Jesus among other faiths

It is interesting to me, the amount of people I have spoken to since my return to Australia that often started out as Christians but somewhere along the way, somehow, got disillusioned with Christ and as a result either cast off God altogether or otherwise began to "blend" some of the Christian tenets and doctrines with other "feel good" religions, isms and dogmas.

I don't know which is worse of the two, but what I do see is that they are varying degrees of disillusionment. The one is a complete disregard and dismissal of faith, while the other feels there is some merit in the Christian faith but that somewhere along the line it got messed up, or that maybe it is simply to hard to live the Christian life in its truest, most pure form because it asks of the follower "too many" sacrifices.

Those "too many" sacrifices stem from the desire to have a foot in each camp, one in the camp of the popularity of the world and the other in the camp of the holiness of God. Unfortunately it can't be achieved without loss one way or the other. The popularity campers don't like being told that you've put them on hold because of.....GOD. And for sure God doesn't like being prioritised below anyone or anything. You end up covering your tracks and the truth from your "friends" (ie. lying, ...which God hates) because if they find out, then you're no longer popular and don't get invited to the "cool events and functions".

(Question: How does a person who knows Gods' word begin to blend other things with it, knowing that "God is a jealous God" and "Thou shalt have no other gods before me").

I also see something else that is a concern to me. That is, the taking of the Christian faith and doctrine and heaping up emotions and feelings on top of the genuine doctrine. It seems to me this occurs because in contrast to the world the Christian faith seems "bland" by appearance and the saved of God look at the world and ask "How do we even begin to compete"? "How do we make the Christian faith tantalising and look like a great choice"?

I believe the answer here is that we DON'T compete. The Christian message is not one of this world but the next. We have no need to wind ourselves or anyone else into a frenzied state to make us "feel" like God is near and listening. Our feelings and emotions when it comes to God and the Christian life are very real and relevant but not to the point of trying to make us feel or think there is something there that really isn't.

It kinda boils down to the same thing as the mediæval monks flagellating themselves, only instead of tearing our backs open saying, "Woe, what a sinner am I?" we are reversing that. In this culture of positive spin and we pat ourselves on the back repeating "I am a good person, I know God loves me, I am a good person, I know God loves me". In this way, WE build up OUR self-esteem and begin to feel all warm and fuzzy but we begin to be blinded to the truth, which in turn means we no longer choose to see that we are sinners "saved by grace" but rather see that, we are not in need of "saving" because we are already "good" and "most certainly will be saved because of our own goodness".

Christ says ...."not so!"


Thing is, that people are still trying to solve their problems for themselves, and while we can solve many things here in our lives, Christ tells us that what we can't fix (and what needs fixing) is the eternal relationship, without his help. It is all about the "me" factor and that takes the glory from God. The feel good things are great for the now and they build up our self esteem and they make us think we can conquer the world but as Christ tried to tell us, "fear not the world for I have overcome the world".... "fear him who can kill the body and soul"

People are proud creatures and as the pinnacle of the creation, we were given dominion over everything else. Though, as the created, we are required to be humble before the almighty and submit to his will. Part of this is realising and admitting to God, to ourselves and others that we are ultimately not capable of saving ourselves from the scrap heap without Christ's intervention.
It truly is only by the grace of God and his desire to RESTORE his relationship with his creation that we can be saved from the terror and horror to come.

Do you believe the word of God, is the Truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth,... so help you God??

Many people I speak with in the course of my Godly wanderings have some semblance of respect, or some measure of awe for God but when it really comes down to the crunch.... they go into a backpedal as fast as they can but if you keep chasing them they fall of the bike they profess to ride. A typical scenario might go like this.....



You talk about Christ easily, are you a Christian?

Yes, I am.

Do you believe the Bible in its entirety? Doubting nothing?

Of course I do.

Do you believe the claim in the Bible that Jesus Christ is THE way, THE truth and THE life, and that no man can get to heaven except through Christ?

Er, yeah mostly...

What mostly?

Well, I think if a person tries to do good and be a good person that God will let them into heaven.

Is that right? Could you show me in the Bible where you get your support for that statement?

Well, no not really.

Well let me tell you. Christ does tell us that we should do good to others, that we should be good and not sin but it doesn't say that's how we get to heaven. The bible does say that we cannot get to heaven by anything we do personally. We cannot accumulate points on a scorecard and cancel out our good side from the bad side and hope that it all works out in the wash.

Ah okay, I guess I shouldn't have brought this up because it seems to be a touchy topic.

Oh, quite the contrary. I believe that God had us meet at this time and place for you to be set on the right track before you wander off too far and get lost in the wilderness..... Are you willing to listen to the truth of what the Bible really has to say?? Great, then listen up.


