Many Christians today are desperately hungry for Biblical truth, especially in regard to “major” issues. Should Christians in our materialistic culture who frequently give Christ the left overs be taught that materialism is at enmity with their Faith? Should the first Chapters of Genesis be ignored, or do they form the foundation for all Christian beliefs. Unfortunately, it seems that a number of leaders shy away from addressing controversial subjects, either from a desire not to offend, or from a lack of clarity in their own minds regarding these teachings.

But Christians are also likely to be “filled up” by passages they never expected to appeal to them. In my role as a local Church pastor, I try to teach the “full counsel of God”. Last week I preached on Matthew 12:46-50, a passage that is at first blush presents a challenge to the interpreter. Why is Jesus family looking for him? Why does Jesus appear to dis his own mother? After the message I was given some feedback regarding the sermon, which though it was preached on a passage few would ever spend time studying themselves was very helpful after all. That is the beauty of consecutive Bible exposition. This little paragraph at the end of Matthew twelve turns out, in the words of S. Lewis Johnson, to be “one of the most important descriptions of true believers relationship to one another in the whole bible” (link).

At Grace, we post our sermons on a few different formats. We have an audio podcast available through itunes, or directly off our website. One of our members has added us on his account at Sermon Audio dot com. We also post video to vimeo, through our Grace Appeal channel. Unbeknownst to us, these links made for the benefit of our members have had a fairly wide distribution outside of our Church, and around the world. I became curious, and decided to do a little bit of study on our statistics. While doing this review, I looked to see what topics were the most frequently accessed.

The top three messages across the various platforms include:

1) Authenticity Vs. Materialism (a study of Matthew 8:18-34) It asks the question, “When is a believer not a believer, and when is a disciple not a disciple?” It seeks to show how a believer can be confident of his or her own salvation. Authentic faith appears to be a great struggle with believers in a materialistic culture. One would think that this would be primarily a North American phenomenon, yet to my surprise, while it was still a top selection here, this message was mostly accessed oversees, the largest group being in Indonesia. What is it that made this message to significant in that culture? It is primarily accessed through Sermon Audio and receives less attention in our other mediums (video link, audio).

2) Creation’s World (based on Genesis 1:1) provides an intro and overview of the issues of the Genesis account, “Fact or fiction?” and it aims to affirm the believers faith in the Scripture and provide a foundation for addressing the modern conflict, so called, between faith and science. This message has been very popular in North America, and is consistently downloaded throughout all our various mediums. It was the most “shared” resource on facebook we had this past year (video link, audio).

3) A number of other messages were close to these, including our most popular vimeo feed The King’s Test (based on Matthew 4:1-11) it shows how the human race was plunged into war, chaos, hopelessness and sin, through the machinations of the Devil. Only the true Messiah can defeat him. It answers the question: “How did Jesus fare in his greatest test?” by showing a powerful evidence of his identity as the Son of God and Saviour of the world (video link, audio).

What do I take from this review as a pastor who is called on to preach week after week? Overall, it seems to me that people are looking for something less uncertain than material things, more certain than changing philosophies of origins, and they want to know if Jesus really is the answer to those things. It is my commission to proclaim the Kingdom of God in all its fullness, the good news of Jesus Christ bringing hope now, and fulfillment of all that we were created for in the future. It encourages me to preach on the hard topics, and not to shy away from exploring them, but to remain faithful to proclaiming “the full council of God”.

The Qoheleth has said, “But I say that wisdom better than might, though the poor man’s wisdom is despised and his words are not heard.” Yikes. You may feel better about being so weak, but now you have to worry about being despised . . .

Maybe I can find something that makes despised people feel better!

We live in a rapidly changing world. Many important discussion going on in within Western culture today, which have the potential to impact the future of our civilization. Whether it is about ‘law and order,’ environmentalism, human rights, constitutional interpretations, international wars, abortion, or even political theory, many old ways are being challenged, and new perspectives are emerging.

With change, there is both opportunity and hazard. The British Prime Minster David Cameron is currently calling his nation to take on personal responsibility as a way to overcome the challenges and changes facing British society (link). If we desire healthy democracies, which balance social responsibility and personal freedom, on what bases ought we (or can we) proceed?

I hope in this post to continue to show that our only hope, as history, philosophy and theology all inform us is to regain the consciousness of the value of the human being as an immortal individual, morally responsible to their Creator.

Historically, whenever the individual has become viewed as part of the machine of a culture, freedom and hope are destroyed for all but the few who gain power. Popular unrest and change came to France in the 18^th century. But, when he rose to power through this opportunity, Napoleon Bonaparte harnessed every individual, indeed the very soul of France to the machine of his own aggrandizement. Any who got in the way, he destroyed. Both the ideals of the revolution and the freedom desired by the individual were lost.

Again, the 20^th century saw a very similar rise of the disenfranchised in Russia, give way to the dictatorships of Stalin and Lenin, as the Communist Empire soon eliminated the happiness and freedom of the greater part of their society, as man was seen as a mere cog n the machine of empire.

