Evangelism
I am not an evangelist. I rarely tell people they should "get right with God" or that they should have a "personal relationship with Jesus" or that "God has a plan" for their life and aren't they interested in knowing what it is?
The thing is, though, I really am glad that someone evangelized to me. If someone hadn't told me that God existed and that I could be forgiven of the ways in which I'd done him wrong and have a in-good-standing relationship with God, I don't know if I would have gotten to know Jesus. And Jesus has been worth knowing. There's been a lot of other stuff that has come with my relationship with God. Knowing something about why I'm valuable as a person, which has made me much more comfortable in my own skin. is something I'm not sure if I would have understood without knowing God. Grace would probably not have been something I would have gotten to know, which means I'd still be starvingly hungry for it. But all those things or none of them, Jesus, the Father, and the Spirit have been deeply, deeply worth getting to know.
Which leaves me in a weird position of being grateful for something I have but not really doing much to help others have it. At least in a person to person way. I do pray for this for specific people, albeit with some lack in consistency.
One of the reasons I'm not fond of evangelizing is that I've met a lot of people, including myself. who have been wounded in some way by evangelism. A lot of the ways that people talk about
God, talk about Christianity, and try to get other people to become Christians has damaged a lot of lives.
I think a big reason for this is because Christians have lost sight of (if in fact they knew) the whole purpose of evangelism: introducing Jesus to people and helping people see what the reality between God and man is. And from a pragmatic standpoint, I think simply introducing people to Jesus would suffice. I'm not sure you can actually make a good introduction to Jesus without naturally including any other pertinent details. And as I talked about in a different post, one of the key things here is that you're introducing a person. Is it really that dissimilar to saying "Hey, John, I like you to meet my friend Dave. He's a really swell cat and I think you two would get on together well."? Granted, there's more to the whole situation than that, but I think that is fundamentally what the purpose of evangelism is.
It's God that we're after. It's knowing Jesus, knowing the Spirit, knowing the Father that matters. Introducing people to everything but the actual person of God seems...pointless. And it seems to me that a lot of people don't actually hear that when they listen to Christians. The moment you mention Jesus people respond very defensively, as if you're going to hurt them.
What I really want people to experience, what I want people to know in a definite, living way, is what a great thing it is to know Jesus, to know all of God. To know that God loves them, to know the wonderful peace of grace, to have found something solid upon which to live a life. To that end I could really care less about the religion of Christianity. I don't care if anyone becomes Christian from a religion standpoint, I just want them to meet and be friends with Christ.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Theology 2
My last post made me want to write up a sort of tree of sources. I'll write it up in list form, though.
The first item in the list is the most basic, the primary source, the most basic aspect of reality from which everything else flows. Each item then flows from the last.
1. God exists.
2. God is a person (in three distinct parts, each of which is also a person. Strange.).
3. God relates.
4. God creates things.
5. These things include the universe, the earth, angels, and humans.
6. Some angels rebel against God, and so do all humans.
7. Apparently, the rebellious angels can't or won't repent of their rebellion.
8. Humans can, and maybe will.
9. God sees the rift between himself and humans (and, apparently, also all of creation) the rebellion creates as being a fixable problem.
10. God sets upon a course of action to solve the problem.
11. This course of action goes through a few phases culminating in God's only son dying as an intermediary sacrifice between humans and God.
12. The sacrifice is accepted and a means by which the rift between humans and God can be closed is established.
13. The means of restitution between God and humans must be chosen by each individual, it is not globally applied.
14. At a time of God's choosing, the realities set in progress by the creation of the universe are
stopped.
15. Judgement of each human's relationship with God is enacted.
16. Those who have followed the means of restitution enjoy continued eternal relationship with God, those who have not followed the means of restitution suffer eternal banishment from relationship with God.
I think it needs some further work, but even if incomplete I think that's the general gist.
The first item in the list is the most basic, the primary source, the most basic aspect of reality from which everything else flows. Each item then flows from the last.
1. God exists.
2. God is a person (in three distinct parts, each of which is also a person. Strange.).
3. God relates.
4. God creates things.
5. These things include the universe, the earth, angels, and humans.
6. Some angels rebel against God, and so do all humans.
7. Apparently, the rebellious angels can't or won't repent of their rebellion.
8. Humans can, and maybe will.
9. God sees the rift between himself and humans (and, apparently, also all of creation) the rebellion creates as being a fixable problem.
