Artsy reflection on life, music, and heaven.

So I am artsy. This is an understood fact by most people who talk to me. I have talked to a friend and we decided as musicians that when something is too "perfect" we feel we need to metaphorically speaking rub some dirt on it.

I was listening to a band at a place called "The Red Cat" a month or so ago a friend was playing there as well. Not to shamelessly plug my friend but I enjoy my friend's music because it has a tension at the soul of it. It is very clear in his music that as Christians we sing the song of the redeemed. That the tension of sinfulness and soul is seen in his music. It was a showcase of semi-local talent and a band went up to close out the show. As they started to play I realized it was perfect, musically missed no notes, no harmonies, and nothing I could add to it to make it better. But to me the music rang hollow. The music had no soul, no tension, no struggle, it was altogether an un-relatable expérience. I hated it, it was not what I enjoy about music.

Music is often a topic either allegorically or literally tied to the Christian idea of heaven. We speak of worship in heaven as perfect and it may be, just not our idea of perfect. As I listen to and write music, struggles are what make the best songs. So as I think of the song of the redeemed, we as the church have been brought through sin purposefully to sing and glorify God in a way that does not ring hollow. We will be cleansed of our sin, but it is not as if our identities we gathered through the lives we had are removed. The sanctification we experienced through our lives here on earth will be complete in heaven, not abolished.

I feel as an artsy person and a theologian that there is a purpose to sin, that God as the Ultimate being, in total control, allowed sin for a reason. And perhaps this reason is that the song of the redeemed might have soul. Perhaps the relief of the tension it will be, but it may be Jazzy, perhaps sung from the chest.

Legalism

Legalism, everyone knows the holier than thou legalistic type. There in our churches, they are our friends, family, and sometimes ministers. Everything is brought down to a list of rules or laws, nothing is left to love all is left to law.

There is a key point here God's people are not the covenant keepers, Christ was and is. He has kept the law. We no longer have to for we have his righteousness, and he has borne God's wrath for our sin. We are now part of the New Covenant people of God. A people that God has given law not on stone tablets but on our hearts. God Changes our desires, we long for holiness, not necessarily keeping the full OT law. But the heart of the law is kept, conviction is brought when we fail to keep the spirit of the law.

This brings up an interesting phenomena, conviction something that is not universal to every experience I know people who are convicted to drink and others who aren't at all. Neither is wrong, it is a gray area. If you are convicted of something and persist it is sin. If no conviction and no clear command in the NT era, then you are fine, and probably not sinning.

And here is the dreaded application, you Christian stop keeping a law on a list and keep the law of the Spirit in your heart. Aid in that in fellow believers lives, not comparing you list of don'ts to their behavior. Aid their devotion to God not their behavior.

What Dr. Greene meant to me.

Sadly yesterday my beloved English Professor passed away in his office. There is quite a hole in the Sebc family, we miss him, love him, and know he has found his souls ultimate fulfillment in what he was created to do. This has brought about this blog post I truly must show what he meant to me and other students.

"Dr. Greene teaches you how to be a person, how to care about people, and disguises it as english." This has been said by more than one of my fellow students, and said by myself. It is true, he played a very important role in the lives of countless students.

When you arrive at Sebc you are immediately thrown into an intellectual and academic environment, you gain so much knowledge. This can have adverse effects.

I won't pretend to have read all of "Orthodoxy" by G.K Chesterton, but what I have read he shows disdain for logic.

"The poet only asks to get his head in the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits." G.K. Chesterton.

He pinpoints logic as a thing that causes men to lose their sanity. I completely disagree. I prefer C.S Lewis's "Men without Chests" that a man that is all intellect is a dangerous and completely unable to function in any vital role. Dr. Greene knew that Sebc was an academic environment, so he tried his best to not let it produce "Men without Chests."

Do not get me wrong Dr. Greene discussed theology with Dr. Snyder chair of Biblical studies. He modeled for all of us being in balance; loving God and people; with his heart, soul, and mind. He truly loved everyone I have ever seen him with, he did his best to teach and to show us how to be good Christ like people. He made everyone feel valued. I and other students experienced him knowing our names before we were in any class of his and before we were ever introduced.

He did all this effortlessly. I pray all of us would learn to care about people the way he did. That people would see us and just know we care about them.

Professors and students all loved him and saw him as an example of how to be caring and intellectual. How to be smart and still be moved emotionally. He taught all of us to be better people.

Thank you Dr. Greene you taught me so much more than proper usage of commas, you taught me that caring is just as important as being right.

The necessity of separation.

California's proposition 8 struck down based on america's constitutional 14th amendment. To interpret the constitution we must not import the context of religious beliefs, as we should not import political beliefs into our interpretation of the Bible. Under our constitution GLBT (gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, and Trans-gendered) individuals have the right to be united civilly. This event brings about this blog.

Quick history overview Catholicism corrupted by governmental ties, Anglicanism influenced by heathen monarchs, Islam enforcing religious practice as law, and republicans trying to legislate the Bible.

Government and Religion are at the core almost indistinguishable from one another. Both have set doctrines; both require the public to believe in them; both to be of any consequence must be of large size; both rely on charisma, power, and momentum; and both are corrupted by fallen man. So it seems natural that they form alliances in a hunger for power.

In history we see this quite evident, in Babylon, Ur, Egypt, Israel and contemporaries we see deities and religious practice directing the government. In Rome we see imperial cults worshipping the emperor. The Catholic church and varying ties to countries. Anglicanism as the English church tied directly to government. Islam enforcing as law the Koran. All of these has negative effects on these entities.

