I love Christmas music. Carols, Hymns...it's all good. I love the fun Rudolph and Frosty, and the more solemn Silent Night. But the one Christmas song that I never fully understood, as a kid anyway, was O Come O Come Emmanuel. What's all this talk about "ransom" and "captive"? This song doesn't mention shepherds, wise men, Mary, Joseph, the inn, sheep...how is this a Christmas song? And then, recently, it hit me. O Come O Come Emmanuel is THE Christmas song...while other Christmas carols focus on the angels, the shepherds, the inn, the sheep, the wise men...the shoes...this one focuses on the attitude of the people. It focuses on the REASON for Christmas.
Before Jesus was born, before God came to Earth as a baby, the people of Israel were crying out for God to save them. To ransom them. To free them. While they weren't in slavery in Egypt anymore, or in Exile in Babylon...they were enslaved by the Romans..in their own city. The Romans had taken over...Caesar was king, was god. The Israelites wanted God to come, and shoe the Romans who was boss..."Come and Save us! Ransom us! Free us!". And so God did. He sent Jesus to save them. Rescue them. Redeem them. Ransom them. Unfortunately...he sent him as a baby. Jesus didn't part through the clouds, with sword ablaze, white horse galloping towards the Roman soldiers...he came as a lowly, infant child, born in a stable to an unmarried virgin. Not like he was expected to arrive.
But that's the point of Christmas isn't it? The point of Christmas was that God would lower himself...not only just to human form, but to the weakest, most vulnerable of human form...a baby. Christmas is about God hearing the cries of his people...of the poor, the outcasts, the sinners, the weak...and answering their prayers. But while the people wanted the coming of the Savior to be the end...they wanted it to happen fast..."God, Come down, rescue us, kill our enemies and then go back up to heaven so we can worship and praise you forever (or until we end up in exile again, in which case we will forget you for a while)". But that wasn't God's plan. It was to be a slow process. Instead of going all Chuck Norris on the Romans...he took more of a Ghandi approach. Instead of being born into a royal family (or skipping the birthing process altogether and just arriving as a fierce warrier), he came as a baby to a poor carpenter's family.
Christmas isn't really about the nativity at all. It's not about the shepherds, it's not about Mary and Joseph, it's not about the Angels. It's about God, hearing the cries of his people. Christmas is about God arriving, listening, caring. Christmas is God finally saying "enough is enough", and taking matters into his own hands. That is what Christmas truly is all about. It's about God's people crying, "Come Emmanuel. Rescue Us. Save Us. Ransom Us"...and God coming. Merry Christmas everyone...let's praise God that he heard our cries, felt our tears, and came to our rescue.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
God, Apathy, and the Windows 7 Phone
One of my new favourite commercials is for the new Windows 7 phone (I'd never buy the phone, but the commercial is GREAT). This is the full, minute long extended edition of that commercial...
Ok...now that you are laughing and entertained, I'm gonna put a spiritual twist to this commercial. I find that, while we can laugh at these people in the commercial who miss out on life because they are so focused on their phone, many Christians do the exact same thing with the Bible. I know right...bold. But think about it. So many Christians go around, with verses in their head, stories, themes, ideas, whatever...all fine and good...but they never live them out. They never use those verses, stories, parables, ideas, lessons. While it's not like we are walking around with a Bible in our face, running into people and forgetting about our wives and family, we do seem to have a lot of "ideas" in our head, and not a lot of "action" in our life.
For example...we read the story of the Good Samaritan, or the passage about "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat", and we feel good about ourselves. We take something from the passage, we try to see Jesus in the homeless, in the forgotten, downtrodden, outcasts, poor. But instead of helping them, we walk by, give a smile and move on. Or, we read about love and acceptance, and see how Jesus hung out with sinners, hookers, drunkards, theives...and yet we stay in our small little cliques. We judge those who are different, we ignore those who disagree with us. We fail to comfort those who are mourning. We read the stories, we get the point in our head...but we don't do anything about it.
