Coincidences Don't Exist

So, I wanted to share this story with everyone because it is a good example of God in daily life...which is what this is all about!

Last night, I decided to go Israeli folk dancing at a synagogue near my house. I have gone to this particular venue before, but had not been for a while since I was not living at home until recently. It was about 11:00 pm. As I was walking across the parking lot to my car, this woman comes up randomly and asks me something in Hebrew.

Long story short, we got into a conversation immediately about the Lord (in English, I should specify). She asked me what synagogue I go to and it just took off from there. I was able to explain to her some of the reasons about why I think Yeshua is the Messiah. I told her that I believe that God is perfect, but none of us can ever be perfect. All other religions tell me that I have to do something to earn God's acceptance. Here's the problem - if God is perfect, then how can he accept imperfection without going against his own nature? So nothing I can do will get me to God. At this point, the woman seemed to actually get it. I think that despite her poor English, she really had never thought about it that way before. So I continued and explained that that is why we need a mediator - Yeshua.

Although our conversation ended there, she told me that she thought it was great that I have such a strong belief and a loving community to be a part of. And then she just walked off.

I have to say, I was not expecting to share with anyone that night, but I am so amazed that the Lord gave me that opportunity. I am also glad that I was bold in speaking to her, especially since it was obvious that she was a bit wary to be talking to a Messianic Jew. I hope and pray that the Lord used me to plant a seed in her heart that will result in her coming to know her Yeshua.

So my encouragement to you all, always be prepared to share your faith and be bold! You never know how the Lord will use you to soften someone's heart to Him!

Try this one on for size

So, at church on Sunday, Pastor Aaron gave everyone something to think over, and it blew my mind.  He even said it was going to blow our minds, and I didn't believe him.  So I thought I would share it with all of you as well.

How does God think?  This question isn't qualitative, meaning in what ways does He think, but literally; how does a God who knows everything think?  When we think, we rationalize and weigh options until we come to a conclusion, but God doesn't have to do that.  He already knows what is best, and what will accomplish His will. 

I've been thinking about this, and every time I do, my mind is blown.  Just goes to show, His ways are not like our ways.

Patience

Patience can seem:

Wonderful
Desired
Hated
Refused
Undesirable
Foolish
Loving

And a whole bunch of other things, I suppose. Many people say that, "Patience is a virtue," but who of us is really trying to be patient?

Here's what I know:
"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved — and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus," (Ephesians ch. 2, verses 4-6)

In Corinthians, Paul refers to love as being "Patient," among other things (1 Corinthians v. 4). In fact, Paul asserts that "Love is Patient."

If you can, in your mind, replace "great love," in the passage from Ephesians with "great patience." Here, then, we have an illustration of the love and, subsequently, the patience that God shows to us.

(Extrapolated from verse)
We were dead in our trespasses, but God, being rich in mercy, made us alive together with Christ.

(As it pertains to me)
I have sinned against God. I have disobeyed His commandments. I have done everything I could to disobey, even. But God, in His mercy, has washed me clean of my inquities, and drawn me to Him.

I must look to God when I seek to learn about patience.

Truth

Well, it really didn't take long for me to fail at posting once a week.  But here is try number two.

The other week, I was reading The Trinity: Evidence and Issues, and in the opening paragraphs, the author (Robert Morey) explains his logic, and all of the starting assumptions he is making a priori.  I'm not going to go into all the details, but one statement he made about God's existence struck me as somewhat profound.  He said (and I am paraphrasing), that God is independent of our belief in Him.  Meaning, it doesn't matter if we believe in him or not, he will continue to exist.  If no one believes he exists, he will continue.  If everyone believes he exists, he will continue.  This argument was used to defeat the humanist view of men being the way to know God, and God being dependent upon man.

Well, one thing lead to another, and the more I thought about that fact, I realized that it applied to all things related to the truth.  Truth really is absolute.  Despite what the growing trend in society is, the truth does not depend on what people believe.  That then leads me to another conclusion: our beliefs have no impact on what is true.  Reading this, you might be thinking that is fairly obvious after my last statement, but each one has a subtle, different implication of responsibility on our part. 

If the truth is independent of human thought, then it is our responsibility to bend our beliefs to conform to truth, and truth should dictate our lives if we want to actually be living sincerely.  Since our belief in something doesn't change truth, we should not trust primarily in something because we believe it, but because we know it to be true.  Many people, including ourselves, have trusted in different beliefs because those beliefs are all they know.  And what a tragedy when we place our trust in our beliefs (read: ourselves), rather than what is right. 

Hopefully, the next question you would ask, is the same thing that Pilate asked, "What is truth?"  Little did he know the answer was standing right in front of him.  The truth is, we are all sinners.  The truth is, God has to be, and is holy.  The truth is the gospel.  Sure, everyone may not believe it to be true, but that really doesn't change the validity of it.  I have seen my life changed/change because of it, and I have seen other people changed by it.  It will speak for itself, if we are willing to listen.

So if perchance you read this, and you think I am just some crazy religious nut, my challenge to you is this: what is truth to you?  Is truth what you define it to be, or is truth what truth has defined itself to be?

