Click here for video!
Friday, August 30, 2013
An Atheist Makes The Case For Sharing The Faith
Penn
Jillette is a well-known, outspoken atheist but he says something interesting
about the idea of sharing Christian faith.
He uses the word “proselytize” but we can think of it as sharing the
faith.
Here’s
the quote, “I’ve always said that I don’t respect people who don’t proselytize.
I don’t respect that at all. If you believe that there’s a heaven and a hell,
and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life, and you think
that it’s not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially
awkward…how much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize?
How much do you have to hate somebody to believe everlasting life is possible
and not tell them that?”
Again,
Jillette is not a believer. But he is
just expressing a simple and fairly undeniable logical thought process. If you are a Christian who really believes in
the God of the Bible and you believe heaven and hell are real then it only
makes sense that you would want to help people come to know Christ. In fact, Jillette is basically saying that to
believe these things and NOT tell people about them reveals—in his words—something
like hatred for the person.
It’s an
intriguing comment because we don’t normally have well-known atheists making
the case for the logical consistency of Christians attempting to share the
faith.
Jesus
talked about sharing the faith, too. He challenged
His followers this way…
“Then
Jesus came to them and said, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has
been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and
teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am
with you always, to the very end of the age.’” Matthew 28:18-20
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Avoiding Quarrels
Some people like to focus on minor religious topics, issues
and controversies in order to stir up questions, disagreements, confusion and
doubts. I think most of us will be much
happier—and won’t miss a thing—if we just simply avoid the temptation to engage
in quarrels over these types of matters.
Tuesday, August 27, 2013
First Day of Cardiac Rehab
On my
first day of cardiac rehab one of the questions I was asked was, “How much do
you think you weigh?”
I said,
“I think I weigh about 165 pounds, can we go ahead and put that into your
chart?”
Several
of the staff people laughed. You don’t
have to be a trained rehab professional to take one look at me and know that I
haven’t seen 165 pounds in a long time.
Then
one of the nurses smiled and replied, “I thought you said you were a minister.”
I said,
“I am… and ministers never fib. So, why
don’t we make it 163 pounds in the chart?”
Again,
people laughed. And the nurse said,
“It’s going to be interesting having you around here.”
I think
we’re off to a pretty good start.
Maybe This Isn't That Funny, After All
Here’s some “wisdom” that I recently heard on a reality TV
show: “If you want true love you have to
realize that you’re the only person who matters.” I know it has to be taken
with a grain of salt—and then some—because it’s “reality TV,” but the person
who said these words actually claims to have some expertise on the subject of
love. Think about the lack of basic
logic revealed in the idea that love involves the realization that “you’re the
only person who matters.”
I laughed when I heard the person say this and then I
thought about lots of people being exposed to this kind of thinking and being
influenced by it and I stopped laughing.
Monday, August 26, 2013
Don't Give Up, Keep Doing What Is Right
Sometimes life can feel like it is specifically designed to
be hard, frustrating and discouraging.
I’m not joking when I say that I’ve had moments of frustration when it
felt like everything I tried to do was way more difficult than it needed to be. (It’s not true, of course, that everything was difficult, but that’s what it felt like.)
The truth is that life can be very challenging and it does involve
struggle, but we don’t want to let that keep us from hoping, dreaming and
trying. Don’t give up. Keep striving. Keep doing what’s right. (I’m challenging myself with this post and I
hope you’re encouraged and challenged, too.)
Saturday, August 24, 2013
Taking Our Faith Seriously
A large Pew Forum survey reports that 78% of
adults in the U.S. identify themselves as Christians. I’m praying that all of us who call ourselves
Christians will take our faith in Christ seriously. I’m praying that we will walk humbly with God
and that we will sincerely allow His light to shine through us in ways that are
authentic, positive, loving, attractive, helpful, gracious and powerful.
