How do we help people engage with the Bible? How do people learn best? When in Acts 2 it describes them as being devoted to the apostles teaching what did that look like?
How do we engage with the Bible today? Surely it is about asking questions of it every time we come to it. Questions like what surprises me? What don't I understand? What does it teach me about God? What does it teach me about man and/or myself? How does this fit into the teaching of the whole Bible? How should this effect me?
If that's how we approach the Bible surely we need to build in some way to do this in our Bible teaching. Its how home groups work, but how about on a Sunday? God's word needs to be taught but should we allow/encourage such questions as part of our meeting together to encourage and build one another up in our faith? Could we break into groups over coffee and a biscuit or donut or fruit (for the health conscious) to talk about what the Bible says and how it applies to us?
Certainly the emphasis in the New Testament is not just on listening to God's word but on working it through, on putting it into practice in our lives outside the doors. How best should we wrestle with this and how can the church best help those with questions about the Bible do exactly that?
Tuesday, 27 February 2007
Tuesday, 20 February 2007
Relationships for the rebellious
Mother Theresa said that loneliness was the world's greatest disease, coming from a lady who spent her time caring for the underprivileged, sick and deprived in our world that is some statement. There greatest need was not money or the removal of poverty oe better medical care but relationship.
We were made for relationship, for friendship, for companionship to love and to be loved, we instinctively feel those needs. However, we also take them and twist them so that being loved can become the be all and end all. So the pressure is on all of us to find the group we fit in to be it the goths, the sporty jocks, or the emo set, or whatever. Find somewhere you belong, where people will accept you, where they will love you at all costs.
Or it is seen in the obsession with beauty as the staggering figures today on those who'd have cosmetic surgery to improve their looks or body image shows. The way to be loved is to be beautiful.
The Bible provides the antidote to just such misconceptions about relationship. We were made for relationship with one another, that's why in Genesis the only thing wrong in the garden is Adam's loneliness and so God makes Eve to be with him. But the other relationship in the garden we see go the other way - we see our relationship with God broken by actions that show God exactly what we think of him.
The story of the Bible is the story of God's plan to enable that relationship to be restored but not to impose it upon us. He sends his Son to tell us of the problem and then take our punishment so we are credited with his perfect record and justice is still done.
The result is a restored relationship with God, that brings with it restored relationships with those around us. It changes our view of beauty, it repairs our shortsighted view of love and relationship.
We were made for relationship, for friendship, for companionship to love and to be loved, we instinctively feel those needs. However, we also take them and twist them so that being loved can become the be all and end all. So the pressure is on all of us to find the group we fit in to be it the goths, the sporty jocks, or the emo set, or whatever. Find somewhere you belong, where people will accept you, where they will love you at all costs.
Or it is seen in the obsession with beauty as the staggering figures today on those who'd have cosmetic surgery to improve their looks or body image shows. The way to be loved is to be beautiful.
The Bible provides the antidote to just such misconceptions about relationship. We were made for relationship with one another, that's why in Genesis the only thing wrong in the garden is Adam's loneliness and so God makes Eve to be with him. But the other relationship in the garden we see go the other way - we see our relationship with God broken by actions that show God exactly what we think of him.
The story of the Bible is the story of God's plan to enable that relationship to be restored but not to impose it upon us. He sends his Son to tell us of the problem and then take our punishment so we are credited with his perfect record and justice is still done.
The result is a restored relationship with God, that brings with it restored relationships with those around us. It changes our view of beauty, it repairs our shortsighted view of love and relationship.
Thursday, 15 February 2007
Making the good news known
People do things all the time that make us question their beliefs. Jesus certainly did in the gospels, that's why he has so many run ins with the Pharisees, as he does things that show he thinks differently about the sabbath, about cleanliness, about sin and righteousness.
For Christ followers the challenge is to do likewise. How do my beliefs show in my actions? How does being part of God's kingdom affect my living in exile in this kingdom? Do my friends and family see that my beliefs about life, about death, about God are different? Am I perceived as just being religious or do I live as a sinner saved by God's outrageous grace in Christ?
What would such living look like? It would mould my attitude in the office as I put on the mind of Christ; not worrying about my rights, not concerned about my position, knowing that living for God means I might be belittled but that God will lift me up.
Or as a parent, how do I live the gospel? What opportunities does the day present to me to teach my children about the outrageous love of God, as we look at the world and as they experience pain and joy?
Living like that provokes questions and gives credibility to our words as we make the great news about Jesus Christ known.
For Christ followers the challenge is to do likewise. How do my beliefs show in my actions? How does being part of God's kingdom affect my living in exile in this kingdom? Do my friends and family see that my beliefs about life, about death, about God are different? Am I perceived as just being religious or do I live as a sinner saved by God's outrageous grace in Christ?
What would such living look like? It would mould my attitude in the office as I put on the mind of Christ; not worrying about my rights, not concerned about my position, knowing that living for God means I might be belittled but that God will lift me up.