My Awesome God

Before I left Philadelphia after graduation, I had peace about my future and life post-graduation. God had worked out all the details for me to come back to Drexel and continue my studies. Every aspect was planned out...funding, advisors, research, a place to live. I was so thankful to the Lord for taking care of things. A couple of weeks ago, I spoke to my boss and she informed me of some changes that were occurring at work and school that would benefit me. After talking with my parents, praying about it and attending some meetings the past few days, I stand amazed at the faithfulness and sovereignty of my God. While I was content with the way I had left things in June, God has fine tuned His plans for me in the past month. He has created a better opportunity for me and rearranged the lives of others to bring it to pass. He's even put it in the hearts of unbelievers to be thinking of me and looking out for my good, which is just so awesome!

Trusting God for my future has always been a struggle for me. I'm a planner. I need to have details set in place and even a back-up plan so that there isn't a moment where I'm frozen in place and can't move forward in some way. Pursuing graduate studies is a whole new ball game for me, something I had never planned for. So it's been really cool to see God work things out and to see what He has in store. It's definitely better than what I had planned for myself. I'm just so amazed by the Lord and His goodness. My encouragement to all of you is to trust Him in every aspect of your life. I know it's hard to surrender our wills and our plans but you can rest in the security that we serve a faithful, sovereign, omnipotent God that only and always has your best interest at heart. Being content to allow our lives unfold from His hands brings much peace to our anxious and weary spirits and more importantly, much glory to His name. Like the hymnist says, "O for grace to trust Him more!"

Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen. ~ Ephesians 3:20-21

The Gauntlet Has Been Thrown

This past year or so has been one of the most taxing, and intense challenges of my faith that i can ever recall.  As a result, I think I have gained a deeper understanding of who God is, how He relates to me, and what he has called me (and I believe many of us) to do.

Prior to the Jehovah's Witnesses coming to my apartment, I very rarely ever found myself researching what other people believed.  Up until this point, I have been able to rely solely upon whatever I have been taught in church, or been able to reason from my own reading of the Word.  I soon found out, however, that this was not enough to get me through a conversation with well-trained agents of a non-gospel.  The first time I spoke with them was with my roommate Tad, when they came to our apartment.  I firmly believe that God supplied Tad and me with the necessary tools in scripture to defend our beliefs that day, for I have never been able to recollect scripture as well as I did that day.  It was because of that, I felt as though I could handle whatever they threw at me, and was more than ready for them to come back again.  Oops.

The next time they came (almost a year later), I was by myself in the apartment, and long story short, they gave me a whoopin'.  They came more than prepared this time, and I was not.  I was left in a frustrated and confused stupor, wondering what had happened.  It took me some time to realize that, although God is more than capable of providing the knowledge and wisdom for sharing the Gospel with anyone, that does not mean that we are to be slack in our personal studies and our diligence in searching the scriptures for truth.

I have also been challenged in my knowledge of the scriptures.  I don't know about you, but I find it terribly upsetting that people who are going around preaching a false gospel can quote scripture (albeit out of context) better than I can.  It is to my shame that this is true.  Knowing what the truth is, and understanding the gospel is a wonderful thing, but I have found it loses a great deal of impact when it is put in my own words, instead of the words of God.  I need to be able to support my beliefs with scripture, not only logic and understanding.  This is especially true when speaking with those who claim to be of God, but are in reality against Him.  We know that Jesus is God, but how many of us can provide more than a handful of verses that prove it?  Or how about verses in support of a Trinity? 

It is because of this that I have come to the conclusion that we need to be prepared to defend our beliefs at all times, just as it says in 1 Peter 3:15.  Now I'm not saying we need to constantly be researching different beliefs and how to defend against them, but we should be examining our own beliefs and doctrines, and weighing them against the whole of scripture.  We take many of our beliefs for granted, assuming them to be right because it is taught at a pulpit.  Hopefully, if we are at gospel preaching churches, we are able to trust our pastors, but they are still only men, and if we aren't cautious, we can fall into the same snare many cults fall into: abiding by man's word, in place of God's. 

It is now my challenge, and i would argue everyone's as well, to memorize scripture, and prepare to defend my faith against any power of the earth, to "preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching." (2 Timothy 4:2)

What could be the beginning of something cool

Or just another 3500 Minutae. 

You may be thinking, "Geez Sam, you barely pay attention to your other Blog, and you are starting on this one?"  Well, you can just poo-poo elsewhere, because that is simply not the case here.  For one, this wan't my idea, so there.  Two, the goal of this blog is to have multiple posters (ors?), and have the blog be more of a "what's on your mind" kind of blog than a "here's an idea, what do you think about it?" blog.  So hopefully this blog will recieve more tender love and care than my own, and be watered multiple times a week, rather than the cactus like sprinkle of Sam's Theology Blog. 

What will we be posting about?  The goal is to simply share what God is doing in our lives, whether that is what we learned in devotions, something God has done recently (or not recently) in our lives, or just what he has placed on our minds.  Pretty much whatever we want to post about. 

With that, i shall hopefully be posting something every Thursday, and leaving the responsibility of the rest of the week, to my colleagues.  If you would like to become a poster, just shoot me an email.