Like the commerical...we are missing out on life. Phones are supposed to connect people, and yet the people in the commercial are more disconnected then ever. The Bible is supposed to inspire us to action, and yet we don't act. By just reading the Bible, and doing nothing with our knowledge, nothing with the words, themes, ideas, parables, lessons, we are misuing Scripture. It becomes just a book. And I'm sure, God is looking down from heaven...seeing all of his so called "followers", who claim to love him, serve him, and follow him, and yet they do nothing. They are in their own little world (I should say, We are in our own little world, cause I'm including myself in this too), missing out on opportunities to love, opportunities to serve, and opportunities to show people the love of God...and he is yelling down at us, "REALLY?"
Look up from the pages of the bible. Look outside the windows of the church. Instead of walking around with your head focused on Heaven to see if Jesus is descending, look at the ground to see who you can BE Jesus For?
Anyway...that's just my opinion. What's yours?
Ok...now that you are laughing and entertained, I'm gonna put a spiritual twist to this commercial. I find that, while we can laugh at these people in the commercial who miss out on life because they are so focused on their phone, many Christians do the exact same thing with the Bible. I know right...bold. But think about it. So many Christians go around, with verses in their head, stories, themes, ideas, whatever...all fine and good...but they never live them out. They never use those verses, stories, parables, ideas, lessons. While it's not like we are walking around with a Bible in our face, running into people and forgetting about our wives and family, we do seem to have a lot of "ideas" in our head, and not a lot of "action" in our life.
For example...we read the story of the Good Samaritan, or the passage about "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat", and we feel good about ourselves. We take something from the passage, we try to see Jesus in the homeless, in the forgotten, downtrodden, outcasts, poor. But instead of helping them, we walk by, give a smile and move on. Or, we read about love and acceptance, and see how Jesus hung out with sinners, hookers, drunkards, theives...and yet we stay in our small little cliques. We judge those who are different, we ignore those who disagree with us. We fail to comfort those who are mourning. We read the stories, we get the point in our head...but we don't do anything about it.
Like the commerical...we are missing out on life. Phones are supposed to connect people, and yet the people in the commercial are more disconnected then ever. The Bible is supposed to inspire us to action, and yet we don't act. By just reading the Bible, and doing nothing with our knowledge, nothing with the words, themes, ideas, parables, lessons, we are misuing Scripture. It becomes just a book. And I'm sure, God is looking down from heaven...seeing all of his so called "followers", who claim to love him, serve him, and follow him, and yet they do nothing. They are in their own little world (I should say, We are in our own little world, cause I'm including myself in this too), missing out on opportunities to love, opportunities to serve, and opportunities to show people the love of God...and he is yelling down at us, "REALLY?"
Look up from the pages of the bible. Look outside the windows of the church. Instead of walking around with your head focused on Heaven to see if Jesus is descending, look at the ground to see who you can BE Jesus For?
Anyway...that's just my opinion. What's yours?
