A Weighty Issue

Today has contained a highly personal discussion on the subject of self esteem, in particular; mine, or the lack of it. This mostly stems from the fact that things my size found on land are normally having buckets of water thrown on them by Greenpeace and being rolled back into the sea.

Now this is not a new thing, and the idea that it needs to change has been around for a long time. However, I am at the point where I have had enough, and no one can change it other than myself.

This is not a cry for some recipe to sort myself out, but just to make people aware so that I cannot hide it out of the way. Please ask me how things are going, and maybe a bit of hassling (although I get enough of that here!).

"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body" (1 Corinthians 6:19-20 NASB)

Marriage

Well, let this be a no holds barred discussion. I have been thinking about marriage of late, and where the idea actually comes from (please do not read anything further into this than my treating it as a cerebral exercise). When I look throught the bible, I cannot find any scriptural basis for what is now called "getting married". The Bible does say "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh." Gen 2:24.

But what about everything we have today? Ceremonies, receptions, even any formal declaration? Now I am all in favour of a good knees up, but at the moment I cannot find any scriptural basis. You do get wedding feasts being celebrated, Jesus himself goes to one, so they aren't wrong.

My questions are thus: Am I missing something in scripture? If not, should we be attaching this level of importance to a ceremony, and do we have any obligation to have one? I am by no means advocating running into crazy promiscious relationships, and at the moment I would definately steer the current course were anything to arise, but I am desiring of a deeper understanding.

Let discussion commence.

Stagnation

I have been aware recently that I haven't been maintaining my blog very well. The grass is unmown, there are frogspawn in the Carp pond, and to quote Mr Baines, "Mr Lumb, Mr Lumb, Mr Lumb... your blog is a stagnant swamp of smellyness. What's going on?".

Well many things have been going on, but suffice to say that trotting them out here would simply be making excuses for blatant neglect. Henceforth, I will try to write something reasonably regularly, so that those of you who have faithfully come to look at my ramblings will have something to laugh at again.

Enjoy!

Questions, questions, questions

Recently, I was asked the following question (to which I still don't have a proper answer). I thought it might be interesting to ask you lot about it as well, so here goes:

With whom in the bible do you most identify yourself with, and why?

Discuss.

Revision

Sorry for the lack of posts of late, but I have exams coming up, and would dearly like to be able to come back next year. After June 16th, we should have more activity, including a review of Dylan Moran doing standup.

Over and out

Jon

Not Even a Hint

Not Even A Hint arrived in the post this morning. It is now about 2 O'clock in the afternoon and I have already read it from cover to cover. This is a seriously good book for any one who is human (and I think that is everyone) and who has some difficulty with lust.

It takes the focus off of legalism and judgement, and focuses instead on making sure we pursue God first and foremost in our lives. It also talks about what God's design for sex and relationships was really meant to be. In particular, God made us as sexual beings, and God thought that it was "very good" (see Genesis 1). The issue as always is the Devil twisting what God has designed, and this book will really help get the focus back on God's incredibly good design.

If anyone has any struggles with lust and the likes, can I really, really recommend this book from the very bottom of my heart.

P.s. Sorry for not updating for a while.

Crysis

For all you gamers out there.



Farcry was one of the best FPS games ever, and now there have been announcements about the sequel, Crysis. I have just watched this video, and it absolutely blew me away. Watch it and weep people.
Please note that this image doesn't do the game justice the way the video does.

Denominations et al (Andy's question)

Andy Atkinson said...

"Ok here's a question for Mr Jon and I hope it doesnt fall into the anal categorie but its an interesting thought provoking one..... Taking just christianity into the picture as a whole , do you think that God is pleased by the efforts of people in different denominations thinking maybe "ok they were wrong on that bit there but there heart was good and they tried there best to serve me" or is there only one way to please God and the rest is blatantly going against his commands?"

Glad to see that we have a nice easy question to start off with. Cheers Andy (with heavy sarcasm), you wouldn't believe how long it has taken me to get something of a coherent answer to this in my head.

My initial thoughts on this were as follows; Heart is the most important thing. However, there are several things that I feel are important and worth mentioning:

1. The issue of Truth (with a definite capital T).
   
   A lot of people are obsessed with the idea of Truth and theological correctness, and on one level I would naturally fall into this category. Yes, it is important to look at things and to make sure that we are living correctly. However, I feel that a lot of the time we become too obsessed with getting things right (and making sure that everyone else is following the letter of the law). Jesus was definitely not big on condemnation and pointing the finger (see the woman caught in adultery, John 8), except when it came to the Pharisees, (and again, I think this was down to a heart issue).
   
   My point here is that all this seems to come at the expense of the relationship with God and other people, and can often become elevated in people's minds to the highest priority. So whilst there is a need for us to examine the Bible, and make sure we are living by what it says, the bigger priority is to love God and have a heart after him. (See King David for being a prime example of this, as he is remembered in the New Testament as being "A man with a heart after God", Acts 13:22). I would also recommend checking out this link where they talk about not having a clear cut "Statement of Faith".


2. Fundamentals
   
   I think there are certain very clear cut issues that do need to be set aside though, because they are the very underpinnings of Christianity.
   
   
   • That Jesus is the Son of God, and that Jesus is God himself (as opposed to being a prophet). Certainly any arguments that claim Jesus was "just a good teacher" etc do not hold at all. Jesus expressly claimed to be the Son of God, and in the words of CS Lewis, "He was either correct in who He said He was, or on a par with a man who claims that he is a poached egg"
   • That Jesus is the only way to Heaven, through His death and resurrection. You cannot be saved by any other means, for example praying to the virgin Mary (who is often an underrated person, but that is for a separate occasion).
   • You need to be baptised in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
     

If people want to sit there and squabble over small petty differences, then a) I do not have the time of day for it, and b) I think it really gets in the way of our walk with God. I am not entirely sure that I have clear cut answered you question, but then again, the answer would always have to start with and "it depends...". We are called to have a relationship with God, and I really feel that if we pursue that as our first priority, God will sort out the issues along the way in his own time. Not to say that we don't have to work at it, but that we don't have to get our knickers in a twist about it.

Please discuss. This is by no means the diffinitive reasoning on the subject, and I am always up for a bit of learning.