Category: General Christian Teachings

Last night, I blogged on how I was fighting Yiazmat, the boss in Final Fantasy XII with 50,000,000 hit points. I could have beat him last night, but I had some friends who I normally go bowling with on Sunday nights, so I paused with maybe around 1.5 mllion hit points left on him and went bowling. My thinking is that I can resume a game any time. My time with my friends is different.

So I go and before too long, one of them is telling me about how a former co-worker of mine and a current one of hers was giving her a two-hour lecture on God and Jesus. Note that this was being said knowing that I am a Seminary student and that I definitely have some strong beliefs on the topic.

What resulted? Instead of a two-hour lecture, in between our bowls, an hour and a half-discussion with two of my other friends listening in and saying things every now and then and ending with my friend saying “I want to know why you believe what you believe.” Why’d I have to go? Well, I have a job that requires me to get up early, so home I went. 

But I thought about that as I left the bowling alley. Now I did meet my goal today of vanquishing Yiazmat, but I also thought “Heaven won’t care if I defeated Yiazmat ultimately.” What will matter the most though will be that I was a witness for the Christ in the time that I had here. That is the real battle of good and evil.

Now as I say that, some of you might be thinking “Then why waste your time on things that don’t matter?” Because I think those things that we sometimes think don’t matter are secondary so that we can do the primary things. A man needs to take time for pleasure in his life that is non-religious in its nature for God gave us many good things to enjoy and those secondary things enable us to enjoy the good things and do the primary things better. If I did not take time to unwind in the evening, I wonder if I could truly do the apologetics that I do during the day.

Consider marriage as an example. There are a number of guys, and I think I’m one of them (In fact, I’m quite certain that I am) that come alive with the love of a good woman in the romantic sense. A woman can definitely help empower a man to do things that he would not normally be able to do.

That is really non-religious in its nature as marriage is something you can do regardless of religion. However, a good marriage can enable some men and women to be better at practicing their religion. In the same way, I believe our hobbies and interests when given the proper time enable us to be the best at what is primary. Note this. The secondary must always serve the primary.

However, this is where the real battle is fought. I enjoy fantasy battles of course, I’m a huge gamer. This is the most important battle of all. Peter Kreeft has said Christian apologetics is the closest you get to saving the world. I think he’s absolutely right. We’re each doing our part in the ministry. Some of us are empowerers. We enable others to go out and fight. Some of us are fighting in the frontlines. 

We’re all needed. There are many battles out there to win and one way to lose is that the soldiers don’t do their jobs. Get out there and be the best at doing what you do. Someday, that will be a battle that Heaven will talk about.

I spend my Sunday afternoons away from debate in relaxation. If someone contacts me on those days, it’d better be important. I often listen to MP3s and get in some gaming at the same time and today, I started a long goal of mine and began fighting Yiazmat in Final Fantasy XII.

Yes. I said began.

Why do I say began? Because this is the ultimate bonus boss in the game that has 50,000,000 hit points. (Yes. I counted the number of zeros. It is 50 million hit points.) This is not a boss that usually falls in one setting and I put the game on pause to go get some ice cream as usual on Sunday. I might not finish it tonight and might finish it tomorrow night. Now someone can walk away and save and his hit points will remain the same, but I’ve heard he does some healing stuff and I don’t want to risk it.

And some of you are thinking, “Geez. You’ve told us a lot about your gaming experience. Is this a change of the nature of the blog from being about theology and apologetics to being about your adventures in video games?”

If you think that, shame on you.

My roommate is also a Final Fantasy buff and I’ve told him the law that I have noticed for most games which includes Final Fantasy. The deadliness of a boss monster is in direct proportion to the bigness of that monster and the ugliness of that monster. If you come across a creature in a game that is big and ugly, brace yourself. You’re in for a tough battle.

Yiazmat is not the biggest and toughest boss to ever appear in a Final Fantasy game though. The biggest one of all was in Final Fantasy X. (At the time of this blog, this is true as far as I know.) In that case, the party even has to go inside this creature and defeat it from within and there is a whole labyrinth and a practical city inside of this monster.

Interestingly, I didn’t have a Playstation 2 when this game came out and it was one of the reasons I got it. I still read gaming magazines and had to stop when I saw a story about Final Fantasy X so I could see what it would be about.

