 | You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan. You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God's grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the Holy Spirit gives you assurance of your salvation, and he also enables you to live the life of obedience to which God has called us. You are influenced heavly by John Wesley and the Methodists.
What's your theological worldview? created with QuizFarm.com |
Friday, June 09, 2006
What's Your Theological Worldview?
Thursday, May 04, 2006
Right and Wrong
"Nobody said it was easy, but no one ever said it would be this hard."--from Coldplay's The Scientist.
Sometimes I think I should have read the fine print before signing on to follow Jesus. He's great and all, and we get along most of the time, but the problem is that when you love Jesus, you have to also love everybody He loves...and the list is long. And there are definitely people on the list that I don't even like.
There's this one guy who's particularly been a pain. I can tell you 10 good reasons why this person is a bad person. I can give you a long list as to why this person makes me angry just looking at him, and I can prove to you beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am right and justified in my feelings. The problem is that something inside me is telling me that I'm wrong. I don't think God heard my argument, b/c God would know that this feeling shouldn't be here. I mean, I really know I'm right. And I really know I'm pissed off. And the voice that is telling me that I'm wrong just pisses me off even more. I want to love Jesus, but why do I have to love His friends? Some of them are pretty selfish and just plain hypocritical. How does He love these people? Even more, how can He expect me to?
Whatever my personal thoughts on this, according to Jesus, even if he is wrong, if I don't love him like Christ loves me, I'm just as wrong. Gotta be honest, that's part of the gospel that I'm not a big fan of. At least not right now. I might like it more when I'm on the other side of the situation.
Sometimes I think I should have read the fine print before signing on to follow Jesus. He's great and all, and we get along most of the time, but the problem is that when you love Jesus, you have to also love everybody He loves...and the list is long. And there are definitely people on the list that I don't even like.
There's this one guy who's particularly been a pain. I can tell you 10 good reasons why this person is a bad person. I can give you a long list as to why this person makes me angry just looking at him, and I can prove to you beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am right and justified in my feelings. The problem is that something inside me is telling me that I'm wrong. I don't think God heard my argument, b/c God would know that this feeling shouldn't be here. I mean, I really know I'm right. And I really know I'm pissed off. And the voice that is telling me that I'm wrong just pisses me off even more. I want to love Jesus, but why do I have to love His friends? Some of them are pretty selfish and just plain hypocritical. How does He love these people? Even more, how can He expect me to?
Whatever my personal thoughts on this, according to Jesus, even if he is wrong, if I don't love him like Christ loves me, I'm just as wrong. Gotta be honest, that's part of the gospel that I'm not a big fan of. At least not right now. I might like it more when I'm on the other side of the situation.
Wednesday, March 01, 2006
The Mark of The Christ
The Mark of the Christ
Amidst all the talk of my sin and the imposition of the black, ash cross upon my forehead, I could barely hold in the tears. I wasn't really broken over my sin like I thought I should be. I kept trying to replay all the sins I had committed over the last few days, especially the bigger ones, so that I could make myself feel as bad as I thought I was supposed to. It just didn't work. Instead of wearing the cross like a sort of scarlett letter announcing my sin, for me, the cross on my forehead was a mark of Christ's love for me. As the Israelites marked their doorposts so that the angel of death would pass over their houses, the ash cross was, for me, a sign that I have been spared. God's mercy overwhelmed any feeling of guilt that I thought I should have been experiencing.
We see a different view of Jesus with each of the seasons of the Christian year. In epiphany, the season we have just left, I believe we climbed the mountain to see the heights of Christ's love, the Light of the World that has come down into darkness. In Lent, we climb down from that mountain into the valley to witness the depths of that same love. Today, Ash Wednesday, our foreheads are marked with the depths of Christ's love for us.
Amidst all the talk of my sin and the imposition of the black, ash cross upon my forehead, I could barely hold in the tears. I wasn't really broken over my sin like I thought I should be. I kept trying to replay all the sins I had committed over the last few days, especially the bigger ones, so that I could make myself feel as bad as I thought I was supposed to. It just didn't work. Instead of wearing the cross like a sort of scarlett letter announcing my sin, for me, the cross on my forehead was a mark of Christ's love for me. As the Israelites marked their doorposts so that the angel of death would pass over their houses, the ash cross was, for me, a sign that I have been spared. God's mercy overwhelmed any feeling of guilt that I thought I should have been experiencing.
