02 January 2024

Jesus wants us Christians to be fruity.

Yes, I know what “fruity” tends to mean in our culture. No, I don’t care. I’m taking the word back. Fruity fruity fruity.

Fruit is a metaphor we see all over the New Testament for behavior. The way Christ Jesus describes it, if you’re a good tree, you produce good fruit, and a rotten tree produces bad fruit. I’ll quote him:

Luke 6.43-45 NRSVue
43 “No good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit; 44 for each tree is known by its own fruit. For people do not gather figs from thorns, nor do they pick grapes from a bramble bush. 45 The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of evil treasure produces evil, for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.”

His apostle Paul didn’t care to even call bad behavior “fruit,” preferring to call ’em “works of the flesh.” Ga 5.19 But the scriptures’ general idea is there’s good fruit and bad. People are fruity in one way or the other.

And if we’re truly following Jesus, we should see the good stuff. Right?

John 15.1-8 NRSVue
1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. 2 He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. 3 You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. 4 Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. 5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. 6 Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. 7 If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples.”

In the quote above, it sounds like it’s possible to produce no fruit, good or bad. Which isn’t better. Jesus tells another story about a fruitless tree:

Luke 13.6-9 NRSVue
6 Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. 7 So he said to the man working the vineyard, ‘See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?’ 8 He replied, ‘Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, well and good, but if not, you can cut it down.’ ”

Those who produce no fruit—nothing God can use, anyway—are getting disposed of. “Gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned,” is how Jesus put it. Jn 15.6 Being fruitless is functionally the same as producing bad fruit. God wants fruit!

So if we truly follow Jesus, we oughta be super fruity. Our lifestyles should be filled with christlike behavior. Filled with proof of God’s influence on our lives: We should share his character traits, which Paul called “fruit of the Spirit.” Ga 5.22

And yeah, to some degree we should also see some supernatural stuff. Like miracles, prophecy, healing, and so forth, ’cause God’s kingdom isn’t all about philosophy and talk, but God’s power. 1Co 4.19 Stuff happens when God’s among us. But when he’s not—’cause we won’t include him and never bother to follow him—stuff doesn’t happen, and fruit isn’t visible.

So when a person claims to be Christian, claims to follow Jesus, yet their lifestyle is no different than any pagan who has no relationship with God at all—worse, if they’re jerks, or downright evil, and try to justify their dark behavior and beliefs with Christian-sounding excuses—we’re dealing with hypocrites at best, antichrists at worst. Fakes either way.

01 January 2024

Religious. Not “spiritual.”

Happy new year, happy 8th day of Christmas, and happy Feast of the Circumcision (’cause if Jesus was circumcised on the eighth day, that’d be today, right?). At the beginning of each year I figure it’s a good idea to remind readers of the point of TXAB, i.e. the Christ Almighty Blog. And remind myself too: I’ve seen many a blog which began as one thing, evolved into another, and it wasn’t an improvement.

This blog is about following Jesus the Nazarene, our God-anointed king and Messiah, or Christ. The first of his followers became known as Χριστιανούς/Hristianús, “Christ-followers,” or Christians, because that’s what we’re meant to do: We follow Jesus. We teach what he taught, believe what he tells us, do as he says, and grow good fruit.

Except some Christians don’t follow Jesus. Yet claim the title anyway.

You see them everywhere in my homeland of the United States. We claim to be Christian, but we’re not Christ-followers; we’re fans. We really like him! We claim to love him—or at least love him as we’ve re-imagined him, usually to suit our prejudices, politics, and all the sins we’re hoping to get away with. We surround ourselves with other like-minded hypocrites who claim they know Jesus and really don’t, and thereby become Christianist. As revealed by the fact all their fruit is “fleshly.”

There are so many of these misbehaving “Christians,” it’s no wonder various Christians insist, “No, don’t call me Christian; I’m a Christ-follower. Call me that.” They want it very clear they’re legitimately, honestly trying to follow Jesus. They’re not just in it because “Jesus” hates what they hate, and justifies their various hatreds.