Friday, August 23, 2013
God Will Never Stop Loving Us
God cannot lie. It’s
not that He could lie if He wanted to but He chooses not to lie. It’s that lying is an impossibility for God
because Truth is part of His nature. [See Hebrews 6:18] I’m bringing this up because God promises in
His word that He will never stop loving us. [Romans 8:35-39] Let that sink in for a moment: You and I will never stop being loved by God! That’s
His promise to us. This is wonderful news, isn’t it?
Thursday, August 22, 2013
Does Jesus Really Know What's Best?
Some people are concerned that if they live the way God
calls us to live it will ruin their fun and cramp their style. That’s why it’s
interesting to consider that Jesus said that actually the best way for us to
live our lives is to die to ourselves and live for Him.
“What? That’s crazy!” Some will protest. “That would be
confining and boring.”
So, then, the questions are:
Is Jesus right? Does Jesus really
know best? Does Jesus really know the
most fulfilling, most effective, most meaningful way for you and I to live our
lives?
I can’t claim that I follow Him perfectly, but I’m trusting
that He does know best.
Wednesday, August 21, 2013
Follow Jesus
Sometimes, in Christianity, we think in terms of following
particular theological points of view or particular denominations. We might even find ourselves thinking in
terms of following a particular teacher or leader. I can understand how these things happen and
I respect the importance of theological distinctions and the role of
leadership. But it’s good for us to remember
that ultimately, we follow Jesus and our primary allegiance must always be to
Him.
Tuesday, August 20, 2013
I May Have Swallowed A Bug
There’s a slight
possibility that I may have swallowed a small bug. He was flying around my head for the past 10
minutes and I kept trying to clap my hands together and squash him.
At one point, he
flew right in front of my face, close to my mouth, as I was taking a deep
breath. And I haven’t seen him ever
since then.
I’ve brushed my
teeth and gargled but that’s not really making me feel better about this whole
situation. I realize people eat bugs and
still live when they are surviving in the wild but I’m feeling queasy.
I think I’ll go
gargle again.
The Wisdom of Seeing Cause And Effect
A lot of times the troubles we are experiencing come from
not seeing the simple connection between genuine root causes and the effects
they produce. Actually, it’s probably
more accurate to say that our troubles may come because we don’t WANT to see
the connection between root causes and their effects. It is an aspect of wisdom to see this
connection and respect the truth of it.
Monday, August 19, 2013
Seeing The Beauty And Wonder of Life, Right Now
We’re all very busy, so, it escapes our attention that the
“same old world” that we experience every day actually has a lot to notice, if
we will slow down, open our eyes, pay attention and be fully present. If we can’t see that life is interesting
right now, it’s unlikely that we will see life as more interesting just because
we go somewhere different tomorrow.
Sunday, August 18, 2013
Jasper's Conditional Love
Jasper
put his head in my lap and looked at me, lovingly, with his big brown
eyes. It almost seemed he was ready to
say something.
“What
is it, Jasper? What do you want to say?”
I asked, petting the top of his head.
I
believe the desire was there—he truly wanted to verbalize a thought—it was on
the tip of his long tongue… but he just couldn’t form the words.
One of
the things that draw people to dogs is that they appear to extend unconditional
love to us. That’s a tremendously attractive
quality. Jasper’s love, however, is
conditional and he really does not attempt to hide that fact. With Jasper, it is a blatantly conditional
love that comes my way.
You
see, I was eating some Fritos (no, not sliced apples, it was Fritos) and that’s
why Jasper was giving me the time of day.
He gazed at me with rapt attention, occasionally licking my hand or
nuzzling his head against my leg.
And, of
course, soon the bag of Fritos was gone.
But guess what?
Jasper
still sat with his head in my lap!
I
scratched behind his ear and let out a contented chuckle. “Perhaps he loves me more than I realized,”
came the pleasant thought.
It
turns out, though, there was a small piece of Fritos sticking to the upper part
of my pant leg. Jasper ate it and walked
away. After all, Nadia had some sour cream
and onion potato chips.