I had to read what I read twice to make sure I read it right.

The game involves a character named Tidus who is a champion of a sport called Blitzball in his town. However, his town is demolished when a mindless and destroying force bent on destruction comes through leaving everything in ruins. This force is called Sin.

Yes. I’m not kidding. It’s Sin.

Now if anyone wants to see how big and ugly this thing is, either go to YouTube or go to Google Images and type in something like Final Fantasy X Sin. Throughout the game, various bosses are fought that are seen as SinSpawn. These are little pieces of Sin, which still dwarf the main characters. All of them are, of course, ugly.

It makes me wonder.

When we consider Christ, Christ is goodness incarnate and he is a beautiful figure. I’m not saying that Christ was a Fabio walking around Judea, but he is seen to us today as a figure of beauty simply because of his character and many of us today would see him as a beautiful figure.

What would sin look like if it took form?

Characters who see Sin in Final Fantasy X are ready to take up arms and destroy it. The whole game is about the attempt to get rid of Sin, which when it happens from time to time, leaves a period that is known as the Calm, but Sin always returns. Now I disagree with how Sin is dealt with in the game, but it’s interesting how many times the word “atonement” shows up and how there are helpers in the game and each is called a “fayth.” (For you spelling nazis, that’s how it’s spelled in the game.)

We sometimes see sin in our lives as cute and innocent. Have you ever wondered what would happen if it was personified? Do you think it would be something cute? Would it not be hideous and evil? Would it not meet the criteria of a Final Fantasy boss in being big and ugly, which means it does some serious damage?

What would you do if you could see your Sin?

Would you take up a sword and fight?

Or would you instead shake hands and treat it like an old friend.

I leave that question to you and I think you know the implications to be drawn depending on how you answer.

I  was in a dialogue with an atheist recently about a passage in the Psalms he didn’t like and he was saying “Your God is good isn’t he?” Well, yes. He is. However, I had to add that he is also a just God and he is a God who punishes sins.

But as I thought about it that night, I realized that that was the question I was asked. “Is he good?” Isn’t it interesting that that seems to be one of the main questions asked. The others would be “How can a God of love allow this to happen?”

It seems we focus then on the attributes that we like. We focus on the goodness of God because we want God to be good partially. Of course, we believe he is anyway in classical theology, but goodness is one that appeals to us more on how God relates to us.

We want God to be loving because we like the fact that God loves us. Now I don’t believe he is loving but that he is love and his being loving is a result of that. Again, I am not against saying that God is love and believing that he loves us. 

We even want a God of justice at times because there are a lot of evil people in the world and we want to see them get what we deserve. Interesting aspect of that is that when it comes to punish sin, we always seem to want God to punish everyone else’s sins and never our own.

What about holiness?

I think this could be one reason we don’t emphasize holiness. We don’t see the relevance to our lives which is a great shame. However, it could be the opposite. It could be that we do see the relevance and we don’t want that relevance.

We can look at the other attributes and focus on how God is going to be towards us. When we think about his goodness, it means that he will be good to us. When we think about his loving, it means he will love us. When we think about his being just, it means he will punish those who abuse us.

When we think about him being holy, it means we must change the way we are to him.

It means we can’t approach God in a buddy-buddy way that is too often now. God is treated even less than the person that you’d treat on the street hopefully. A man talks to God while he’s shaving. One has to wonder if he’d do that if he was speaking before his boss sometime. Would you take your razor to your boss’s office when you have to meet him and shave while you talk to him?

What about changing your life? Most of us would not like the world to know some of the sins we remember doing. I know I wouldn’t. We have to realize God does know them and we have to own up to them. Holiness forces us, if we acknowledge it, to admit that we were wrong.

Are you willing to give up some things? Are you willing to start practicing some things? It might mean you have to ditch that internet pornography you’ve been dealing in. It might mean you have to part with some of your money in order to support the cause of Christ. Are you willing?

We don’t like change. Really. Most of us would like things to stay the same.

Holiness says you either become like Christ or you don’t see him at all.

And oh, we all say we want that, and in some level, most of us do, but we don’t want it in that way. We want to be like Christ in the way that we think he is and not the way that he really is. Surely this is a little sin! Surely God won’t make a big deal about that!

