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It’s that time of year again, the time when people everywhere look ahead to the following 365 days and decide what it is they want to accomplish. Usually it’s to lose weight, eat better, work harder…or less; for me it’s usually nothing at all. I’ve never made New Years Resolutions before, but this year I thought I’d join in on the craze. After all, there are quite a few things about me that need improving. I thought I’d share them here because, well, what better way to ensure you accomplish your goals then to post them for the world to see? So without further ado…here are my New Years Resolutions for 2009.
1. Eat Right/Get to the Gym
Yes, it’s typical. I know. But I suppose there is a reason it’s one of the most popular resolutions: most of us eat terribly. I have survived 29 years without counting calories, drinking energy drinks like water, and eating junk food whenever I wanted to. I wonder how many more years that can last? Even worse - and something I was unaware of until recently - married men eat more. I’ve never eaten like I have this holiday season. Praise my beautiful wife for spending hours in the kitchen cooking up some delicious grub, but even she admits: we should probably watch what we’re cooking up.
I get picked on quite often when I mention my need to eat better and work out more. Usually I’m looked at oddly and then reminded of my rail thin figure. But hey, I like my figure - and I’ve notice it changing with age. Everybody was skinny once, is it wrong to want to stay this way? I never thought eating right was a big deal…but come News Years day it will be.
2. Build A Stronger Relationship With Christ
This is probably something we could all do, but if I take a personal reflection on my own relationship with Christ I know I need to work at it more. Please don’t misunderstand me: my faith in Christ is - and always will be - true and strong. But my passion for prayer and bible study - two very important elements of the Christian walk - has wavered a bit. I’m not sure why, perhaps it is because the Lord has blessed my life in amazing ways and when everything goes right we seem to forget why. The truth is we should continually pray and thank the Lord for the good times as well, something I have failed to do.
I like to compare the passion of the Christian spirit to a campfire. If you constantly attend to a campfire the likelihood it goes out (unless you don’t know what you’re doing, like me) is slim. If you keep supplying it with the necessary sticks and leaves it will continue to burn strong. However if you walk away from it for awhile, perhaps forget about it as you head to the river for a swim…it will die down. In the same way, if we feed our spirit with prayer and bible study we will remain “on fire” for the Lord, but if we forget, or fail to make time, that passion will easily die down. It’s just something I’ve noticed when I take honest look at my Christian walk and something I know I need to work on.
3. Become a Better Leader
I’ve been blessed in my Air Force career by making rank fairly fast. The good thing about this is the increased opportunities, and of course, the better pay. The bad thing (for me) is the increased responsibility for leadership. I have to admit: I’m a terrible leader. When it comes to leading a team I’m more likely to push them aside and do the task myself than lead them to victory. In the face of failure, I’m more likely to get frustrated and vent than I am to calmly react and inspire. This isn’t a good thing in any career, but in the military the effect is magnified. I’m studying right now to hopefully make the next rank this coming year and I know that if I do, the need to change my ways when it comes to leadership will be even more pressing. So why not start now? I should have started two years ago.
I don’t know exactly how I’m going to do this. It’s not like there’s a class you can take and all the sudden you’re a great leader. But I do have ideas on how to be a good leader. I’ve seen good leadership. I’ve seen bad leadership. I just need to take a good look at my actions and learn from them. I need to to map out a plan to succeed, because if I don’t - if I just let myself react - it probably won’t be as a leader, not a good one anyway.
So there you go. My 3 resolutions for the new year. They’re important to me and I know I will make a serious attempt to accomplish all three. At least until February. Isn’t that how’s it done? Like I said, I’ve never done this before so I’m unsure…
During his ministry on Earth, Jesus Christ performed a number of miracles. Everywhere He went people approached Him asking, or at least hoping, for a miracle. Many times, these miracles were what caused people to believe He was the Messiah. But before Jesus began his ministry, and miracles, He was a child who grew up under the close watch of His mother. It wasn’t until a wedding in Cana when things began to change. This is where Jesus performed His first of many miracles: turning ordinary water into the best wine around.
