comes to succeptibility to temptation, anger, frustration, relationship problems, and so forth. BUT, Christians stand in stark contrast to non-Christians in that we have hope and we can lean on our Heavenly Father, who will help us in our troubles. That is not to say that Christians don't get depressed - it happens - there were a number of people at the Bible school who had psychological and psychiatric problems. I remember one of the first people I met (like, this is within days of showing up in residence), I accompanied to the hospital as he needed to get treated for an STD that he contracted from his girlfriend. Then there was the friend (a youth pastor major) who told me about his sexual activities with his girlfriend - I later caught him looking at porn one day when I went to visit his room - that was awkward and disappointing). I met another guy who told me the places to go in the school's basement / laundry area, where one can get a "quickie" with one's girlfriend - he claimed to have used that location over 300+ times. All this started to depress me - I guess I had expected better, but I also realized that lot of Christians wore masks.

No one was more surprised as me when I discovered (after I graduated) that my first-year roommate came out of the closet as a very open homosexual later. I started wondering about all the times he jumped on me and tried to wrestle me down on my bed as we were practising WWF wrestling moves. He is apparently now in the U.S. and somehow has gotten "married" to his subsequent boyfriend. I did keep in touch with him for a while and he told me that he was gay, which was a huge shock to me. Things that make you go "hmmmm...."

Unfortunately, five to seven years after becoming a Christian, I started to get a bit depressed in my faith - I realized that it wasn't a works-based faith, but it seemed like no one I knew really gave a hoot about the pursuit of holiness. Christian living seemed to be overshadowed by Christian liberty. At that point, I had switched from my Mom and Dad's church to a new church which was pastored by my theology professor. That was very different at first, since this church was influenced and had split from a United Church. I started to see Christians practise their faith differently, and things like liturgies and such I never saw before. It was interesting.

I remember applying for a job at a Christian school in 1997 to teach computers. I got through the interview with flying colours and they were ready to hire me until they found out that I did not know how to program. I told them that I was clear on this at the outset and that I knew hardware and some operating system stuff. They admitted they assumed that everyone who knew "computers" knew all facets. Bad assumption - guess they weren't IT-savvy. That would have been fun doing that job, but you know, years later that school closed down, so I am glad I didn't take that job.

It is really in the working world that I saw God's hand heavily in my life, and thank goodness for that since that proved to be a huge calming influence in the later years. I ended up with my job in IT (that I do to this day) as a result of not getting that Christian teaching job - so I tell people that even if God may not grant you where you may think you want to go - He has other purposes, and sometimes, you won't know these purposes till a lot later). Anyway, one of my friends in my Bible school recommended me to her boss' boss (a VP) at a large Canadian IT firm. Happens that that VP was a very strong, mature Christian. I was interviewed and got the job and it was a huge learning curve for me, since everything I know at that point was self-taught. But to the company's credit, they sent me on numerous (and very expensive) courses to get me up to speed. Then I met other Christians at the workplace...this was great, since obviously in a non-Christian company, it's nice to know you have people both watching your back and encouraging you. And I saw God's hand at work again when that company folded, and surprisingly, I was the only remnant which survived the eventual dissolution of our group. I was offered a position that made much more money (almost double my current salary at that time) but God had given me a sense not to take it. Turns out that other company went out of business a year later. I was moved to my current job and location where I knew no one and upon starting back in 2000, I remember it was such a nasty, backstabbing environment. Yet, within a year, myself and another Christian from another division of my old company were moved to this account and we really saw God working in us to change both the environment and attitude of our colleagues. Turns out that years later, we found a number of other Christians on our account, and to this day, while due to economic realities, our account staff has been decimated, a number of us Christians remain gainfully employed, despite many cutbacks that we have survived.

Getting married and having kids has obviously changed me - I would think for the better. While it was a steep adjustment for me to have had to learn to live with another person who is not like me at all, my wife has really encouraged me throughout the years, and especially during the last few years, when we have experienced a number of very challenging personal difficulties, to just continue to trust in God. My kids (my son in particular - my daughter's too young to talk) have really been a firm reason for me to try to pursue a life of consistent holiness - that being said, I will be the first to admit that I often come short of the standard which I set for myself, and I'm sure I disappoint God often). I think it was only just this year that we started getting over the hump from all of our financial and medication problems and now I am really glad that we persevered.

Probably to everyone's shock, including mine, I was nominated to be an elder in 2005 at our old church. It was an honour to have been nominated, particularly by another elder, and several others; I was very resistant at first, but with some encouragement from my former pastor, friends and wife, I accepted the nomination and was voted in. After three years of doing it and deciding not to sign up for another term, I knew why I was indecisive at first - I should have listened to my gut and declined the first time - I was not elder material - my spiritual life was not as strong as it should be, and I really think that my expectations were too high (and in retrospect, they should have been based on the 1 Timothy and Titus requirements). While I didn't really contribute a whole lot during my time doing this, I was heavily involved in one situation which turned out really badly, and left a very, very sour taste in my mouth. Church politics, I suppose, but moreover, I think it came down to me seeing that some people really did not care about spiritual maturity. That, I think, was the beginning of the end and when I started thinking that I needed to be elsewhere. In retrospect, I think going through the experience was a good thing, since it showed me that despite my meager contributions during my time as an elder, and my hesitancy in taking on the role, deep down, I still had some Biblical standards that I was trying my best to follow. Anyway, enough of that. The past is the past and that's the last time I'll talk about that.

