Mobile Phone vs Bible

I Stumbled across this this morning, looks like it’s been around for a few years but I’d not read it before. Very telling and very challenging:

I wonder what would happen if we treated our Bible like we treat our cell phones?

What if we carried it around in our purses or pockets?
What if we turned back to go get it if we forgot it?
What if we flipped through it several times a day?
What if we used it to receive messages?
What if we treated it like we couldn’t live without it?
What if we gave it to kids as gifts?
What if we used it as we traveled?
What if we used it in case of an emergency?
What if we upgraded it to get the latest version?

This is something to make you go, hmmm, where is my Bible? Oh, and one more thing. Unlike our cellphones, we don’t ever have to worry about our bible being disconnected because Jesus already paid the bill!

Source

Free to Think

Personally, I find it impossible from a logical perspective to accept that there is no God. That is not to say that I believe that anyone who chooses not to do so is ignorant or illogical, but from my own experience of life and study of God through the Bible I can come to no other conclusion than the existence of a good and just creator of everything.

Contrary to the currently fashionable secular view of faith, the true New Testament faith is not something made stronger by ignorance or by believing against the evidence. Faith is consistent with knowledge and a true understanding of facts and evidence that we can see around us.

I personally find it immensely frustrating that the world uses ’straw men’ arguments against the simple logic and truth of the Christian faith, setting up caricatures and twistings or misunderstandings of the truths revealed in scripture in order to undermine the message and keep people believing that faith is blind and ignorant.

Sadly many have fallen for the lie and believe that Christians are easily lead, simple minded fools at best for following the teachings of Christ. At worst we are zealous ‘fundamentalists’ who threaten the perceived freedom of our society.

John 8:44 says Satan is the father of lies, Jesus goes on in this passage to explain that the people do not believe the truth when they hear it because they are not of God. We are by our very nature, sinful (See my previous post) and so we cannot be ‘of God’ so it’s no surprise that a proportion of the world is following a lie.

Paul said in Romans 10:17 that “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ.” Only when the Holy Spirit reveals the truth of the mercy and grace of the love of God for us, through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ can anyone accept it. Once we accept that understanding given by the Holy Spirit it makes perfect sense and the lies are revealed for what they are. Only then, when the clouds of lies are lifted and our eyes spiritually open can we be truly free to think.

Why is it broken?

If God is perfect, good, just and righteous, why is the world he created and the people in it that he created in his own image so obviously broken? Why do we continue to kill and destroy each other with words and weapons? God has given us instructions on how he expects his creations to behave but whether we believe the Bible or not we sin daily against our God even when we know what we are doing is wrong in God’s eyes and sometimes even in regard to what is acceptable in our society. Why?

It all comes down to what is called our ’sinful nature’ or inherited corruption, we are all born with a rebellious and sinful nature within us, to rebel against authority (God, as our creator, being the ultimate authority). It is natural for us to sin and rebel and it is this nature that leads us to sin even when we know better.

I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.
Romans 7:18 (in context)

My wife and I have a young daughter and I can see this nature in her, from the moment she was old enough to begin to assert herself as a person she began to rebel against us. We certainly didn’t teach her to do that, in fact like most parents we try to teach her to respect and obey us but her sinful nature causes her to rebel whether she understands it or not.

I see this nature in myself; I read the bible (although not as much as I should) and even when through His word God warns me about my actions, words and thoughts I still cannot help but rebel against Him, even though I know He is right and I am wrong.

But God did not make His creation with this sinful nature and there is only one place and time that it could have begun in order to affect everyone on earth today: Back in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve fell into the temptation of Satan and they understood good and evil they and every child they would ever have, from generation to generation were left with this sinful nature which we have inherited.

Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned
Romans 5:12 (in context)

Yes we can do good, and sometimes great things for education, society, the development of civilization, science and technology, arts laws and so on but because of that sinful nature, because of the corruption inherited from Adam, as far as God is concerned (and let’s face it, it’s His opinion that counts) we can’t do anything that pleases Him.

Our sinful nature is not like that characterized by the little devil on the shoulder, always opposed by the angel on the other side, our entire being is affected by sin, thoughts and actions, feelings and motives, everything we are is bound up in sin.

Everything that we are and everything that we do condemns us before our just, holy and righteous creator God, and so we stand helpless before Him. It may sound depressing but that is the true state of man as it has been since that day in the Garden of Eden.

I’m trying to make it sound like that for a reason, the better the understanding of our position before God the more amazing this next verse (a personal favorite) sounds:

But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.
Ephesians 2:4-5 (in context)

This is the Good News of the Gospel message that while we were still lost and helpless in our sin, God sent His son, Jesus Christ, into the world to take the punishment that should be ours, and what do we have to do to be a part of this? do we need to perform some sort of ritual, or perhaps go to church every week or pray every day? Not at all.

He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved”
Acts 16:30-31 (in context)