The Resolute

If you like science, and you like Genesis, then you’ll like Barry Newman’s posts discussing how the two relate.

Here’s the first post and the series.

In January I ran a 4 part “Summer Bible Studies” series on relationships. It was to compliment a mini sermon series on 1 Corinthians 7 that Scott preached.

We looked at  4 topics over 4 weeks:

• The Bible on Marriage
• The Bible on Singleness
• The Bible on Courtship (going from single to engaged/married)
• The Bible on Divorce and Remarriage

In case it might be of help to anyone, I’ve made them available right here.

PDF’s of each study:

The Bible on Marriage

The Bible on Singleness

The Bible on Courtship

The Bible on Divorce and Remarriage

Or a zip file of the 4 studies:

The Bible on Relationships 4 Part Series

I’d appreciate your comments and feedback.

I should add that they are based on a set of studies that Scott Tarrant originally produced², as well as a lot of input from a few friends and colleges, especially Kev Chan³.

I also have a set of leaders notes which I’d be happy to add, however they’d need to be updated a little since they were only meant for my reference as I run the discussions, and lets just say they might not be entirely… coherent for anyone else… but let me know if you’d like them and I’ll see what I can do.

1. This study refers to An Australian Prayer Book. These studies were run in an Anglican context, if you’re not Anglican, hmm… guess you won’t have access to one of these… still worth looking at how your denomination defines marriage. [↩]
2. Scott’s the Assistant minister at St Andrew’s Anglican Church Wahroonga, and he ran a 3 part series of studies on similar topics a few years ago. [↩]
3. Kev’s the other MTSer/Ministry Apprentice/Trainee Minister at St Andy’s where I’m a MTSer/Ministry Apprentice/Trainee Minister. We spent many a lunch break talking through the planning of these studies. [↩]

The longer I continue as a Christian the more Christian books and literature I seem to acquire, and on the odd occasion I even read them. It seems for every conceivable topic there is a plethora of books available to enlighten me.

However there is one particular kind of book that I find quite worrying. It is what I will refer to as the Christian ‘guide book’. At this point some distinctions and definitions are important. A ‘guide book’ as I am defining it is not a theological or doctrinal book; these are books which aim to look at the bible’s teaching on a particular topic such as the Spirit, or Election, or the Cross in order from a rather academic perspective. These books I believe are very helpful.

Nor is a ‘guide book’ a commentary. Rather a ‘guide book’ is a book aimed at instructing Christians on how to live either generally or with regard to a particular issue. These books may heavily base their conclusions on the bible’s teaching or if there is little in the bible on their topic (such as the issue of dating as Gus has already mentioned) then they refer to “Christian wisdom” or some other such ‘authority’.

At the outset I will admit that some of these books can be very helpful, however, as a genre I think most of them are not. The reason: they are quite simply rubbish. Whilst commentaries and theological books look at the bible’s teaching and effectively are someone’s considered opinion on what the bible is saying argued from the bible; guide books more often than not seek to tell Christians exactly how to live in a way that does not reflect circumstances, the freedom afforded to us as Christians and more often than not the bible’s teaching.

2 Timothy 3:16 ff are very famous words, and if the bible is indeed “profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. “ Then why would we spend our time looking at someone else’s wisdom when we have the bible’s wisdom, and the Holy Spirit to help us understand and implement it????

My other problem is that so often ‘guide books’ take us away from grace. ‘Guide books’ give us rules for living as a Christian, which is just what Jesus death shows me won’t save me. I need to rely on Jesus death and resurrection for salvation, not on John Smith’s Guide to Christian living.

My problem with these books is not so much that they exist but that we set too much store by them. How about we do Christianity by the book? The only book that matters, the Bible.

There’s quite a few debates that make the rounds in Christian discussion. There’s the role of women in the church, charismatic vs pentecostal vs reformed theology (aka. The Role of the Spirit), the question of what to do at church, the authority of Scripture and what ‘baptism’ means.

On those, and many other issues, I generally have an opinion. I’ve read the bible and done some research and come to what I believe is the correct answer. On each of those issues there are people who disagree with me. And I can usually see where they are coming from, I can understand why they would want to argue their point of view. There’s a misunderstanding, a misreading, preconception or other motivation for the other point of view.

But there is one issues I just don’t get. Apparently some people insist that the King James Version of 1611 is the only true/authoritative English version of the Bible.

Yesterday there was a SMH video about Amazing Grace Baptist Church in America that is holding a “Halloween Book Burning” where they claim to be “burning Satan’s bibles like the NIV, RSV, NKJV…”.

The KJV was a marvelous contribution to Christianity, it’s a good translation that allowed millions of people to read God’s Word. But to say it’s the only version we can read?… I don’t get it. Surely since 1611 there has been heaps of scholarly work to help the translators get our modern English closer to the original ancient Greek and Hebrew. And I’m not even sure of the difference between thou, thy and thee… And never mind the thousands of people who became Christians reading the Gideons NKJV bibles in hotels, or the NIV, ESV, Good News and the like.

This is such an issue in the US (just google ‘KJV debate‘) that Don Carson wrote a book called “King James Version Debate, The: A Plea for Realism“. John Piper recently answered the question “How can a pastor respectfully and lovingly move his congregation from the King James Version to a better translation?”

It’s such a privilege that I can go to my bookshelf and compare 5 or more translations of the Bible. I’m not burning any of them. And to call them ‘Satan’s'… please don’t give him the honour.