Striving For Success On God's Terms
When I became the
pastor of the church in Oak Lawn, I (secretly) thought I would be the
successful pastor of the successful church filled with successful people. I was not anticipating the possibility that
God had other plans in mind. As time has
gone by I’ve come to realize that a more accurate description of the situation
would be that we are the church for hurting people.
That was not what I
was expecting.
But God is helping
me understand I can still be the successful pastor of the successful church
filled with successful people. It’s just
that I need to have an accurate understanding of success as God defines it.
Success is
this: Faithful obedience to God.
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Self-Restraint and Freedom
Freedom is a fantastic thing. But freedom requires that people exercise
virtues like respect for others and self-restraint or else the very freedom
that we love crosses a line which ironically leads to oppression.
Friday, August 16, 2013
Using Our Time Wisely
Every one of us will have this in common today: We will have
60 seconds to each minute, 60 minutes to each hour and, ultimately, we will
have 24 hours in this day. Poor, rich,
good-looking, not-so-good-looking, powerful, not-so-powerful, young, old; when
it comes to this particular matter we are all the same. The big question, of
course, is how will we use this time that we are given? I’m praying that we will use it well. …But don’t let that cause you to feel any
pressure!
What's Coming Up 8/18/13? -- Audio Podcast
Lisa Roule and I talk about Ashton Kutcher's speech at the Teen Choice Awards as well as what's coming up at the services this Sunday.
Click here for podcast!
Click here for podcast!
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Good News: No One Is Beyond God's Mercy
When people think of themselves as “pretty good” in terms of
their personal moral conduct, they can sometimes be bothered by the fact that
no one—including the most offensive criminal—is beyond God’s mercy. But the
truth is this: for every single person who has ever lived—for all of us—it is
very good news that no one is beyond God’s mercy.
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Someone Following Me
Last
night, at about 10 pm, I went for a walk.
After I had been out for a while I noticed there was someone else who
was out walking and he was about 25 yards behind me. At first he caught my
attention because his shoes were clicking on the sidewalk.
I
didn't really think much about it until after I had taken several turns down
various blocks in the neighborhood and it occurred to me that he was still
behind me.
I began
to think “this is a little bit strange” when I took a few more turns and he was
still behind me.
“Is it
possible this guy is following me?” I thought.
And
almost immediately my next thought was, “Oh come on, no one's following you.”
But
when I took another turn and he was still behind me I actually began to
think about a strategy. “How am I going
to respond if this guy actually tries to do something strange?” I pondered.
But I
also continued to tell myself, “For crying out loud, stop being so dramatic!”
Finally,
I came to a point where I took a left turn and the person following me took a
right turn. After I walked a short
distance in my new direction I glanced back over my shoulder to look for the
person who had been following me. And at
the same moment he was glancing back over his shoulder looking at me.
I
thought, “What are you looking at?!? You’re
the one who was following me. I should
be glancing over my shoulder for any further signs of trouble, not you!”
But I
reassured myself. “See? Your mind is always inventing crazy scenarios
and trying to turn nothing into something.”
Just
then 6 Samurai-Shaolin-Lethal-Ninja-Warrior-Monks jumped out from behind the
bushes. Some of you know, I’ve had some
health issues recently and—I’m embarrassed to say—it took me almost 3 minutes
to dispatch them all. I’m really slowing
down.
So,
what’s the point of all this? It’s
simple, I’m just trying to let everyone know there are some parts of Oak Lawn
where it’s important to watch out for aggressive roving
Samurai-Shaolin-Lethal-Ninja-Warrior-Monks.
Other
than that everything has been fairly routine, lately.
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Taking Jesus Seriously
Some people have concluded that the truth and reality of Jesus
is not something to be taken seriously or carefully considered, simply because
submitting to Jesus would be extremely inconvenient. It can be much easier to say, “This Jesus
stuff is all a big myth.” And then go on
about your day without the idea that there is Someone to whom we are
accountable.