The story of Jesus turning water into wine is found in John 2:1-12, however it is not in any of the other gospels. This should stand out to the reader and should be considered to fully understand the story. Why would John include this story when the other writers did not? It’s important to remember that John’s gospel is much different than the others. He did not write his gospel to tell of what happened in Jesus’ life, but so that readers would “believe that Jesus is the Christ” (John 20:31). Therefore, the reader should understand as they read this story that John included it not to explain what happened, but to explain who Jesus is.
John begins the story with the wedding, mentioning that Jesus’ mother was there, along with Jesus and His disciples. Jesus’ mother becomes worried after noticing the wine was gone and asks Jesus for help. This tells the reader a couple things. Although John does not specifically say who was getting married, it seems the couple are either friends, or possibly related to Mary, and that she is helping with the arrangements, especially the serving of the food and wine. In Jewish wedding traditions of the time, if wine was to run out it would be extremely embarrassing to everyone involved, so Mary’s concern is real and her desperate desire for help is evident in her request to Jesus for help. There is no evidence of Jesus performing miracles before this, but Mary knows who Jesus is. She knows the miracles around His birth, and knows Jesus could help.
In verse 4, John records Jesus’ response to his mother, which is a very important part of this story. In today’s culture, responding with the word woman would be considered quite rude, however in Jesus’ time this was not so. Jesus uses the same term to Mary as He speaks to her from the cross in John 19:26 and other times with other women throughout the gospel of John (4:21, 20:15). What the term does, however, is make clear the relationship between Jesus and Mary. It is clear that Jesus lived an obedient life to his parents (Mark 2:51), but now things were beginning to change. By using this term Jesus redefines his relationship to Mary; He no longer follows her orders, but only those of His father in Heaven.
Following the dialogue with Jesus, Mary tells the servants to do whatever Jesus asks of them, which shows that even though Jesus responded sharply to Mary, she still felt something might happen…and happen it did. Jesus tells the servants to fill the stone water jars that guests used for ceremonial washing with water, which they did (2:6-7). Six stone jars full would be a very large amount of water, and again, the water was not for drinking, but for ceremonial washing.
When Jesus then tells them to take some water to the master of the banquet, the servants had to be confused, perhaps scared. Was Jesus really going to give the master of the banquet ceremonial washing water to drink? It was not like they were asking some random guy to take a drink, but the head master of the banquet, the big kahuna. Fortunately, somewhere between the servants drawing the water and taking it to the master of the banquet, the water turns into wine, the best wine, which is contrary to normal practice, but appreciative to those in attendance (2:9-10).
The story that John writes, again, is not to tell what happened, but who Jesus is. By turning water into wine, Jesus shows two important qualities of Himself. One, Jesus turns what is dirty into something wonderful. The ceremonial washing water, which sat in dirty washing pots would not have been tasteful to anybody at the wedding, however Jesus takes that and makes it into something wonderful: the best wine around.
Jesus also shows that when He gives, He gives plenty. The six stone water jars used for washing would have been quite large. Together, the water must have equaled over 100 gallons, all of which Jesus turned into wine. Where at first there was no wine, now there is more than enough to go around. That is how Jesus gives. If Jesus gives a large amount of wine to those at a wedding, imagine how much love and how many blessings He will give to those who trust and follow Him.
A Constant Battle
Does this mean I am voting Democrat? No. I don’t know. Maybe. I want to vote for whomever I think will lead this country best, whether they’re Democrat or Republican shouldn’t matter. I understand the whole liberal/conservative thing, and for the most part I would consider myself a conservative, but is it more important to have a president who is against abortion or has a good foreign policy? A president who is against same-sex marriage or who has a good economic plan? I feel many Christians vote Republican because they feel it is God’s party or something. I feel they look at one or two issues, like abortion and/or same-sex marriage, and decide based on those issues. Are those issues going to make our country a better place? Are they that important?
Really?
Take abortion for example. First, let me make this clear: I am completely and wholeheartedly against abortion. I think it’s a terrible thing. But to me, when it comes to electing a President, it’s a non issue. One, I don’t feel it will ever change. Even if a President is against abortion…it’s not going to change…not in America. And two, even if it did change, would that make America a better place? It’s still going to happen. It will happen underground in more dangerous situations and more people will die or get hurt. Is that really what we want? Just because it’s illegal doesn’t mean it goes away. Drugs are illegal too and last I heard they’re still around. I am comfortable knowing that I personally am against abortion; I always will be. Whether or not it is illegal in my country won’t change that, it won’t change my personal relationship with Christ, which, to me, is more important.