Conversely, the Greek Democracies challenged by all the idiosyncrasies of individual freedom overcame the invasion of the greatest dictator of the ancient world, Xerses of Persia, in the 5^th century BC. The same spirit of freedom animated “the American experiment”, which has given rise to the world’s greatest superpower.

The difference is an elementary one. Both Napoleon, and the Soviets were secular naturalists, which placed all their value in the state, as greater than the short lived individual. The Greeks, let by the philosophers of the golden age, and the British settlers of America, believed deeply in the individual as an immortal being.

The immortal individual is a foundational value. American philosopher William Ernest Hocking (1873-1966) argued: “Life itself is individual, and the most significant things in the world – perhaps in the end the only significant things – are individual souls.” (“The Philosophical Anarchist” in R. Hoffman, ed. Anarchism, New York: Lieber-Atherton, 1973, pp. 120-121.) Plato, through a Socratic dialogue concludes: “beyond question, the soul is immortal and imperishable, and our souls will truly exist in another world.” (Pheado, 63c).

The Theological Argument. The great religions agree with the Philosophers in being certain of the immortality of the individual. Hindus believe in a reincarnated soul, whose immortal existence strives to build good karma and ascend to perpetual bliss. Other eastern religions share this view of immortality and bliss through moral virtue, including Taoism, which has been called, “a school of thought focused on the quest for immortality” (Maspero, Henri. Translated by Frank A. Kierman, Jr. Taoism and Chinese Religion (University of Massachusetts Press, 1981), p. 211).

The Judeo-Christian perspective is perhaps best known in the West. God creates Human Beings as immortal beings, who will life forever in either eternal bliss with their Creator, or eternal punishment apart from him (John 3:36). Each of these faiths provides a similar foundation for ethics. However, the distinctions between them lead to very different ethics. A judicial perspective of eternal judgment shapes Judeo-Christian ethics. While Eastern faiths propose personal enlightenment as the foundation of moral valuation.

The point however, is that humanity has a shared consciousness of immortality, which no amount of time, circumstance, or oppression has been able to shake. When this is encouraged and nurtured, free and responsible societies are able to flourish.

What unique contribution does Christianity contribute to this discussion? How can this practically help us evaluate current opportunities? Find out in post three, coming soon.

Many people are concerned about the way the world is going. Others are excited about it. Some see their culture going ‘to hell in a hand basket,’ while others see a positive utopia on the horizon. Change itself is neither good, nor bad. It is a part of all our lives.

Today, the Western world is facing nothing less than a total revolution. The implications of globalization and the philosophy of post modernity have together brought unimaginable change and potential for good or ill to the dominant culture in the world today. Perhaps not since the Second World War, has such a dramatic danger presented itself. What Hitler could not achieve by force of military power, intellectual forces may accomplish by cultural transformation—the total overthrow of Western civilization and its replacement with a new and repressive order based on the rule of the powerful.

Movements such as the “Arab Spring” and “Occupy Wall Street”, along with the riots in London, have together made us both more aware of the actual or perceived growing gap between the powerful and the disenfranchised, and alerted to the instability of the status quo.

There are two possible outcomes from the inevitable responses and re-evaluations that will come out of this time of transition. It is possible that some oppressive individual or group will seize the opportunity and come with the will to power, suppressing all who stand their way. Or a new popular strength will create a new cultural consensus, and social contract, based on a value system. This value system can be collective, (the needs of the many outweighing the needs of the one or the few, as many cultures in the past, especially communistic regimes have held), or it can be individualistic (the right and responsibility of the individual, which has been the heart of liberal democracy, restored).

Our only hope, as history, philosophy and theology all inform us, for the preservation of personal freedom, is to regain the consciousness of the value of the human being as an immortal individual, morally responsible to their Creator. This perspective will lead to stable democracies, which balance social responsibility and personal freedom.

Look for Part Two .

Deuteronomy 12 provides a mandate for Israel to obey after entering the land (cf. 12:1). When they enter into the land and control it, they must destroy all the false religious worship centers, even the Asherims and idols. Of course, Israel actually built Asherims and religious centers on the high places (2 Kgs 17:10–12). So instead of tearing down the false worship centers and idols of the nations, Israel built them up. But this stands in high contrast to the echoing cry of Deuterononomy 12:4, “You shall not worship Yahweh your God in that way.” Thus, even if Israel thought they were worshiping God, they were surely wrong.

Deuteronomy 12:5 tells Israel they seek the “place” Yahweh will choose to put his name and dwell. What is especially noteworthy is that Deuteronomy 12:5 explains that this place will be one place “out of all your tribes” (cf. 12:14) Thus, Israel could not make the excuse that since Israel and Judah split they must create two places of worship. After Israel enters into the land and God grants rest to her (Deut 12:9), then Yahweh will choose his place to make his name dwell. There all cultic worship must occur. Now there is a future pattern here that one must pay careful attention to or loose the transformation of the “place” theology.