Moving to a new church this year has really helped me spiritually, as I am now back into regular Bible study and have been challenged to look deeply into the Word, and I am approaching it with excitement in my heart and not grudgingly. My wife has noticed a difference in me and have commented such in the affirmative. It was kind of weird how we ended up at our new church, but it has really been a solid place to worship and a place where God's Word is taught in an expository way. It is incredible what our new church has gone through in the past five years, in that it has experienced a large split of people who want to be more "seeker friendly" (Willow Creek model) and be more marketable and draw numbers of young people, simply leave the church - about 400 of them. That is a good thing, since when I found that out a couple of months back, I immediately realized that this church is for me, if it takes a solid Biblical stand against current watered-down church trends, even if it means the decimation of its numbers. I remember once visiting their website and it was slick - like really corporate-looking. Now, with those seeker-friendly types gone, I guess the webmaster went too, so the church website is pretty basic now, but who really cares when you know that the people behind it are solid believers who love the Word and not the world. Our new church has recovered nicely and due to a pastor that refuses to compromise on God's Word (he did not have an easy go of it since there was much resistance to his Bible-centered teaching), God has blessed the church in the past few years. I am not one for a making commitments in a short timeframe, but my wife and I have felt so much at home at our new church that later this month, we are starting to take membership classes there. You know how sometimes, you just know that you're in the right place at the right time? We are there. What has been an interesting blessing is how God has affirmed our decision to move churches (long story), as tough as that was - we had some dear, old friends at our old church which had a huge impact on us, so moving away was not easy, but thankfully we keep in touch). We met, on our first week at our new church, a family that lives within a football toss of our house - they've been there for years, we've been here for years, yet we never knew them. But we met them at church and have really clicked with this young family. My wife and I have now, for the first time, in years, started praying together again and discussing Bible topics - she has listened to preaching sermons which I have, in the past two months, been downloading and putting on CD to listen to on the car ride to and from work every single day. I just have that spiritual fervour that I admit was lost for quite some time. My son and I have very meaningful Bible discussions and I really feel that responsibility on my shoulders to not only model a consistently decent father for him, but also to model a (hopefully somewhat decent) Christian. Again, I often fall short and make many mistakes, but it has been years since I have felt this fervour to immerse myself in the reading of God's Word, and it has been a good 5 years or so since I have felt the excitement and anticipation of going to church on Sunday mornings. Heck, I even get there early, which is unheard of for me, since I generally am very disorganized and am late for everything (that is to my shame and no one else's). I really feel, to a degree, that it's back to 1991-1992 again when I had that zest for my new-found faith. That is not to say that I am like I was back then - I am certainly not. I am hardly as naive as I was back then, and am paranoially cautious about my social relationships as well as about personal safety issues (I must have gotten that from my Mom). I recognize that even though we are Christians in this world, the world is not a friendly place, despite what well-meaning people will want to tell you. I make no illusions about the fact that I can never fully feel at peace, at home, and content in this world. Of course, very few understand this and look at me funny and ask how can I be a Christian, yet own guns. It's not an easy one to explain, so I don't get into those conversations if I can help it.

There is, of course, much more that I can say, and I'm sure I can edit this so it doesn't sound so structurally disjointed, but I'm naturally lazy so I will forego that. I do want to say that my final comments are for those who have just become saved for the first time in 2009. What should one expect? What is the Christian life like? Well, as one who has been there, I can tell you this truth - God is always in control, whether we think so or not, whether we believe it or not. I have seen more evidence of God working in situations and scenarios that will stump even the most ardent of critics of the Christian faith. Despite my own personal hangups, I know that God is a God of forgiveness and second chances.

I also know that God is One who keeps His promises. When He says that, for instance that we can lay our burdens on Him, He means that. To experience God shouldering the load of life's troubles is very satisfying. I can speak firsthand of this, from personal experience (unfortunately, it took many years and many situations before I finally got this one). The question is, whether we choose to dump our load onto His trusty shoulders.

Third, there is no better way of knowing God than to read His Word. I have neglected it for years, despite my theological education. It's amazing, really, how we can read the Bible many times over, and learn new truths and applications for life each time. Sure, some parts are challenging (like reading genealogies or books like Job, which I think can be easily condensed) - but even then, there are passages which will come out and speak to you at a particular time and place - it's weird, but true.

Also, for the Christian in 2009, stand firm. Don't compromise with the world. Even churches will tend to get muddled in worldly theology and practices - resist the urge to conform to the world, but as Romans says, instead be transformed by the renewing of your mind. To that end, I'd suggest a good way for any Christian (especially a guy) to work on their faith is to watch what they take into their mind. Guys like me who have a history of struggling with porn know that there are things that are not wise for me to watch or situations where it is not wise for me to be in. For years, I didn't work as well to guard my mind, but I think that I could have saved myself much trouble if I had developed this sense of discretionary intake of information, in the first place.

I may add more to this posting once I get a chance to re-read it.

The Shack by Wm. Paul Young - A Book Review

As a general rule, I tend to stringently avoid books in the mainstream Christian realm, which have gained either secular acceptance or are touted as something that is akin to an addendum to the Bible. Sometimes, my curiosity gets the better of me and I will reluctantly pop down a few bucks to buy a used or at worse, extremely cheap-priced copy of the book. It happened with the whole "Purpose Driven Life" phenomenon a number of years back, and I thoroughly regretted dropping even a dollar for that utterly theologically-devoid tome. I have since come across people who consider that book a treastise of great theology, and I simply conclude that they obviously have not had much formal theological training to appreciate substance. While it is beyond the scope of this review to comment on Purpose Driven Life, I will simply say that it re-inforces my long-held belief that if a Christian book is popular in the mainstream market, something has gone wrong. Fact is, the Bible has always had opposition from the secular world, but that is to be expected, just like how the Bible teaches that the Christian life is not easy and that Christians will (not may, but will) be persecuted.

Fast forward years later and once again, I hear of a massive promotion of the latest Christian cross-cultural book phenomenon, "The Shack." Heck, our church is in on the action, as is many churches, both promoting the book for study, reflection, or personal enjoyment. The book is selling at Costco, Chapters, and anywhere else that sells best-selling paperbacks and hardcovers. Christian media is discussing this book as a fresh, much welcome inclusion for any believer's library. And both Christians and non-Christians are commending the books on its inherent ability to make one think deeper about faith, if not actually promote life-changing behaviour. Based on all this, and the fact that I am an occasional sucker for hype, I thought I'd drop ten bucks or whatever it was to snatch a copy of the book, despite the fact that it is recommended by Eugene Peterson, who is, on my list of Christian writers, near the very bottom, in terms of theological consistency and doctrinal objectivity. I first gave it to my wife, who tends to devour books much more quickly than myself. Ensuring that she was not to give anything away, I asked her for her opinion of the book, and to my surprise, she rated it as so-so. So last Friday, I decided to crack open the book and check it out for myself.