Friday, November 12, 2010
Fmylife
A While ago, I bought a book called "Fmylife". Yes...the "F" stands for exactly what you think. The book is a collection of very short anecdotes about crapy things that happened to people. I'm not going to lie, it's a freakin hilarious book. To be honest, while I was reading through it at HMV, I was literally convulsing at moments, trying to contain my laughter and to not cause people to stare at me (because having a 23 year old shaking and crying tears of joy wasn't distracting at all). Now, I'm also not going to lie and say that the book is full of appropriate material that everyone can read, and is fun for the whole family. There is a lot of content that is...sketchy, to say the least. However, I am going to share some of my favourite clean stories, and perhaps edit a few of the sketchier ones. I hope it makes you laugh a little bit...and then I will finish this blog off with some spiritual relevance, I promise. So...here we go:
1) "Today, I was at work at the grocery store, and a woman pulled a cart toward me filled with chips, breads, lunch meats, and sodas. I said 'looks like your going to have a fun party', she replied 'my mother just died. This is for after the funeral'"-fmylife
2) "Today I was walking through a bookstore with my girlfriend when we passed a stand selling Girl Scout cookies. I saw a box of my favourite kind, so I pointed at them and shouted 'Yeah!'. My girlfriend looked shocked. Behind the box of cookies was a nine-year-old scout bending over with her bottom pointed at me"-fmylife
3) "Today at a rehersal, a friend poked me and said, 'my mother is in the orchestra. Guess who she is' I jokingly answered, 'the fat singer?'...it was"-fmylife
4) "Today I was at an interview for a music school. When I got my guitar out of it's case, I realized that my friends thought it would be funny to replace my real guitar with one from Guitar Hero"-fmylife
5) "Today I went to the gym to get into shape. I pulled a muscle while taking off my sweater in the locker room"-fmylife
6) "Today my anatomy teacher was putting together a skeleton model for class. A leg bone was missing, so I jokingly said 'what's the matter, lose a leg?'. Unfortunately there is nothing funy about asking that question to a guy who's had a leg amputated"-fmylife
7) "Today my crush talked to me for the first time. He told me to stop staring"-fmylife
8) "Today I fell asleep in drivers ed, and woke up in the middle of a dream, laughing. Everyone was staring at me. I found out that my teacher had just told a story about his niece who didn't wear a seatbelt and is now brain-dead"-fmylife
9) "Today, while at work, a kid of about 5 was having trouble zipping his jacket". When I reached to help him, he started screaming 'No, bad touch! bad touch' and kicked me in the knee. Everyone looked"-fmylife
10) "Today in the middle of a date, I went to rest my chin on my hand, missed, and stuck the straw from my drink straight up my nose. My nose bled all over the table. He hasn't called me since"-fmylife
11) "Today I got a Save the Date card for the wedding of a couple my husband knows. I emailed the bride back saying 'I got your S.T.D.', and hit send before I realized how that sounded"-fmylife
12) "Today my parents met my boyfriends parents for the first time...bailing us out of jail"-fmylife
13) "Today, my professor, who was born without arms, asked somebody 'Need a hand?'...there are over 300 students in the class, and I was the only one laughing"-fmylife
14) "Today I got 31% on a chinese test at school. I moved here to New Jersey from Beijing 2 months ago"-fmylife
15) "Today, in front of 20 guests, I yelled at my husband for not coming to blow out his birthday candles. It turned out that he was in the other room, quitely changing his disabled friends adult diaper"-fmylife
16) "Today for the first time every, I met someone with the same name as me. I'm 20...he's 97"-fmylife
17) "Today my boss asked me, 'Can I give you some constructive criticism?', I said sure. He said 'your work is [crap], you have no talent and i can't figure out why I hired you"-fmylife
18) "Today I found a bone in my sandwich. It was a veggie burger"-fmylife
19) "Today I walked into the kitchen and accidently broke my mothers vase. I said 'Acciden't happen', to which she replied, 'Yeah. Like your birth'"-fmylife
20) "Today I told my dad that I was going to get some beauty sleep. He said, 'see you in a decade'"-fmylife
21) "Today, at a strategy meeting, my manager displayed a flow chart of his employess. I wasn't included. Turns out I had been fired, and they forgot to tell me"-fmylife
22) "Today, while shaving, I cut myself. With the blade protector"-fmylife
23) "Today I made fun of my friend when she tripped over a curb. I said loudly, 'haha, you can't even walk'. Then I noticed the man in the wheelchair a few feet ahead of us"-fmylife
24) "Today I asked my boss for a raise. He responded by saying, 'Who the hell are you?'"-fmylife
and finally...
25) "Today I met a really attractive guy, who introduced himself as Wyan. He was really cool and sweet, and we got along pretty well. Later someone told me that his name is Ryan and that he has a speech impediment. Througout the conversation I had been referring to him as Wyan"-fmylife.
