Preparation Canyon State Park

Not only do I enjoy the human powered form of cycling!  I also enjoy the power-generation of my electronically fuel injected 800cc motorcycle.  This photo was taken by my buddy Chris during a stop at Preparation Canyon State Park in western Iowa a couple weeks ago!

Ride Strong -

Kevin

Objections to Christianity - Exclusivity

Was listening to Tim Keller (Redeemer Presbyterian Church - NYC)  teach on an objection to Christianity "exclusivity" that was so convicting that I sent these notes a friend of mine. This is long but well worth the read.  Based on 1 John 4:1-10.  Enjoy :-)

Exclusivity: (1 John 4:1-10)
Problem that people have with all religions. How can you claim that you have the only truth. 40, 30, 20 years ago the barrier to peace was the cold war. But now it is religion. Agree that religion generally speaking has a strong tendency to divide people. Creates a slippery slope for people. Religion erodes peace between people. What do you do when you realize this. 2 ways that don't work as you address this divisiveness and one way that does work

Two Ways that Don't Work -
1) - People are hoping for or helping that religion would weaken and go away. Religion used to help us a adapt to our world, but now people think that it doesn't relate. But that is not what is happening in the world. Africa in the last 100 years has gone for 10% to 50% Christian, China over the next 100 years will be more Christian. Governments have taken control over religion, but Christianity continues to grow rapidly. Why is it that religion doesn't go away. It only gets stronger. 1 John 4 1 - John is talking about teachers. Commentaries - don't make the assumption that he is talking about religious views, there is a spiritual realm that people sense. People will worship something. That is not all good. You could worship something that can enslave you. Rather than free you. Worship is not a just an intellectual thing. Stamping religion out will not work.
2) - Confine religion to the private realm. People say - "We are not against religion - but keep it in the private realm". People say that we need to agree on 2 things 1) That all paths to God are equal and 2) Faith / religion gives you strength in private live, but never bring it into public life. Neither of these things hold water. 1 John 4:5 - they = critics of Christianity. They are coming from a religious faith view point, even as they are criticizing ours (1) all way are paths to God - why? Fact is that we all have truth and use an illustration = Group of blind men that come up to an elephant. All grab hold of it, and say what it is like - elephant is long, elephant is short and stiff, elephant is huge and flat. They begin to argue. Everyone of them is right and everyone is wrong. The are see part of reality, but not all. So they conclude that religion is the same. That is how we need to view religion. Book - "Gospel of a Pluralist Society" - only way you could know that the blind man didn't have the true reality, is if you could see the whole elephant. In religion - you say you are the one that knows the whole truth about religion. An arrogance that you know that all religion is equal. (only an appearance of humility) What is that absolute vantage point that you claim to relativize all scripture claims? When you say that no one has a spiritual take on reality, that is a spiritual take on reality. 2) Keep religion private - leave truth and reality at the door when you come to the public square. Simply look for strategies that work, not ones that are in line with religion and spirituality. We live in a society that tries to enforce this. Totally impracticable - what is religion? Not institutional! Religion is a set of answers to the big questions, Why are we here? What is right and wrong? What should we be spending our time doing? Those things can't be answered in a lab. It is a faith assumption. You cannot leave faith at the door when you go into public. Example - divorce. Lets just decide on divorce laws that work for people. Depend on your view / purpose of marriage. But impossible - individualist western societies - the needs of the individual more important than the group. You will make the divorce easy, but people in a traditional society - the family is more important than the individual. You are going to make divorce hard. You can't come to any conclusion of what will work in divorce with out deeply held belief about human flourishing. To say religions reasoning should be kept out-of the public square because it is faith based is on its own a faith based reasoning that should be thrown out.

So everybody has a set of exclusive beliefs, therefore what matters is which set of exclusive beliefs that can produce loving, exclusive reconciling peaceful behavior. Every body has exclusive beliefs! Even when you don;t think you do, you do.