Now, setting some context here, without going into painstaking detail. Two Thursdays ago, my wife and I experienced our second miscarriage. We have two beautiful little kids, but the loss of another child was both disappointing and devastating to us, particularly when the second miscarriage occurred exactly two years to the day the last one happened (October 30, 2006). I was a complete mess the first time, and didn't fare much better this time, especially given the fact that my wife experienced a lot of complications which required multiple hospital visits.

In all of this, I experienced raw pain and all of the frustration with not understanding why God allowed this to happen to us, all came to the surface once again. So I thought it was somewhat of a strange coincidence that the book that I had planned to read dealt with a father who lost a child as a result of a gruesome murder, and who is now angry and deliberately distant with God. Hey, I could relate, and since I had some time at night to reflect, on these things, I thought I'd give the book a whirl.

Well, I am not one to beat around the bush, so here is my candid opinion of the book, and I will deviate from the standard review format (noting positive elements first, followed by negative elements - I am deliberately not doing it this way because of structure and flow of how I want to present my opinion). The first 80 pages were fabulous. I thought it was well written (for a Christian book - what a shocker!) and the rising action and pace of the story kept me turning the pages, well into the night. I really felt the main character, Mack Philip's, pain, despite the fact that he lost a six-and-a-half-year-old girl to what turns out to be a serial killer. I was pleasantly surprised by the vividness of the descriptive language of scenery, people, etc., and was enjoying the plot. At around page 80, I thought to myself, "OK, I can see why this book is so highly regarded by a number of different Christian folks".

Then everything started going downhill. I have never read a book like this before, that starts with such a high degree of promise, only to descend to the depths of utter lameness and cheesy dialogue. Where to begin... First, I started recognizing that this book is really not that much of a far cry from Purpose Driven Life. In trying really hard not to given anything away, all I can say is that the book probably resonates with so many people, because it takes the ever-popular "safe" approach to sprituality, emphasizing only part of the nature of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, while ignoring the other parts. Here's a quick illustration to demonstrate what I'm getting at here. Remember when Jesus caught that woman in adultery? The vast majority of people will conveniently quote Jesus' words "let who is without sin cast the first stone." Of course, these same people seemingly glide over the fact that Jesus, in addressing the woman, tells her "go and sin no more". These folks who promote such touchy-feely theology tend to focus more on the loving nature of God, without looking at the righteous side of God as well. And, furthermore, in many of these books, you will never hear any discussion of the nature of sin (it's important, since it's sin that separated us from God to begin with) or repentance (turning away from sin). Instead, what we get is a mish-mash of God as our beer drinking buddy, our friend who overlooks all our faults and will never point out our shortcomings, and a Jesus who just wants relationships, and will accept anyone's behaviour, even though He prescribes otherwise elsewhere in Scripture.

OK, so I'm being a bit vague here by not referring to the book, so I'll provide some specifics here, without revealing main plot points. First, I will come right out and say that this book is about as politically correct as they come. God is a big black woman (his words, not mine), the Holy Spirit is an Asian woman, and Jesus is some middle-eastern guy (at least that's closer than the other two). Now, this is addressed somewhat in the book through the lengthy discourses and conversations that the main character, Mack, has with each of these three characters (think of this book as the Christian version of the David Chilton best-seller "The Wealthy Barber" in which the characters impact financial advice, under the guise of a character conversation in a fictitious environment). The author, Wm. Paul Young, through the characters, indicate that this visible minority focus is supposed to dispel stereotypes, namely that God is an old white man. I personally have never held that view, but I'll play along, just for fun. The problem is, while Young goes out of his way to play up these characters (and a hispanic woman shows up much later as another character), he reinforces his own stereotypes of how each of these minority members act (ie. the smattering of awkwardly-timed ebonics from the black woman, supposedly in the role of God), the submissive, always bowing Asian woman, portrayed as the Holy Spirit, and the exotic beauty of the hispanic.

Now, one may think that this was what Young was trying to accomplish - to get people to stop thinking of God as a man. Problem is, God is not a woman either, so it would have been better to simply make God appear as a voice rather than assign a gender - now, Young later does gender-switch the black woman to be an old white man with a ponytail, but I don't get why he needs to specifically personnify God, Jesus, or the Holy Spirit. It certainly did not make it more believeable to me.

Some other observations: there are several points where men are slammed in the book, with the suggestion among the characters that women would be better to run our world, etc. There is the characterisation of the God (as a male) character and the Jesus (male) character kissing each other on the mouth, as a supposed sign of affection. And then there is the expected schpeel about the environment. If you didn't leave the book thinking that Young is trying to pander to special interests groups, then you are either part of those groups or you didn't pick up on those parts of the description.

While the above aspects already lower my opinion of the book, I have saved the best for last: my main beef with this book is that, theologically, it is inconsistent with what the Bible teaches. Now, I know what you are saying - I either have no imagination, or I am part of the structured religious establishment, for which Young indirectly chastises throughout the book. I don't agree with either assessment, since I write a lot of material, so certainly I must have some imagination in order to write excessive blog entries and other stuff, and while I am formally theologically trained, I believe I am one of those people who have taken a closer look at what I have been taught and systematically compare it to what the Bible says, under controlled conditions. Why is this important? Because without proper controls in Bible study, one can make the Bible say whatever they want. And hence, you get a book like this one, which obviously caters to people who are turned off by Christianity or who are angry at God. How attractive is the prospect that God can be whoever or whatever you want him to be? Don't believe me? It is striking that near the end when Mack gets ready to leave the shack, that the God character already packs his car up and Mack starts to think "God - my servant" (no, I am not taking that out of context - check the bottom of page 236 and the top of page 237).

(TO BE CONTINUED)

Christians Are Consumers Too and Don't Like to be Hosed Either

Well, well, well...I just heard that a long-established Christian bookstore in the area will be closing down due to going bankrupt. I suppose you would think that as a believer, I would be saddened by this. In a way, I am, but only in a very small way. It was a family-friendly store with decent staff and a good selection of popular books (emphasis on popular). I have not been a regular shopper there for years, once I found out that they were more than willing to commit highway robbery with the exorbitant prices that they charge. I mean, who, really, did they think they were fooling? Of course, if you didn't know better, you'd be happy to pay for the products that they have there, but with the advances in online ordering, the ability to network with people and buy second hand, it's hard to understand why they continually jacked up the prices of their books far beyond reasonable.