We see a different view of Jesus with each of the seasons of the Christian year. In epiphany, the season we have just left, I believe we climbed the mountain to see the heights of Christ's love, the Light of the World that has come down into darkness. In Lent, we climb down from that mountain into the valley to witness the depths of that same love. Today, Ash Wednesday, our foreheads are marked with the depths of Christ's love for us.
Friday, February 24, 2006
Progress and Recess
27Jesus resumed talking to the people, but now tenderly. The Father has given me all these things to do and say. This is a unique Father-Son operation, coming out of Father and Son intimacies and knowledge. No one knows the Son the way the Father does, nor the Father the way the Son does. But I'm not keeping it to myself; I'm ready to go over it line by line with anyone willing to listen. 28"Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. 29Walk with me and work with me--watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. 30Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly." (Matthew 11 from The Message Translation)
It doesn't take long for my schedule to fill up. Occasionally I'll actually say no to something or give up the responsibility for something else, but I usually fill it with something else, some task, some job, some class. My life is filled with a lot of doing but not that much growing. I've bought into the lie that doing a lot is progress. Jesus' way is different. All the things the Father gave His Son to do and say came out of Father and Son intimacies and knowledge. Real fruitfulness is birthed in the same place as real rest--intimacy. Living with the Father and the Son is living freely and lightly. If I'm tired and worn out and burned out (and I am), it's because I'm not living in intimacy. It's because I've believed the pride of progress--that the more I do, the more important I am. My religion has been making good grades in seminary classes, as if Greek tests are tests of knowing God. They're not. I can make 99's on my midterms and ignore the voice of God. I've somehow convinced myself that I can please God by my hard work. We live in a culture that prizes independence. We even have a document that declares it. But God is not pleased with my independence. He wants to hear my Declaration of Dependence. He wants to go over His way line by line. He wants me to walk with Him and work with Him.
In the kingdom slowing down is better than speeding up. Listening is more important than doing. Recess is better than progress. The way of Jesus is the way of a son.
It doesn't take long for my schedule to fill up. Occasionally I'll actually say no to something or give up the responsibility for something else, but I usually fill it with something else, some task, some job, some class. My life is filled with a lot of doing but not that much growing. I've bought into the lie that doing a lot is progress. Jesus' way is different. All the things the Father gave His Son to do and say came out of Father and Son intimacies and knowledge. Real fruitfulness is birthed in the same place as real rest--intimacy. Living with the Father and the Son is living freely and lightly. If I'm tired and worn out and burned out (and I am), it's because I'm not living in intimacy. It's because I've believed the pride of progress--that the more I do, the more important I am. My religion has been making good grades in seminary classes, as if Greek tests are tests of knowing God. They're not. I can make 99's on my midterms and ignore the voice of God. I've somehow convinced myself that I can please God by my hard work. We live in a culture that prizes independence. We even have a document that declares it. But God is not pleased with my independence. He wants to hear my Declaration of Dependence. He wants to go over His way line by line. He wants me to walk with Him and work with Him.
In the kingdom slowing down is better than speeding up. Listening is more important than doing. Recess is better than progress. The way of Jesus is the way of a son.
Sunday, January 15, 2006
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
Us and Them
This post is possibly going to be difficult for me to write because the ideas that I'm having haven't completely taken shape yet, but I think that I need to get them out, so maybe you can help me with them.
I was talking to a friend on the phone recently, and she asked me what I had eaten for dinner, and I told her "stir-fry" which is an Asian type of dish with meat and vegetables cooked in a frying pan and served with rice. She responded with a comment about it being an "ethnic" meal. Oddly enough, this comment took me a little off-guard because my family had eaten this meal dozens of times, and it ceased to be for us the food of a culture vastly different from our Southern U.S. culture and had become very much a part of our own menu. It is more common to eat stir fry in our house than it is to eat fried chicken.
I'm working at school on what is called an Intercultural Worship Task Force to try to represent the many cultures present in our community within our worship. While we have had some success in this feat, having incorporated music from India, Nigeria, and our Native American cultures, among others, I don't believe that we have yet adopted these different ways of worshipping Trinity as a community, though I do believe we have made strides in that direction. When groups from cultures not normally represented in chapel (anything non-white, non-North American) lead us, it still seems like "special music" or an event, rather than a normal part of our worship to God.