So, you are likely wondering...what is the point? Why list 25 embarrassing stories? Well, to be perfectly honest, we have all been in similar type situations. Ok...maybe not those exact type situations, but we have all done embarrasing things, humiliated ourselves and put our foot in our mouths. We have all had days that made us feel like our lives our pointless. Worthless. We have all thought that nobody could possibly have a worse life than we do. Well...it's not true. No matter how bad our lives get, or how humiliating a day we have...someone, somewhere has it worse. Life can throw curveballs. Life can be unpredictable, and devastating...but life goes on. The embarrasing situation you had the other day, will be forgotten by everyone eventually. Will you let it go? Will you move on from it? When you focus on your mistakes, on your embarrasments, you can't truly enjoy life. When you are focused so much on not humiliating yourself, you can't truly live. Life is full of embarrasing, humiliating situations. Stop dwelling on them. Life will get better. Life will go on. Enjoy life. Have fun. Your life isn't over because of one mistake, or one humiliating moment. Laugh it off and move on.
1) "Today, I was at work at the grocery store, and a woman pulled a cart toward me filled with chips, breads, lunch meats, and sodas. I said 'looks like your going to have a fun party', she replied 'my mother just died. This is for after the funeral'"-fmylife
2) "Today I was walking through a bookstore with my girlfriend when we passed a stand selling Girl Scout cookies. I saw a box of my favourite kind, so I pointed at them and shouted 'Yeah!'. My girlfriend looked shocked. Behind the box of cookies was a nine-year-old scout bending over with her bottom pointed at me"-fmylife
3) "Today at a rehersal, a friend poked me and said, 'my mother is in the orchestra. Guess who she is' I jokingly answered, 'the fat singer?'...it was"-fmylife
4) "Today I was at an interview for a music school. When I got my guitar out of it's case, I realized that my friends thought it would be funny to replace my real guitar with one from Guitar Hero"-fmylife
5) "Today I went to the gym to get into shape. I pulled a muscle while taking off my sweater in the locker room"-fmylife
6) "Today my anatomy teacher was putting together a skeleton model for class. A leg bone was missing, so I jokingly said 'what's the matter, lose a leg?'. Unfortunately there is nothing funy about asking that question to a guy who's had a leg amputated"-fmylife
7) "Today my crush talked to me for the first time. He told me to stop staring"-fmylife
8) "Today I fell asleep in drivers ed, and woke up in the middle of a dream, laughing. Everyone was staring at me. I found out that my teacher had just told a story about his niece who didn't wear a seatbelt and is now brain-dead"-fmylife
9) "Today, while at work, a kid of about 5 was having trouble zipping his jacket". When I reached to help him, he started screaming 'No, bad touch! bad touch' and kicked me in the knee. Everyone looked"-fmylife
10) "Today in the middle of a date, I went to rest my chin on my hand, missed, and stuck the straw from my drink straight up my nose. My nose bled all over the table. He hasn't called me since"-fmylife
11) "Today I got a Save the Date card for the wedding of a couple my husband knows. I emailed the bride back saying 'I got your S.T.D.', and hit send before I realized how that sounded"-fmylife
12) "Today my parents met my boyfriends parents for the first time...bailing us out of jail"-fmylife
13) "Today, my professor, who was born without arms, asked somebody 'Need a hand?'...there are over 300 students in the class, and I was the only one laughing"-fmylife
14) "Today I got 31% on a chinese test at school. I moved here to New Jersey from Beijing 2 months ago"-fmylife
15) "Today, in front of 20 guests, I yelled at my husband for not coming to blow out his birthday candles. It turned out that he was in the other room, quitely changing his disabled friends adult diaper"-fmylife
16) "Today for the first time every, I met someone with the same name as me. I'm 20...he's 97"-fmylife
17) "Today my boss asked me, 'Can I give you some constructive criticism?', I said sure. He said 'your work is [crap], you have no talent and i can't figure out why I hired you"-fmylife
18) "Today I found a bone in my sandwich. It was a veggie burger"-fmylife
19) "Today I walked into the kitchen and accidently broke my mothers vase. I said 'Acciden't happen', to which she replied, 'Yeah. Like your birth'"-fmylife
20) "Today I told my dad that I was going to get some beauty sleep. He said, 'see you in a decade'"-fmylife
21) "Today, at a strategy meeting, my manager displayed a flow chart of his employess. I wasn't included. Turns out I had been fired, and they forgot to tell me"-fmylife
22) "Today, while shaving, I cut myself. With the blade protector"-fmylife
23) "Today I made fun of my friend when she tripped over a curb. I said loudly, 'haha, you can't even walk'. Then I noticed the man in the wheelchair a few feet ahead of us"-fmylife
24) "Today I asked my boss for a raise. He responded by saying, 'Who the hell are you?'"-fmylife
and finally...
