Grand Ol' Topic of Faith

Something I'm big on is faith. Now this doesn't mean I believe in faith only salvation, I believe in Christ only salvation, that is, only from Christ does salvation come. It's not baptism that saves, it's not faith that saves, it's Jesus that saves. You want to argue about how that salvation comes about, have at it. Just don't tell me I'm wrong unless you're willing to admit you're wrong. But that's all besides the point.

I think faith does a lot. Others will say it doesn't, but then I have to counter with scripture and show them that it does. What I mean is that faith requires action.

James 2 is a favorite chapter of mine. First off James tells us not to show favoritism between people. Now there is a difference between showing favoritism and helping people who need it. I give some people more time than others, but that's because those particular people actually need it. I've had people try to take my time who only wanted it, which would have taken it away from the people who needed it, and I chose those who were in need over those who just wanted. A child who breaks their arm needs more attention than a child with a paper cut. That's the mentality that I had, and I think it worked and was still in line with what James is talking about there.

But then moving on to the next passage in the chapter, James talks about how faith without works is dead. This is what I really want to get into today. This tends to be something I come to a lot because I see this problem a lot.

There's a preacher that said one time something along the lines of, "Going to church doesn't make you a Christian just as sitting in a garage doesn't make you a car." I just tried to find the source and failed, but someone did note on that idea that a more appropriate phrase would be, "Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage would make you a mechanic." This I think is more spot on. Going to church can, over time, bring you into true Christianity, just as being at a shop could slowly turn you into a mechanic.

I've talked about my mechanic friend before and I've had this happen to me. I hung around, watched, had some people show me how to do some things, and I'm no mechanic, but I can change oil and brakes and do a few other easy things. That's what we call the discipleship process. A master teaches an apprentice so that the apprentice can become self sufficient enough to eventually become a master and do the same. 

So what does this do with faith? 

You have faith, you want to do something about it, you find someone older and wiser who has been in the faith a while, and follow them, learn from them, grow to the point where you can do like wise. That's what Jesus did, that's what he told us to do, that's how the Church really got kicked off in Acts, those are the people that followed Paul, and that's what a lot of churches today have lost. 

Faith has to lead to action. It's not always discipleship though, some people think that only good works matter. "I tithe every week, I pray, I read my bible, I give extra to the homeless, I volunteer at a food pantry, I even lead a bible study for people in the church." That's all great. And I have no problem with that. But how many people have you helped lead to Christ? How many non-Christians do you tell of the Gospel? Your faith breeds actions, which is good, but does it breed discipleship? 

I guess what I'm saying is that Faith without works is dead. But what works need to happen? What works show that you have faith? Why do works show that you have faith? I'll try to answer these three questions real quick.

Why do works show that you have faith?

Let's say you love someone, boyfriend, girlfriend, parents, whatever. You tell them to their face, "I love you." But then when they're around you ignore them, never do anything to make their life just a tad bit easier, never show them that you love them in anyway possible. Is that love then? No. Same goes for faith. You say you believe God exists, that Jesus is his son and died for your sins, and you say you accept him as your savior and Lord. But you act no different from before that faith and after it. You still complain about everything because you're life is sooooo terrible. You still pick on people, mouth off to your parents, give your younger siblings hell, break laws, and really just do whatever you want because you're grown and no one can tell you what do to. Do you really have faith then? If you did believe all of that then you couldn't help but change your life because of what Christ did for you.

What works show you have faith/ what works need to happen?

As I said, yes, there are easy things to do in response of having faith. We can give, we can volunteer, we can lead Bible studies, what have you, but serving can turn out to be pretty easy. For most people that's in their comfort zone, and others it's just on the edge of growth. I serve a lot, because I enjoy it. I don't do it for praise for myself, I don't do it because I think it'll show my faith. I do it because I want to love everyone as God does, and it doesn't matter who needs help I'll go out of my way to help them whether I like them or not, because I show no favoritism. But that's not me showing my faith. Me showing my faith is sitting down with a believer or non-believer and giving them time, not service, but time, even if I don't know them. I show interest in them because I am interested in them. We'll talk about whatever, maybe we'll get to a topic about Christ, maybe we won't. Doesn't matter. But I actually care about that person and that's what matters. I may not know the person like I said, but they're as much one of God's children as I am, they just may be lost, or they may not. I have that faith that Christ died for me, but not only for me but for them also. And I live on that faith.

So go out, and live your faith.

You've Already Been Paid For

You and your family decide you want a dog. You're not worried about breed, sex, color, none of that, you just want a dog. So you up and go to the pound, might as well save one right? You go in there with intent and a purpose. "I want a dog." You're looking through the choices and find the one that you want, picking it out. To take this dog home though you have to pay X amount of dollars. It's worth it to you because you and your family want a dog that bad. If you don't do all these things, taking time, picking out a dog, and paying for it, the dog will be put down.

You have just redeemed a dog.

Redemption is a word that we use in church that isn't always understood. I think this dog analogy works great for the idea of redemption. But to put it even plainer I'll do a couple more examples.

You redeem coupons, giving them to someone in exchange for something.
You redeem a wage, working throughout the week in exchange for money.
You redeem items, giving someone money for that particular item.

Redeeming things is a lot like bartering. I have this, I think it is worth this much. You have that, and it's worth this much, we can trade these things, I give you this, you give me that. I just redeemed that with this.

In the Old Testament God goes to a man Hosea and says, "You're going to go marry a prostitute." So Hosea obeys. They marry, have some kids, then his wife (Gomer) runs away back to her old life. God comes back to Hosea and says, "Go get her back. It's going to cost money, but it doesn't matter. Go get her." With God telling Hosea to do this it can be assumed that maybe Hosea didn't want her back. And if her own husband didn't want her back, why would anyone else really want her? But he goes and pays to get her back, despite the fact that he has to pay for what is already his. She was already his wife, yet he had to go buy her back. He had to go redeem her from her old life to bring her into the new one. But Hosea got off easy. Yes he had to pay something for what was already his, but you can't really place value on a human life, so whatever he paid to have her back was less than he should have paid.

God had to do the same thing as Hosea, he had to redeem us. Last time we talked about sin. We see throughout scripture, and right now Romans is coming to mind, that we are slaves to sin. Sin owns us. We can do nothing that sin doesn't tell us to do. That is essentially what it means to be a slave to sin.

Yet we are God's creation, his masterpiece. But he still had to buy us back. So what he did was sent his son, putting on flesh and bone, to come and pay for our sin. Romans 6.23 tells us that the wages of sin is death, that is sin is paid for with death. You work a job, getting paid $8.00/hr for 20 hours a week. Before taxes that's $160/week. Those are your wages, money you have earned for the time and work you have done. Exact same concept with this verse. We have done sin, one single sin, and we have earned death for it. Our actions have only gained us death. But the rest of the verse says that the free gift of God is life, in Jesus Christ our Lord.

We have been offered a free gift of life, countering the wages of sin that we have rightfully earned. The gift of grace and life is free to us, but it cost God something so that he could reclaim us. It cost him his son. Jesus was the currency paid so that we could be brought back to God and be redeemed, so that we can be reconciled and receive grace and life.

God paid for us, his own creation, with his sons life.

That's like if Bill Gates wanted a computer that ran Windows, he would have to give up his firstborn for it. It's already his, he's the one that started Windows. Why should he have to give up his son for it?

Well why would God have to give up his son for us then?

So by now you should have an idea of what redemption is, but I want to get a little further into what it does.
Ephesians 2.8 says that we have been saved by grace. We can change the word saved there to redeemed. (I've talked about this before and haven't been struck by lightning so I think I'm good.) So then we have been redeemed by grace, or the grace of God. This is saying that God did all of the work.

