Thoughts from bible study. February 24, 2007

  Last night was bible study night at church. We’re studying the book of James, and last nights section was 2:14-26. One section that stood out to me was 

 

  15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.  

 

   At first, this section seamed ludicrous to me. I mean, whose going to tell someone in genuine need, “Man you look pretty bad. Go someplace and take care of yourself.” But how often do I say something to someone when I don’t want to give an action to back up my words? It reminds me of when some guys from another faith [I can’t remember which one] came to our house and asked if they could talk with my dad. The men also asked if they could help with anything, and since dad was in the middle of doing some gluing [and the men knew that was what he was doing when they asked] he told the men that they could help with that. However, the men refused to help because they might get his hands dirty. Are we willing to get our hands dirty to help others? The thought of seeing someone in need and telling him “I hope better times come to you soon” seams ludicrous to me, but the more I look at my life I wonder, Am I Willing To Get My Hands Dirty To Help Others?  

 

  Now I know that in our section of the world there are lots of scammers pretending to be in need so that they don’t have to work. That’s not what this James or I are talking about. If we see someone who we know has a real need, are we willing to take time to help them?

Humility February 22, 2007

    Last fall I took a class at our church on humility. Two things that stuck out to me from the class were   
    

   1 Pride [the opposite of humility] is at the root of pretty much most sin. Thus wouldn’t you want to know how you can overcome pride?  
   

  2 One way to overcome pride is to remember the cross. Remember that it took the perfect Son of God to come and die for you [self] to be saved. If you’re a Christian that thought ought to be a pretty big humble pill to swallow because what that means is that you [self] were in a pretty sorry shape before Jesus saved you, and now it’s only by the grace of God that you are saved. Of course the best way to stay humble is to pray and ask God for humbleness. 
  Humbleness is truly important. We have nothing to boast except for in Christ.   

   2 Corinthians 10:17-18 ”Let him who boasts boast in the Lord. For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends. 

  Lastly I found this poem in my reading book for school and just wanted to share it with you guys.    

Humility By Robert Herrick 

Humble we must be,     
  If to heaven we go;
High is the roof there  
  But the gate it low 

New theme February 19, 2007

As you’ve probably noticed I put a new theme on here. I did that for three reasons. 

1 New, cooler look. 

2 easier access to my categories and to my archives by month. 

3 The old theme would mangle my post. Seriously! I would write something out in word and then post it and it would look completely different than what I wanted [the spacing would be different; it would have a different font and font size.] So I’m hoping this theme will do better. 

Please tell me what you think. [post a comment.]

The Joel Osteen bible – part two February 18, 2007

I just wanted to make a little clearer what I was talking about in the last post.   Churches are experts at preaching a “gospel” that will get people into pews on Sunday, but not save from their sins. There are two major lies in the “seeker sensitive” movement of today.

  

Lie # 1  Life will be a pleasure cruise after you become a Christian. 

The bible says in Matthew 13:20-21 The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away.

My view To tell a person that the Christian walk is going to be easy is a lie.

Lie # 2 Christian walk doesn’t require any change in a person’s life.*

The bible says in James 1:26 If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue [act according to the bible], he deceives himself and his religion is worthless.

My view Now the bible makes it clear that it is entirely through the death of Christ that a person is saved. However the bible also makes it clear [Try reading James sometime] that true faith will generate a desire to do good things.

Tons of “Christians” fall away every year.** Why do they fall away? Because they’ve been wrongly told that once you’re a Christian, life becomes a pleasure cruise. The church of America needs to stop trying to fill its pews with people who aren’t saved, [and if they don’t hear the truth never will be truly saved.] and they need to concentrate on trying to get people truly saved.

I hope this helped clear up what I said in the last post. Maybe it just made it more confusing tough. I also hope you look at the * and ** bellow.

  

* I don’t mean to say that works are required to be saved, only that they are an outpouring of actually being saved.

** A true Christian never falls away John 10:28 I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my

 

 

The Joel Osteen bible February 16, 2007

  In modern Christendom, we’ve manipulated the word of God into something we want to hear. Having altered scripture to fit our every whim and fancy, we say that man is basically good, that he is capable of saving himself, and that he is allowed to do whatever he pleases. To demonstrate this type of alteration, I’ve taken a couple of favorite bible passages and changed them to fit modern theology. These renditions are, in a way, amusing, but I pray you’ll see the danger of trying to make Gods word say what we want to hear. No matter what we want to believe, the truth of Gods word stands true. There is only one way to be saved, and that is through believing in Jesus Christ.  

  I call my translation the TME [tickle my ears] version. Click on the reference to view the real version.

 

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he sent his one and only Son, that whoever prays a little prayer shall never have bad things happen to them, but have eternal happy time both now and in the life to come.

Romans 3:23 for all have done not so good things and come just shy of the glory of God,

2 Corinthians 5:17  Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is now allowed to do whatever he wants; the old consequences for sin have passed away; behold, all things become open to you .

1 John 2:6 the one who says he abides in Him [Christ] can optionally walk in the same manner as He [Christ] walked.

 

  Now nobody is going to make a translation of the bible quit like this. However, preachers “preach” from this “bible” every Sunday. They ignore what the inspired word of God has to say, and shape their sermons to tickle people’s ears. That’s quit frankly sad. Our world needs to hear the truth about how to be saved, not a bunch of non-offensive lies. The bible is an inspirational guidebook for life, but this guidebook doesn’t always tell you what you want to hear.