I think the problem is in the pronouns. We're still singing "their" songs when we need to be singing "our" songs. I hope to see the day when there is no "them", and there is only "us", not because the minority has accepted and conformed and been swallowed by the majority, but because I adopted my Indian friend Andrew's culture when I adopted him into my family, and he adopted my culture when he adopted me into his family. I hope that we will weaved together, not blended, as one, and their songs will become our songs as our songs have become their songs. The Gospel is this: we were Them's, and Christ became one of Them, so that we(They) could become one of Us.
As Christ and the Father were one, may we also be one.
I was talking to a friend on the phone recently, and she asked me what I had eaten for dinner, and I told her "stir-fry" which is an Asian type of dish with meat and vegetables cooked in a frying pan and served with rice. She responded with a comment about it being an "ethnic" meal. Oddly enough, this comment took me a little off-guard because my family had eaten this meal dozens of times, and it ceased to be for us the food of a culture vastly different from our Southern U.S. culture and had become very much a part of our own menu. It is more common to eat stir fry in our house than it is to eat fried chicken.
I'm working at school on what is called an Intercultural Worship Task Force to try to represent the many cultures present in our community within our worship. While we have had some success in this feat, having incorporated music from India, Nigeria, and our Native American cultures, among others, I don't believe that we have yet adopted these different ways of worshipping Trinity as a community, though I do believe we have made strides in that direction. When groups from cultures not normally represented in chapel (anything non-white, non-North American) lead us, it still seems like "special music" or an event, rather than a normal part of our worship to God.
I think the problem is in the pronouns. We're still singing "their" songs when we need to be singing "our" songs. I hope to see the day when there is no "them", and there is only "us", not because the minority has accepted and conformed and been swallowed by the majority, but because I adopted my Indian friend Andrew's culture when I adopted him into my family, and he adopted my culture when he adopted me into his family. I hope that we will weaved together, not blended, as one, and their songs will become our songs as our songs have become their songs. The Gospel is this: we were Them's, and Christ became one of Them, so that we(They) could become one of Us.
As Christ and the Father were one, may we also be one.
Sunday, January 01, 2006
Supermodels
In his book Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller says that we sometimes have to see someone else love something before we ourselves are able to love that thing. Tonight I found myself among a group of teenagers in Florence, Alabama as we entered into the new year in worship. Had I not been overcome by a sense of wonder at the sight, I would have probably been a little embarrassed to be a worship intern at a seminary who was standing at the back of the building looking on as the teenagers danced and sang and bowed and raised hands. I watched as they taught me through their worship how to love Jesus. But for some reason, i wasn't embarrassed at all. Perhaps because when I am desperate to learn how to love, it doesn't really matter who teaches me or who leads me in worship.
After a few minutes of standing, I decided to sit, because a slow song came on and that's what you do during a slow song. That is unless, of course, you are at a high school dance (or any dance), and then, slow songs are the only times you (if you are me) actually walk to the dance floor and dance. As I sat on one of the many futons scattered across the room, I couldn't stop staring at the 10 ft. wooden cross that faced me. There was nothing particularly special about this cross, but it spoke of a mystery that I seemed to have forgotten. It probably should have been strange to watch followers of Jesus dance around the very symbol of his death, but it was in this symbol of death that those who danced around it (as well as those of us who just sat and stared) found life. In our Lord's greatest sorrow, we find our greatest joy. So I just stared and smiled, because it was in that cross that I was able to see Someone else love something in a way that inspired and empowered me to also love that thing.
After a few minutes of standing, I decided to sit, because a slow song came on and that's what you do during a slow song. That is unless, of course, you are at a high school dance (or any dance), and then, slow songs are the only times you (if you are me) actually walk to the dance floor and dance. As I sat on one of the many futons scattered across the room, I couldn't stop staring at the 10 ft. wooden cross that faced me. There was nothing particularly special about this cross, but it spoke of a mystery that I seemed to have forgotten. It probably should have been strange to watch followers of Jesus dance around the very symbol of his death, but it was in this symbol of death that those who danced around it (as well as those of us who just sat and stared) found life. In our Lord's greatest sorrow, we find our greatest joy. So I just stared and smiled, because it was in that cross that I was able to see Someone else love something in a way that inspired and empowered me to also love that thing.
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