I had this whole section written on what it means to be a maverick and go it alone. I was then going to transition to the part where I talk about how the church has problems. But it was overly dramatic. So I'm going to start over from scratch.

The church has some pretty severe problems. It tried to separate itself from the world and the sin in the world. In the process it created its very own subculture of holiness while alienating itself from the very people it was supposed to help.

I've refrained from discussing these things on my blog very often because people often feel that when I mention these things I'm attacking them directly or their way of life. I am really and truly not doing this.

However, I cannot stay silent on the issues that are important to me. I can't just watch while the same things keep happening over and over without saying anything. If you're offended, I am sorry, but if you don't like what I'm writing you can stop reading.

I believe that today's church is very, very broken. It is not fulfilling the purpose for which it was created; namely to bring about the Kingdom of God. God's Kingdom is not a building. It is when God's people share what they have with the world around them and it changes things.

God's Kingdom is not advanced when Christians wall themselves off from the rest of the world in the name of holiness. God's Kingdom is not advanced by bemoaning the state of the world we're in. God's Kingdom is not advanced by forming conspiracy theories on how the world is out to get us. God's Kingdom is not advanced by picketing and/or boycotting anything we don't agree with. How arrogant!

So what does advance the Kingdom of God? Rescuing adulterous women from self-righteous pricks will do it. Sharing God's power with others. Interceding on someone's behalf for God's divine intervention and seeing it happen. Miracles. Oh, and denouncing religious nonsense.

I'm not saying these things because I'm bitter. I'm saying these things because if no one points it out, we'll simply keep clapping and cheering the emporer on as he tours the town in his birthday suit.

A friend of mine wrote this in her blog. I agree with it so much that I'm reposting it here. Enjoy.

There are a few examples in the New Testament of the Apostle describing the function of the Law. Most often, I have heard or read that the Law was given to us so that we could know how holy God is in comparison to ourselves. This makes sense if one considers Jesus' life, death, resurrection and eternal function to be the fulfillment of the Law.

However, it occured to me the other day that before Moses, the Law had not been given to man as guidelines for living. The importance of this, in my mind, has to do with the story of Noah. In the time of Noah, according to the Bible, man was wicked, and had no hought that was not evil. If wickedness exists before the Law, that indicates to me that there is a fundamental sense of right and wrong beyond the Law and beyond theHoly Spirit; a "natural Law" of sorts.

Often, we as Christians acknowledge as source of truth almost exclusively the Bible andthe promptings of the Holy Spirit. Of course, if there exists some nebulous guidelines for human behaviour that exists alongside but separate from the Word and the Spirit, it makes it harder to argue that the philosophies of those who do not know God are without merit. After all, if a fundamental understanding of what is bad and what is good (keeping in mind that God is the sum of all that is good) is already a part of every man, then surely every man, regardless of his beliefs surrounding the Gospel, has had the opportunity to witness on this earth the application and interactions of good and evil and make certain judgements about these observations going by his or her inherent moral compass. Their arguments, therefore, should be heard and understood and meditated on carefully, so that Christians, who should always love and seek after truth, may glean and absorb any single kernel of truth from any source available to them.

To be more clear, let me give an analogy. If Christians were diamond collectors, the Church with its present philosophy would be willing to trade or buy diamonds only from other Christians. But what if millions of people around the world collected quartz and had picked up a few diamonds along the way? Should we shun diamonds from those whose life's mission is not necessarily to collect diamonds because they do not share our focus? A diamond is a diamond and should be valued for itself.

Even the above paragraph is rife with the very arrogance that the world, and I believe our God, abhors in the Church. The idea that there is something inherently stupid or less about peopel who do not believe as you do is so intolerably prideful that I do not know how Christians are not choking on their own hypocrasy. In a country where almost everyone has heard the words of the Gospel and with a Gospel full of undeniable power, I have to wonder where the gap in the evangelistic process is. After all, if the Gospel as I understand it fills people with love and purpose and takes over and improves the believer's life the way it has mine, then why are there so many who have heard and do not accept it? The problem is not the medicine. I believe the Gospel to be perfect. I believe Jesus to be perfect. You cannot blame the world. When you visit the hospital, people who are hurting and sick should elicit sympathy and compassion, not condemnation.

If what needs to change for evangelism to work is not the Gospel and not the world, then the only part of the equation that is faulty is the church.

My personal theory is that while the words of the Gospel are powerful, if not lived out on the stage of your public relations and private life, consistently and earnestly, your Gospel is being continuously discredited. It is as though, with every passing day, Christians shout more and more loudly, "The claims of the Gospel are false! The good news I speak with my mouth is untrue!" All the while, our superior attitude and words say that there is no way of life valid in our eyes but our own.

I am both horrified and ashamed that my brothers and sisters seem to equate closed-mindedness with holiness. Upon inspection of the bible, I have found that God (goodness) defines holiness, and that living like God lived makes one holy. The only people Jesus condemned while walking this earth were the people who were leading His temples. Upon meeting the people that were considered the most morally repugnant members of society, He listened to and respected them without qualm or complaint. In fact, when one reads about Jesus meeting a woman from Samaria (Samarians being looked down on by the Jews) who had been married 5 times and was living with a man who was not her husband, one finds that Jesus never even mentions that her behaviour is wrong. He never moralized to her, only sat to talk to her and answer her theological questions. The reason for this is rather obvious: she knew already that what she was doing was wrong. She was already ashamed. There was no need for Jesus to tell her, and doing so would only have made her defensive and unresponsive to his real message and His love.

How rare is it to encounter that method of sharing the love of Christ? How remarkable that we feel that we would be better able to share His love than He was!

The only thing I wish I had been able to get footage of was the shofars at my grandmother's burial. Oh well. This one is long...more than 18 minutes! Next vlog coming soon...

Labels: vlog

In this episode, watch as I struggle to find a way to start saying what I want to say. Watch for a special guest appearance by my cat, Tabitha.

Labels: vlog

The "Videos" section of my site has long been nonfunctional. Over this past week I gave it a much-needed update.

Check it out, and I think you'll agree that over the years my videos have definitely improved.

I went to bed last night around 11 and could not fall asleep. I couldn't figure out why. Was I depressed? Did I have too much caffeine? Finally around 4am I finally went to sleep.

Tonight I finally stopped by the store to purchase some cold medicine. I've been meaning to for a few days but keep forgetting. So because of this I've been coughing a lot. However, I have had some sudafed. I've been taking it whenever I start to get nasally congested. I ran out tonight, and when I got back from work I was reading the back of the box.

I noticed a line that says "Stop use and ask a doctor if you get dizzy, nervous, or sleepless."

Oops.

Enough with the Sudafed.

Ali is hilarious

Labels: coldstone, pictures

Here I am, all set up on the new web host.

That was relatively painless.