This grace of God allows us to be redeemed then.
He had enough love for us to be merciful to us despite our sin.
He had enough mercy on us to not just straight up kill us but instead to extend grace to us (seen in Titus 2.11)
And he had enough grace for us to save us from our sin which is death (Hebrews 2.9 is a fitting reference here).
How he saved us then was with his son Jesus, bring us back to the idea of redemption.

But just above I stated that grace has been extended to all. This means that we all have a chance to take it, but not everyone does. Read Titus 2.11 and tell me that God has extended grace to everyone. And it is grace that saves/redeems us. All we have to do is consciously take it, you cannot accidentally accept the grace of God.

Well how do you accept it? It's been said, "Grace is free, but not cheap." This is a true statement. Grace is a free gift of God. If it wasn't free then we'd have to give something of equal value for it or else it's a steal, and you can't steal from God. But we don't have anything of equal value of God's grace. That's why it's free. But it's not cheap, it costs us everything. What do I mean by that?

When I got baptized at school, I was talking with a professor about it and he told me that the only thing that we own is our sin. This is also a true statement. Think about it. You die right now, what goes with you? Your cell phone? Nope. Friends? Nope. Clothes, money, xbox, dog, bed, boyfriend, girlfriend? Nope to all of the above. Not even your body is yours, you cannot control what it does. From the time you're born it starts to die and you can do nothing to stop it, only further it along.

The only thing you'll take with you after life is your sin, because no one gave that to you. You chose that for yourself. That is all that you own, that is everything you have, most people find their very identity in their sin. I used to always put relationships before God and I found my identity in that. That was my sin, and it controlled and owned me, much as I owned it because it was mine, and I chose to do those things. Yet to receive this grace we must repent of our sin, turning our back to our own lives and handing all we own to God.

For our sin he gives us grace, and by his grace we are redeemed.

Yet he gave us his son for our sin, giving something invaluable for something worth less than excrement in the yard.

This is what it means to be redeemed.

You pay for your dog, you bring it home, and becomes part of your family, it's valuable to you.
God has already paid for you, and he asks that you come join his family, leaving your past life behind, giving him all you own so that you can find joy in this new life, joining his family.

Saved from What?

So the past two day's I've basically been talking about Jesus as King and the Gospel message. Both of which are closely tied to the issue of salvation. Salvation=Saved. The person who saves us is our savior. And our savior is the Messiah, the king who came to save. Now I'll get into salvation at a later time, but right now I want to talk about why we need saving, and hopefully I can get some people out there who don't think they need saving to realize that they really do.

In the beginning God made everything, and it was all good. It was exactly as it was supposed to be. Then came the Fall. The serpent came and tempted Adam and Eve, we're not going to get into whose fault it was or anything because it doesn't matter, and they sinned. Now it is to be noted that being tempted is not a sin. Jesus was tempted yet he was still perfect. Adam and Eve were tempted and they failed the test, and sinned.

Now in this moment in human history there are a lot who say that Adam and Eve never had any real knowledge of how to handle a situation like that; being tempted. While they have never been in a situation like this, they did have knowledge how to handle this type of situation. They were given two rules: Take care of everything, and don't eat THAT. Pretty simple. the Fall hasn't happened, things don't die, should be pretty easy to take care of the Garden. Don't eat from that particular tree? Well there's tons more stuff around here to eat, shouldn't be that hard. It should be ingrained in their minds by this point that they're not to eat of that certain tree. And that's shown in the dialogue between Eve and the serpent. "God said, 'You shall not eat of the tree in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.'" Eve has that memorized so she knows that she is not to eat of that tree. And God had made them a promise: Eat of that tree and you die. Now he wasn't talking physical death, but spiritual. The serpent tricks her and reverses her thinking though, getting her to eat from the tree, going against what God has told them not to do. They knew this thing wasn't God, he spoke about God in the third person and said the exact opposite of what God did say, therefore they questioned God and his wisdom, then went and acted on that questioning doing what he said not to and therefore sinning. It wasn't because they wanted to go against what God said, but they wanted to be like God (Gen. 3.5-6). In that moment she put herself before God, wanting to be like him and maybe even hoping to be better than him.

Because of that single moment in history, one bite, everything changed. And the world has been declining since. I've spoken about it before, the Law of Entropy, how everything is dying. This is a result of the Fall, of sin entering into the world. Everything started to die then, everything began to decline, all as a result of sin.

Now we all have sin in our own lives. Think about the best person you know, whether it be your parents, pastor, best friend, grandparents, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Liam Neeson, whoever, they have sinned. The only person that hasn't sinned is Jesus, which is why his sacrifice was perfect, but we'll get into that later. Paul tells us in Romans that all have sinned. Solomon tells us the same in Ecclesiastes. There are all types of ways to sin: Actions, inactions, seen, unseen, thoughts, conversations, even letting your emotions out of control is a sin (example being Matthew 5.21-22). Go look at the sermon on the mount, Matthew 5-7 and tell me that you haven't done at least one of those. Have you looked at a guy or a girl and thought, "I'd hit that"? Guess what, you've sinned. You've committed adultery. You ever been driving and someone cut you off and you thought about running them off the road? Well you just basically murdered them.

Now these things don't mean we might as well go out and do them. Let me be very clear about this.

THOUGHTS LEAD TO ACTIONS

THOUGHTS ARE AS BAD

AS ACTIONS

BOTH CONDEMN THE SAME

WE ARE CALLED TO BE CHRIST LIKE

WHO WAS PERFECT

WHO KEPT HIS THOUGHTS

EMOTIONS

AND ACTIONS IN CHECK

GET YOUR IN CHECK AS WELL

MESSING UP BY THOUGHT DOES NOT MEAN IT'S OKAY TO MESS UP BY ACTION

What this really comes down to is: Have you repented? Have you been saved? If so act like it. But if you're still a slave to sin then continue to reap judgement on yourself. Pile it high and see where that gets you on the other side. If you're a Christian: Act like it. If you're a pagan: Do whatever. 

You may not think you sin, but that's you turning from the truth. We all sin, saved and unsaved. The difference is those who are truly saved make an attempt not to sin. They don't always succeed, I sure don't. They stumble, probably a lot. But they try. They act like their saved. 

A guy smokes from the age of 14 till he's 40, pack a day kind of guy. Finds out he has stage 3 lung cancer. He goes and gets treated, and by the grace of God the cancer goes into remission. Now do you think after that he's just going to go out and start smoking again? Probably not. He realizes that he has a second chance and he's going to honor and respect it. 

It's the same thing with sin. We have this cancerous thing in our lives which is killing us. We finally realize it after a while and realize what it's doing to us. We go to have someone take care of it, we go to God. He says that he's already done everything to take care of this cancer in our lives, all we have to do is believe that he and his son did all the work. We do that, we turn our back to the life that we lived, and start over again. Since we've had the problem taken care of do we then go on living the way we did? By no means! We died to sin and found a new, better life in Christ! 

The point of all of this is: We all have sin in our lives and it's killing us. Murder, rape, abuse, bullying, obesity, hurricanes, earth quakes, wild fires, depression, fear, hate, suffering; it all comes back to just sin in the world. Those in the world continue to sin more and things get worse. I think there's something to that. We all do it, we can't get around it. There is absolutely nothing we can do to take care of this sin problem.

But luckily for us, someone who could do something about it already did. And he did everything required. Jesus lived a perfect life. He went to the cross in our place. He took on our sin. He died then rose again. This defeated sin, defeated death, and brought life back into the world, and pouring out grace. This grace has appeared to all of us, as has God. Accepting is the only way to gain this grace and the freedom that comes with it.

For sin is paid for with death, but God gives the gift of grace for free, giving us life.

Sin is why we need a Savior.

The Clearing of Issues

So I was going to title yesterday's post "Step One" but realized before I posted it that that's a horrible title. I'm working on leading people to Christ, who is our salvation, and it is in my theology that salvation is not a process, but a culmination of events at once.