10. God sets upon a course of action to solve the problem.
11. This course of action goes through a few phases culminating in God's only son dying as an intermediary sacrifice between humans and God.
12. The sacrifice is accepted and a means by which the rift between humans and God can be closed is established.
13. The means of restitution between God and humans must be chosen by each individual, it is not globally applied.
14. At a time of God's choosing, the realities set in progress by the creation of the universe are
stopped.
15. Judgement of each human's relationship with God is enacted.
16. Those who have followed the means of restitution enjoy continued eternal relationship with God, those who have not followed the means of restitution suffer eternal banishment from relationship with God.
I think it needs some further work, but even if incomplete I think that's the general gist.
Theology 1
So, I have lots of thoughts about lots of things. And I've been wanting to write out some of my thoughts about God, Christianity, etc., in a more organized way for some time. Here goes nothing.
I don't really have a good way of introducing how important I feel this idea is, so that knowledge will have to serve as preface.
God is a person.
Like any person, he has thoughts, feelings, desires, goals, etc. Like all people, one of his innate inclinations is to interact, or relate, with his environment. On a personal level that would be you and me, and globally all people and everything everywhere. And like all people, he is real.
(For the my purposes here, I'm assuming that God exists and reality exists and that both can be known at least in the sense of interaction.)
The reason I think this is so important is that I believe it is the basis of everything that has to do with God. It is the thing that Christianity has as its most obvious lynch-pin after the existence of God. It is the moving force behind all the concepts and doctrines of Christianity. (And also Judaism, for those keeping score at home.)
Also, it is important currently because I feel it often gets left behind in Christians' communication about their faith, which affects everything about one's faith, including evangelism. For example, a popular phrase that I heard growing up in an evangelical environment was "a personal relationship with Jesus Christ." Well, if Jesus Christ is just a concept or an object, really anything besides being a person, that whole concept sort of loses its appeal and becomes confusing or at least esoteric. It would be like talking about a "personal relationship with your car" or a "personal relationship with happiness". Kind of odd thoughts, right? Rather on the periphery of the day to day realities of making sure you have enough to eat, a place to sleep, something to ward off the elements, etc. But if Jesus Christ is a person in the same way that I am or anyone else is, than that phrase immediately makes much more sense. Two people having a personal relationship is a pretty fundamental part of being alive, isn't it?
And it also removes the dogmatic and philosophic elements of the beliefs from the hypothetical realm. The story of God's interaction with man and man's interaction with God as told in the Bible can be seen not as a story but as a history. God can't be just a concept or an allegory or an imaginary device is he is an actually real, living person.
And I think people are much more interested in relating to a real person than some out-of-the-frame, complex deity-thing. Even more so if that person has your truly best interests at heart and has set out upon a planned course of action to ensure your best interests are met. If God loves me in the same way that my friends love me, that has some appeal. If he loves me even better than my friends, better than any (potential) romantic partners, well, all the better, I think.
And if God is a person and the Almighty Creator the Bible claims, than he actually does have some legitimate claim to how we live.
Because he's not a concept, not an object, he's a real person.
But if that's not made clear, what exactly is the virtue of this belief?
But because I believe God is a real person, I get an awful damn lot out of the statement "Jesus loves me".
Jesus loves you.
I don't really have a good way of introducing how important I feel this idea is, so that knowledge will have to serve as preface.
God is a person.
Like any person, he has thoughts, feelings, desires, goals, etc. Like all people, one of his innate inclinations is to interact, or relate, with his environment. On a personal level that would be you and me, and globally all people and everything everywhere. And like all people, he is real.
(For the my purposes here, I'm assuming that God exists and reality exists and that both can be known at least in the sense of interaction.)
The reason I think this is so important is that I believe it is the basis of everything that has to do with God. It is the thing that Christianity has as its most obvious lynch-pin after the existence of God. It is the moving force behind all the concepts and doctrines of Christianity. (And also Judaism, for those keeping score at home.)