Speaking of change…I also feel many Christians or Christian organizations have a “we need to change the world” attitude, and to that extent I totally agree…we do. But are we doing it the right way? Jesus changed the world more than anybody who has ever lived and He never once picked up a picket sign. He never even got angry. What if we put down our picket signs, and put away our ‘us against them’ attitude and started do what Jesus did best: love? If we learned to love everybody and accept everybody I don’t know…maybe there would be change. Maybe. Just a thought…
But anyways…I’m off the point. I wanted to discuss politics. I’m not sure who I’ll vote for. I might even end up voting Republican, but not because I am told to. I want to look at the issues, all of them, and make an informed decision based on what’s best for this country, and even more specifically, what’s best for me and my family. I think everyone should do the same. We should at least know why we’re voting a certain way. And heck, if issues like abortion and same-sex marriage are the most important issues for you…then that’s what you should vote for. Even I can’t argue with that. I just have a different set of priorities and I don’t feel that voting Democrat is such a bad thing. I don’t think God feels that way either…but what do I know?
I’ve been trying something different lately. Instead of just reading the Bible, taking it from point A to point B and letting that be that, I’ve been trying to actually study the Bible. I’ll read a short passage, think about that passage, and then try to understand not only what took place, but what it means and what I can learn from it. It’s been going pretty well, I think, and although I know I won’t be able to just read a passage and know everything that there is to know, I still feel as if I’m learning a lot. The Bible study that I’ve been involved in has helped too.
The reason I mention it is because the other day I was studying the passage where Jesus feeds five thousand people with just a few loaves of bread:
Then Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves, and when He had given thanks He distributed them to the disciples, and the disciples to those sitting down; and likewise of the fish, as much as they wanted. So when they were filled, He said to His disciples, “gather up the fragments that remain so that nothing is lost.” Therefore they gathered them up, and filled twelve baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves which were left over by those who had eaten. (John 6:10-13 NKJV)
I don’t know how many times I’ve read that and thought, “Wow…what a miracle! He fed five thousand men with just five loaves of bread!” But after thinking about it, I noticed something completely different. Instead I thought about what Jesus says a couple verses later:
And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.” (John 6:35 NKJV)
So, I felt that what Jesus did by feeding five thousand men was not just perform a miracle, but show the world what he can do for everyone: me, you, your friends, everybody. What am I talking about? I’m not entirely sure, but think about this: Jesus fed five thousand men with bread and had a bunch left over, twelve baskets full. Also, Jesus himself is the bread of life. And so I feel that what we should take from the miracle is that there is enough of Jesus to go around, plenty in fact. However many people come to him, his arms will always be open, there will always be some bread available. No one has to go hungry.
Another interesting tidbit is that Jesus gave the bread to the disciples to hand out, which is exactly what He did during His time on Earth. Jesus spent three years teaching and mentoring His disciples so they could spread the message to the world; so they could hand out the bread of life to whomever would listen.
Maybe I’m wrong, maybe all Jesus wanted to do was feed a bunch of people and show them that He can perform miracles, but for some reason I doubt it. I truly believe it was much more than that.
The Bible is amazing.
Two days ago I wrote about love…true love, awesome love, the kind of love that makes you write dumb blogs about love…but I didn’t write about the truest of all loves.
This weekend at church the drama team put on a small skit that I guess has been done multiple times around the country, but it was a performance I had never seen before and one I will probably never forget. The skit put true love on display, the truest of all loves: God’s love.
I didn’t cry when I proposed to Stephanie, I didn’t cry when she said yes, I didn’t even cry when she gave me that wonderful video…but last night while watching this performance I couldn’t help but shed a tear. The love I share with Stephanie is true, it’s awesome, but it doesn’t make me cry, it makes me smile real big because it’s so dang cool. The love God has for me, and all of us, is different. It’s never faltering, even when we treat the love with arrogance and disrespect, as perhaps I do too much, it is still there. That love makes me cry, because that love is by far the truest of all loves.