In America we have the good sense to not tie the two together. We have separation, the government says gays can marry but the Church can disagree. But as a country with the core doctrine of religious freedom we also cannot require a lesbian Buddhist to act as if they are a Christian, we all know everyone will not make it to heaven why would we require them to follow our rules if they do not believe them. I am not saying they are valid in their beliefs I am saying fallen man will always be somewhat wrong. They will not be perfect unless at death Christ fully sanctifies them. So it is anti-american to legislate your beliefs upon someone else but you can also believe what you want in america.

It is healthy to separate the two entities to not corrupt the Church as a whole. The Church is the bride of Christ and Rome is portrayed as a prostitute these two should not unite. Ergo separation is healthy. So take the good with the bad, no prayer in schools, no prayer to Obama. I hope you understand and are edified by this blog.

Patriotism and the Covenant community.

In honor of the fourth of July I have decided to write about patriotism. This is spurred on by the way people try to hold on to the U.S as a christian government, community, and nation. This belief had lead to irreverent practice in the "christian" community.

I hear it all the time on the radio, out of the mouth of friends, in our churches, and in our communities. What is it? The phrase "God and Country", this phrase undermines what I believe to be a key value in Christian Theology. It equates a devotion to both entities, Christ when talking about money in Matthew 6 says that: "No one can serve two masters" it is within the context of money, but the point is there is no split devotion.

In the Old Testament, under the old covenants you have a national Covenant community, Israel were God's people following God's covenant and at the same time were one nation. Under the new and current covenant there is not one nation as the covenant community neither will there be before God's throne only one nation. Revelation 7 makes clear the ones before God's throne are "from every nation, tribe, people, and language" this excludes in the latter covenants superiority on ethnic or geographical grounds. America is not God's new covenant community that he will bless because he is obligated because we follow him. People say "well we were based off christian principles" but I know historians who are professors and have doctorates that would debate that the founders were Deists (a god separate from his creation), there are some who will say that founders were christian, but it is definitely not a clear part of history. So there is nothing better about America before God than Mexico or Uganda, or Iraq. There is not a special relationship between God and the U.S.

Having said that is there a reason that Christians jump to be all about God and Country?

Perhaps we are afraid that if we aren't the most patriotic we will be sent to a communist nation. I wish that were so, so that the gospel could spread. Or maybe we will be locked away, or who knows what irrational things run through our heads.

First I don't think the government cares if we have God and Country sundays there dealing with oil spill and war PR. Second I don't think we should disrespect the government we are to give to Caesar's what is Caesar's, so do not use this as an excuse to circumvent the law, or the government. For the most part I urge you do not commit patriotic Idolatry!

The purpose of my blog.

I will be honest, there are tons of blogs I will never read or even care to read. So I admit this is for me to yell into the great abyss. To say whatever I feel I need to, and not feel illogical. This gives me a place to vent. I hope it will enrich and edify the reader.

I may post songs, poems, musings, or even a philosophical argument(how boring). I would hope it finds an audience but I care little if it does. I may post scholastic papers if I think they are good. And for fun I am going to post my last blog like thing done blogless here.

The softcore gospel. Sunday, June 20, 2010 at 1:18am

We cannot just "bring people to church." I hear this all the time

and I'll say it works 10% of the time. We want to avoid an awkward

conversation so we hear people say just get them to church. But this

cannot be our sole evangelistic effort. So you may say: "well they see

how I live differently." But the truth is if we invite someone to church

and they agree, they have a reason for it, even if that is to feel good

about themselves, and they will most likely assume that is why you go

as well. They may have no clue it is real to you. This is why talking to

people is a mandate of the gospel, without it people will believe what

they want to about you and why you go to church. So I turn to the

gospel we commonly hear.

I have been struggling through why the message of the gospel

does not

elicit the desired reaction among southern individuals. Quite awhile

ago I came to the conclusion that everyone was desensitized to the

gospel. I now believe this to be false. This brings me to the point of

this musing.

I have been reading Francis Schaeffer's book "The God Who

is There" it talked about man having a protective roof over his head to

protect him from the realization of his being guilty. That you have to

reason with someone to the point that they realize they have infinite

guilt. This brings me to the title I chose. We have a gospel "clothed" in

a cryptic language and covered with vague ambiguities. But the true

naked gospel is something that must be grasped, in strong language if

need be. It shows man staring down the barrel of the gun of God's

wrath, God sending his son to take the bullet for the church, and

believing faith in mind, soul, and heart being the only way to have

Christ's protection. True guilt, guilt that is sending mankind straight to

the lake of fire.

But we recoil away from telling people they are guilty, we fear it,

the shear nerve of telling someone that before God basically they are

screwed. But I actually think that this is a good thing manifesting itself

in a bad way. We should fear, but out of love fearing that this image-

bearer, could spend eternity under the wrath of God. The gospel

requires us to give all, it is a message for the faint of heart yet the

calling it places on us requires the strength of God. We should ask God

for the nerve to sit someone down and truly show them their guilt.

We should not disguise or dress up the gospel in our terms that

strip it of its power. The true gospel shows our necessity, our

depravity, our hopelessness, our powerlessness, and our weakness. But

the true gospel also shows God's sufficiency, God's holiness, God's

provision, God's power, and God's strength.

Without true understanding of the true ramifications of the terms

we use like "Jesus died for your sins" people we just say: "Thats cool"

and continue to be depraved haters of God. They will continue to store

up wrath for themselves. Our gospel cannot afford to be vague. We

cannot play around with the souls of others for our fear of their

opinion of us. If we do this we put the way they view us in a more

important spot than their soul.