And the Christianists claim they’re totally following Jesus too! (Certainly they’ll claim it whenever somebody does something they consider sinful.) But y’know, whenever you drop an authentic God-encounter on ’em, either they immediately recognize their errors and repent… or they lose their minds in horror and offense, and insist this has to be some kind of devilish trick. Yep, given the opportunity they’ll commit straight-up blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, which is why God doesn’t drop that on them as often as he could; why push ’em into sin? But we needn’t even bring up their near-blasphemies. Fleshly works prove ’em as frauds quite effectively.

Well. Once we quit following the crowd and follow Jesus whithersoever he leads, we call this being religious.

26 December 2023

St. Stephen, and true martyrdom.

You may remember Στέφανος/Stéfanos “Stephen” from Acts 6-7. He’s not in the bible for very long, but he makes a big impact, ’cause he’s the first Christian to get killed for Jesus. Or martyred, as we put it, although properly martyrdom really only means giving one’s testimony. And hopefully not getting lynched for it.

Stephen’s feast day is actually today—26 December, the second day of Christmas. It’s the day good king Wenceslas looked down, if you know the Christmas carol; maybe you do. We have no idea whether Stephen literally died in December, much less whether it’s the 26th (or 27th, in eastern churches); it’s just where tradition happened to stick it. In some countries it’s an official holiday.

If you’ve read Acts, you know how he comes up. If not, I’ll recap.

In the ancient Hebrew culture, tithes weren’t money, but food. Every year you took 10 percent of your firstfruits and celebrated with it, Dt 14.22-27 and every third year you gave it to the needy. Dt 14.28-29 Apparently the first Christians took on this duty of distributing tithes to the needy. But they were accused of favoring Aramaic-speaking Christians over Greek-speaking ones, Ac 6.1 so the Twelve had the church elect seven Greek-speakers to make sure the Greek-speakers were served properly. Ac 6.2-3 Stephen was first in this list, and Acts’ author Luke pointedly called him full of faith and the Holy Spirit, Ac 6.5 full of God’s grace and power. Ac 6.8 Definitely a standout.

The first church still only consisted of Jews. Christianity was a Judean religion—the obvious difference between Christians and Pharisees being we believe Jesus is Messiah, and they believed Messiah hadn’t yet come. Otherwise the first Christians still went to temple and synagogue. It was in synagogue where Stephen got into trouble: The people of his synagogue dragged him before the Judean senate to accuse him of slandering Moses, temple, and the LORD. Custom made slandering Moses and the temple serious, but slandering the LORD coulda got you the death penalty… if the Romans hadn’t forbidden the Judeans from enacting it. But as you know from Jesus’s case, they could certainly get the Romans to execute you for them. So Stephen was hauled before the senate to defend himself.

Unlike Jesus, who totally admitted he’s Messiah, Stephen defended himself. His defense was a bible lesson: He retold the history of Israel, up to the construction of the temple. Ac 7.2-47 Then he pointed out God doesn’t live in a building, of all the silly things. Ac 7.48-50 Oh, by the way, the senate was a bunch of Law-breakers who killed Christ. Ac 7.51-53

More than one person has pointed out it’s almost like Stephen was trying to get himself killed. Me, I figure he was young and overzealous and naïve, and had adopted the American myth (centuries before we Americans adopted it) that if you’re on God’s side, no harm will ever befall you. You can bad-mouth your foes, and God’s hedge of protection will magically defend you when they turn round and try to punch you in the head. You can leap from tall buildings, and angels will catch you. You know, like Satan tried to tempt Jesus with. Mt 4.5-7

And that’s not at all how things turned out.

Stephen’s martyrdom.