Here is a video of the performance, not by my church, but by one of the many church groups that have done the same thing.
It’s definitely worth watching.
I was listening on the radio today to a Christian talk show where two Christian leaders, or writers, were discussing global warming and other political issues. They brought up the fact that Rick Warren, a popular Christian leader, along with 85 or so other Evangelical leaders, signed a letter stating to help with the cause against global warming, or something like that. The topic was interesting I guess, but that’s not what caught my attention. (Whether global warming is a real threat or not, who knows? What I do know is that God is in control so if the world blows up, it happened for a reason. Isaiah 24 touches on that. Verse 3 says, “The Earth will be completely laid waste and totally plundered…” So it sounds like this whole global warming thing has been planned for a while.) What caught my attention is that this writer, and Christian leader, was bashing people like Rick Warren and the other evangelists for signing this letter. He was laughing at them and couldn’t believe that they did what they did. And that frustrated me.
As Christians, how can we expect to spread the word and love of God to everyone if we can’t even get along with each other? Doesn’t that sort of defeat the purpose? To me, this guy’s response to the letter on global warming, saying it wasn’t the Christian thing to do, was, in itself, very un-Christian. When I say un-Christian, I mean acting opposite to how Christ taught us to act. To me, we don’t have to agree but can’t we accept? Can’t we believe that Christ moves in different ways among different people? It’s the same thing when people bash Joel Osteen about not being “Christian enough.” That doesn’t make any sense.
A couple posts ago, I wrote about doubt and mentioned how Donald Miller wrote in his book Blue Like Jazz, that there are people who believe and know that God exists and people who don’t believe and know that God doesn’t exist. He said that the argument stopped being about God a long time ago and now it’s about who is smarter. Well, the same thing is happening amongst Christians. Many Christians spend a lot of time worrying about what other Christians are doing and pointing out what is wrong and maybe the argument stopped being about what is right and wrong a while ago, and now it’s about who is right. Are not all arguments about that?
Anyways, it bothered me to hear that today and I just wanted to write about it. I wish we, as Christians, could all just get along. I think that would do wonders if we stopped pointing the finger at each other and actually lived as Christ wanted us to live. And yes, I realize the ironic thing about this post, that by me pointing out my frustration with a Christian going on the radio and bashing a fellow Christian, I am also doing the same thing. I guess it’s an endless cycle. Hopefully it will stop sometime.
I post some of my blogs on myspace as well. I posted the same blog on “The Lost Tomb of Jesus” and had a friend respond, which I encourage. This is what he wrote:
I totally agree with your general thesis that the ‘Jesus’ industry is large and exploitative, and how if said archaeologist might have fucked up, then they would more likely try to make an esoteric connection, than admit that they are wrong. But…as an atheist, I must draw attention to this:’…RELIED MORE ON “WHAT IFS” THAN “HERE’S HOW.”‘
Sure, a documentary might do this every now and again, but religion is based on this idea. The ‘Here’s how’ must be based upon truth, which is the child of logic, reason, and most importantly…proof. No religion anywhere can offer any solid proof that their tenets of faith are correct, that is why it is called faith. The only thing that can offer solid proof of anything is what has been accepted as scientific law. Religion is based, unequivocally, on the ‘what if’s’
As said before, I feel this documentary was an exploitative pile of shit, and it should in no way challenge anyone’s faith…much like the Da Vinci code. But I find that the primary implication of this particular blog provides a false dilemma.Of course, as an atheist, I can’t entirely prove my disbelief in God or Jesus as a diving being. I can only base it upon what I feel to be overwhelming scientific evidence.
Regardless, I do enjoy reading your blog becaue it makes me think about beliefs contrary to mine, and that presents a challenge, which is a beautiful thing. You present your ideas in a mature and well thought out way, when you could just as well tell people like me that we’re going to hell, and be supported by others.Thus brings me to the end of my rather long ‘devil’s advocate’ commentary.
It honestly is always refreshing to hear other people’s points of view. If I only subscribe to my own viewpoints without giving regard to others I will never fully understand why I believe. With that being said, let me disagree with a part of my buddies statement.