 

Hebrews 4:12 [NASB]
For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

 

You don’t think people will want to hear what the bible has to say? Tough. They can get over it. It’s your job to give people scripture, not to change scripture. Think about it, the God of this whole universe wrote the bible. Don’t you think it’s perfect the way He wrote it?

 

English assignments February 9, 2007

The next three posts are two essays and a story I had to do for English class. Their not that great, and I didn’t even put in the changes my teacher suggested, but here they are anyway. I hope you enjoy them.

Who did I please? February 9, 2007

By Trevor Gustafson

  One day a miller, who was kind and elderly, and his son, an obedient lad, were on their way to town to sell their cherished donkey. While the miller and his son merrily traversed through the countryside, the donkey, who was oblivious to all around him, lazily strolled behind them.  As the three travelers went along down the road, they passed many well meaning, but very critical people.     

   Before long the miller, his son and the donkey encountered a group of women drawing water form a well. As the three travelers passed by, one of the women called out, “Why are both of you walking when you have such a fine donkey to ride?” The miller, who was very embarrassed by the scene, quickly hoisted the boy up onto the donkey and, without a word, set off down the road. However the three travelers had not gotten far when they encountered two elderly gentlemen standing along side the road. As the three travelers passed by, one of the men called out, “Boy, have you no respect for your aging father? Get down and let your father ride.” Greatly embarrassed by the mans’ comment, the miller quickly told his son to get down, then climbed onto the donkey and started off down the road with his son trailing behind him. Again the travelers had not gotten far when they encountered a cluster of woman and children. As the three travelers passed by, one of  the women called out, “You are an uncaring and unloving father. Look at how your son must nearly run to keep up with you. You ought to let him ride.” At this, all the women and children turned their heads to stare. The miller, who was extremely embarrassed by the unwanted attention, quickly pulled his son up onto the donkey and again started off down the road. However the travelers had only gotten around the next bend in the road when they encountered a citizen walking in the opposite direction. As the travelers neared, the citizen called out, “Look at the poor donkey that you are riding. He is tired. Perhaps you should carry him.” Even though the miller thought the proposal a bit strange, he did not want to make a scene. Therefore, he quickly tied the donkeys’ front and back legs together then took a poll and placed it between the ropes. After that, the miller picked up one end of the pole, his son took up the other, and together they began to walk down the road carrying the donkey upside down between them.   

   Before long the three travelers could see the city just over the other side of a tall bridge. However, as they crossed the bridge, a crowd of city dwellers began to mockingly snicker and point their fingers at the comical sight. The donkey, which was befuddled by the strange treatment and spooked by the noise, began to kick and soon broke loose from its ropes. As the donkey fell, the boards on the bridge shattered, sending the donkey plunging into the river below. The miller hastily ran to the river bank to try to save the donkey, but it was no use. As the donkey slowly floated out of site, the miller thought to himself, “By trying to please everyone who did I really please?” 

Smart rats listen to music February 9, 2007

By Trevor Gustafson     

Many scientific experiments have been made to test the effect of music on the intellect of rodents. The outcome of these experiments has been surprising. Dr. Frances Ruscher, who is a teacher at the University of California at Irvine, has scientifically experimented on three groups of rats. One of the groups she had listen to Mozart, another group minimalist music by Philip Glass, and the third group was kept in a sound proof environment listening to absolutely nothing. Except for the music, each groups’ environment, which was all the rodents ever knew, was kept the same. The rats were tested to see how fast each group could traverse through a set of mazes. The rats that had listened to no music were tested first so that information from the other two groups could be compared to theirs. The results were phenomenal. The Mozart listening rats finished the course in half the time, while the rats that had listened to minimalist music could not complete the course at all. Because Mozart is a complex style of music and Minimalist very simple, the results of the test imply that listening to complex music may have increased the rats intelligence while simple music had the opposite effect on them. Since we know that most mammals react in nearly the same way, it is likely that humans react similarly to rodents when exposed to music. Consequently, we make the conclusion that just as listening to the right type of music made the rodents smarter, music may also affect the intellect of human beings.

An unexpected fact February 9, 2007

ByTrevor Gustafson 

     People, who were interested in the effect of music on the growth and health of plants, have for many years experimentally combined many different types of music and plants together. Their observations are unexpected and shocking. While listening to Ravi Shankar playing, plants were once documented growing + nearly horizontally while trying to reach towards the music. In 1957, a florist named Arthur Locker started exposing his plants to music. He found that his plants grew much larger and more abundantly after this unusual treatment. The first truly scientific experiment between plants and music was done in 1960. It found that plants listening to a George Gerswin song weighed 40% more than plants that didn’t listen to anything. Farmers have also experimented with this strange relationship. One Canadian farmer discovered that by exposing his crops to music by Bach, he could increase his crops size by 66%. Dorthy Ratallack, a scientist who is very interested in plants and music, found that depressing or gloomy music would cause her plants to grow away from the speakers. Even after she rotated them, the plants still tried to get away from the depressing noise.  Rattallack also tried recording two versions of the same song, one of which used percussion and the other stringed instruments.  Scientifically, she monitored the effect of the different styles of music on two separate groups of plants. What did she find? The plants listening to the stringed instruments grew towards the speakers while the plants listening to percussion instruments grew  away from the speakers. In addition to these findings, Rattalack also experimented with what affect different types of music have on the growth of plants. She found that Country and Contemporary music had little to no affect on the plants, while Jazz music would make plants grow tall, but have scrawny roots. As Dorothy Ratalack and so many others have found, it is an unexpected, yet proven fact that certain types of music really do have a tremendous impact on the growth and health of plants.