Opus 2025-250: The Key Ingredient

As I am contemplating on what it’s like to worship a living God, I find that a lot of our formulas, checklists, and rituals have their place, but they are not the vitally important thing in knowing the assurance of eternal life and the presence of Jesus in our hearts.

A while back, I started a list of conversion experiences given as examples in the scripture.  The list is still open.  If I come across another, I will add it.  Looking at them, the one thing that I could find that was consistent through all of them was believing.  The only place where the word was not used was the thief on the cross, but even he showed a trust in Jesus.  The word is expressed in different ways, different formats, different tenses, different grammatical, declensions, but it is there.

Since we are looking through photographs of life instead of the motion, picture, we are caught in a moment of time.  Because of that, we are limited to taking this word in Greek, pistis, and asking ourselves what happened at that moment.  The key element in knowing the living God is believing.

Hebrews 11:6 (KJV) But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

Since this is just a moment in time and only captures that moment in time, it is enough to get us started.  It plants the seed.  It gives us that key ingredient that is necessary.  But keep in mind that this God whom we worship is a personal God.  He created us in His image.  He relates to us.  And He expects us to relate to Him as a living God.

Because of that formulas are helpful and lists can be useful but keep in mind without that key ingredient of believing, everything else is just noise.  Also, keep in mind there is enough evidence in the Greek grammar for the fact that this believing, or faith, might be better translated in some places as “faithfulness”.  That means that the believing is a beginning of a lifetime relationship with God, not the final moment.

Take that initial ingredient and begin the recipe for a glorious life.

homo unius libri

Opus 2016-84: The Humor of Being a Stranger

I don’t know when it was posted on Hope and Change.  I enjoy the cartoons but I have also gotten into reading the blurbs below.  The one with this cartoon struck me as significant to me as a Christian.  Jarlsberg wrote,

“ And although the electorate is clamoring for "outsiders" in this political cycle, we feel like we're the real outsiders because we can't even identify with most Earthlings anymore.  And not just when it comes to politics, but also cultures, communication, and commonality of purpose. Not just in our own wounded United States, but throughout the world.”

This should describe Christians.  I know it is how I feel when I drive among crazy people or listen to the leadership at our school.  I seem to be surrounded by people with totally different ideas.  I would say ideas of right and wrong but they reject those labels.

Then he quotes the Bible

“Maybe we're just having a bad day. But we feel like strangers in a strange land and, ...

I know that most people think this was the creative writing of Robert Heilein but like many authors he was just borrowing a phrase from the Bible.

(Exodus 2:22 KJV)  And she bare him a son, and he called his name Gershom: for he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land.

We see the thought repeated in the New Testament.

(Hebrews 11:13 KJV)  These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.

I have not picked up that Hope and Change is written by someone who is serious about being a Christian.  I can still enjoy his humor and his insights.

We, as followers of Jesus, are aliens.  We are strangers.  We are out of place.  It has always been that way.  It will always be that way.  I don’t like it.  I don’t enjoy it.  I accept it.  I am afraid I don’t identify with Earthlings any more, but then I never did.

homo unius libri