Case in point - I was looking for N.T. Wright's Gospel study set - a series of six books that was like a combination devotional / Bible study / commentary. My buddy, who is an Anglican guy, knows of a bookstore that sold the set for something like $90.00 Cdn. + tax. Of course, this place was located downtown, so I wasn't crazy about riding the subway, and was even less enthusiastic about driving there, with the cost of gas and all. My friend could have picked it up for me the next time he was downtown, since he goes to theology school in the area, but I didn't know when the next time he would do this would be. So I held off on the purchase. A couple of other Christian bookstores in Toronto had the set and it was selling for around $100.00 + tax.

At the aforementioned Christian bookstore which has now gone under, they were listing it for $124.99 + tax. Now, you may say, who cares - what's $24.99 + tax? Well, consider this...I ended up buying the set brand new, at a gigantic Canadian retail book chain for...are you ready for this? $54.99 + tax. Yes, it was brand new and even in the sealed distributor's box. Now that is insane, considering the fact that the publishers are still making money off this.

This Christian bookstore was also known for using their own pricing stickers, covering the MSRP. I guess that's OK if the price is lower, but when it is 10-20% higher, I have a wee bit problem with that. Now, you may argue that Christian industry is at a bit of a disadvantage, since the cost of doing business is likely more since whether it is Christian books, music or anything else, they don't have huge companies financially backing them and they don't sell their products en masse. I can appreciate that, and for that reason, I don't mind paying the bit extra to support the industry. But when a store or company is consistently gouging the Christian consumer - well, Christians have brains too - and free will - and choice. For me, I chose to take my meager spending dollars and go elsewhere, even if it means that I end up buying from a non-Christian source.

I used to be a record reviewer in the Christian music scene, writing regular reviews for one of the largest Christian alternative music magazines on the market (give you a hint, it was based in Texas and was started by the founder of a cheesy Blonde Vinyl band that sang about sex-related themes). Anyway, as part of my deal, I got my Christian CDs brand new, for VERY cheap from the Canadian distributor (and they couriered them all to my residence or my parents' residence, depending on where I was). Now, consider this for back in 1994: Christian CDs were selling at most stores for $18.99 Cdn. + tax, which was a rip anyway. The average secular CD was selling for around $15.00 at the time at most places, and a lot more at the secular version of the ultimate store of highway robbery, HMV. Now, CDs at this Christian store would sell at $18.99, but that was considered a once-a-year-sale type of price. The average price of a regular CD was $22.99 + tax. Yup. To put it into perspective, I got mine directly from the distributor for $3.00 + tax each. I must have purchased over 400 CDs during my stint as a record reviewer. But the distributor told me that they were selling to be at cost, which surely must make you shake your head at the $22.99 + tax price tag.

Years ago, I made the mistake of going against my brain and buying a Christian book mainly due to its sheer popularity. I don't mind telling you that I seriously regret purchasing Rick Warren's cheese-bucket tome, "The Purpose Driven Life". If you haven't read it, you ain't missing much. Anyhow, this store was selling it for $18.99 or so. The suggested retail price was a few bucks less, and I ended up getting it at CostCo for a mere $9.99. Now, you may not know this, but this Christian bookstore was not only a retail outlet, but also a supplier/distributor. Guess what - Costco bought their Warren books from this store and sold it for considerably less than what this store listed it for - that makes you really wonder what the cost of the book was to Costco. Obviously this store sold to Costco for far less than to the average book buyer. I wonder why. Did they think Christians would be stupid and not shop around? Needless to say, you can't really cut it any other way than to state that it is pure greed that enveloped their selling practices. And of course, like the Bible says, you reap what you sow and certainly this company is now on the reaping side of the equation, after all these years.

Now, a casual reader of this MAY conclude that I am being very hard on Christian businesses. Nothing can be further from the truth. Do you know that when I choose to do business with someone - whether it's proper or not, I do give preferential treatment towards Christian businesses, even realizing that I may have to pay slightly more (which is OK with me). When I needed to get a new roof for my house back in 2001, I solicited different companies and in the end, I chose a company based out in Durham Region called Excel Roofing. The owner/proprietor is a Christian and runs his company in a way that honours God. Now, his staff may not be all Christians, but he has a certain value system in how he does business. The roof cost a bit more than what other companies were quoting me, but I though it was a reasonable amount, and let me tell you - they did one heck of a job on my roof. I know people since then who have had their roofs done by different companies and have had problems, but this Christian guy's company did an amazing job on my roof. Seven years later, all the shingles look the same as they did, nothing is loose or curling (unlike my next door neighbour's roof which was done a year ago and already has curling shingles). My dentist is a Christian, and I specifically continue to go to him and recommended my wife and son to go to him. I have to drive quite a bit to get to him, but I'm happy with his service, and know that he will do a good job, as he always does.

I do a little information technology work on the side, and I run my own business the same way - so far, I am batting 100% with satisfied customers. I don't think I'm doing anything different, other than simply treating my customers with respect, and doing what I said I would do and keeping my word, and conducting myself beyond approach in my speech and behaviour. Yeah, it sucks sometimes that I overrun my estimate, but I eat that cost, since I gave the customer my quote and I honour that. I actually have a new client that I am seeing tomorrow night and she heard via word of mouth about my business and abilities. Just like anything else - if you do things above board, your business will be OK. If you start getting greedy - well, we all know what will eventually happen.

I certainly am not out to discourage Christians from making a buck. If a Christian can turn a good reasonable profit without knowingly hosing people in the process, that's great. But what I can't stand are the stores like this one who seem to think that Christians (who by stereotypical nature are doormats) will pay anything for Christian literature and music. Well, the ruse is up and just like in the typical marketplace, if you are going to be ripping people off, word will get around, and your business will dry up.

However, significantly more is not.