To say religion is based upon a “what if” idea, is almost true. In fact, I do believe it to be true of many religions. But to say that “No religion anywhere can offer any solid proof that their tenets of faith are correct” is wrong and doesn’t have any support. In fact, of all the religions in this world, only Christianity has historical and archeological evidence to back it up.
Ask any apologetic professor and they’d be happy to show you the evidence. Ask the number of people who have set out to disprove Christianity, only to become Christians. C.S. Lewis is perhaps the most famous, but there are many more. Josh McDowell has a large book called Evidence of Christianity that is presented in an outline form not to convince anyone, but merely to state the facts. If proper research is done on the evidence of Christianity, you’ll see that Christianity is historical. To list the evidential proof would take forever, but I invite anyone to do a quick google search on apologetics or Evidence of Christianity and you’ll find it. Check out the website http://www.thetruthaboutreligion.org for information on all religions, and you’ll see only Christianity has historical evidence to back up its claims. To be honest, we know more about the life and death of Jesus Christ than we do any other human being ever.
A lot of people say that Christians only have “blind faith.” That’s not true. To become a Christian you don’t park your brains at the door. My heart could never rejoice in what my mind rejects. Christianity is not a blind leap into the dark; it is a bold step into the light. The tenets of faith of Christianity is that Christ died and ressurected three days later. If Jesus Christ died and never rose to life, then Christianity is a myth or a fraud, even I will admit that. In 1 Corinthians 15:14, Paul tells everyone to grab hold of this central truth, that “if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.” The evidence for the resurrection is the key to establishing that Jesus is indeed who He claims to be. It is the historical validity of this central fact that gives Christians genuine and eternal hope amidst a hurting world.
If we refuse to accept the evidence, that’s when we demonstrate blind faith. And that goes both ways.
I’m guessing the majority of you have heard about the documentary, “The Lost Tomb of Jesus” that aired on the Discovery Channel. It was all over the internet last week. If you haven’t heard of it, here is a link to the article i first read early last week. I recommend reading it.
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1593893,00.html
Basically it goes like this: in Jerusalem in 1980 a tomb that contained ten separate ossuaries (bone boxes) was uncovered while building an aparment complex. 6 of the boxes had names on the side. The documentary claims that these names are of the family of Jesus, including Jesus himself. This of course would mean that Jesus never did rise from the tomb nor appear after his death before ascending to heaven. The documentary also claims they found a box with the name Mary Magdalene and a box for the son of Jesus. Of course meaning that they found out that Jesus married Mary Magdalene and they had a baby. For more information read the article, because i don’t want to go through it all.
Hopefully you tuned into to watch the documentary last night, if not for the entertaining purposes, then just to watch and fully understsand what’s being presented to the public. I personally think that it was perhaps the first documentary I’ve seen that relied more on “what ifs” than “here’s how.” It really showed a lack of respect to the art form of documentaries. Anybody who watched could see that the “ifs” were stacked to support one hypothesis, that of course being that this must be the family of Jesus, and these must be Jesus’ bones. As an example of how far the director would go, at one point they put a tube camera underground only to discover they were in the wrong tomb. The director, the eternal optimist, says “although we found ourselves in the wrong tomb, perhaps these finely crafted ossuaries, so close to the talpiot tomb (the one they were looking for), are somehow connected to Jesus or his followers.” In other words, because this is Jesus’ tomb, the nearby tombs are likely those of his followers and because those nearby tombs are likely those of his followers, this must be the tomb of Jesus.
During the documentary they also suggest they have DNA evidence that says Jesus and Mary Magdalene were not related through the mother…therefore they must be man and wife. What?? Why not through the father? Why not cousins? I think there are a few more explanations. How come they didn’t take this a step further? For example, if Y-chromosome samples from Joseph and Jesus showed no genetic link between father and son, then the discovery channel could take credit for proving the virgin birth. How come they didn’t test everybody’s DNA? Other than the obvious answer which is it wouldn’t have made for good television.
And wait a second…how did they get the DNA? If you watch the documentary they say the bones were quickly reburied after the discovery in 1980. So they say they got the DNA from the boxes themselves. Susan Sheridan, a Bioanthropologist at the University of Notre Dame said this in an article.