Or as a parent, how do I live the gospel? What opportunities does the day present to me to teach my children about the outrageous love of God, as we look at the world and as they experience pain and joy?
Living like that provokes questions and gives credibility to our words as we make the great news about Jesus Christ known.
Tuesday, 6 February 2007
If Christ were Lord over the world...
How do you create a community that shows what life would be like if Christ was Lord over the world?
The gospel's give us a picture of what life would be like if Christ was Lord over the world, as death is conquered, sickness is healed, demons are banished, sin is defeated and perfect obedience is lived out. It is this glimpse that we see fleshed out in Revelation 21 and 22 and the descriptions of the new heaven and new earth where Christ is Lord and God is on his throne and all barriers to that are removed, including our sinfulness.
The Church is to be the community that enables the world to glimpse what such a reality looks like now, just as Israel was to be for the people around it in its day. So what marks such a community?
Acts 2 shows us some of the marks of just such a community and the word that stands out is devotion. But it is only as the gospel is proclaimed (apostolic teaching), Christ is remembered (breaking of bread) and God is relied upon (prayer) that such a community (fellowship) is formed.
How do you create a community that shows what life would be like if Christ was Lord over the world? You don't, you pray that God would do so as you devote yourselves to God's word and remember together what Christ has done for us on the cross; taking the punishment for our rebellion on himself and crediting us with his right standing before God. You then look to devote yourself to those thinsg with thsoe around you. Wouldn't such a community turn the world upside down now just as it did in the first century?
The gospel's give us a picture of what life would be like if Christ was Lord over the world, as death is conquered, sickness is healed, demons are banished, sin is defeated and perfect obedience is lived out. It is this glimpse that we see fleshed out in Revelation 21 and 22 and the descriptions of the new heaven and new earth where Christ is Lord and God is on his throne and all barriers to that are removed, including our sinfulness.
The Church is to be the community that enables the world to glimpse what such a reality looks like now, just as Israel was to be for the people around it in its day. So what marks such a community?
Acts 2 shows us some of the marks of just such a community and the word that stands out is devotion. But it is only as the gospel is proclaimed (apostolic teaching), Christ is remembered (breaking of bread) and God is relied upon (prayer) that such a community (fellowship) is formed.
How do you create a community that shows what life would be like if Christ was Lord over the world? You don't, you pray that God would do so as you devote yourselves to God's word and remember together what Christ has done for us on the cross; taking the punishment for our rebellion on himself and crediting us with his right standing before God. You then look to devote yourself to those thinsg with thsoe around you. Wouldn't such a community turn the world upside down now just as it did in the first century?
Monday, 5 February 2007
Grace
What is it? What does the word grace mean? Is it just a description of the way someone moves, or just a prayer giving thanks for a meal? Or is it something bigger than that? Is it just forgiveness? Is it a human action or is there some other meaning?
On their album all that you can't leave behind U2 have a track that asks just those sort of questions. Is grace just the name of a girl or is it an idea that could change the world? It is a brooding song that poses lots of questions but is it a song about a girl or about a bigger reality.
When they sing of how grace makes beauty out of ugly things, or finds goodness in everything is it just an individual or grace personified that they are singing about.
And what difference would grace at work make to the world in which we live?
On their album all that you can't leave behind U2 have a track that asks just those sort of questions. Is grace just the name of a girl or is it an idea that could change the world? It is a brooding song that poses lots of questions but is it a song about a girl or about a bigger reality.
When they sing of how grace makes beauty out of ugly things, or finds goodness in everything is it just an individual or grace personified that they are singing about.
And what difference would grace at work make to the world in which we live?
Thursday, 1 February 2007
Its all DONE!
Been preparing some training materials on sharing the gospel and was struck again by the gospels simplicity and yet its impact. I guess most people think Christians are religious and religion is all about DO. Yet the Bible says we can't do, we are hopeless nothing ever matches up to God's standard, even our very best is tainted.
So how do you answer the question 'When did you become religious?'. Religion is spelt DO. Christianity is spelt DONE, the wonder of the gospel is that there is nothing that I can do because it is all done for me in Christ. I am credited with his perfect son ship whilst he paid for my rebellion.
We just have to accept that we have rebelled against God and there was nothing we could do but await a justice we fully deserved and trust in Jesus to save us and turn and ask him to rule our lives now.
It is no wonder all the gospel writers describe it as such great news and that it turned the Roman world upside down!
So how do you answer the question 'When did you become religious?'. Religion is spelt DO. Christianity is spelt DONE, the wonder of the gospel is that there is nothing that I can do because it is all done for me in Christ. I am credited with his perfect son ship whilst he paid for my rebellion.
We just have to accept that we have rebelled against God and there was nothing we could do but await a justice we fully deserved and trust in Jesus to save us and turn and ask him to rule our lives now.
It is no wonder all the gospel writers describe it as such great news and that it turned the Roman world upside down!
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