When I was working for Enterprise I ended up talking with some baptists who believed whole heartedly what they were taught without thinking about what it was. I know this because they stuck to their beliefs even after I thoroughly questioned them poking some pretty big holes in their theology. This also happened with some other baptists who randomly showed up at my house because I visited their church. Those were some fun conversations.

But the real conversation and banter found itself centered around one particular issue: Eternal Salvation.
For those of you who don't know, this is the idea that once you are saved you will always be saved no matter what you do. If you want to believe that, go for it. That's incredibly dangerous territory to be and isn't supported by scripture, but you go right on ahead and believe that.

So when I was talking with the guys from Enterprise, I asked if one of the men believed in predestination like other baptists. He gives some answer that sounded a lot like predestination but made even less sense. But then he stated that he believed in Eternal Salvation. I start asking him questions, poking here and there, and he holds to it with all he has. I look at the other guy there and ask if he believes in it to which he replies, "Eternal Salvation? Oh yeah of course. As long as you're fully saved."

Fully saved? Does this mean you can be partially saved? If you die and you're not fully saved does only part of your soul head on to heaven while the rest goes down to hell? By saying "fully saved" what he was saying was that salvation is a process and that there are hoops you must jump through in order to be saved. Does this sound like how God works? That's how it was in the OT, but once Jesus came the things that we did became meaningless for salvation because Christ did all the work. That's the point of Jesus coming to earth. So by saying that salvation is a process then we are still saved by ourselves and the of Jesus was for nothing. Not only that but scripture points to not a process of salvation, but an event of salvation.

I take this idea of salvation as a process from something that was started in the 60's or 70's I believe called the five steps of salvation. I could have those dates completely wrong, but the five steps were: Hear, believe, repent, confess, be baptized. Yes, all of these things lead to salvation, and it cannot be had without these things, but these are not hoops that we must jump through to be saved. They are not entirely separate actions. I see them as chain reactions.

Now in the rest of this I may make some older and fundamental people mad, but oh well. This is how I see scripture, you don't have to believe it. Just don't outright say I'm wrong without proof and don't try to shove your beliefs down my throat. I'm not making anyone believe what I say, I'm only sharing what I think.

So what makes us "saved?" Is is being baptized? Living a good life? Praying, reading, and singing on Sunday's? Am I saved simply because I went to a Christian college or am in ministry?

Absolutely not. It doesn't matter what we do, none of these things will save us.
The biggest issue with churches that I've ran into on this topic is baptism. I once baptized a guy in my youth group and his elbow was sticking out and the minister there wanted me to do it again because of that. He thought he wasn't saved because he wasn't, by definition, "Fully immersed." If God keeps a person out of heaven for that reason me and him are going to have some issues. But if it's baptism that saves us, then why was Jesus baptized? Did he have sin of which he needed to be forgiven? Did he need saving as well? What did he need to repent of? Does anyone else see the issue behind the statement of, "baptized for salvation?"

Salvation is being saved. Saved from sin and the death that comes with it. You cannot be partially saved, that makes no sense. You cannot save yourself, you can only be saved by outside help. So being saved washes away our sins, if it didn't, we couldn't have the Holy Spirit, God himself, with us because God can't be in the presence of sin. In Acts 10 we see Cornelius, a God fearing Gentile with his family and Peter when the Holy Spirit, God himself, comes upon them. To which Peter replies, "Can anyone stop them from being baptized?" Now how can God come upon people, full of sin, if they haven't been baptized for salvation? How many times throughout scripture do we see people receiving the Holy Spirit at baptism? Once. And that was with Jesus. Ever other time we see baptism there is no sudden coming of the Holy Spirit, it either comes before or after baptism. This leads me to believe that baptism is but a symbol. It's necessary for all believers, being commanded by Jesus, but it's not what saves us.

So what does save us? Ephesians 2.8 says that is is grace that saves us. Well how do we get grace? Through faith. Faith for me is incredibly powerful and essential for all Christians. We have faith in the point of yesterday's post, that Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of the only and living God. Not only that but we accept him into our life as our personal King and savior. When we have that faith we have all of the things that salvation will include: It causes us to be humble, repent, acknowledging the supremacy of Christ. We receive grace, redemption, righteousness, sanctification, justification. In a simple word, through this true and actual faith, we are saved. If we have this faith then we will act on it. All that comes from this faith is a process. we are not 100% righteous, but Christ continually works at making us righteous. We have not 100% repented, we still fight our demons, but now with the help of Jesus. We are not 100% sanctified, but are continually being made holy.

The only two things that happen 100% when we come to this faith is that we receive that Grace of God and are saved by it. But it will not remain if do not allow ourselves to be transformed. God doesn't want you to come to him perfect, he wants you as you are: Broken. He'll put you back together again and make you into something new and better. But you have to let him do this. This is where we humble ourselves and repent.

All of this is what I will be getting into through the next week or so. But this is what I felt like I needed to talk about today. The main thing to remember is Jesus did all the work. And in the words of the fantastic Dr. Girdwood, all we have to do is ride his coat tails up to heaven.

The Rock King

Class one day I was given a challenge: Completely relay the Gospel message in 30 words or less. Needless to say, that wasn't too easy, but I think I got it down.

God came to earth in human form as Jesus. He lived a perfect life then died for our sins, then rose again three days later defeating death and sin.

Bam. 29 Words.

That is the essence of what I wanted to get at yesterday, telling of what the Gospel is. I went a bit deeper than just 29 words last night, but I still told of what the Gospel was, the Good News of Christ. With that we began to lay down a foundation that we can continue to grow and build on.

To recap, the foundation is Jesus, with the cornerstone being his identity as Messiah, leading to him as Savior, which is the Gospel Message. That's where we're coming from, the foundation on which we will not only begin building on, but also be putting together.

Today we go to step one of that task.

Step one is defining what it means to Jesus as King, Messiah, or Christ.

Jesus' main teaching in the Gospels, and we see this especially in Matthew, is the Kingdom of God/Heaven. What exactly does this mean? Well going back to yesterday, Israel had no human king for a long time, with God being their only king over them. Eventually they wanted to be like the countries around them and have a human king over them. So God gives them what they want, and they get a King over the nation of Israel. This comes at a price, the king will abuse and extort them, ultimately being a regrettable decision for them. They say, "Oh well! Do it anyways!" and get their new king, Saul. He goes nuts, dies in battle at his own hand (or someone else's depending which book you read), and David becomes king. Then there's a long line of kings eventually ending in them being taken over by numerous enemies throughout the years, finally leading up to the Roman Empire taking over and the only king that they have then is Caesar.

This brings us to Jesus who comes up and says that he is the promised Messiah, the promised King of Israel, saying that the Kingdom of God is at hand. Now looking back to the previous paragraph we may be thinking that the Kingdom of God is a nation with God as king. Yes and no. When we come into the family of God we become a part of the new nation of Israel, with God as our King yes, but there is more to it than that.

Back to the beginning of time Adam and Eve have a personal, intimate relationship with God, where they walk with him every day, talk with him in person every day, and he is physically there with them. Not only was he their God, but their King and Friend. This is the original Kingdom of God: Having God as a personal King in your life whom you can go to at any time about anything. Israel's kingdom needed people to go between God and the people, they couldn't go to God themselves for fear of death. Yet with Adam and Eve, they could be around God before the Fall.

So with Jesus coming as Messiah he came to usher in the Kingdom of God, with him being King over our lives. No longer do we have intercessors between us and God. The only intercessor that we have is a form of God himself (Rom. 8.26).  Not only that, but that form of God that intercedes for us is constantly with us, meaning part of God, which is fully God, is always with us. God is always with us. How much closer to the original Kingdom of God can we get?