The DNA could have come from a variety of sources, Sheridan said, and most likely came from people who handled the boxes. What it probably did not come from are the bones originally found in the boxes.
“Getting ancient DNA out of bones, i mean we’ve got four big skeletal collections here from the near east … We have really excellent bones, and we can’t get dna out of them. … You have to be very careful about contamination control,” Sheridan said. “and a lot of times, even in the bones we have from Jerusalem that are about 500 years younger than (the ones mentioned in the film), some fungus has moved in and destroyed our ability to get DNA.”
And all they discovered was that the two sources were not related through the mother. They must have been married.
Other archaeological experts are speaking out against the documentary as well, including the man who did the original excavation of the tomb back in 1980.
This is from another article:
William Dever, who the Washington Post describes as one “who has been excavating ancient sites in Israel for 50 years and is widely considered the dean of biblical archaeology among U.S. scholars” has responded to the film by saying,
“I’m not a christian. I’m not a believer. I don’t have a dog in this fight … I’ve known about these ossuaries for many years and so have many other archaeologists, and none of us thought it was much of a story, because these are rather common Jewish names from that period,” he said. “It’s a publicity stunt, and it will make these guys very rich, and it will upset millions of innocent people because they don’t know enough to separate fact from fiction.”
The Washington Post added that similar assessments came yesterday from two Israeli scholars, Amos Kloner, who originally excavated the tomb, and Joe Zias, former curator of archaeology at the Israeli Antiquities Authority. Kloner told the Jerusalem Post that the documentary is “nonsense.” Zias described it in an e-mail to the Washington Post as a “hyped up film which is intellectually and scientifically dishonest.”
One part of the documentary that i felt was particularly funny was when they said “Maria is the latin form of Mary, and is how Jesus’ mother was known after His death as more Romans became followers.” How do the filmmakers know that Jesus’s mother was known after his death by a latinized form of her name “as more romans became followers”? Are they ignorant of what was going on during that time? And do they not see the obvious contradiction here? People became followers of a crucified and risen savior, not a middle-class resident of Jerusalem. If Jesus was walking around Jerusalem with a wife and kids, there would be no followers, Roman or otherwise, to be calling her Maria.
I have to admit, as a Christian I’m not mad or offended at this documentary. I’m actually entertained and happy that they released it. To me, it shows how far people will go to try and disprove Christianity, and it still hasn’t been done. Unfortunately, I do believe it will hurt many people. I think there are many people out there who maybe were questioning christianity and were questioning the validity of the claims, and then to have this movie come around…who knows. Hopefully they will see it as the joke it really is.
I do have to say one final thing though, and i’m saying this not as a Christian, but as a person who is intereested in history. Something major happened in 33 ad, the year of Jesus’ death. Something that changed the world. What was it? Jesus’ followers said he was raised three days after the crucifixion and ascended into heaven. They said this in the same town that it happened. Christianity began in Jerusualeam, the same country that Jesus was crucified. It’s not like they started spreading rumours in a different country. And if they were lying…why? For money? Fame? These people were martyrd for their beliefs. Put to death in gruesome ways, some stoned, some crucified upside down. I would like to think that if they were lying, at least one of them, when faced with death would say, “ok, ok…just joking.” I know i couldn’t die for what I knew to be a lie. And if it wasn’t true you’d think they would find evidence that it wasn’t…and this documentary wasn’t it…
The truth is, the “Jesus” industry makes a lot of money, and there is no end to where speculation can take you…as long as it can be used to attack the christian faith, anyway. Unfortunately, I don’t think there’s an end in sight and we can expect more of this in the future.
Also, Dr. Joe E. Zias published a viewer’s guide to ‘The Lost Tomb of Jesus’ that you can find on his website. Dr. Zias is a member of the science and archaeology group at the Hebrew University. “This group is composed of scientists from various disciplines, attempting to bring diverse fields of scientific inquiry to archaeology, anthropology and research on the dead sea scrolls.” In the guide he says way more than i could say to show how far off the filmmakers are. If you’re interested it really is good reading.
Here is the link: http://www.joezias.com/tomb.html