Good and Not So Good Bible Devotionals

For many years, I have been looking for a good Bible devotional for daily reading. Aside from the fact that my own lack of discipline and my absolutely atrocious time management techniques has led to my not really having a consistent devotional life for a year or two now, my other problem is in the fact that I have not found a truly useful daily devotional tool. Now, if you're a regular Bible reader, I know what you're thinking - just read the Scriptures from start to finish, or for those who are really sponteneous, just flip the Bible to a different page per day and read from it. Or read a bit from beginning to end. The problem with this approach, for me anyway, is the fact that I just can't do readings of any sort without some structure or parameters. It would be nice to know when to quit, so that way you are not stopping in the middle of a passage and are left scratching your head. Or you read too much and your mind wanders. Or you read too little and do not feel engaged with the text. Besides, there are some books of the Bible that, although I acknowledge to be part of the Word of God, it is not on the top of my to-do reading list. The book of Psalms is one, and the book of Job is another. But more on those another time.

A couple of years ago, my wife and I tried (and I said tried, because we were not sucessful at completing the task) to use John MacArthur's study Bible (I am a reasonably keen fan of Pastor MacArthur's preaching and teaching, though I don't agree with some of his positions on certain issues). It was an aggressive endeavour, as we had planned to read the entire Bible from start to finish in one calendar year. This was also very ambitious of us, seeing as we had a relative newborn baby at the time who usurped much of our daily attention So in January of that year, we started our nightly Bible study time by reading a bit of Genesis, a bit of Matthew, and a bit of the Psalms/Proverbs, as the suggested study timeline indicated. Not only that, but we ended up reading MacArthur's notes and such. If you've ever tried to do one of these "read the Bible in a year" things, you'll know that you need to read a LOT per day in order to achieve this. The problem was, we ended up going through some pretty confusing passages in the enormous chunk we read every night, and the Psalms parts were difficult to digest, as they always are for me.

For me, a devotional guide not only provides a logical structure of what to read when, but it also follows a theme that provides you an overall picture of the Scriptures. A tremendous asset or selling point would be if the devotional included aspects of a commentary, providing important contextual, historic and language/culture input that people otherwise may not know. Let's face it - few few Bible readers are theologians, so any help is much appreciated. Besides, having commentary value enhances the passage in question, making it more alive and providing a thorough contexual examination of the passage's location in the book as well as in Scripture itself. Think about it: if I were just to look at a simple passage through the lens of normal reading, I would obviously (and perhaps unconsciously) read the passage through the filters of 2oth or 21st century images and word definitions. A commentary would help to unravel some of this and provide some linguistic help.

My point in writing this post is not to necessarily review a bunch of common devotional guides and critique them; rather, I'd like to share the fact that I have been looking for a good Bible devotional and it just so happened that a good friend of mine recently suggested that I consider the Tom Wright "Everyone" series. The "Everyone" series seems to be, at first glance, a Bible commentary. Each book more or less corresponds in a one-to-one fashion with the associated Scripture book. Thus "Matthew For Everyone" would be dedicated just to the book of Matthew (though in the "Everyone" series, Matthew is split up into two guides). The book of Luke is covered in "Luke For Everyone" and so forth. Anyhow, I managed to read through a good chunk of the book that my friend lent me to consider, and I think I will be buying the rest of the set. This is exactly what I'm looking for.

Tom Wright, if you don't know, is N.T. Wright, an Anglican dude from the U.K., and a theologian which the Christianity Today publication (on which my feelings are lukewarm) considers one of the top five contemporary Biblical theologians in the world today. Now, I've read a couple of Wright's books, including "Who Was Jesus?", in which I had some serious reservations, but when my friend, for whom I have a deep level of respect, encouraged me to consider perhaps using Wright's Bible study set as a daily devotional, I put my personal bias aside and decide to check it out.

Well, I am impressed. I can see how these books can be used as devotionals. For one, it has everything that I expected of a good devotional, and more. The entire book is broken down into much smaller sections, the text of which are included in the book (so you don't need to car a Bible and a devotional around - it's great for the traveller or the person who has limited desk space). In between each section of quoted text are the commentary sections - it discusses historical context, word meanings, and then proposes some application. This is very much like the Life Application Bible (which I really like) style of Bible reading, but instead of constantly flipping back and forth between the text and the small footnotes, the commentary part follows each text section. This way, after you read the passage section all the way through, it is fresh in your mind when it comes to dissecting it. And each reading is maybe 10-15 minutes or so, if not less, so there is no chance your attention span will wane.

The "Everyone" series is meant for exactly that: everyone. It is written from a non-academic, non-technical perspective - much of the theological nomenclature can be found in a supplemental glossary, so as a result, a well versed theological person does not have to wade through elementary definitions in order to continue reading, but the new Bible reader will similarly not have to worry about deciphering endless amounts of technical academic theological language. This makes the book more engaging, and your get right into the Biblical text. If it is for these reasons that I'd recommend that you consider this series if you are looking for a well-rounded Bible daily devotional tool. I don't think it's meant as a daily devotion per se, since it's not split up by days, but I think it's better this way since you aren't focusing so much tracking days rather than immersing yourself into the Word.

I Am Not A Christian

A couple of nights ago, on Halloween night, my wife, son and I, as has been our practice every Halloween night ever since we can remember, disconnected our doorbell, turned off the lights, locked all the doors, cleaned up our garage, and made our way to our dinner buffet location. While it is very uncommon these days for any family to refrain from having their kids participate in trick or treating, we decided that that this was something in which we did not wish to participate. That goes against the grain of what society would otherwise preach, and to an extent, even what many Christians may even think. For us, we feel that that night is not honouring to Christ, so for our family, we choose not to participate. I am on the fence about allowing my son to dress up for school, but this year, we decided that dressing up as a fireman, in and of itself was not a bad thing, so we allowed him to put on his fireman outfit. Since I am the one who drops him off and picks him up everyday, I get a chance to interact with several other parents, and a few thought it strange that we weren't allowing him to go out trick or treating. Without getting into a discussion about our spiritual beliefs and convictions, I simply told them that this was not our practice and our choice was go out to dinner as a family. A couple of them said that they respect the fact that we stand for our convictions. One, however, thought that we were depriving our child of something that all the other kids do. "He will feel left out", they said, since "everyone else is doing it." Man, if that didn't get my pulse racing, I don't know what will. I calmly and evenly said to her that "well, this is a great first lesson for him, then, to not simply go with the crowd in life." She nodded and went about her way.