This is what it means to have Jesus as Messiah, as King. That he brought the Kingdom of God to us, allowing us to be personally under the Kingship of God as our personal Lord and savior. Any of you baptized? Remember saying that? "I believe Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and my personal Lord and savior." A lot of good stuff there we'll probably look at later. But if you repeated this phrase you are saying that you are making Jesus the only God, the only King in your life, and you will serve him to the best of your ability, which can only happen when you lean on him, which is why we need him to be personally involved in our lives.

All of this is the cornerstone which the rest of the foundation will be laid in relation to.

The rest of the foundation is pretty easy. We see all through scripture who God is, and we see through the New Testament who Jesus claims to be: The Good Shepherd, the True Vine, the Living Water, the Bread of Life, etc. It is your job to go look at these and see who Jesus is. Compare it and relate it to him as Messiah, and lay that stone down to build the foundation for your life.

Now since we know the basics of the Gospel message, we'll be getting deeper into it throughout the time it takes to get all these things out of the way. I don't know how long this is going to take, but it'll be worth it. Today's post is only a part of the Gospel. Tomorrow I think I'll talk about why we needed Jesus to come bring the Kingdom of Heaven. Then we'll see where it goes from there.

Time to Get to the Roots

So we recently finished up Ecclesiastes which was fun, but I began to notice while working through it that it's a 12 chapter long hyperbole, meaning that the author over exaggerated his points. We saw him go from one end of the spectrum saying everything that we do is absolutely pointless meaning life sucks to enjoy everything because it's all awesome. Only a few times does it make sure we understand that while everything is permissible, not everything is good.

So all that got me thinking, I should really do some stuff on the basics of Christianity. Now to start all of this off I want to say that, as usual, this is my take, what I've seen, experienced, and read all will come together for this. Some people disagree with me, some would agree, some will even say I'm going to Hell for my beliefs. They can deal with that in their own way, I don't care. I don't plan on getting too deep with these next few posts, but there will be some deepness. I will do my best to make it applicable, meaningful, and understandable for you.

All that being said: Let's get started.

I posted a few weeks ago probably about how Jesus is the foundation. This is what I want to start off with because you build on a foundation. Now this is found in Matthew 16, Mark 8, Luke 9, and 1 Corinthians 3 (along with some other scripture which you'll have to dig a bit to pull it out). Jesus is what all other things are build on. He calls himself the truth and the life. Not just a truth, or a life, but the truth and the life. A devo book I was going through a couple days ago tells of how can be seen as Jesus saying that he is reality. Everything else is not true, is not real if he is not a part of it. It is in him that we find meaning and purpose. It is in him that we find the reason for our lives. And if we don't build our lives on that truth, we're building on sand, a bad foundation. But if we build on the rock, build on Jesus as our foundation, we will begin to have some stability.

With Jesus being the foundation and providing stability to our lives we have to have a corner stone, or the first stone laid on the foundation. That stone is the truth that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the promised Savior from God. We acknowledge this, understand it, believe it, and set it down first. then everything else that we believe about Jesus is placed in relation to this one truth. With that we begin to have a foundation, and the more we know Christ, the bigger the foundation, and the bigger the life we can have.

So what exactly is this corner stone? Yes I said the Christ, the Messiah, and the Savior, but what do those words really mean? This is a problem that has arisen thanks to lazy churches who allow Biblical illiteracy to run rampant through our congregations. I can be as much to blame as anyone having spent my time in church work, but this is a problem dating back decades now where we don't understand what the words Christ, righteous, justified, sanctified, redeemed, and many more mean. So hopefully I can begin to clean this up.

Christ/Messiah the same word, just a different language. They both mean anointed. Anointed means to be covered in oil, which is something that was done to kings in the past. There were prophecies in the Old Testament about a king that will come from the line of David (3rd king, 2nd human king of Israel) who would save the people of Israel. He would be the "Messiah" or "anointed one," or the true king of Israel. The word Christ is the Greek word for Messiah, which is the Hebrew word (more or less, don't want to bother you with too much language stuff). So Israel is waiting for this Messiah, this king, to come and save them from all the problems that have happened to them. If you take the time to look at Israel's history, you'll see there's a lot of problem they went through. It should also be noted, that while reading a book for class there was a person in there that wrote that all the problems Israel went through was just something that kind of happened to them, and they did nothing to deserve it. Yet scripture tells us something completely different, that Israel sinned in the eyes of God, and he removed his protection from the as a result of their sin, and they were taken over by a foreign nation. This is what they wanted to be saved from, and why they needed a new King to save them.

Skip forward a few centuries to the turn of the ages. Jesus comes along. Here's this carpenter from the wrong part of town walking around saying that he is this promised Messiah, doing all of these miracles, and at times even putting himself on even status with God, going as far as to call himself his son.

The audacity of this man.

Yet throughout his life he has never sinned. He has only loved and expressed it through all of his actions. He has gotten angry at times, but for perfectly legitimate reasons, having a righteous anger similar to God's own righteous anger. Throughout his life he does nothing to deserve any type of punishment, yet makes enough people mad with what he does and says that they finally plot to kill him. They turn one of his best friends against him, take him to trial illegally, bring false witnesses against him, the entire time not defending himself, then have him condemned to death. The beat him, humiliate him, make him unrecognizable as a human, torturing him. Finally they nail him to the cross to kill him. Yet we see in the story that he willing gives up his life, they never took it from him.

"This can't be the promised King that God was supposed to send us from the oppressive countries ruling over us. He died and we're still under these horrible powers. How is he the Messiah?"

Three days pass. A woman goes to where this man is buried to give him some last rites. She's thinking of how she's going to get this huge stone off the entrance for the tomb. As she walks up. the stone is gone, and the body is gone.

Upon inspection by her and the men following Jesus they see his body just disappeared. It wasn't taken, what he was wrapped up in was still there. He then begins to show up all over the region to different people, revealing himself.

He's alive. He rose from the dead.

He must be the Messiah. He did save us from an oppressive power. Not from one of this world, but one that was spiritual. He saved us from sin, taking on our sin as if it was his own for the love that he has for us. This is why Jesus is our savior. This is why he is the Messiah, he was sent by God, to be king of our lives, and to save us from the bondage of the oppressive nation that is sin, so that we might believe in him and be called children of God.

This is the Gospel. This is what us Christians profess to believe. This is the basis of all of Christianity.

Coming to and End

Read Ecclesiastes 12

Finally we are wrapping up Ecclesiastes today. Today's is pretty straight forward, but with a few deep things at the end. Let's to the easy first.

We are all heading towards our end, it's just a fact of life. I'm 23 now, I didn't take too good care of myself over the past going on 8 years, and I'm not like I used to be. I play football with some high school kids and I'm bent over heaving and sore for the next week. I have trouble walking up hills and running around. I'm getting back into shape slowly though. Trying to anyways. But enjoy the youthfulness that you have you can, and keep yourself in shape before you end up like a old guy while still in your twenties.

Solomon leaves us with two pieces of advice before we finish this out. The last, which is the easiest but also crucial to keep in mind, is that all that we do will one day be judged. And we will not only be judged by our actions but also our intent behind the actions. This is a scary thought. C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity talks about the Cardinal Sin, the greatest of which, according to him, is Pride, putting yourself before all else; also a form of idolatry. This goes deeply with intent behind actions. If I go to serve to glorify God, I do it with good intent. If I go to serve to bring myself praise and be admired I do it with pride and ill intent. Yes I did something good, but I did it with the wrong intent. God will judge the action by the intent. And you can't use the excuse of "Well I didn't think about it." Then you are no better than the fool. Always have a reason for what you do, and make sure you do it with pure intent.

If you noticed I said that was the last thing that Solomon gave us. There is something before that but it's deep. I'll make it simple though.