Also, it is important currently because I feel it often gets left behind in Christians' communication about their faith, which affects everything about one's faith, including evangelism. For example, a popular phrase that I heard growing up in an evangelical environment was "a personal relationship with Jesus Christ." Well, if Jesus Christ is just a concept or an object, really anything besides being a person, that whole concept sort of loses its appeal and becomes confusing or at least esoteric. It would be like talking about a "personal relationship with your car" or a "personal relationship with happiness". Kind of odd thoughts, right? Rather on the periphery of the day to day realities of making sure you have enough to eat, a place to sleep, something to ward off the elements, etc. But if Jesus Christ is a person in the same way that I am or anyone else is, than that phrase immediately makes much more sense. Two people having a personal relationship is a pretty fundamental part of being alive, isn't it?
And it also removes the dogmatic and philosophic elements of the beliefs from the hypothetical realm. The story of God's interaction with man and man's interaction with God as told in the Bible can be seen not as a story but as a history. God can't be just a concept or an allegory or an imaginary device is he is an actually real, living person.
And I think people are much more interested in relating to a real person than some out-of-the-frame, complex deity-thing. Even more so if that person has your truly best interests at heart and has set out upon a planned course of action to ensure your best interests are met. If God loves me in the same way that my friends love me, that has some appeal. If he loves me even better than my friends, better than any (potential) romantic partners, well, all the better, I think.
And if God is a person and the Almighty Creator the Bible claims, than he actually does have some legitimate claim to how we live.
Because he's not a concept, not an object, he's a real person.
But if that's not made clear, what exactly is the virtue of this belief?
But because I believe God is a real person, I get an awful damn lot out of the statement "Jesus loves me".
Jesus loves you.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Infrastructure
Recently, there was a large gas pipe explosion in San Bruno, California that leveled an entire neighborhood damaging close to 40 homes, injuring 60 people, and killing 4. (Here's a nifty article about how news reports are often wrong and sometimes make things worse.)
Last night I watched a program on the History Channel about America's failing infrastructure.
One of the interesting things we will see in our lifetime is the collision of people's views on taxes and their need for infrastructure. It is quite commonplace for people to complain about their tax burden, and levies for schools and infrastructure fail so often it is almost cliche. The current climate in America leans heavily toward the idea that our resource distribution systems (gas lines, sewer lines, electrical lines, roads, dams, levees, waterways, etc.) are automatically granted us as citizens. Their continued existence is not something we need to concern ourselves with. These things are somebody else's job and are taken care of for us. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Our infrastructure, like all structures, require maintenance and replacement. This is true for fire alarms, toilets, refrigerators, stoves, cars, houses, boats, and so forth all the way up to roads, dams, bridges, sports teams, governments, and the environment. And just like all our in-home amenities, our out-of-home amenities like our free highways (freeways, get it?) must be maintained by us. We as individuals are responsible for the maintenance of everything we use. It may be someone else's "job" to do the actual work, but if we don't fund it and oversee it, we have no one to blame but ourselves.
Currently our infrastructure is unfunded and we as a society are not looking after it.
Oh, Burn Notice is on, see ya...
Last night I watched a program on the History Channel about America's failing infrastructure.
One of the interesting things we will see in our lifetime is the collision of people's views on taxes and their need for infrastructure. It is quite commonplace for people to complain about their tax burden, and levies for schools and infrastructure fail so often it is almost cliche. The current climate in America leans heavily toward the idea that our resource distribution systems (gas lines, sewer lines, electrical lines, roads, dams, levees, waterways, etc.) are automatically granted us as citizens. Their continued existence is not something we need to concern ourselves with. These things are somebody else's job and are taken care of for us. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Our infrastructure, like all structures, require maintenance and replacement. This is true for fire alarms, toilets, refrigerators, stoves, cars, houses, boats, and so forth all the way up to roads, dams, bridges, sports teams, governments, and the environment. And just like all our in-home amenities, our out-of-home amenities like our free highways (freeways, get it?) must be maintained by us. We as individuals are responsible for the maintenance of everything we use. It may be someone else's "job" to do the actual work, but if we don't fund it and oversee it, we have no one to blame but ourselves.
Currently our infrastructure is unfunded and we as a society are not looking after it.
Oh, Burn Notice is on, see ya...
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