We did explain to our son why we do not celebrate Halloween, and he accepts it and does not make a big deal of it. Honestly, sometimes I think it's the parents who are more of the sh*t disturbers than the kids are. I also wonder how these kids will turn out, having parents who consider societal pressure and expectation as the barometer for how they should raise their kids. *sigh*

On the way to dinner Wednesday night, my wife and I have a discussion in the car, much to the chagrin of our son, who wishes for us to turn up the Transformers 1986 soundtrack CD, with arena rock and all (another indication that left unbiased, children can choose to listen to cheesy 80s Stan Bush music without worry about the antiquated nature of such music). My wife was mentioning to me that she, as part of her daycare practice, brought the kids to an indoor playground a couple times a week, to let the kids let loose, expend energy, and indirectly, give her (and our house) a much needed break from wear and tear. I showed up one time at this indoor playground and notice that errie absence of any male in there. I felt like a sucker that day, surrounded by boundless maternal estrogen (which is clearly different than standard estrogen). It was as if I had just shown up at a lesbian convention. But that is neither here nor there. Anyway, she told me that naturally, the conversation with these other women drifted towards Halloween, and eventually it came out that she did not allow her son to participate, and when she was asked why, she said, "Well, I am a Christian, and I don't celebrate Halloween", and proceeded to outline the reasons. She told me in the car she got funny stares and snickering the rest of the day.

I mentioned to her, by way of some encouragement, that if she gets that kind of reaction, then she is doing her job in witnessing to others. The Bible teaches that followers of Christ will be ridiculed, and possibly even persecuted. That is par for the course, and over time, I have come to accept this as part of my life. That is not to say that we should deliberately go out looking for ways to piss off people; but if, in the course of interaction with non-Christians about our beliefs, we receive a hostile reaction - well, that is just to be expected. The Bible teaches that God's wisdom is considered foolishness to the world, so we shouldn't really be surprised. A few years ago, our home/car, were targeted for Halloween vandals who slashed our tires since it was clear we did not hand out candy on Halloween night. Judging by what I saw the next day, several other people in the community were driving their cars on rims, calling the cops and generally having a miserable November 1 day. I know several other Christian families who were targeted, who do not celebrate Halloween. The cops seemed to indicate afterwards that this happens occasionally where hooligans (usually teenagers or older) decide to mete out their justice for those who do not succumb to pressure to participate in trick or treating. Since then, we have parked our car in the garage every Halloween night, and I have now been regularly scouting our premises late at night, after my wife and son went to sleep. Sounds like an isolated incident that year, but it was sure annoying.

My wife brought up an exceptionally good point, and one that framed the conversation for the rest of the car ride, and has caused an expediting of a world view shift that I've been slowly developing in my own mind. And this may prove controversial, but I believe that there is much truth in the fact that anyone using the term "Christian" to describe themselves, will automatically be lumped into the same camp as televangelists, hypocritical child molesters in churches, closet homosexuals who rant against legalizing homosexuality, and two-faced individuals who lead an otherwise "holy lives" on Sunday mornings, but the other six days of the week are engaged in anything by Godly behaviour. You know who I am talking about - the couple or family who always smiles on in public, and you never see them make mistakes - generally, these folks have the most to hide. This is not an indictment on Christians at all, but simply acknowledging that there is a negative stigma attached to the word "Christian". Now, you may say that I am contradicting myself here, in that I am saying that we should expect persecution, yet we should not carry the label. Personally, I am starting to think calling oneself a Christian comes with some serious issues. For one, does one really need to say it? As my wife and I agreed, it is far better (and in my view, more in line with Scripture) to show that you are a Christian by the way you live. The Bible says "they will know that you are Christians by your love". In other words, your faith is demonstrable; it need not be accompanied by a self-declaration of a label. Augustine once remarked that the gospel should be preached at all times; use words only when necessary. I think there is much truth in all that. Notice that in Jesus' ministry, He referred to Himself in many ways, most of which were metaphorical. He never went around saying, "Look at me! I am God's Son! I am all powerful! I am sinless!" He didn't need to say much. His actions said it all, as did His consistent life practice.

As I delved into this further that evening as I was trying to sleep, I thought about several other reasons why having the label is not a good thing. For one, it creates unrealistic expectations. Like it or not, the overtly "Christiany" Flanders family on The Simpsons TV show accurately depicts, in my view, people's view of Christians. They expect Christians to have it all together, to not use foul language, get angry, make mistakes, etc. While these are in and of themselves good aspects of one's life to strive towards, in pursuit of holiness living, how far it is from the truth, for anyone who has lived the Christian life. The book of Romans talks about the Christian struggling with temptation, sinning when we don't want to sin. The followers of Christ, His original disciples had many personal and character issues. But thank goodness God still manages to find some way to use imperfect people for His purposes and for His glory.

The next thought that I may be a bit harsh, but I'll say it anyway. I personally would refrain from using the Christian name to describe myself, since it conjures up way too much denominational baggage. No one really views a Christian as a "follower of Christ", as it was originally intended. People view Christians as denominationally fundamentalist "shove my beliefs down your throat" types, Roman Catholic (with all the rote, robotic, and oftentimes unbiblical practices that go with following the pope), or unintellectual and unthinking spiritually emotional hippie types who refuse medical attention, exclusively homeschool their kids and avoid contact with the outside world, spending all their time putting their hope in rapture theology that is biblically unsound, at best.

All this equally applies to the ever-growing practice of putting Christian fish symbols, stickers, decals and such on one's car and belongings. I don't begrudge anyone doing so, but I personally won't wear "What Would Jesus Do" armbands, underwear or neckties, since I know that I fall short of what I should be doing many times, and I'd rather not drag the name of Christ into the mud with me.