25) "Today I met a really attractive guy, who introduced himself as Wyan. He was really cool and sweet, and we got along pretty well. Later someone told me that his name is Ryan and that he has a speech impediment. Througout the conversation I had been referring to him as Wyan"-fmylife.
So, you are likely wondering...what is the point? Why list 25 embarrassing stories? Well, to be perfectly honest, we have all been in similar type situations. Ok...maybe not those exact type situations, but we have all done embarrasing things, humiliated ourselves and put our foot in our mouths. We have all had days that made us feel like our lives our pointless. Worthless. We have all thought that nobody could possibly have a worse life than we do. Well...it's not true. No matter how bad our lives get, or how humiliating a day we have...someone, somewhere has it worse. Life can throw curveballs. Life can be unpredictable, and devastating...but life goes on. The embarrasing situation you had the other day, will be forgotten by everyone eventually. Will you let it go? Will you move on from it? When you focus on your mistakes, on your embarrasments, you can't truly enjoy life. When you are focused so much on not humiliating yourself, you can't truly live. Life is full of embarrasing, humiliating situations. Stop dwelling on them. Life will get better. Life will go on. Enjoy life. Have fun. Your life isn't over because of one mistake, or one humiliating moment. Laugh it off and move on.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Lest We Forget...until tomorrow.
Today is Remembrance Day (Or Veteran's Day, if I happen to have any American readers). It's a day set aside to remember the men and women who served, and currently serve in the Armed Forces, protecting us, and earning our Freedom. More specifically, we attempt to remember those whose lives have been lost while fighting for our rights and freedoms. The thousands, upon thousands of young men and women who have fallen in the line of duty. Many people attend Remembrance Day Ceremonies, wear poppies, visit veterans, fly flags at half mast. There are numerous ways to show our love and appreciation for those who fought, and are fighting overseas.
Remembrance. It's important to remember. Lest We Forget! For many people, today is the only day they really think about the soldiers, the wars, and the lives lost. To some, Saving Private Ryan is just an entertaining movie, and never really think about the real lives, the real people who died, in horrible, gruesome ways. As Christians, we are called to remember. Unfortunately, like many who only think of veterans during Remembrance Day, many Christians only think of Jesus death and sacrifice during Easter, or communion (even though many people only see it as a meal, and don't take much meaning out of it). Why is it that we only remember one day out of the year? Why do we only praise God one day a week? Why is Christmas the only time we think about Jesus being born? Now, I'm not saying that we should eliminate these special holidays and just treat every day like a holiday...but I am saying that we should be constantly remembering. Every day should be an act of worship. Every meal we eat, we should be thinking about the Last Supper, and Jesus sacrifice. Every time we see a veteran, we should remember the cost of our freedom. Whenever we look at our flag, we should think of all those young men and women who fought for us. Who gave the ultimate sacrifice so that we may live in freedom.