One way that does work -
1) Strategy that deals with the divisiveness of religion - look at the things about the christian gospel that are unique to Christianity that are different from all other religions. Most people don't like that, the say "don't stress what is different, but what is in common." But those (similarities) are not the features that will lead you into the reconciliation and peace in the world. It is counter-intuitive, but turns you into an agent of peace. This text show us how unique Christianity is from other religions.
1) Origin of Jesus salvation - 1 John 4:2 Jesus Christ has 'come' means that he was somewhere before he came into the world. Every other religion in the world is that the leaders founder is a human being only, but God came into the world, in the flesh. Why is it like that? Because that is a reason why Christianity is different from other religions.
"GOD CAME INTO THE WORLD" = origin of Jesus Salvation
2) Purpose of Jesus salvation - Eastern religions = to liberate you from the flesh. That is the problem - the 'physical world'. Western religions = flesh is real but it is bad, and through an spiritual experience you can get out and go to heaven. All other religions the goal is to escape the world and go to heaven. But Christianity - God received a body in Jesus Christ, and at the resurrection of Jesus - the body experiences redemption. Not an escape from the world, but a redemption of the world. Getting rid of death, disease, poverty in the world. Christian salvation means a transformation of the world, not an escape. If some one says there is salvation in other faiths, "What kind of salvation are you talking about?" No other religion holds out the salvation of the world like Christianity. The resurrection - If religion says that the only thing that matters is heaven, the next life. Then what happens is that you are interested in converting people to your tribe and getting more people converted to it and the hell with the rest of the world. But if you believe the gospel you are working to make this a good world. Making the city a good city. Serve the city, make it a great place for all people. To make a new heaven and new earth.
"RESTORATION OF MATERIAL WORLD" = purpose of Jesus Salvation
3) Method of Grace - in all other religions, if you want to be saved you have to perform the truth, you have to love god, your neighbor, your family and if God sees you doing that he will save you. But that is not what the Gospel says at all. 1 John 4:10 - ...This is love not that we loved God.... God comes and sacrificially pours himself out for those that don't love him, others. Jesus is not mainly a teacher comes to die in our place, he dies for those that are not performing the truth that could be saved by his grace. The gospel says you are not saved by performance. If you are a performer you believe you have to be better than people - that creates a slippery slope - that you are saved by what you do, that is not what the Gospel says. The gospel is the only faith system that leads you to expect that people that don't believe as you believe are better than you (more disciplined, more self controlled, etc). Your not saved by performance - you cannot experience grace unless you admit you are not as good as those around you. If you believe the gospel you will see people that don't believe as you do, as better than you, the gospel humbles you. No other system does that! Jesus - he is not just a good person. He is God in the flesh. People say that leads to self righteousness. It didn't! When Christianity began to grow initially - it seemed to be inclusive. Christians proclaimed Jesus lord of all (seemed exclusive). Christianity created the most inclusive community in the history of the world up to that time. Greek and Romans didn't mix the rich and poor - Christians did. Jews didn't mix races - Christians did. Christianity ended up being the most inclusive community - because Jesus isn't just a great guy but God! Ultimate reality of a Christian is that you see a man on a cross loving people who don't love him. Forgiving people who abused him. Sacrificially serving people that oppose him.

Summary Statement -
Everybody has exclusive beliefs - Christianity is no different. Which set of exclusive beliefs leads you to the most inclusive behaviors? Take the Gospel into your life and you will live in the humility and see how people who don't believe what you believe are better than you are.


1 John 4 (NIV)

Test the Spirits

1Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.
4You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 5They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. 6We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.
God's Love and Ours

7Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

What is Sin?

"Basing your identity on anything other than God!"

Some real simplicity to that!   Identity - it is what we find that defines us.  Family, education, fitness, marriage, kids, work, and on and on and on.  There are so many things that we identify with.  The world trains us in this way from the very begging of our understanding.  We are called to look out for #1, capitalize on our natural abilities and if you work hard, make the right decisions and with a little luck, you will be noticed, be successful, arrive!!  But what is the end in that?  Where is God in all of that?  None of those things above are bad in themselves, but when we find our identity in those things, when we leave God out of the picture and do those things independent of him.  We sin!   I think many people Christians alike, me included, try their hardest to manage there sin.  But it is impossible!    I think that is why I really was struck by the simplicity of this definition.  It has caused me to a deeper repentance that has and will continue to drive me to a deeper faith!