Why does it matter what people think? It doesn't. But the problem is, you are trying to witness the Gospel of Jesus Christ to someone, and by using the term Christian, you are already erecting a wall of unfounded (but sometimes founded) expectations which makes it harder to share the gospel with someone. Don't get me wrong - I am not against using the term Christian - but I don't think it is necessary. Practice what you preach, and show people that Christians can be real people with real feelings and you know what - we make mistakes too - I think this will go a long way in sharing Biblical truth with them rather than some presumed dogmatic theology that is devoid of any real joy and spiritual fervor. I think if people see how you act and behave, they will eventually draw conclusions about why you are different. They may even guess that you are a Christian when they see you are a real person who makes mistakes, who just happens to have joy and love in your heart, who practices kindness when you don't need to, who practices forgiveness when you don't feel like it, who turns the other cheek when wronged, and who will love others when they laugh at you for being a Christian.

What Is Sin?

Since I feel a bit in a theological mood today, I am going to discuss some theological topics. One that has always been one of my favourites to discuss is: what is sin?

It's very interesting, because if you ask any group of people, Christian or not, chances are they will define sin in terms of its tangible outcroppings, or its manifestations - they will say stuff like sin is lying, cheating, murdering, etc. The problem with this is that defining it by the symptoms is not entirely accurate. The other problem is that Hollywood and such has made so many movies in which they have not really consulted anyone with half a theological brain to find out whether what they are portraying is accurate. So people think sin is bad stuff that you do. That is not correct, according to the Bible.

In that vein, in framing my comments here, I do want to state that a lot of people view TV and movies and think that the Christian church = The Roman Catholic Church. As a result, they will see the church being a bunch of dos and don'ts, of ritualism and rules-based (I have some major issues with Roman Catholic theology - that will be another discussion for another time). If you look at how the early church was set up in the New Testament, as well as Jesus' teaching for his followers, you will see a different structure. True, some Protestant denominations are just as rote and ritualistic, but I know that many aren't, so I'd ask you to qualify how you define "Christian theology" and "Christian church". I'd go even as far as to say that, despite the fact that most Americans call themselves Christians, I think the number of born-again Christians who have accepted Jesus Christ as Saviour and following Him every day is considerably smaller. Anyway...

While sin is not defined per se (ie. you will never see Jesus say, "this is what sin means", in the context of the rest of Scripture, I propose that sin can essentially be seen as anything which people do which they put their own selfish desires first. Essentially, I would see it as going your way instead of what God would like (or at the very least, not seeking God's will). Now, I realize that I'm not speaking to a predominantly Christian audience here, so I'm sure I may get a cold reception, but this is how I see it, as per my understanding of the Bible, and I have seen consistency in how this plays out in real life.

Some will argue that the Christian sees the world as a horrible and bad place, and as a result, has this worldview of sin in order to buttress their bleak outlook on life. However, I would generally agree with this outlook - however, I would define horrible and bad in the context of sin - it's all through Scripture since the Fall, that humans have that separation from God due to their decision to go their own way. As a result, humanity, until its very end, will bear the consequences of sin. Some people have asked about why God allows suffering of people who never deserved it. I can't answer that question, but I would say that in some cases, it has to not do with their own sin, but other people's sin. Someone drinks too much, drives a car, hits my car and kills my wife and child. Did I deserve to lose my wife and child? I can't figure out why this happened, but I do realize that if I'm ever in such a situation, I'll just have to yield to the fact that actions have consequences and sometimes those consequences affect those beyond us. That is the nature of sin - it's never really in a vacuum.

I'm sure a follow-up question would be: are people inherently good or bad? Again, this answer will not make me popular, but I strongly believe and am convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that people are inherently bad, even if they have the propensity and potential for good. This is consistent with my understanding of sin built-into people when they are born till they die. Here's a personal example I can share: when my son was born, he was born into a pretty loving household. We did not teach him any aggressive behaviour or to be selfish. Yet when he turns 1 or 2, what happens: he starts grabbing stuff from other kids, he starts wanting his own way, he starts pushing others that are in his way - in other words, he is very self-centered. How did he become like that? We never taught him that, nor did we model that for him. It is only by constant discipline and correction that he is able to either keep those selfish desires in check, etc. I've seen this with every single infant/toddler that I meet, regardless of who the parents are. People are generally selfish. And that is just not babies and toddlers.

The good news of the Gospel is that Jesus has overcome sin, and as a result, has bridged the gap between God and humanity. Unfortunately, many churches do not teach this central truth, but instead focus on a list of dos and don't, which is not only not taught by Jesus, but based on Scripture has been shown to be ineffective, since people are selfish by nature and will want to go their own way at some point, rather than yielding to a higher authority. This is no different than the Pharisees who accosted Jesus in his day, who basically were the same people who thought that faith was just "doing the right things" and "looking the right way", etc. That was a false notion of following God, and it was rebuked in Jesus' day by the Man Himself, and it should be rebuked today.

The Christian and Gambling

Since it's wee into the night, I am not sure how much of this I can get done on this topic, but here goes...

Many, many years ago, when we had many more employees at work than we do now, they started a lottery pool (which exists to this day), as typical in many corporate offices, and people pitched in. When I was asked to participate, I politely declined. It wasn't until a few years later that someone approached me and asked why I didn't participate. I simply told them I don't gamble, and they said, "it's not gambling". Well, what can I say? I respectfully disagreed, and responded that what do you call it when you put money into something where the odds are heavily against you that you will get anything back? In my view, this is the opposite of wise investing, where you put your money into something that generally appreciates in value and although there may be slight risk, the general trend of investments tend to rise (I know that there is a grey line here, since some investments are extremely volitile (ie. sector investments), while others are fairly sound (money market, bonds, etc.).

Aside from the addiction part and the documented broken marriages and families arising from gambling's worse by-products (this is not really the scope of this blog entry, so I won't touch it here), my biggest beef with gambling is that it plays on unrealistic hopes and dreams of peple. Notice how the lottery companies will spin this - "what would you do with a million dollars?" Or "imagine the freedom..." Problem is, the chance of winning anything is very, very, very remote. Unfortunately, some people will tend to be so desperate as to try to make money the easy way that they don't think through the process that is working against their favour. My Dad has always taught me that there's no such thing as easy money, and I have seen the truth in that. I literally know people who hinge their future hopes and retirement on "hopefully" winning the lottery. Until then, they keep working, but put away money into lottery tickets. Imagine what they would have if they actually had put that money away in mutual funds or some other appreciating investment, growing their money along the way.

