Everything

I was at my sister's church in Leeds on Sunday (http://www.mosaic-church.org.uk/) which is a fantastic vibrant and growing church. They have what looks like a great conference coming up called 'Everything' and here's a description of it...

'The Earth is the Lord’s and everything in it' - Psalm 24:1
"The gist of the conference is that Everything - not just the ‘sacred’ elements of culture, but everything - belongs to God. And as His people, we are called to get involved and have a positive influence on society."

I think that the prayer 'Your Kingdom come, your will be done' demands our whole lives; that we will seek God in all things-our work, our sleep, our play, our social, our pain, our suffering, our joy, essentially just where ever we are, whatever's happening, whatever we're doing.

"Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labour in the Lord is not in vain"-1 Corinthians 15:58b

The Hound of Heaven.

(Talking about the poem 'Hound of Heaven' by Francis Thompson)

'The name is strange. It startles one at first. It is so bold, so new, so fearless. It does not attract, rather the reverse. But when one reads the poem this strangeness disappears. The meaning is understood. As the hound follows the hare, never ceasing in its running, ever drawing nearer in the chase, with unhurrying and imperturbed pace, so does God follow the fleeing soul by His Divine grace. And though in sin or in human love, away from God it seeks to hide itself, Divine grace follows after, unwearyingly follows ever after, till the soul feels its pressure forcing it to turn to Him alone in that never ending pursuit.'
—The Neumann Press Book of Verse, 1988

Jesus. The Hound of Heaven.

1 Corinthians

It has been a long time since I last blogged! So as I sit on the train back to London from Aberdeen I thought it would be good to get a few thoughts down on 'paper'.

Over the past week i've been going through First Corinthians using the ESV study bible (very good resource!).

Here are just a few things i've learnt:

1. Unity

Paul seemed to plead for the church at Corinth to stay unified and humble through a love for Chirst and each other. In Chapter 1 verse 15 Paul asks the question "Is Christ divided?" and so requests his followers not to be.

In chapter 3 we find that there are problems with certain people saying that they followed Apollos, and others saying they followed Paul. In response to this Paul says "what after all is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe - as the LORD has assigned each to his task".

To me this speaks of unity in diversity: that we're not all called to do the same thing, clearly Paul and Apollos had different tasks (see 3:6-9), but instead we are called to be unified above all in giving Christ glory.

2. To some The Cross is foolishness

In chapter 1:18 Paul says that "the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God"

I was reminded of that this week after bumping into a friend who has no religious background at all. He came to a free lunch and talk that our University's Christian Union was hosting last week, and straight away he brought up the lunch and told me that all us Christians are mental with all this Jesus stuff! But amazingly he said it was great and wants to find out more.

3. Love. Judgement. Mercy

Love is everywhere in 1 Corinthians. Whether Paul is talking about worship in the church, food laws, marriage, Spiritual gifts, unity, idols; it all leads back to the question 'does this show our love for Christ and for others?'

Love. Love. Love.

But where does God's judgement come into love? Often I find it difficult to see how discipline or judgement can go hand in hand with love and mercy. In chapter 11 I think we find a verse that can really help us in our understanding of this:

11:32: "But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world"

WOW! For me this is huge a verse! Right here loud and clear we find that the reason why, as Christians, we are disciplined by the Lord is because of his great love for us so that we will not be condemned! We receive judegment but it is in essence a great sign of mercy.

The ESV study bible's footnote to this verse says that "When suffering alerts a Christian to the presence of sin and leads to repentance, it functions as an act of both disciplinary judgment and mercy".

To me this drastically changes a lot, for if I realise that everything that God does is out of love then it demands a trusting of him in all things.

So those are just a few messy thoughts, which are definitely not 100% water tight...please weigh all this up for yourself!

And now I get to enjoy three weeks off uni for easter! :-D

The purpose of the Lord will stand!

So it's my 20th birthday today!!! Yes! I'm no longer a teenager and have entered the 20s-30s age bracket! Haha what a joke!

As I look ahead I am incredibly excited as to what God will be doing as we faithfully seek him.

I am reminded of Proverbs 19:21
"Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand"

I wholeheartedly believe that his Kingdom is being extended in wonderful ways and will continue to do so in ways which will blow our minds! But I don't want to forget that we can make all the plans we like, however unless they are made in Christ and for Christ they are completely worthless.

But isn't this that idiot?!

In Luke 4 we find that Jesus is back in Nazareth, where he had grown up, but now teaching and receiving praise from people (v.15). One Sabbath he was in the synagogue and he read publicly from Isaiah then boldly stated "Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing" (v.21)

This passage from Isaiah that Jesus read out is ACTUALLY AMAZING! It speaks of great hope with freedom for prisoners, recovery of sight for the blind and the oppressed being released! Wow! And Jesus is central to this because it is fulfilled in him!!!

The people of Nazareth knew Jesus' seemingly insignificant background and they compared those memories they had to what he was doing now...and they were confused. Luke 4:22-"..."isn't this Joseph's son?" they asked". I think it can be a great comfort to us. Because the same thing can happen to us.

As we go about living Christ-centred lives people may start saying things like "wait a minute, isn't this that guy who used to be so selfish?", "isn't this that girl who went off the rails?", "isn't that the guy who was depressed?", "isn't this the woman who neglected her family?"...because they now see something new.

I guess the main difference behind Luke 4:22 and people asking that question about us is that our past is full of sin, but Jesus' wasn't, so we can't claim any glory for ourselves as we're "saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone" (Martin Luther)

As we are transformed more into the likeness of Christ we may find that people start saying "isn't this 'x' who... but now he/she is..." but with joy we can respond "yes, that's what happens in the Kingdom of God!"

Faith, Love and Christ

So I was reading Paul's first letter to the Thessalonians about a month ago and have found that a couple of verses have really stuck with me...

1 Thessalonians 1:2-3-"We always thank God for all of you, mentioning you in our prayers. We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labour prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ"

I took three things from this that the Thessalonians were doing well:

They were

1. Working by faith
2. Labouring in love
3. Enduring because of Christ

What a great way to live!

Aberdeen

Hi all!

I'm now living and studying in Scotland doing a Bachelor of Divinity (theology) at Aberdeen university.

The course itself has been amazing so far. I have 12 hours of lectures and 2 hours of tutorials each week so it's quite a lot of work! Here's a breakdown of what i'll be studying up till Christmas:

1. Level One New Testament Greek- This has been great, quite a steep learning curve though!
2. Introducing the Hebrew Bible- This is basically an introduction to the Old Testament. Very eye opening!
3. Jesus of Nazareth Life, Teaching, context- Some good critical scholarly study on Jesus and writings about him.
4. Basics of World Religions- I'm really enjoying this module as it's blowing away some previous assumptions i've had.
5. The Rise of Christianity- We're looking at the first 4 centuries of Christianity and it's impact. Again, really interesting stuff!

And uni life in general is a lot of fun.

AND IT REALLY IS MASSIVELY WET UP HERE!