What do you find your identity in?

Doctrine of the Conviction of the Holy Spirit

Defined by John Calvin -

"The testimony of the Spirit is more excellent than all reason.  For as God alone is a fit witness of himself in his Word, so also the Word will not find acceptance in men's hearts before it is sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit.  The same Spirit, therefore, who has spoken through the mouths of the prophets must penetrate into our hearts to persuade us that they faithfully proclaimed what had been divinely commanded."

"Even if it wins reverence for itself by its own majesty; it seriously affects us only when it is sealed upon our hears through the Spirit.  Therefore, illuminated by his power, we believe neither by our own nor by anyone else's judgment that Scripture is from God; but above human judgement we affirm with utter certainty. . . that it has flowed to us from the very mouth of God by the ministry of men."

I was reflecting on a discussion I had this morning about how our tongue's are an extension of our hearts.  How it reveals what we believe and how we strive to either put people in their place or come across as being better.    I pray that the Spirit penetrates my heart with the consistent reminder that my identity is in Christ alone, based on Scripture Alone.

"sola Scriptura"

The Omniscient Man?!?!?

Truth?  What is it?  How do you define it?  Who ultimately decides it?

I started reading "Let the Reader Understand" - A guide to interpreting and applying the Bible

by Dan McCartney and Charles Clayton.  In the introduction of this book I came across this profound statement, at least I think it is -

"If humans claim to be the ones who ultimately decide what is true, they are claiming to be able to make an absolute judgement.  But to make an absolute judgement, man will.....have to seek to make a system for himself that will relate all the facts of his environment to one another in such a a way as well enable him to see exhaustively all the relations that obtain between them.  In other words, the system that the non-Christian has to seek on his assumption is one in which he himself virtually occupies the place that God occupies in Christian theology.  Man must, in short, be virtually omniscient."

This is hugely relevant in the American culture and society.   I have had numerous conversations when the topic of truth comes up.  The society as a whole rests on the whole idea of truth being individualistic.  Each person is entitles to define his own truth.   But if that is the reality then what people are saying is that they are omniscient as God is.  Do people really believe that?  Or do they really know what they believe?

A Gem of Reality

OK - I get easily excited :-)

Doing some very heavy reading today in a chapter titled - 

"Philosophical Presuppositions of Biblical Errancy" and came across this phrase: 

"The Bible is a personal love letter from the personal God to persons He loves.  We are not confronted in Scripture with the choice between God's revelation and the God of that revelation.  All we know about God comes through His revelation.  There are indeed times when one revelational command of God conflicts with another (as obeying God over parents [Matt. 10:37],.....  There is no way to know that God is giving the command unless we have some revelational knowledge about who it is that is commanding us."

Revelational knowledge comes from a personal relationship with God!  Without that relationship we are leaves blowing in the wind!  The whole idea of the Bible being a personal love letter helps drive my dependency on it completely.

Kev

Scripture Memory

I have to be totally honest, scripture memory is one of the spiritual disciplines that I have been very convicted of not putting my heart and literally my mind into.  I am very bent towards structure.  Sometimes that can be a good thing, but in the past I have let the structure get in the way, and instead of it being a healthy thing, it becomes un-healthy.  Funny how, if we do not use it we lose it, and that is very clear in the usage of the brain.  I was never a great student, but by God's grace alone, he is allowing me to delight in the Lord and trust in him with all my heart! 

Here are a few verses that I have been focusing on in the last couple of weeks -

Psalm 37:4

Delight yourself in the Lord

And he will grant you the desires of your heart

Psalm 46:10

Be still and know that I am God

I will be exalted among the Nations

I will be exalted in the earth

Proverbs 3:5-6

Trust in the lord with all your heart

and lead not on your own understanding

In all you ways acknowledge him

and he will make your path straight

Proverbs 3:11-12

My son, do not despise the Lords discipline

and do not resent his rebuke

Because the lord disciplines those he loves

As the father, the son he delights in.