Now I think there are degrees of sin, but let’s remember that all sin is sin and it just takes one.

Holiness. It’s a doctrine that we might not emphasize because we don’t like what it requires. It requires nothing of God, as if any other doctrine did, but it requires everything of us. Do we really care about holiness today?

I recently read C.S. Lewis’s “Christian Reflections” where he has a short chapter with his thoughts on church music. I decided to write on the topic as well, seeing as I agreed with much of what Lewis said. I realize that after I write this, some of my readers might think I’m somewhat of a Philistine. Oh well. 

Lewis says that he is like many laymen. He wants the hymns to be fewer, better, and shorter, and particularly fewer. Many of you might be surprised to hear that. I don’t think it’s because Lewis was an intellectual. I consider my roommate an intellectual as well, and he’s quite the music lover and in the praise band at our church.

Honestly, church music is rather an awkward time for me during the service. I’m standing there listening and I consider the magic words to be “You may all be seated.” I would often much rather sit and listen and meditate, which is often what I do during prayer. I will normally sit, because I see it as a position of humility and it reminds me that he is God and I am not.

Now I’m not against all music of a Christian nature. For instance, if someone plays “Holy, Holy, Holy” I am deeply moved. It is not though because of the cadence of the music as it were. It is because of the great propositional truth that I find contained in that song. I particularly love to hear, “God in three persons. Blessed Trinity.”

I have another friend from where I used to live until he moved away who is a huge music fan and the worship leader at his church. (Do pray for him also. He’s in hard times now.) We’d listen to music in my car and if I thought a song was good he’d say “But it’s all on the same chord.” If he thought one was good I’d say “But the lyrics are hideous.” Now there were some songs we liked together like “This Fragile Breath” and a number of Casting Crowns songs, but there weren’t many.

Ironically, if you want to talk about music that does present an emotional response, I think of something like Smallville’s “Save Me” or as strange as it may sound, give me music from a classic video game and I’m set. I enjoy Evanescence and yes, I’m one of those crazy people that listens to Weird Al. To end the list, the tunes of House and Monk are also popular to me.

For me, church music doesn’t really do it. I think much of what I like is either associated with something else or it’s instrumental. When I hear church music, I’m too busy analyzing the lyrics in order to really get into the music of it all.

A little note if you are a musician and playing before the untrained like myself. If you make a mistake, unless it is a huge and obvious blunder, don’t sweat it. Most of us don’t recognize it. 

Now what does excite me is a good message. You give me something new on the nature of God and I’m set. That’s the way it is. You may not be like that. That’s fine. That’s something we have to realize. I’d prefer shorter songs. You might prefer shorter sermons. 

So some of you all might be wondering then what my stance would be on music in church. I like what Lewis said. He said that while he doesn’t get particularly edified, he realizes that there are others that are and the best thing to do is let them enjoy it. If it enhances their worship, great. If I can stand for a time and ponder lyrics and try to get theological truth, then that’s fine as well.

Now it could be that this is something wrong in my temperament and I’ll get past it later. I don’t know. I just know more often than not, I’d prefer to sit down with a good book instead of listening to some music. It’s the way that I relax. 

That’s my thoughts on the matter. Why speak? Because I wonder if maybe some people are like me also and we need to realize that the body of Christ is diverse in this and there are different ways of worship. I certainly have no desire to see music expunged from the church at all as it has always been a part of the church and neither would Lewis. I would like to see though more depth to the songs that we do have. If all were like “Holy, Holy, Holy,” I think my response might be quite different.

A friend of mine told me recently about a situation involving his sister. As readers know, I don’t like to name names on my blog and this time, I am definitely not doing such. In case any are concerned as well, I also told him my plans before I wrote this blog and he told me he would love to see me write on this topic. The identity of my friend will remain a secret, but he talked about how his sister could be in a compromising situation, which is not easily avoidable apparently, with a member of the opposite sex soon and how his mother had said “It’s her decision to make.”