Too often, we think about the veterans during Remebrance Day, think about Christ's birth at Christmas, his resurrection at Easter...and then once the day passes we don't think about it again for a year. Lest We Forget doesn't mean that we only remember once a year...it means that we should NEVER forget. Even for a day. Remember the sacrifice. Remember the love. And with remembering, look ahead. Look to your future, your present...and think about how you will honour God with your life? How will you honour the veterans with your actions? It's more than just wearing a poppy for a day or two, or putting a Jesus fish on your car. Live out your gratitude. Live out your appreciation, your love. If those thousands of soldiers didn't fight for our freedom and pay the price for it...our live would be drastically different. If Jesus decided that we weren't worth it. If he fought back, and refused to go to the cross...think of how meaningless our lives would be? Let's Remember. Shall we never forget!
Remembrance. It's important to remember. Lest We Forget! For many people, today is the only day they really think about the soldiers, the wars, and the lives lost. To some, Saving Private Ryan is just an entertaining movie, and never really think about the real lives, the real people who died, in horrible, gruesome ways. As Christians, we are called to remember. Unfortunately, like many who only think of veterans during Remembrance Day, many Christians only think of Jesus death and sacrifice during Easter, or communion (even though many people only see it as a meal, and don't take much meaning out of it). Why is it that we only remember one day out of the year? Why do we only praise God one day a week? Why is Christmas the only time we think about Jesus being born? Now, I'm not saying that we should eliminate these special holidays and just treat every day like a holiday...but I am saying that we should be constantly remembering. Every day should be an act of worship. Every meal we eat, we should be thinking about the Last Supper, and Jesus sacrifice. Every time we see a veteran, we should remember the cost of our freedom. Whenever we look at our flag, we should think of all those young men and women who fought for us. Who gave the ultimate sacrifice so that we may live in freedom.
Too often, we think about the veterans during Remebrance Day, think about Christ's birth at Christmas, his resurrection at Easter...and then once the day passes we don't think about it again for a year. Lest We Forget doesn't mean that we only remember once a year...it means that we should NEVER forget. Even for a day. Remember the sacrifice. Remember the love. And with remembering, look ahead. Look to your future, your present...and think about how you will honour God with your life? How will you honour the veterans with your actions? It's more than just wearing a poppy for a day or two, or putting a Jesus fish on your car. Live out your gratitude. Live out your appreciation, your love. If those thousands of soldiers didn't fight for our freedom and pay the price for it...our live would be drastically different. If Jesus decided that we weren't worth it. If he fought back, and refused to go to the cross...think of how meaningless our lives would be? Let's Remember. Shall we never forget!
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Let the Idiots be Silenced
There seems to be a growing epidemic amongst Christians...we seem to have become stupid. Ok, perhaps not stupid, but we seem to have lost our ability to properly discuss our faith and beliefs. Now, I could generalize this and say it is predominatly a certain denomination, or gender, or particular country of origin...but I will not do that, as it seems to target everyone.
Now, in the Bible we are told to always have an answer ready...but it seems that many Christians interpret that as "give an answer for everything...whether you know the answer or not". We read that we are to have an answer ready, and see it as we can't say "I don't know"...as if not knowing the answer is a sin. Let me tell you people...it's OK to not know the answer. It's ok to say "pass", or "That's a good question, I'll have to look it up for you", or simply "I don't Know". What is happening instead, is that Christians are making themselves, and therefore other Christians, look stupid, unintelligent and crazy.
Here are a few very unintelligent Christian responses that I found on Christian chat rooms and forums. Buckle up...it's a sad scary ride.
"Evolution can't have happened because we aren't born monkeys"
"It's funny how non-creationsits will blame a God they don't believe in, but they won't let evolution take the blame for amputees not being able to heal"
"For those who think the bible has 'fiction' it it...what parts"
"Would you rather have a not smart Christian running the country, or a smart Atheist. I'd rather have a not smart Christian."