Seeing a vision of Jesus at God’s side, and utterly tone-deaf to how he’d enraged the senate, Stephen shared this vision. Ac 7.54-56 But shouting and plugging their ears (yep, exactly like a little kid who does this and yells, “Nah nah nah can’t hear you!”) the senators rushed him, dragged him out of the chamber, dragged him out of the city, and illegally stoned him to death. Ac 7.57-58

The Romans had made it illegal for anyone but Romans to enact the death penalty, remember? That’s why the senate had to go to Pontius Pilate to get Jesus executed. Jn 18.28-32 But lynch mobs don’t care about law. Likely there was later hell to pay with the Romans, but Luke never got into that.

In a stoning, the practice was to drop the victim off a cliff—which would kill you—then drop heavy stones down on the body. If falling didn’t kill you, the stones would finish the job. It’s not like movies depict it, where people just throw fist-size rocks at you till one of ’em finally cracks your skull.

Seems the fall didn’t kill Stephen, because Luke recorded his last words: “Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” Ac 7.60 KJV Christians tend to self-righteously figure Stephen was in the right, so this was an act of grand forgiveness on his part. Me, I figure Stephen realized some of his own culpability in getting himself killed.

Either way he died, and Stephen’s death triggered the first serious persecution of Christians. It drove most of them out of Jerusalem, where the first church was headquartered. They began to spread Jesus wherever they went—throughout the Roman Empire and beyond. Plus it brought Saul of Tarsus into the story as a persecutor—though after Jesus got hold of him and repurposed him into an apostle, we better know him by his Greek name Παῦλος/Pávlos, “Paul.”

To persecutors’ annoyance, they began to discover how killing Christians didn’t stop us from spreading. “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church,” was a famous statement of second-century church father Tertullian of Carthage. Getting killed for Jesus makes heroes of us. People admire heroes.

Stephen’s death was a big deal because Stephen was a big deal. He “did great wonders and miracles among the people.” Ac 6.8 KJV People knew him as a strong, dedicated Christian. His death made an impact because people knew his character.

Contrast this to how people presume martyrdom works. They figure the big deal, the huge impact, comes from making that dying confession; of claiming to trust Jesus right before some gun nut shoots you, or bravely defying the antichrists who threaten to torture the skin off you. Stephen wasn’t any such person. He laid down his life for Christ Jesus a long time before his martyrdom.

’Cause dying for Jesus requires us to live for Jesus. The life makes the witness. The death only draws attention to it.

Bad martyrdoms.

A dying or defiant declaration is the easy way out. You can actually go your whole life long without following Jesus whatsoever… but because you confess him on your deathbed, you imagine this’ll gain you sainthood.

And Christians with this kind of rotten, cheap-grace attitude are largely the reason we have rubbish martyrs throughout Christian history. There are loads of irreligious, may-as-well-be-pagan, lousy Christians who didn’t live for Jesus whatsoever, who assumed (as Christians still do) when we “die for him” it’s like a billion karmic points, and makes up for all our evil. Hey, since we gave our lives for the cause, it should count towards heaven, right?

True, getting killed for any cause—even a wrongheaded or evil cause, as we see with suicide bombers—means certain people are gonna see you as heroes. But don’t assume martyrdom automatically makes a Christian righteous. It doesn’t in the least. Loads of Christian martyrs didn’t die for Jesus so much as die due to their own ignorance, stubbornness, arrogance, and stupidity. Some of ’em were even mentally ill.

We actually see some of this in certain church fathers. Some of ’em pursued death for Jesus’s sake. Sought out persecutors. Did nothing to stop pagans from killing them. Sometimes ’cause they decided a quick death was far better than being sold into slavery, which was the more common punishment. Or—when they were old and gonna die anyway—they figured it was best to go out in a blaze of glory for Jesus. In some cases the Holy Spirit legitimately forewarned ’em they weren’t gonna survive their arrest, so they made peace with the idea and stepped into it. But ordinarily? Those who desire martyrdom have a screw loose.

The words μαρτυρέω/martyréo and μάρτυς/mártys are Greek for “witness.” Your martyrdom isn’t significant because you died for Jesus. It’s because before your death you lived for him.