Deuteronomy 12:8 says, “you shall not do according to all that we are doing here today, everyone doing whatever is right in his own eyes.” But this was precisely the condition of Israel during the time of Judges (immediately following the conquest). Judges 17:6 and 21:25 echo the refrain, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.” It seems that the cause of this chaos was no unified kingship (cf. 18:1ff).

Until everyone did what was right under a unified kingship, then there would be no rest from enemies and enjoyment of the land occurred:

“For you have not as yet come to the rest and to the inheritance that Yahweh your God is giving you. But when you go over the Jordan and live in the land that Yahweh your God is giving you to inherit, and when he gives you rest from all your enemies around, so that you live in safety, then to the place that Yahweh your God will choose, to make his name dwell there, there you shall bring all that I command you.” (Deut 12:9–11a)

This time of rest from enemies and enjoyment happened during the rule of David, where “rest” from enemies and enjoyment of the inheritance occur (2 Sam 7:11–12). Thus, David’s son Solomon will build “a house for my name” (2 Sam 7:13). Solomon constructs the temple where Yahweh put his name (1 kgs 8.29, 43-44, 48), which the book of Kings confirms in other places (e.g. 1 Kgs 11:36; 2 Kgs 21:4). The promises made to David and his son—the whole hope of messianic kingship, rest from enemies, an eternal kingdom, and the presence of God with his people—are tied up into the place where Yahweh put his name, Jerusalem.

Now if this is true, the nature of Israel’s sin is a monstrosity of evil, coupled with a bombastic stupidity. To worship away from Jerusalem meant a giving up or rejection of God’s blessing and promises. Perhaps when Judeans did something foolish, they said, “I pulled a Jeroboam son of Nebat!” The theological lesson from 2 Kings 17:7–12 is to never leave God’s means of worship and blessing or judgment awaits.

So go to church!

A little over a hundred years ago, a Mesopotamian scholar argued that the Summerian culture creates lists of kings in groups of 10. He then suggested that the biblical accounts of Genesis 5 and 10 were built upon this pattern, and consequently were not chronological lists.

This led 19th and 20th century liberal scholarship to attack the reliability of scripture.

Now, here is the crazy part. Sincere evangelical scholars of noted intelligence defended the attack by assume the liberal position (specifically that the genealogies were non linear, as not chronological.). They argued that as Matthew made lists of selective genealogies in Matthew chapter one, the author of Genesis was simply following normal practices of Summerian culture when making a selective genealogy, therefore Genesis could still be trusted. We simply must recognize it had no intention of providing chronology.

This has come to be the foundation of evangelical old earth arguments.

Now here is the fun part. PhD scholars developed these theories. They are truly intelligent men. Do you think you are smarter than a PhD?

Read Genesis 5 and Genesis 11, “How many names are listed in the two genealogies?”

The peace of 1918 did not last. As another Great War came and went, followed by significant and costly conflict from Korea to Afghanistan, Canadians and many others around the world have declared November 11th Remembrance Day. We remember, on this day each year, the sacrifice of so many, who gave up peace to take up war, who lost their lives, their liberties and their own pursuit of happiness, so that we might enjoy ours.

Why must their be war? It is one of the great facts of life that separations and conflicts characterize human society. This is one of the great impacts of the Fall of the human race from harmony with God into sin and rebellion: “God made humankind upright, but they have sought many evil schemes” (Ecclesiastes 7:29).

Until all people turn their hearts back to their creator, and we are restored to His perfect peace, we will have to deal with the “evil schemes” of many people and nations. This will result in wars and rumours of wars. God is good, however, and his mercy is poured out on us, in what theologians call “common grace”. He makes his rain to fall on the just and unjust alike.

One of the great graces of God, is that he has given us government, an agency which is “instituted by God” (Romans 13:1). Its purpose is twofold, (1) first, to give “approval” to good behaviour (Romans 13:3) and (2) second, to carry out “God’s wrath on the wrongdoer” (Romans 13:4). The agents and ministers of government who commend good and punish evil are “ministers of God” (Romans 13:6).

We thank God, for the freedoms and liberties we enjoy. We thank God for peace, and for good government. We also thank those who faithfully defend those freedoms, and our governments from those who wish to exercise their “evil schemes”.

Until the war drums beat no longer and the battle flags are furled, we will remember and be thankful for the sacrifice of Military, Paramilitary and RCMP members who have put their lives at risk, and who have sacrificed their lives, so that we may live. God grant his peace to each member of our armed forces, and may the prince of peace soon return and end war for all time.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Just to illustrate the point, HarperCollins publishes Bart Ehrman’s books who denies the historicity of the Scriptures and claims to be an agnostic. The company that publishes him because he is “religious” will now control what the wider evangelical world will read in their past time.

Read more here.