"Light can't be '11 million light years away'...if it were, I wouldn't be able to see it. I'm 20, not 11 million years old"
"Man is made in the image of God the Father. That s the primary reason why man has a penis" (????...wow)
"By not hating gays you are disobeying God and deserve to go to hell"
"The first 5 books aren't [jewish], Moses was a Christian"
"Does planting trees help bring people to Christ? It's like going to a starving country to feed the hungry. It doesn't do them any good to live another day, if they are doomed to Hell anyway"
Ok..I'm going to stop now because it is just getting sad and ridiculous. I know that most Christians aren't at that level of stupidity and intolerance...but as I drive down the road and see church signs like "Experts built the Titanic and amateurs built the Ark", I can't help but wonder how non-Christians interpret that. So here is the challenge, and the point of this blog. Do your research...THINK before your speak. Don't just give a comment for no reason, or give an answer you haven't fully thought about. Want to know why people are atheists, or have a negative view on Christians? It's because Christians tend to be more vocal about their beliefs (which isn't necessarily a bad thing), and they say things that are offensive, stupid, and even unbiblical. If Christians actually acted intelligent, and researched, thought about and prepared their answers...then maybe we'd get more respect. It's too bad that while there are many, MANY smart, intelligent Christians out there who do a lot to further the kingdom of God, there a many stupid Christians who open their mouths and ruin all the good that other Christians are doing. As the chidlish phrase states, "If you don't have anything good to say, don't say anything at all"...this applies to stupid, unintelligent, poorly thought out responses and questions too.
Now, in the Bible we are told to always have an answer ready...but it seems that many Christians interpret that as "give an answer for everything...whether you know the answer or not". We read that we are to have an answer ready, and see it as we can't say "I don't know"...as if not knowing the answer is a sin. Let me tell you people...it's OK to not know the answer. It's ok to say "pass", or "That's a good question, I'll have to look it up for you", or simply "I don't Know". What is happening instead, is that Christians are making themselves, and therefore other Christians, look stupid, unintelligent and crazy.
Here are a few very unintelligent Christian responses that I found on Christian chat rooms and forums. Buckle up...it's a sad scary ride.
"Evolution can't have happened because we aren't born monkeys"
"It's funny how non-creationsits will blame a God they don't believe in, but they won't let evolution take the blame for amputees not being able to heal"
"For those who think the bible has 'fiction' it it...what parts"
"Would you rather have a not smart Christian running the country, or a smart Atheist. I'd rather have a not smart Christian."
"Light can't be '11 million light years away'...if it were, I wouldn't be able to see it. I'm 20, not 11 million years old"
"Man is made in the image of God the Father. That s the primary reason why man has a penis" (????...wow)
"By not hating gays you are disobeying God and deserve to go to hell"
"The first 5 books aren't [jewish], Moses was a Christian"
"Does planting trees help bring people to Christ? It's like going to a starving country to feed the hungry. It doesn't do them any good to live another day, if they are doomed to Hell anyway"
Ok..I'm going to stop now because it is just getting sad and ridiculous. I know that most Christians aren't at that level of stupidity and intolerance...but as I drive down the road and see church signs like "Experts built the Titanic and amateurs built the Ark", I can't help but wonder how non-Christians interpret that. So here is the challenge, and the point of this blog. Do your research...THINK before your speak. Don't just give a comment for no reason, or give an answer you haven't fully thought about. Want to know why people are atheists, or have a negative view on Christians? It's because Christians tend to be more vocal about their beliefs (which isn't necessarily a bad thing), and they say things that are offensive, stupid, and even unbiblical. If Christians actually acted intelligent, and researched, thought about and prepared their answers...then maybe we'd get more respect. It's too bad that while there are many, MANY smart, intelligent Christians out there who do a lot to further the kingdom of God, there a many stupid Christians who open their mouths and ruin all the good that other Christians are doing. As the chidlish phrase states, "If you don't have anything good to say, don't say anything at all"...this applies to stupid, unintelligent, poorly thought out responses and questions too.
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