Now I thought about this for awhile and it’s an odd claim to use. Of course it’s her decision to make. Who else could make it? Now naturally, if a thief draws a gun on you and says “Your money or your life,” it is still your decision. You could give your wallet and hope he’s merciful. You could try to karate kick him and hope you can succeed. You could just try to run and hope you can outrun him, but either way, the decision is yours still. The thief can coerce you, but he cannot decide for you.

Which is an interesting point, giving someone advice is not the same as making a decision for them. I seriously doubt any of us will ever get to the point if our parents are still alive and we’re in a good relationship with them when they don’t offer advice. My mother calls me to this day and still offers advice. Sometimes, I appreciate it and sometimes I don’t. There are times I still go to my friends and sometimes still to my family and ask for advice. 

So the first point that must be said is that when one offers advice, one does not take away the decision. In fact, there could be an attempt to force this event to not happen. If the daughter does not want it to, and I don’t believe she does, then she will be glad to work with it. If she does want it to happen, she will do what she can to avert it and it will be her mistake in that case. Either way, the final responsibility will be hers. If someone wants to do something sinful, they will find a way to do it. If they want to find a way out, they can do that as well.

But I notice something held in this statement also. It’s usually said when it involves a decision that we think someone could make a big mistake in, but we don’t seem to want to limit them for some reason. We think we’ll be intruding if we interfere at that level. Well, yes. You are intruding. You’re supposed to do such also. If you see someone who is about to walk into sin, you are supposed to do what you can to help that person out. In the end, the decision is theirs, but you are to do your part.

The person it seems would want the other one to make a good decision. If that’s the case, why not go on and offer your advice and a way out? We are told in Scripture that God provides a way out when we are tempted with sin. If God is willing to do it to avoid sin, is it too much for us to play our part?

I also told this friend that I have a rule that when dating, I would not allow a girl to be in my apartment when I’m alone. I wouldn’t even allow one if my roommate was here. Who knows? He might step out for awhile and I could take advantage of the time and for all who might think otherwise, my mind can immediately envisage such an event happening. Yes. My mind does think about such things. I am a guy after all. 

Now I told my friend also that someone might say to me “Are you really the type that if you had that time alone with a girl in your apartment you’d have sex with her?” I told him I’d answer, “I would hope not, but I don’t intend to put the situation to the test in order to find out.”

Why? I think we need to be real about our temptations. When I see a beautiful girl, I am tempted. When I sit down at my computer, I can think about all that I can access with just a few clicks of the mouse and for a moment, I am tempted. Fortunately, I haven’t acted on such temptations, but I have to be real about the temptations. 

Which makes me think this kind of objection is not being real about the temptation. The sexual drive is one of the most powerful drives out there. Why put it in a compromising situation? Now I realize we will all be in situations where we will be compromised, but how many of those do we want to enter into willingly? If we can avoid them and still bring about good, then why not do so?

So yes, it’s her decision to make. No doubt. It’s your decision though if you will help her or not.

I have been considering lately that we fail to often emphasize the holiness of God. Most of us do not see holiness as a good topic. In fact, in our day and age, it’s a boring and humdrum topic. The holy almost has a negative connotation to it. We think we have to wash our hands automatically or be wearing only white or not speak a word. Many of us live in a world though of action where things happen and things not explicitly religious and we wonder how holiness plays a part.

Why is it we don’t think about holiness?

There are numerous biblical passages about holiness. In Isaiah 6, the angels before the throne of God sing “Holy, Holy, Holy.” In Leviticus, we are told several times by God to “Be holy, because I am holy.” In Hebrews 12:14, we are told that without holiness, no one will see the Lord, a proposition we ought to take extremely seriously! It seems holiness ranks quite high on God’s list.

Why not on ours?

I thought about this last night reading “Christian Reflections” by C.S. Lewis. I was reading his section “On Ethics” and how he spoke of how when we are poor, we automatically put money on a high list of priorities. When we are ill, we suddenly value health. Now we might value these things otherwise, but we often seem to put a more than usual value on them when they are absent.

I also thought about that afterwards as I was relaxing watching a Smallville as I do many a night and sipping on a Green Tea Ginger Ale, which I am convinced is the nectar of the gods. I thought about how refreshing it was and considered how it is when I am truly absent of a drink for a time and get one that all of a sudden, that taste is there. Many of us have probably picked up a drink wanting that same cool refreshment, and it just isn’t there. However, there are times we could be most aware of the absence and then experience it as we are truly longing for it then.