These days, gambling does not simply take the form of slot machines and baccarrat tables at a casino. People can gamble online, through the lottery, sports betting, and the most disturbing trend, the charity lotteries. The justification here is "oh, but I'm supporting a good cause". OK then, how about you simply donate to that charity without going through the lottery? My educated guess is that nine out of ten people will not do that. And I think you know why - they are in it for themselves - to win cars or houses or whatever the charity is giving away via the lottery, under the guise of "supporting a good cause". No different than people giving to churches in order to get a tax receipt (the question is whether you would give to your church if there was no tax benefits for yoruself?) It's sort of like horse racing. I was flipping channels one weekend while my son was sleeping and saw the Kentucky Derby coverage, even though I don't follow horse sports at all. I find it absolutely laughable that they participate in such a ritual like singing some silly song and then watching horses run for less than a 5 minutes. But the place is packed, and you know why? Everyone there is betting on the horses. Take betting out, and how many people would spend a couple of minutes (literally) watching horses run around for the fun of it? Yet, the Derby (and the other Triple Crown events) are made out to be some horse-loving sport (and I don't deny that there are people who watch it for the horses themselves or to see how many Hispanic jockeys there are).

For the Christian, I have some food for thought, and while I am not so stupid as to simply tout, as true as it may be, that "gambling is a sin" like some believers will blatantly state, I will pose several questions to the Christian pondering this issue, keeping in mind that it is true that the Bible has more to say about money and money management than any other topic, theological or otherwise (God, in His wisdom, I am sure, knew that money management would be an issue for people):

First and foremost, what does it say about your faith in God providing for your needs when you are trying to take a shortcut to what is supposedly easy money, rather than rely on Him to supply your needs? What does it say about your willingness to believe God's promises such as Matthew 6:25-34 (one of my favourite Scripture passages of all time) which indicates for people not to worry (and these sentiments are all from Jesus' own mouth) when you decide to play the lottery? Jesus says that our Heavenly Father takes care of the birds of the air and clothes the lilies of the field, and He certainly cares more for people than these other things. In the book of Malachi, it is the only place where God has ever explicity asked people to test Him. Guess what He asked to be tested about? Money! As a personal note, my wife and I can absolutely attest to God's goodness when we had our son, and she went on mat leave and our monthly budget showed that we were going to be taking a financial hit month after month to no end. Well, several amazing things happened during that time where it was really a leap of faith to trust God in light of what we thought was contrary evidence - not only did He take care of our needs, He surprised us by supplying more than enough so even during those times, we had money to put away in mutual funds, etc. (some of the things that happened will astonish you and I am convinced there is no other explanation than God's providence). When we are in a tight financial crunch, I look back and know that God indeed takes care of us, and so when I am telling you this, I am not just paying lip service here - I truly believe this myself!

The Bible warns against dishonest gain and not working for one's wage (I'll have to look up the passages for these ones, but trust me they are there - it's just getting late and I'm starting to doze off here). The fact of the matter is, like it or not, God has given us the ability to work, and working for one's money (obviously in legal ways) is honouring to Him. Not really wanting to work for money, or taking shortcuts in making money is not, and it's been shown in several places in the Bible. There is even a certain expectation that we work - I believe it's in 2 Thessalonians 3 that it says if we don't work, we don't eat. Likewise, being good stewards of the money that God entrusted to us is absolutely important. I think there's not much of a difference between gambling away the money to which God has entrusted you, and and farting the money away on absolutely stupid things (which I have been guilty of doing many times).

The Bible models wise investing through its accounts of Biblical people and through Jesus' parables. The book of Proverbs are full of examples of making wise decisions, taking time to plan, not rushing into things, etc.

Now, people may argue, what's the difference between putting money into a charity lottery and putting money into your kid's school fundraiser? I am not here to draw out lines in every situation, but I'd encourage you to ask yourself at those times: why I am I putting money into this? Am I expecting money back?

If not, well, I'd say you have nothing to worry about.

If so, ask yourself if this a wise investstment - ie. is it likely that my investment will grow as a result? In gambling, the odds are always against you and you are almost certainly always going to lose money, since the whole system only works if there are an overwhelming ratio of losers to winners. When people give to their kids' fundraising efforts, they are not expecting any money back - so it is considered a gift of charity. The child or their school wins as a result with added funds for programs, and you win since you are helping them out with a gift. If you are putting money into any kind of raffle or lottery, you are essentially wanting something back (otherwise, you would give through non-lottery channels), and you are giving to a system where the odds are against you.

Another question that has been raised, and for which I haven't spent an enormous amount of time thinking about, is the whole idea of signing up for stuff which gives away money and prizes but you don't have to put down any money. I would say that it's not gambling, since what is being gambled here? You're probably exposing your address, email and contact info to telemarketing companies, but because you're not putting in your own money towards an odd-on losing proposition, I wouldn't consider it gambling, though some people would still say it's not working so it's kind of lazy. As I haven't really worked out this in my mind, it would be foolish for me to comment further.

The next one is interesting - and again, I haven't thought this through, so this may not make sense (and I'm exhausted right now) - how about "friendly wagers" between people? Again, I look at it whether there is any money being put in? If so, then I'd say it is gambling but then again, most people make these wagers with some semblance of control over what they are wagering. For instance, if I were to bet you $20.00 that I would beat you in arm wrestling, I'd have to be an idiot to do so if I didn't think I could beat you. However, since it is never really guaranteed, you are still playing the unknown card, and as such, it is probably likely siding on the gambling definition. If it's one of those "whoever wins this game will buy the other one dinner" - I don't consider that gambling per se, but again, I haven't thought through this one as I said. Maybe when I'm more awake, I'll run this scenario through again.

Now, I don't distinugish levels of gambling, since gambling is gambling and I don't think there is such a thing as innocent gambling, even at many church-affiliated bingo halls where I am amazed that senior citizens (with generally fixed incomes which generally mean less disposable money to throw out) fart their money away under the guise of fun and fellowship. I also am not one to rank sins, since the Bible does not indicate certain sins being lesser or more than others, though of course, the consequences of sins will differ in their severity. In the end, it is really between you and God, but the Bible does have quite a bit to say about how to gain wealth and properity in a God honouring way, but sorry to say, gambling is not one of them.