Throughout the Old Testament we see "Fear the Lord" a lot. And by a lot I mean like in every book. What exactly does this mean? If God some big kid with magnifying glass waiting for us to screw up so he can burn us like ants? Or is he like some half wit who just crushes us with his fist like we're beetles? (Game of Thrones anyone?) No. God is neither of those. He is the supreme being, creator of all, the LORD, king of kings, the only living God, the only God at all. The God who, if he wanted, could flood the entire earth killing all, again. Could rain down fire and brimstone destroying entire cities if he wanted to. Yes, he his a vengeful God who abhors sin and wants to punish it accordingly. And we being sinful beings should quake in fear of that fact. Yet the fact that he holds back should show us his love, and earn our respect, and we should be in awe of him for his gracious mercy. This is what it means to fear the LORD. To understand that we cannot stand innocent before him and that we deserve punishment, and with that to also know that he is merciful and refrains from giving us our just punishment because his son has already taken it upon himself to take on our burdens of sin. How can you not respect a God like that? How can you not stand in front of him and be full of awe at his amazing grace and love?

So I leave you with this tonight: Know your intent behind your actions, for God will judge them accordingly, and Fear the Lord, for it is only right that you do so.

A Tale of Two

Read Ecclesiastes 11

In this chapter I see two different topics: Giving and Living.

I have a friend, his name is Gene. Most of you may know him. My home church has a car repair ministry and he is the one that runs it. It's a Non-profit organization and the work for the Kingdom. Gene is the one who runs the shop. He used to have a really good job running his own repo business, then he sold that and went to work on semis. He got fired from there, or quit, I can't remember, but then he went to work at Restoration. One of the first big jobs that he did was work on my sisters car. She blew her engine on her way to Michigan for vacation. This happened because she never got an oil change. (Make sure you have your oil changed kids.) Gene did this in his spare time for little money for the benefit of another.

After his last job with semis, he started up with Restoration. With Restoration, like any other ministry, he has to raise his funds. This is tough on him and his family, but they make do. They got a nice place to live, vehicles, and they're not going hungry, plus they got some extra. Whenever I hang out with this guy for lunch or if I'm running errands for him he's always trying to pay for my gas or my lunch. He has such a big heart that he's always willing to give. He doesn't look years down the road, he realized that may never come, but he's always in the moment looking to serve.

The next story is similar, but with a different focus. As opposed to freely giving and serving, this one is about living in the moment.

Recently I went to camp, didn't know anyone there except the dean and really only met him once before that. It's a high school week, I don't know anyone, I'm just kind of there floating around. I'm a quiet guy. Don't talk much, try to stay under radar, pretty awkward at times; it's fun stuff. So while at camp you'd expect me to be rocking Socially Awkward Penguin memes. Well I've noticed at camp over the years that there are kids in the same position that I'm in. They're kinda awkward, other kids don't know how to deal with them so they shy away from them. Those kids just stay quiet and to themselves, never really coming out of their shells. Those are the kids that I flock to. I get to know them a bit, show them some love of Christ, whatever. If there was no one like that at camp though, I'd be sitting in a corner having life happen all around me and just observing it. But when those kids are around I have to step up, because I know what that's like. Then at camp I basically come alive, coming out of my shell, not observing but participating. I play the games, the run around, I get sweaty and dirty and do things without thinking them through, like playing football on a possibly broken toe because 'Mercia that's why. Camp fire comes around and Romans 16.19 is started I do everything I can to drown everyone else out and get them loud and pumped. It's good times. But during those times I do stuff, I live. We're told in Ecclesiastes 11 that all of us are to do this. A great clip from a movie is basically saying this exact same thing.

The clip is kind of, well, ghetto, but it's still worth a watch.



We are to enjoy that life that we have. Run around! Have fun! Make friends and get outside your box!

But there is something incredibly important here that you should take notice of in verse 9.

You have to answer to

God for every last bit of it

It's All Upside Down

Read Ecclesiastes 10

God has a strange way of flipping things on their head. I'm reading a book for class called Return to Babel and it's a book with people from different nationalities and countries reviewing scripture. It's really interesting. But I had to read some views on Isaiah 52 and one writer wrote how for people to live, someone must die for them, so only death can bring life. This is a concept by God which he took from the world and flipped on its head.

Now we believe that the Bible is full of truth, and is authoritative in nature, the divinely inspired Word of God. so if this is true, then everything leading up to this book is true, and everything after it is true.

Yet we look around the world today and see how the world tells us that everything in the Bible is false, and all those in the world who deny the truth of scripture live contrary to it, so we see all around us the world living on its head believing that it's in the right.

This is what I see in this chapter. It's mainly full of proverbs I suggest you read if you haven't already, and I want you to look at them closely and see what they say. They talk about fools having no sense of direction.

 Do you have direction?

Where are you going in life?

It tells that if someone loses their temper at you just wait them out, they'll calm down. Have you ever seen that happen before? Happens with me.

But the pint where we start to see things flipped in this world is in verses 5-7. 

Mistakes are thrown on the one in charge as opposed to the one who made the mistake

The immature are in high positions

The mature are pushed down

Green boys getting special treatment over the vets

All of this I have seen in my life. I worked at a church for a while and apparently I can't tell my testimony because it's too radical for teens to hear. A parent heard about it and instead of coming to me to talk about it they went and gave the minister above me an ear full. I remember in high school our class president and other student council members spent every weekend in a drunken stupor while the students who were actually leaders and not acting like idiots were told to sit down and shut up and listen to those who did whatever they wanted. I remember at school positions opened and people who had experience applied for them but were pushed aside for younger more pretty faces.

All over we see things flipped contrary to how they should be.

There is more here in the chapter, but this is what stood out to me. Luckily for you, it's an easy read, so I suggest you actually read this chapter and see what God is telling you.

Maybe you need to study more (v. 9)

Maybe you're mixed up in a wrong crowd (v. 8)

Maybe you don't listen enough (v. 14)

Look through this chapter and see what fits you. Be honest with yourself too. Lying to yourself is lying to God, who actually knows all things about you better than you do yourself. So be honest here.

Seize Life

Read Ecclesiastes 9

I look around. I look at where I've been, where I'm at, and where I'm going. I look at those around me, the smart, the foolish, the good and the bad. I see throughout my life that this has always been, always is, and will always be. People have come, and people have went. I have seen birth and death, salvation and slavery.

These things shall always be present in our lives.

All of our lives are completely different, yet they all have the same pattern. We are born, we live, then we die. It's a straight shot, you can't miss this one. We all hit that bulls-eye which is the grave.

There's this poem like thing that a minister I know always reads at funeral services he does called the Dash. It's about how you have two dates on a tombstone, the birth and the death dates. And in between those dates you have a dash there, and that one, simple little mark is there to tell others that there was a life between those dates. Triumphs and defeats. Gains and losses. Love and hatred. Joy and sorrow. What is your dash going to say to those who knew you?

This is what Solomon here is getting at. We're all going to die, there's no way around it. There's a great scene in Game of Thrones where a girl makes a profound statement.

Nothing isn't better or worse than anything.

Nothing is just...

Nothing.

Solomon here is wresting with the meaning of life. He's to the point where he's thinking he might as well kill himself because of the pointlessness of all he has seen. He blows it out of proportion to get his point across, but this is what he's struggling with. And chapter 9 is in response to that struggle.

Seize life he says. Yes, this life leads to death and is pointless. but instead of just dying, enjoy that life that we have because it is a gift from God that we have it at all. 

The dead can't think, can't eat, can't enjoy what we have; but we can. So eat up! Drink away! Enjoy what God has given us!

For he has given it to us for our pleasure. 

As stated, Solomon over exaggerates his point, but he has to because of the over exaggerated points he made earlier. Life sucks and is pointless. But we can enjoy it anyway because God has given it to us out of love.