I think about a friend of mine also as I write this who is struggling with this now in that he wants to live a better life but he just keeps messing up. As I pondered that I would say such this afternoon though, it occurred to me that my friend is in the same boat I and everyone else is in. Unless you are an unfallen angel or unless you are God, and I seriously doubt you are either, then it would seem that you must struggle with holiness in some area. If you are not, then you have a far greater problem than you realize.

And this brings us to our position. We realize we are unholy, but I wonder how much we have realized it. I think my friend is in a great position actually for he realizes his lack. It is indeed, the person who thinks he’s a really good guy and doesn’t need to be concerned with holiness who I would be more concerned with. It is not the person who struggles with sin we ought to be concerned about so much as the person who doesn’t struggle with it.

And yet, we often come to God and I believe we conceal our unholiness. Do we really bring our sins to God? Do we realize that maybe we really need to own up to our sins for truly, they are our sins and they are not his. We need to, in a sense, embrace them and drag them before the throne of God and admit our crime. 

In fact, such is not so much realizing the unholiness of sin as it is realizing the holiness of God. If we say that God cannot use our sins for good, then we are denying Romans 8:28-29 and we are saying that sin is greater than God. We are saying that sin can wreck the divine plan in some way.

If we consider our futures hopeless because of sins we’ve done in the past we’re greatly ashamed of and hope no one ever finds out about, and let us face it, we all have them, then we are also denying him for we are saying his holiness is not enough to overcome the unholiness of us.

In fact, it could be good for us to look those sins straight in the eye and realize them. Only when we realize how unholy they are are we truly ready to approach the throne of God and accept his holiness on our behalf. If we make our sins light, then we can expect to get a light idea of holiness. If we see our sins as divine treason, as I have argued before that they are, and see them as serious cancers that must be eliminated, then we can truly see serious holiness.

Our lack of thinking about holiness is partially because of our thinking about ourselves. We don’t see sin as sin and we don’t often see our need. When we do commit a sin, we suddenly do realize that need, but until then, we are often unaware. Now I am not for a moment suggesting we need to be beating ourselves up for our sins. That is not good for the Christian life. However, we need to see sins as sins and realize that when we do, it does reveal not just a bad action, but an attitude within us that needs to be changed.

We need to see ourselves as unholy in contrast to God and then, only then, do I believe we’ll realize how important holiness is and how much we need him. We need to accept the reality of unholiness.

As I pondered the blog for tonight on the last verses of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, I thought about how we normally view sermons. We view them as exhortations to righteousness and quite often, they are. I believe the Sermon on the Mount is that, but I believe there is something unique about that sermon and it is laid out in these final verses.

Jesus is making a covenant offer to the people as I said at the beginning and letting them know what kingdom people are to be like. In the end, he is challenging his listeners to see if they will be ready to take up that mantle. Are they going to become his followers and thus be kingdom people or are they going to try and go about their lives another way?

The consequences are severe. If there is any aspect in this part that Christ is stressing, it is on how great the fall is if the covenant is not held to. The house may look impressive, but it will not stand. When the day of judgment comes on that house, that house will fall for the foundation could not hold it.

We can have all of our nice little moral theories, but we need a foundation for them. Too often, we treat morality as if it’s just something floating in the air as it were. It has no basis, but we will just take it and go with it. Morality does have a basis though. It is rooted in the eternally existing God. 

Jesus is giving us a choice. We can build up our kingdoms on our own principles or we can build up his kingdom on his principles. Milton’s Satan said it was better to reign in Hell than to serve in Heaven. Which is our choice? Will we choose to have a kingdom that will take us away from Christ, or will we take part in the kingdom of Christ and be servants in it always?

That’s one of the unique characteristics of Christ. Every worldview has to deal with him in some way. You can write him off as a myth as some atheists do or just make him a good moral teacher or a cynic sage. You can make him simply a prophet like is done in Islam, even if he is given great honor in Islam. You can make him an avatar like in some circles of Hinduism. Every group wants to try to claim Jesus as their own in some way. 