The Gospel Changes Everything - 

Kevin

Joy

Isaiah 59:2

But your iniquities have separated
you from your God;
your sins have hidden his face from you,
so that he will not hear. (NIV)

I met with a few men this morning and the question was asked "How do you define Joy?"  Some healthy discussion on what is Joy, but mainly where does it come from.  I think this passage from Isaiah relates really well to this topic.  A truth of the bible is that if we are separated from God we can never be happy or experience a deep sense of Joy in your lives.  How often do we approach God with your wants and needs, and never really come to him in deep repentance of our sin (iniquities).  Here is the punch line: Sin hides us from him, provides a barrier to him, so that we cannot really experience the joy that he offers.

Rock Solid from the OT - Kevin

What defines our identity?

Many athletes that I coach are very driven 'achievers'. But what happens if the goal is missed, or something doesn't go as planned? I am no different in that I fall into the temptation of finding my identity in the result or lack of.

I spent 4 years of my life in pursuit of qualifying for the Hawaii Ironman Triathlon World Championship held each October.  Putting all my worth into qualifying.  In all of that, I sacrificed so much - relationships, time, money.  And during the journey I did not cherish the internal growth, the teaching and the impact it had on me as a person.  All the athletes I work with get a sense of my passion for the 'Journey' and it really came out of that experience.  It is not that we cannot have goals that push us.  But the real success is in the process not the destination.  There are so many parallels with this sport metaphor and with life. But also in answering the really big question ''What is the chief end in life?''   Is it to be the best athlete we can be?   That is not a bad end, and it could be a small part of a triathletes story, but I think there is a much bigger end to our personal story.

As a disciple of Jesus I pray for a deep desire of my heart and mind in the fulfilment the greater end - ''The chief end of man is to Glorify God and enjoy him for ever.''

One of my on-going prayers is that athletes & (people that I interact with) would be driven to a deep reality that their identity is in Christ and not in the outcome.   That by enjoying the sport of triathlon, work, family, hobbies - all of life, they would be glorifying God and not themselves.   Here is the reality - I struggle with this in a deep way.   I have to repent often of my selfish desire and how that drives me to a 'performance' based relationship with God.  When I feel that I am 'doing' good performing well not only in sport but in life, I have a sense that God is pleased with me.  But when I feel I am not 'doing' enough or performing poorly, I feel that I am letting God down.  But here is the truth - his love is not defined by how we feel about ourselves.   And he is not concerned about what we 'do', but 'who we are'.  This leads to a great question - "What kind of person are you becoming?" And is that person you are becoming defined by a true identity or a false one?

We all need to reminded of what our identity is really in, yes that includes me as well!

Kevin

The Meaning of 'Biblical' Inerrancy

Learning to appreciate 'heavy reading' in a significant way.  I never really grasped the need for reading that really challenges you.  I am getting my fill of that kind of reading now as I take a class titled "God and His Word".  The class lays out some foundations for further study of theology and doctrine.  Just spent a few hours reading a chapter in the book "Inerrancy" by Norman Geisler, a chapter titled 'The Meaning of Inerrancy' by Paul D. Feinberg.  I found this definition of inerrancy:

"Inerrancy means that when all facts are known, the Scriptures in their original autographs and properly interpreted will be shown to be wholly true in everything that they affirm, whether that has to do with doctrine or morality or with the social, physical, or life sciences."

I agree a mouth full!  I am gaining a new found appreciation for the depth of scripture as the Word of God and how securely we can depend on it as ultimate truth.  Although the chapter was a challenging read - it listed at length observations, qualifications, and misunderstandings that can and are made on the topic of inerrancy.

One realization that came out of this reading was how much people are culturally affected by certain words.  We you see words like inerrancy or truth, many people already right off that there is none (of either) left in the world.  That 'truth' is what we each define it as.  And then when a christian says - no, the only truth is the bible.   How did we as a culture and society get to that point?  There is no truth?  As I come to grip with what the Bible says and who Jesus is, there is a confirmation that I experience, its the only thing that makes sense, the only system that one can truly rest upon.  Just one great example of how I experience God's grace :-)

Read Strong - Kevin