Enjoy his gift.

Obedience is a Good Thing

Read Ecclesiastes 8

So I've been reading through this book in The Message, and I really like it. Most people will disagree, but I really get the feel for what's being said as opposed to another translation. And yes, I use the word translation intentionally. All text except the original Greek and Hebrew are paraphrases, yet we call some translations and others paraphrases. So for me both are translations/paraphrases, and I like the word translation better.

"But Mike," you may be asking, "Which is the best Bible to read?" Well KJV of course! It's the only true translation and if you read anything else you're going to hell!

Just kidding.

In the words of the great Dr. Girdwood, "The best translation is the one that you will actually read."

So for this I read the Message. Deal with it.

The first verse tells us some things that wisdom does. I suggest you have a look see there.

The next good bit, and the rest of the chapter relates to this, is obedience. It's a good thing. We are told that we should obey our king. Well who is our king? Let me ask you this: What is the Kingdom of God?

If you can't connect the dots, I'll explain it! Jesus came and brought the Kingdom of God. The end of Matthew 4 Jesus sits down and says, "Repent for the Kingdom of God is near." And another time he tells us that it's already here.

Before Saul became king of Israel (Book of 1st Samuel), before David and Solomon (the 3rd king of Israel and writer of this book) God was king over Israel. But Israel whined and complained that they wanted to be like the other kids in the neighborhood and have another dad to tell them what to do. Well God wasn't too happy about that, but gave it to them anyway, if anything just to teach them how stupid they are. God was no longer their only king, they had another now. They were no longer ruled by God.

This is what it means to be in the Kingdom of God, to have God be ruler of your life, have him be your king.
And the King gives us some things that we're supposed to do. We are to obey those things. That is what this chapter is getting at. And one of the biggest things that he tells us to do is: BE WISE AND GOOD.

Now of course we can't really be good, because we're in a fallen world. And we can't really be wise, because we don't live long enough to do that. Yet we are to still strive for it.

Now the world will try and trick you into not doing these things. When you're following God life will get harder for you and it'll seem like karma is just crushing you because you're a horrible person. But you're not a horrible person. By no stretch of the imagination are you perfect, I mean you're a fallen human who has sinned in life. But those people who are sleeping around, dealing, drinking, murdering, breaking the laws of God and men, they're prospering like they're perfect. Man that looks appealing. I should do that. Yet...I'm in the Kingdom of God, and I'm supposed to obey my King.

So which do you choose?

Obey your King and have a harder life?
or...
Do as the world does and prosper now?

That's your call. But which would you rather prosper in? Now or eternity?

Life Summed Up in a Sentence

Read Ecclesiastes 7

This will probably be a short one today, but that's alright.

Verses 1-14 are basically saying to live by. Study them, and follow them, I promise your life will be more fulfilling. Not easier, fulfilling.

The entirety of the chapter, book, and one of the major questions of life is all summed up at the end of the chapter.

God made us all upright, and all of us screw it up.

Verse 20 tells us that no one is upright, everyone has sinned. Solomon has looked throughout the earth and has seen that everything bad that happens is a result of sin in the world. I'm no talking karma, I'm talking the effects of sin. 

He searched throughout his life and saw these two things. God has made us all upright, we screwed it up, and we means everyone who has ever lived, is living, and will live.

He looked for the meaning of life and all he saw was we screw up. And because we all screw up there is no discrimination between the good and bad, the wise and the foolish. We all die the same. The question of "Why do the good die young?" is asked all the time. Look at the big red letters up top then read verse 20. It is because of sin that the good die young and the wicked prosper. Yet when it comes to death, it touches us all, and it distinguishes no one. 

So why not live the life of the wicked? You'll get whatever you want, you'll live longer, life will just be better. Well the last two posts were about accepting your lot in life, with what you have and what you don't have. God has given it all to you, so why are you saying that what GOD has given you isn't good enough? 

Instead of seeking more stuff, go after wisdom. One guy with wisdom is better than 10 guys with brawn. 10 strong guys will try to crush the wise man, yet if he can out think them, he has the advantage. So there is no point to do evil, no point to want more stuff, you gain absolutely nothing from it. Being wise is a reward in and of itself. So why live the YOLO lifestyle and recklessly and gaining nothing?

Instead seek wisdom, seek God himself. You'll never reach the end of it, so your journey and adventure will never end. It will be the most rewarding thing you will ever do, and you will understand more and more along the way.

Your Lot in Life

Read Ecclesiastes 6

While reading today and thinking about the scripture, I noticed Ecclesiastes is an incredibly dangerous book. It speaks a lot of how everything that we gain is pointless, we're all going to die anyway, so enjoy the time that you have. Some of you may take that to mean, "YOLO" and just live in sin because hey, we're just going to die anyway, so might as well live it up.

That's not the point that Solomon is getting at here. What he is getting at is that there is no value in things that the world says to value, and that's all that Solomon has talked about so far.

Just had to clear that up. And now on to Ecclesiastes 6.

God gives some everything and others nothing. Those who have everything a lot of times don't enjoy it. Maybe they're always wanting more and never satisfied with what they have, or it's taken away from them for whatever reason. For example, you work, you get paid, and you have taxes taken out. You earn this money, but you can't enjoy it all because someone takes it away from you. What we gain will, in the long run, be pointless. You get something newer, you have to sell it, you die, someone else will enjoy it, not you.

Some of us strive for more, constantly wanting more, yet a lot of times we won't get it, or we do, and we experience it, but then we die and the experience is lost and turned out to be pointless. Solomon tells us that it's better for a baby to be stillborn and not experience the tragedy that we do. And on the flip side of that, if someone lived for thousands of years and never enjoyed it, their life was wasted. While we experience loss, and life hands us lemons, we still need to find the joy in the life/lot that God has given us.

We, especially Americans, have a problem of constantly trying to find joy in the things that the world tells us to find joy in. Sex, drugs, money, reputation. This is the American dream. I've been there, and I've never been happy in that life. I haven't been rich by any standards, but I've tried to find happiness in so many different things, and never found it. I turned my back on that, and turned to Christ, and I have been filled with joy. I'm thankful and full of joy because of what God has given me, as opposed to what the world tells me to find joy in. There is no joy there. Only in Christ is there joy.

With all of this, no one has a true advantage over another. Maybe in this life you may have some materialistic advantage over others, but are they going to keep you from dying? No. Are they going to save you from your sin? Absolutely not. We all die, we all are judged, and nothing you can do can give you advantage over someone else. So live with what you have, be happy with what God has given you. Believe it or not but you can live without the newest iPhone or videogame system. I have a smart phone, I worked for the money to buy it, and I got it. I pay some for the bill for it. I could get by with a flip phone to communicate with people, but God has blessed me enough to be able to have a smart phone. It isn't the best, but it works, and I like it. I'm thankful for what God has given me, it works just as good as any other phone in communicating with people.

It doesn't matter what you have then. We all die anyway, and who's going to remember us for what phone we had or how much our pants cost? No one. We will be remembered for a bit by our actions, not our stuff. And would you rather be remembered as a follower of God or someone who always wanted more stuff?

All the things that we work for is crap. We don't need it. And when we do get it all we do is brag about it and talk about it, but all that talk is is just us blowing smoke. So is there any advantage to it? Absolutely not. And no matter what we say, no one will know our needs or future. No one will have an advantage over us by what we have and what we say. Only God knows all of these things. And only God will judge us. So why try to impress people by blowing smoke at them about our things?

Accept what God has given you, and find joy in that God has actually given you things. Accept your lot in life.

The Things You Find...

Well not that the long weekend is over, let's get back into with Ecclesiastes 5.

Go on. Get reading.

I've been trying different things with this series I guess you could call it, to see what works best. But feed back doesn't exist, and it really depends how I'm feeling that particular day. So let's do this.