Nothing gets my goat, faster than a lukewarm Christian. I don't like getting onto people but I will defend the word of God and new believers if I see or hear something amiss. It really irks me to see people out there professing that they are Christians and "have been for years" but all they do is spout off the same old "feel good" dogma that when tested by the fire of the Bible, results in nothing but a pile of filthy ashes which they can heap on their head because they have gone astray.

It's not that I feel God's word needs defending because whether I am there to defend or not, God's word is God's word and will always forever and ever be God's word. But as a professing Christian, I will be called to task and held answerable to God for my lack in this world (God forbid).... so I will defend his word and truth.

As a Christian I am called to take the message to the world and proclaim it and how can I go forward and proclaim it, if I have to keep backtracking to what someone else said and correct the errors. It makes God look like the fool and it does no credibility to us as Christians.

Of course, I only have these conversations privately with folks that I percieve to have the appearance of a christian but really just try to make it look appealing to the world by dressing their brand of christianity in the latest clothes of the hippest trend of the moment.

These folks obviously have not read their Bibles and several key scriptures or they would be aware that Christ has told us that "you are in this world but not of it". Christ went to the people where they were at but he showed the the way to a better place, he didn't become "like" them to show them he could be the coolest of the bunch and be the leader.

Christ loved the sinner where he was, he didn't tell him go wash, go sort out your filthy habits, go get your act together.... and THEN come see me. He entered in where the sinner was at and lifted him, helped bear his burden and showed love to the unloveable. Never once do we read of Christ being a crowd pleaser.

Christ set our example and we are to follow it, forsaking all others. Matt 6:20 says "But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal 21: For where your treasure is, there is your heart also.
We are not here ,as Christans, to be crowd-pleasers. We are here to bring the truth, AS THE TRUTH and not wrapped up in something else to make it look more appealing to those of this age, in which we are bombarded 24/7 with anything we might like to do, try or see.

That is the beauty of the message of Christ, it is pure, simple and unchanging in a world which is no longer pure, is very complex and changing faster than I can type. It is not easy being a Christian and holding to the truths which may be unpopular, when everyone else seems to be having such a good time but Christ never said it would be,.....



.............he just told us that it would be worth it in the end.

In the beginning was the Word,....

How does one even begin to argue a statement like this but that is exactly what those of the "world", (those who have not OR will not accept Christ as their saviour) try to do.

Obviously, the first statement is one of foundation. Those of the world say,... exactly on what premise, precedent or evidence do you deign to declare that this statement is provable, true and infallible.

My immediate response is to start quoting other scripture such as, 2 Timothy 3:16 but unfortunately while not irrelevant, only God has the position from which to say there is no other by whom I can sware by so I sware by my own self. (Now if that is not an example of taking responsibilty, I don't know what is. Essentially what God said is,... if it all comes to pieces.... it's on me, it is my fault and I have failed.... but I have digressed already).

By the rationale of the world, you cannot use the very thing you are trying to authenticate to make a case for itself. (ie. you're not "allowed" to use the Bible to prove the Bible is true and authentic because the Bible is the object of suspicion. This however will not stop them using the Bible against you to try and prove its "untruth"). Therefore we are, in the mind of the world, obliged to use other methods to verify the Bibles' claims, miracles, healings and other events. There are vast amounts of texts covering the historical, archæological, philosophical and other evidence to that end.

Without directing the questioner of the Bible (and your faith) to various great books that address this matter very satisfactorily, we have to be able in short order, get to the questioners door in their heart and mind where they can readily acknowledge the rational reasoning they hear from us, and assure themselves that what we're saying is not about duping them into accepting something simply because our argument is convincing but because it is true.

One of the points, I try to make to folks is this:

Okay, so put yourself in God's shoes. Imagine for a moment that you are the omniponent God. You know all things, see all things, understand all things, know the thoughts and intents of every human on the planet.

Since the beginning of time you have had a desire to be in communion with your ultimate creation, even though at the beginning of time, that creation disobeyed you and your command. You want to give your creation another chance to redeem himself and you want to reveal yourself, your intent and your plan to your created. Being that you, know all of humanity's thoughts, deeds and intents, secret and not so secret.

Who would you choose to take up a pen and have them start scrawling on a piece of parchment?

Would it be the guy who you knew that as soon as you told him something to write, would begin to write something else, or put embellishments or emphasis on things which you did not? or maybe use words that were not yours or didn't seem to make sense to him, so he put something else, which meant that later on down the track even though you found someone else more faithful,... because of the earlier fools' meddling with your message, your message now had no continuity or consistency, and ultimately no LEGITIMACY to it???