The other day I was sitting on the toilet… shocking I know. When suddenly a thought hit me… why is it that I have to spend so much of my day doing things like sleeping, eating and using the toilet when I could be doing useful things like worshipping God. It was really frustrating.

Then, a few days later I was reading my bible and I realised, hang on a sec… maybe I am worshipping when I use the toilet. I was really excited. Let me explain. I’d flicked to Romans 12 and found this verse (Romans 12:1-3) “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”

Or in the NIV “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship”.

It seemed pretty clear to me from that verse that as Christians we only have one act of spiritual worship; that is sacrificing our lives to God. Therefore whether I’m going to church, hanging with my mates, using the toilet or going on a man-date with Gus (see his post for an explanation of the term Man-Date)- then I should be worshipping. That is I should be living as a sacrifice.

So the other day I went to Church, and I worshipped God. Then I went home, and I worshipped God. Then I went to Uni, and I worshipped God, and then I used the toilet and I was still worshipping God.

So to conclude, as long as we are living with God and not ourselves as the focus of our lives, then that is how we worship God. Which is pretty relieving, because it means I don’t have to do special ‘religious’ type things to worship him, but at the same time it’s challenging, because I can’t just go to Church and be done with it… God wants my whole life… not just the little bits we sometimes give him.

Last week some guy called Dave made the following comment on my 1 Month Being Resolute post.

I’d also like to complain that you write sarcastically far too much. Sarcasm, like ginger, needs to be used sparsely to avoid being overwhelming.

Last night at bible study we were looking at Job 38-42, and God get’s a little sarcastic with Job. By ‘a little sarcastic’ I mean that the whole of chapters 38 to 41 are just one sarcastic comment after another.

Here’s a taste of God having a go at Job¹:

“Dress for action like a man;
I will question you, and you make it known to me.
Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements—surely you know!”

(more…)

1. Job 38:3-5 [↩]

Church jargon is assumed knowledge in most Christian gatherings. It’s also unlikely that anyone will explain it to new-comers. So we’ve created this basic primer. Unfortunately this is a little harder than it should be since the definition depends a lot on the users beliefs. And then the Americans also have their own definitions for everything too… they just want to be different.

Anyways here goes:

• Evangelical is a term used to describe Christians who believe the bible. You’d think it’d be a synonym for ‘Christian’… but some how it isn’t…
• Liberal is used to describe ‘Christians’ who think they can make up stuff.
• Holy, sanctified, sacred and saint are all related and mean kind of something like: to be set apart, declared holy.
• Hallelujah isn’t even English. When the Bible translators did their translating they forgot to translate it. It means something like “Praise the Lord”.
• Church means gathering, meeting or assembly. Although most people think it’s the name given to pointy roofed, old, cold, locked up buildings that Christians meet in once a week.
• Justification means to be declared righteous.
• Righteous means to meet God’s standard.
• Sin is when we rebel against God.
• Grace is a girls name. It also means a free, undeserved gift.
• Faith is also a girls name. It means trust. Although some people use it to refer to an ooie-gooie feeling inside them.
• Service means to work for someone else’s benefit, ie. to give help. People talk about church meetings as being ‘services’, one of those oddities since God doesn’t really need our help.
• Worship is often used to describe the singing bit of church. Although of course it’s way bigger than that. In English it means to give worth to something… It means to desire, treasure, be devoted to something, and for Christians that something is God. One of the Greek words translated ‘worship’ literally means to lie down flat on your face.
• Minister means servant. Although now it’s also used to describe people who run churches. Also known as ‘pastors’.
• Pray literally means ask. When Christian’s say they are ‘praying’ they mean ‘talking to God’.
• Blessed – Christians will pronounce it ‘bless-Ed’. Or ‘blessd’. Not sure when to use which pronounciation.
• Christ is not Jesus’ surname. It’s the Greek for the Hebrew word Messiah. Does that help? Christ is actually Jesus’ title, which means ‘annointed one’, so Jesus Christ is like saying “Jesus: God’s-Chosen-Ruler”.
• Gospel means important news. The most important news is that Jesus is lord.

Anything I left out or you reckon I got wrong?

A quite time is a common Christian practice of reading the Bible and praying. Many Christians seek to spend between half an hour and an hour each day reading the Bible and praying, many other Christians seek to avoid doing so.

This article looks at Bible reading, and offers 5 simple steps on how to avoid bible reading:

1. Get tired. This will allow you to use the “I’m too tired” excuse. Stay up late. Facebook and Wikipedia are good ways to waste time while staying up late.
2. Get busy. This will allow you to use the “I’m too busy” excuse. Find meaningless things to do such as Facebook and Wikipedia. This will also help you complete step 1. Watching excessive TV can also be helpful. Important, life changing programs such as Australian Idol, Farmer Wants a Wife and Top Gear are appropriate time fillers.
3. Choose an ineffective time of day for Bible reading. Specifically, if you are a morning person then read the bible at night, and if you are not a morning person then keep committing to read it in the morning. The aim is to make it more difficult than it needs to be.
4. Never be honest about how frequently (or infrequently) you actually read the Bible. When discussing your bible reading habits the correct answer is “My quiet times are going great”. If you were to be honest and say that you are struggling to regularly read the Bible then you will find that friends will want to help motivate and encourage you in this struggle.
5. Avoid any kind of reading plan. Reading plans, whether formal publications or informal self defined plans, will provide too much structure and motivation for bible reading. They would cause the reader to become disciplined which would not help avoid further bible reading.