Monday, August 12, 2013
We Really Can Know God
The Bible tells us that we can know God. It’s not that we can know Him completely,
after all, He is infinite and we are finite.
We cannot know everything about God, just like we cannot know everything
about any other person we’ve encountered.
However, we can still truly know Him.
God says, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your
heart.” Jeremiah 29:13
Sunday, August 11, 2013
Making An Amazing Pizza
I had a
hunger for pizza tonight. And before I
grabbed the phone to order from one of our local pizza joints I asked Nadia if
she wanted some pizza, too. As usual,
she said no. (Nadia doesn’t really like
pizza. But she’s still a terrific person
and a wonderful wife and mother despite this tragic flaw.)
Nadia
made an interesting suggestion to me, though.
She said, “Why don’t you make a pizza?”
I
thought, “Hmm, that’s a very intriguing idea.”
In fact, the more I pondered the notion, the more sense it made.
“Most
guys—with limited skills like me—would never attempt to make a pizza from
scratch.” I said to myself. “It’s a huge
effort.” But something told me to throw
caution to the wind and go for it!
So, I
got a box of pizza out of the freezer, sprinkled mozzarella cheese on the pizza
and put it in the oven. Twenty minutes
later I removed the pizza from the oven and there it was: a delicious pizza
that I made from scratch!
I know,
it’s astonishing, isn’t it? I amaze
myself with this kind of culinary expertise.
And to think, I’ve never had formal chef training. It’s all self-education, a love of food and
intuition.
Nadia
and I have agreed, there’s a good possibility I need to be hosting one of those
cooking shows on The Food Network.
God Looks At The Inside
Our inclination is to look at the outside of a person. We pay attention to their looks, what they
wear, hairstyles, etc. God looks at the
inside. He is concerned with thoughts,
attitudes, motivations of the heart.
These inner qualities are more substantive and they reveal more
significant truths about the person.
Saturday, August 10, 2013
A Minute And A Half of God Stuff Podcast - No. 22
God is
more concerned with making us like Christ than He is with making our lives more
comfortable.
Click here for podcast!
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Obligated To Speak The Truth
If your doctor did not tell you the truth about some serious
medical condition which affects you because he didn’t want to hurt your
feelings or make you feel sad, you would report him to the authorities—and rightly
so. Why? Because he is ethically obligated to tell the truth. We are obligated
to tell the truth, too. We must speak with grace, humility and love, yes, but
we must tell the truth.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Testing And Trials Produce Growth
Living through a difficult trial or time of
testing can be frightening and stressful.
It goes without saying that these times are not fun. However, after we have lived some life most
of us come to realize that—even though they are unpleasant—these are the times
in which our faith becomes very basic: we are either trusting in Christ or we
are not. We get to the essence of our faith. These are also times in which we experience
the greatest growth.
Monday, August 5, 2013
Finding The Lego Store
Rachel
and I were wandering around the mall, today, looking for the Lego store. I didn’t really know where it was but I kept
guessing and walking here and there.
Rachel
said, on several occasions, “Let’s look at a directory.”
But I
kept roaming about thinking it was probably right around the next corner.
Suddenly
I began to chuckle because I realized we were having one of those experiences people
frequently mention when they talk about the differences between men and women. We weren’t driving in a car, lost, while I
refused to stop and ask for directions.
But the situation was similar. We
were meandering around the mall and I didn’t know where the Lego store was
located but I didn’t simply look at the mall directory.
I
should say, in fairness to myself, that I was actually keeping my eyes open for
a mall directory station while I was also looking for the Lego store. I wasn’t opposed to consulting the directory.
On the other hand, though, I was not
walking directly to one of the mall entrances which is where, I knew, a mall
directory station would definitely be located.
I kept
acting very confident and trying to give the impression that I was pretty sure
I knew where the Lego store was located.