The first 3 verses when I read them kind of stood out to me as instruction for prayer. I get this from the words, "nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God." Of course there's more to that, but that tells me that this is about talking to God.

-We are told to "guard your steps when you go to the house of God." Well back when this was written they had the temple, where sacrifices were made to atone for sin. (Other things went on as well, but this will suffice for now.) Yet with the idea of guarding your steps as you enter the house of God, well we are the new tabernacle, the new house of God. So how can we guard our steps while coming before God in ourselves? Have you ever prayed to God without mentally preparing for it? If you're asking what I mean by that, then yes, you have. You know that you have not mentally prepared for it by having yourself chase rabbits, random thoughts that come into your head. You were talking to God about asking to heal grandma Betty, and now you're thinking about  how dream sequences are horrible in movies. Guard your thoughts which lead to steps when you come before God. Give him your undivided attention, because he's actually worthy of it.

-When you come into the house of God, most come to talk, few come to listen. "To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of the fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil." The idea behind sacrifice is to give up something worth a good bit for the sin you have committed. Jesus came and we don't need to do that anymore. Yet isn't prayer a sacrifice of our time if we do it by guarding our thoughts? By actually keeping track of what we say and do while spending time with God? And this includes sitting in silence listening to him, which is better than the sacrifice of fools, shot off half cocked and only with part of their mind on the task at hand.

-Watch what you say to him. Remember, he is the only God there is, and while he loves you and cares for you, he deserves, and demands, your respect. Act accordingly with what you say to him. We saw in chapter 3 that there is a time for everything. This includes different ways to talk to God. First off always be willing to listen. But there are times to be thankful, times to beg for mercy, times for seeking healing or peace, and there are times to rage. Some may not agree with this, that's fine, but I have had times where I've had not so polite conversations with God. But I also have no had polite conversations with my parents before. Remember that with God it is always a safe place, but show him respect, and think before you speak. (This also gives you time to cool off before you say something stupid.) Thinking before you speak is giving you time to mentally prepare before coming to God.

With all of that out of the way, we can move on.

Making a vow, or a promise, to God is a serious thing. This is seen in the gospels when Jesus says, "Let your yes be yes and your no be no." Say what you mean, and if you say you're going to do something, do it. And do it fast. Especially when making a promise to God because "He takes no pleasures in fools." Making promises to God is so serious that it's better to just not make one than it is to make one and not fulfill it.

The problem of making vows and not keeping them is a problem of dreaming too big and boasting too much. Now I'm not saying you can't do anything. But when you start saying you're going to be the owner of a Fortune 500 company and you're going to do it all on your own, God may come in and make you sit down. But we have these big dreams, and then big words to back the dreams up, boasting in our dreams, yet we don't see that those dreams and words are useless. I used to have the dream of starting a church plant in inner city New York for kids, starting the discipleship process to that they can impact the world. I was going to become famous, get rich, preach at huge conferences, and teach college. I had big dreams for me. God had other plans, and now I'm in campus ministry, the church's best kept secret. My dreams and words increased, and I saw that it was all pointless, because it was what I wanted and it all would fade away. When the realization came that God wanted me elsewhere doing other things for now, I was first off humbled. But then I realized I wasn't respecting God, I didn't fear him. I still had the mentality my family gave me of "you have to make money." I was fearful of failing my family, my parents, and just failure in general. I wasn't fearful of failing God. But now he's put me in my place so that we can impact the world.

Next up Solomon talks about civil order. Things are going to go wrong in our lives, and we will see a lot of injustice. Homeless, poverty, substance abuse, child abuse, sexual assaults, murder, and the list can go on. As of right now the people who run this country don't care about the "people below them." In the words of Cersei Lannister, their thought is, "They're so small I can't even see them." But something that would be great, would be absolutely perfect for a country, is if a king was committed to cultivated fields. Or, if a king was actually committed to making sure the poor and the hungry, and impoverished were taken care of.

There are those that have lots of money though. And verses 10-11 connect directly with Matthew 6.19-24 (go read it lazy). But verse 11 is something that needs explaining, because for me it took a few to get it. As goods increase in stock, they become more available. Then with them becoming available, the only advantage to getting them is to sit there and look at them, making it a non-advantage, because everyone has them.

Then the last 3 verses deal specifically with joy. What is fitting for us in life is to eat and drink and be happy, enjoying the life that God has given us with its work and hardships and struggles and good times and rewards and ease; for this is the lot that has been given to us, by God himself, picked especially for each and everyone of us. Those given power and possessions are also given by God, and are to be enjoyed. God has given us everything we need to be happy. The trick is to understand that and be thankful for what we have. I just recently moved into a house, and it was utterly empty. Absolutely nothing in it. Yet I had a twin mattress that I could throw on the floor, a chair to sit in, a toilet, shower, and microwave, I was set. I didn't have much, but I had enough to get by and I was happy with that. Then my parents came and gave me a bunch of stuff I was fine without, but I'm thankful for that as well, and enjoy those things just as much as what I had before. God had given us each life, and we are to enjoy what he has thrown our way.

Until tomorrow readers.

Life is a Team Activity

Read Ecclesiastes 4

There's a song called Bullet with Butterfly Wings by The Smashing Pumpkins. The very first line of this song is "The world is a vampire." The meaning behind those lyrics is that the world sucks the life out of us, some slow, some fast. There is a law of thermodynamics related to this. Everything is in a state of entropy, or everything is dying. Side note, I believe this one law shows how evolution cannot work, but maybe that's for another time.

Here in Ecclesiastes 4 we see that the foolish or the sloths are slowly killing themselves, but not doing a thing. Those who work hard though hold a double edged sword. Either you work yourself to death, or you build up your body to last longer. Recently my dad had a mild heart attack because he was so over worked. Luckily it was as un-serious as a heart attack can be, but his job still could have put him in the ground. I think God every day that it didn't. But no matter how you are, lazy as all get out or working your hands to the bone, the reality is you're going to die.

I'm glad Solomon made that painfully clear for us. Negative Nancy.

But while on the subject of working ourselves to death, we are told of a man that Solomon sees who in one translation he describes as, "another wisp of smoke on its way to nothingness." This just reaffirms that we all are just passing breaths, just waiting to move on from this life. But this wisp of smoke, this man that Solomon sees, he is alone. No friends. No family. No co-workers. Alone. And this man is constantly working into the wee hours of the morning, always wanting more than what he has, and never stopping to ask himself, "Why don't I get help with this?" We then see some proverbs or sayings that tell of the importance of teamwork and community. I suggest you read those and see what God has to say about "going it alone." We came into this giant community which spans the globe. They're there to support us just as we're there to support them. Take advantage of it.

Finally we see a poor young kid with some wisdom is better than and old man who is full of foolishness. Yet this young man who had nothing ended up gaining everything, and was marveled at by the people. Yet he still died, and was soon forgotten.

Remember that there is only one important thing in life: Christ. What you've done, what you've gained, it's all meaningless, it doesn't go with you. Instead look to help those around you, use the community of believers you are a part of, and focus on Christ in all you do.

There is a Time for All Things

Read Ecclesiastes 3

When I had my youth ministry I had a few guys that were a bit...hyper. Nothing against that, I was that way when I was a kid, a lot younger than them and before circumstances in my life made me closed off, but believe it or not I used to be super hyper. But one thing I always told those kids was this: There is a time for everything. When I had a bunch of kids move up into my group, I started that first Sunday off with this little speech.

There is a time for everything.

There's a time to have fun, a time to get crazy.

A time to worship, a time to be still.

A time to listen, and a time to be heard.

We will have fun, we will get wild, but we will also pay attention, because what is said here is important.

So begins chapter 3 of Ecclesiastes. There is a time for all things, you just need to know the proper time and respect that.