Probably not and if you did then you would indeed be a foolish god.

Or rather, being the all-knowing God that you are, would you look down upon the earth and select the individuals who would be faithful in writing down accurately all that you told them to write, knowing thereby, that later in history when the penned letters came together in the form that you intended them to, it had a continuity to it that, even though it was written by more than 30-40 some people across the ages, the thoughts obviously flowed from the one pure and incorruptible source.

I myself would most definitely choose the later scenario. As you might say in today's language, this is a "no brainer". You don't even have to think about which choice you would make.

Faith comes by hearing the word

(To preface this post, I'd like to say if you want to read a fantastic book about faith and what it looks like, I highly recommend, "Extraordinary Faith" by Sheila Walsh. Easy reading but goes straight to the heart).

We all hear a lot about faith but really what does all the talk amount to.

The other day I was talking to a guy at the office and he had watched the "special" on TV about the so-called tomb of Christ. Knowing that I am the only professing christian in the office, when everyone else left the room he asked me several questions about what I thought of the info presented on the TV. I told him my thoughts on the basis of the "evidence" presented in the documentary and what proceeded, I felt, was a "God Moment" in which we had a brief discussion on several biblical threads. I guess it was the same thing that had run earlier this year but maybe on a different channel.

This guy having been raised in the Catholic faith openly confesses that he is not a church goer. He still seems to have instilled in him some proper sense of respect for God. He is uncomfortable with the bright spotlight of questioning on himself but at the same time very interested (it would seem) at finding some kind of solid proof to stand on so that he could either, go away from God declaring the hoax exposed or, preferably stand his ground on and say unequivocally that this is the infallible evidence of the existence of God.

Typically, he is one of these fellows that desperately wants to believe and maybe even in his heart of hearts does believe but then he has the problem of fitting that honest belief into the popularity lifestyle and the general acceptance that he so craves. For him, life at this point is all about fitting in and going with the flow of what everybody else is doing, even if he himself is not entirely comfortable with what everybody is being, saying or doing.

I truly believe that his dilemma would quickly be resolved IF he would only do what he consciously makes an effort to not do and that is seek and search out the answers, that are there to be found, for himself. He doesn't make the effort because if he does and finds the answers he seeks, then instead of gliding along in relaxed oblivion, able to claim he didn't know better when something goes desperately wrong, he now has to acknowledge that he did know better and very importantly..... face the consequences.

He wants others to build his own faith for him, by that I mean, to teach him from the Word of God, the truths therein and the foundations on which they stand. Yet at the very same time he reserves the right to dispute the veracity, authenticity and divinity of the Bible...(once again we have the created putting the Creator in the witness box and barraging him with questions, with the created already having made up his mind that whatever the answer he recieves, no matter how beautiful and infallible the explanation, there is a dubiousness that makes the answer unacceptable).

At the same time though, because in this instance "his" faith is actually not his but what someone else has given him he also has an exit door. He is able to blame someone else for not telling him the right stuff if God turns him away at the gate or claim gullibility to others that make a better case for "there being no God" than he can make for "there being a God".

If he doesn't find the the answers which he believes are there, then he has the problem of disavowing the God he has believed in all his life, ...from his life,... whom he still feels the pull and tug of in his conscience, the metaphorical tap on the shoulder, the thought that leaps to mind before the action that he oft dismisses. He tries hard to believe that it is merely the hang-over guilt from his early boyhood teachings when he was growing up that his "friends" say it is.... and not the finger of God weighing on his shoulder and words of God unlocking the secret doors of the heart to make us deal with issues that we wanted to just go away.

The young guy openly told me that he doesn't like to think about things in the Bible because that leads to all kinds of unanswerable questions....like, Where did God come from? I guess that is the best way to deal with most things you don't want to know about... Bury your head in the sand.

His problem is a common one to the age we are living in. The attitude of many young people is that, I want all the access to the things that adults are allowed to say, do or be involved in but at the same time don't not want to accept the responsibility that comes with the territory of being an adult. He is very uneasy about making an unpopular choice even though it might be the right choice.

This guy's faith is weak at best but how could he best strengthen his faith? The Bible speaks of faith comes by hearing the "Word" (ie. reading the scriptures for ourselves). There are other problems here though that need attention before he can proceed to a resolution and the first of these is a communication breakdown. It needs to be understood what faith is.

Is faith a blind leap into the dark hoping that whatever you think is out there to catch you REALLY IS OUT THERE..... Or is it something else entirely.

Yet still, there is something even prior to this that needs to be attended to and that is ....

The rock solid, undeniable authenticity of the scriptures being the words of God, delivered to us, untainted by human thought or opinion..... How do we achieve that?