But even though Rachel is mentally challenged she knew that I didn’t
really know. Rachel’s intellectual
capabilities may not be the same as a typical 24 year old, but she still seems
to have a tremendously acute understanding of the times I don’t know what’s
going on, even though I’m acting like I know what’s going on.
“Can we
just look at a directory?” she continued to ask. My attempt to act confidently knowledgeable
about the situation was not fooling her.
Finally
I broke down, walked to a directory, then—armed with accurate information—quickly
and confidently walked straight to the Lego store.
Every
now and then Rachel will give me one of those “I-told-you-so” comments. But I think, in this case, she was so happy we
were no longer wandering in the retail wilderness that she resisted the impulse
and just enjoyed—finally!—being at the store.
Keep Dreaming Dreams
It’s encouraging and important to have a few things that you
are dreaming about. To have dreams is an
aspect of hope. I want to live with a
sense of hope about the future, don’t you?
People who walk with God and genuinely understand who He is, should be
among those who are most hopeful! “…Your
old men will dream dreams, and your young men will see visions.” Joel 2:28.
Sunday, August 4, 2013
My Dwindling Attention Span
Tonight—actually,
just a few minutes ago—I was watching a movie on television, with a computer in
my lap and browsing through the Amazon bookstore on a Kindle device, all at the
same time. And I felt restless.
I
thought to myself, “You should be writing something.”
So,
that resulted in this post.
Actually,
what’s really bothering me is that I know something’s wrong. Sure, I laughed about it when it occurred to
me that none of the three devices—the TV, the computer, or the Kindle—were really
the object of my complete focus. I
chuckled and shook my head when I realized that I’m having trouble paying
attention. But I know something is not
right.
I have
three technological tools that would have literally seemed like extraordinarily
mysterious magic devices 75 years ago.
Any one of these pieces of technology would have captured my grandparent’s
attention with bewilderment and wonder for hours. And, yet, the three of them, together, can’t
really keep my attention very well. How
is this happening?
Even
though I read a lot and try to convince myself that must mean I have some
intellectual depth, the truth is I can tell my attention span is getting
shorter.
(Is
attention span linked to intelligence? I
hope not. Because if it is, I’m getting
dumber.)
I was
talking with my brother-in-law Paul about this same subject a couple of nights
ago. He says that his attention span is
getting shorter, too. And he said a few
other things, as well, but I can’t remember all of our discussion anymore
because even though we were both talking, neither one of us were paying
attention to the conversation after about a minute, or two.
Like
most of the people reading this post, I’ve been exposed to expert marketing; clever,
entertaining visual images; and endless hype my whole life through television,
radio, movies, computers and now, even, the phone in my pocket. And I think it’s finally starting to have a
noticeable effect on my attention span and my ability to concentrate.
What
does all of this mean? I don’t know. But I’m pretty sure that… um… basically…
Uhhh… What
have we been talking about…?
Saturday, August 3, 2013
The Challenge of Slowing Down
One of the hardest things for people in our culture to do is
be quiet and enter into prayer and solitude with God. We would much rather “do something
productive.” There is a constant
chatter in our minds and a relentless busyness that often elbows prayer and
solitude out of the picture.
…Slow down. We were
not designed for perpetual busyness.
Find time. Make time. We were created to spend some quiet time with
God—this is an important part of a full, rich life.
Friday, August 2, 2013
A Minute And A Half of God Stuff Podcast - No. 18
The importance of the resurrection of Jesus.
Click here for podcast!
Click here for podcast!
Thursday, August 1, 2013
It's Probably Not As Bad As We Think It Is
Many of the bad things that happen in life are not as bad as
we think they are. I’m not suggesting
that there are no genuine tragedies or catastrophic negative events, of course
there are. However, we often have a
tendency to exaggerate negative events to a point beyond their true
significance. So, go ahead and smile
it’s probably not as bad as you think it is.
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