Jesus cannot be a part of someone else’s way. He calls the shots. It is either his way or you don’t go. When we Christians say Jesus is the only way to God, we mean it. Any other attempt to get into Heaven on one’s own terms is an attempt to usurp the throne of God.

Christ has made a proclamation in the Sermon on the Mount. We dare not write this off as simple moral advice on how to live. Yes. There is morality all throughout the Sermon. The Sermon though is a challenge. It is a challenge to come and follow Christ. There is no neutral ground to reply on. We either say “Yes, that is how I choose to live” or “No, that is not how I choose to live.”

Christ has told us the consequences of each. The question we must ask is “Is he telling the truth or not?” If he is, then the wisest thing to do is follow him. If you think he’s not though, then you’d better be right!

Tonight, we’re going to look at false prophets in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus gives quite a strong warning and I think when we look at this, we’re going to have to keep in mind the passages in Deuteronomy that relate to this. Jesus says these prophets will come like sheep in appearance, but they are really ravenous wolves.

So note this before we even get to the passages. Those that are false could be mistaken for the real things easily. I say this because I’ve been thinking about this text and I’m going to give an interpretation of the fruit aspect of this that I don’t think is usually given probably because we’ve grown up so much with a certain understanding that we’ve never come to consider it.

The passages I have in mind are Deuteronomy 18 and Deuteronomy 13. I put the later one first since it deals with the first criteria I want to deal with. In verses 19-22, we are given a test on how to recognize a false prophet. One way is that if the prophet prophecies something and it does not come true, then that is a false prophet. 

Note this does take into consideration the conditional nature of some prophecies, such as Jonah’s preaching to the Ninevites. Some prophecy is given with the hopes that people will respond and if they do, then God does not give the judgment that he would give. This is, in fact, what he tells Ezekiel about prophecy. Ezekiel 33 is an example of such a passage. 

This is one reason I have for rejecting the Watchtower as an organization that claims to be a prophet. They have predicted the end of the world too many times and been wrong every single time for me to believe that they have the guidance of God. Now some of you might be wondering if that’s my only criteria? It’s not, but that criteria is good enough.

The other passage is in Deuteronomy 13. In this case, the prophet comes and what he says does come true and then he says “Let’s go and worship other gods.” That is not a prophet from God. This is another way that I reject the Watchtower in that the God of Arianism is a far cry from the God of Christianity. 

This is also a reason I have for rejecting Mormonism. (One among many.) Their doctrine of God is not rationally consistent. It’s a polytheistic concept of a god who is not eternal and cannot then have the omni-attributes that the God of Christianity has. This is a more complex argument that can be fleshed out elsewhere and if I need to do another blog on that, I will gladly do so another time.

So now we get to the passage about knowing them by their fruit. What kind of fruit are we talking about? Too often, we might turn to Galatians 5 and look at the fruit of the Spirit. I don’t think that’s what Jesus is talking about. If one has the Spirit, one should see the fruit that the Spirit produces. Instead, this is talking about the fruit of a prophet. What will be the fruit of a true prophet? 

Notice also then what the false prophets on that day say they have done? Can anyone point to a bad deed listed in there? I can’t. Jesus says though that not only do those not matter, but that those people are lawbreakers and he never knew them. They claimed to do many acts in his name, but as Deuteronomy 18 says, someone can act presumptuously in the name of God or be out and right lying even.

We’ve too often said it’s about morality. Now I believe a true belief will produce good morality, but because something produces good morality, that doesn’t mean it’s true. I think many atheists are good people. I think many Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses are. Many Christians are also of course. On the other hand, I sadly think many Christians are people that can be quite unChristlike in their demeanor. 

That doesn’t mean all of those beliefs are true or that Christianity is even partly true just because some Christians are jerks. It also doesn’t seem to be what Jesus is talking about because if he was talking about “True prophets will produce good actions,” then why does he go and condemn all those prophets who have good actions? 

In our day and age, we ought to be moral people, but we also ought to be on guard. When someone shows up with a different gospel, be cautious. The sad thing is we don’t recognize a different gospel often. Paul warned about this in 2 Cor. 11 where he even said that those who are false do come and seem to have goodness all about them. Their source is not good though.

What’s the antidote to this? Proper study and good Christian living. We need to be in our Bibles, in our books, and on our knees.