Verses 9-15 tells us a lot about God and what he has done for us.

He has given all of us a task, and there will be a time to work on that task.

He makes everything beautiful in it's time. This is a great sentence. God will make everything beautiful in it's own time, and with God making it beautiful, it is he who determines when the time is right. If he sent Jesus to us at the perfect time, then he will make everything beautiful at the perfect time. Take comfort in that. While your life may seem horrible and ugly, know that God will make it beautiful at the absolute perfect time.

Not only that, but God has put eternity in our hearts. A great movie that comes to mind for this is Troy, and how Achilles is more worried about being remembered throughout the ages as opposed to being loved by a family (scene where he speaks to his mother). We all want our fifteen minutes, we all want to be remembered and memorialized. We all want to know what lies behind death. God has put this in our hearts. So much that we want to know the beginning as well. I remember hearing about how telescopes were getting so advanced that soon we would be able to see the big bang by looking further and further into space, then suddenly that talk stopped. As of right now we can see about 700 million years after the big bang. (There's a lot of views here which still work with scripture, i.e. young earth and old earth Christians. Take your view on it and enjoy, it doesn't bother me.) But man has eternity in our hearts, and God has done that so that we can never see the beginning or end of what he has done/will be doing.

With all of that, God has given us a great gift. While all that we do is meaningless, we can still enjoy ourselves. I'm currently playing the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I pour a lot of time into that because it's such an intensive game. All that time and effort I put into it though, is pointless. But I enjoy it, and it is because of this gift from God that I can enjoy it. So we much find joy in the things that we do, because God has given us the opportunity and gift to enjoy them.

Everything that God does lasts forever. The grace that he made available to us, the salvation that we may receive will endure forever (not eternal salvation, but it will always be there.) Whatever God has done we cannot undo. And he has done these things so that people can recognize and respect (fear) him. 

Then there's the last few words of verse 15: God seeks what has been driven away. How is this not the story of the Gospel? Sin has driven us away from God, so he came to seek us out and make it easy for us to come back to him. 

Today we have a challenge. God has given each of us a task, and that task is to help him seek out those who have been driven away. Find someone who has been driven away by their sin, and lead them back to God.

Ecclesiastes 2- Book Status

Read Ecclesiastes 2

In 1 Corinthians 10 Paul writes something so profound for a Jew that I'm sure that he was shocked when he came to this revelation: Everything is permissible, but not everything is good. What this means is that we're allowed to do anything we want, that is from the freedom we have in Christ, but not everything that we can do is good for us, for our relationship with Christ, and a lot of what we want to do is still sin. Paul counters this with Romans 6 by saying that we died to sin, and are made alive in Christ. We call ourselves Christians, yet if we go with the idea of "everything is permissible" and we take advantage of that sinning without thought of the consequences then we are still slaves to sin and are still dead in our transgressions. A part of becoming a Christian is maturing, and realizing that while we have freedom to do things, we know what is good for us and what is bad for us, and we choose the good, because God our perfect father has told us what is good and we do our best to follow his directions.

Why am I talking about all of this? Well first off I have to make sure I'm not going to give anyone permission to sin without a care in the world. If we have died to sin and came alive in Christ then we are to live like it. Second, this is what the first 11 verses of Ecclesiastes 2 talks about.

Solomon writes how he has tried everything: he lived with the motto of "enjoy yourself" and saw how laughter is nothing but madness and pleasure has no purpose in the grand scheme of things. He tried to cheer his body with wine and looked for anything worthwhile to do on the earth. He had everything anyone could ever ask for, he was the greatest king who had ever ruled Israel, there was none like him. He took whatever he wanted and squeezed as much happiness and pleasure out of everything.

Then verse 11 we see he says that throughout it all he was guided by wisdom, and everything he did, everything he had, all the happiness and pleasure that he had in his life, it was all pointless.

He looked at how he could do anything, yet saw that not everything was good for him. He saw that it was all pointless.

After Solomon saw all of this he looked at the actions that were wise and the actions that were folly in his life, and he tells of how wisdom is more beneficial for us than folly (and most of his actions were folly). We should stick with the things that are good and beneficial for us, just as we should stick with the light as opposed to the dark because in the light we benefit more.

This idea brings us to a passage in John 3.19-21. Light has come into the world, and our actions are seen by all, both good and bad, wise and foolish, spiritual and fleshly. When we accept the light and come into it for the world to see us, we are made clean. We can see what we are doing (Ecc. 2.14) as can the world, seeing that we glorify God through our actions. Those who cling to the dark think they can hide their actions, but God sees all. The fool clings to the darkness, and can't see what he's doing, he doesn't fully understand the effects of sin in his life.

But in the end, the same thing happens to the wise and the foolish, those in the light and those in the dark.

Both will die.

We move on to verse 15, and are presented with the question, "What is the point of being wise then, if we die just like the foolish?"

There is none. But this brings up Pascal's Wager. Quick summary of what this is, a guy named Pascal said that if a man lives his life for Christ: Loving God, serving others, doing everything he can to glorify God, and then dies and find out there is no God, no heaven, no hell, then all he lost was finite things, earthly things, but he still lived a good life. So what benefit do we have for living a life of wisdom? Well we can at least say that we lived a good life, but we have faith that a life of wisdom is what God wants us to live, and if we live that kind of life, with the knowledge of Christ and faith in his blood, we can be called sons of God.

**Side Note: There's a lot more to this stuff, but it will take far to long to actually get into with everything else that needs to be addressed. After I get done with Ecclesiastes I will go more in depth with some of these issue.**

So there is no difference between the wise man and the foolish man, both will die and both will be forgotten, so all we do is pointless. This realization that Solomon has pushes him to hate life. He hates everything that he has done because after he dies it's just going to get passed on to whoever comes after him, someone who hasn't worked for it or earned it.

He gives up trying to be happy with the things that he has done, he knows that everything that he has worked so hard for is pointless for him because he can't take it with him when he dies. This brings up more ideas from Jesus, Matthew 6.19-24, which I think should be after 25-34. Matthew 6.25-34 has Jesus telling us to not worry about how we're going to eat, or where we're going to live, or how we will survive, if we seek first God, we'll be taken care of. Then 19-24 tells us not to store things up here on earth because they will be destroyed here. Instead we should keep our treasures in heaven, where they can't be destroyed.

Two final things to talk about for this chapter.

Verses 24-25: There is nothing better than a man enjoying life. C.S. Lewis writes, "God cannot give us happiness and peace a part from himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing." (I want to say that's from Mere Christianity, but I can't remember where I read it, I just have it written down.) We can see throughout scripture that joy comes from God, a simple example being the Fruit of the Spirit. When we receive the Spirit, when we receive God, we gain a multitude of things, one of which is joy. It is only in God that we may find this joy and truly enjoy life. And our life is work, walking, talking, breathing, serving, careers, school, all of this is work, and everything we do should glorify God. Everything should be worship, and when we worship God in all we do, we enjoy all that we do.

Verse 26: Those that please God (worship God) are given wisdom, knowledge, and joy. But in chapter 1 we see that wisdom and knowledge bring  sadness, how can they bring joy then? Only with god do we gain joy. By putting God in our work from 1.13, understanding the works of men, we find that all that we do for ourselves is pointless, but all we do for God is worthwhile, and we begin storing treasures for ourselves up in heaven, and we please God. Then we we please God we gain more wisdom, knowledge, and joy.

So what does all of this mean? Everything that we do for ourselves is pointless. We gain money, buy houses, cars, tv's, game systems, and whatever else we want, but they all fade away. They're all pushed aside as soon as the newest thing comes out (prime example is Apple products). So instead of working for yourself, gaining things that will just fade away, work for God. Store for yourself treasures in heaven, making God happy with your actions. These are wise actions. Live a wise life.