Look at Stephen: He testified he knew Jesus, saw Jesus, and recognized Jesus as an important influence in his life. What made Stephen’s death relevant was how his short life reflected this relationship. Now if you aren’t known in life for having anything to do with Jesus—if in fact you’re a rotten bastard, and were hoping a glorious death in his name redeems you—it doesn’t; it won’t. People may not recognize hypocritical martyrs for their hypocrisy, but God certainly does. Means nothing to him.

Yep, it’s a mockery of martyrdom, just like the suicide bombers who think blowing themselves up in God’s name will make up for a lifetime of sin, and get them into heaven.

And we don’t even earn heaven! Even Islam, which those ignorant suicide bombers think they’re dying for, teaches this: We’re only saved because God is gracious. You want heaven? He’ll give you heaven, free. You don’t have to die for it; Jesus already did that!

Too many Christians figure we can be jerks and our powerful testimony makes up for it. Really, it doesn’t work that way at all. Anybody remember Samson ben Manoah as a great man of God? Nope; we only remember him for having long hair, for being strong and violent, and for being horny and stupid. You want history to remember you as dumbass who died because your girlfriend nagged you into exposing your biggest weakness? ’Cause that’s Samson’s testimony now; not his trust in God. He had it, but we seldom to never talk about it.

Another phenomenon I’ve seen is when Christians unexpectedly lose a loved one—a kid, a parent, a good friend, whatever—and try to convert the loved one’s death into a martyrdom. The kid got murdered, so the parents begin to claim (sometimes with evidence, sometimes with none whatsoever) the murderer was only out to kill Christians, and their kid died “standing up for Jesus.” Or a Christian’s on vacation, dies in a traffic accident, and because she’s a Christian in a foreign land somehow this gets bent into “she was on the mission field” somehow, and died “in the field.” As happens every time someone dies, all good deeds get eulogized, all sins get forgotten, and they’re made to sound as saintly as possible. True, deaths can be tragic, but swapping real people for fake versions and mourning that? People grieve and seek comfort all sorts of ways, but lies and delusion is hardly a healthy method.

Well. You don’t have to be killed for Jesus in order to be a martyr. Remember, the word means “witness.” Live for Jesus. Share your testimonies. Demonstrate his work and teachings in your life. And if our lives for Jesus happen to irritate others for no good reason, and get us killed, that’s a proper martyrdom.

Working people up till they kill you in a fit of rage? Arguably Stephen wasn’t a proper martyr either. But he’s our first, and he was otherwise a good guy, so he at least merits a day on the calendar.

11 December 2023

John the baptist, the second coming of Elijah.

John 1.19-28.

In the Gospel of Luke, he started the Jesus story with the time an angel appears to Zechariah the Levite to tell him he’ll have a son named John; and this John grows up to be John the baptist. As a result a lot of Christmas stories likewise start with Zechariah.

More of these stories leapfrog Zechariah though. Instead they start with Jesus’s mom, Mary, or Jesus’s dad, Joseph. Or they leapfrog that too, and describe his parents just getting into Bethlehem as Mary’s water breaks, and because nobody would take them in, Mary had to climb into a manger and squeeze out Jesus into it. What’d you think “born in a manger” literally means? And no, that’s not in the bible anywhere. Luke said he was laid in a manger, Lk 2.7 after Mary gave birth. Read a bible, people. But I digress.

I’m not leapfrogging Zechariah, but I am starting with John the baptist… and starting with a conversation John had with the Judeans some decades later, when these people wanted to know exactly who John thought he was. For that, we switch gospels to John, and look at this part here:

John 1.19-28 KWL
19 And this is John’s testimony,
when the Judeans of Jerusalem send priests and Levites out to him
so they could ask him, “Who are you?”
20 John is in agreement with them,
and does not resist them,
and agrees with them: “I’m not Messiah.”
21 They ask John, “So… what, are you Elijah?”
He says, “I’m not.”
“Are you the Prophet?”
He answered, “No.”
22 So they say, “Who are you?—
so we can give an answer to those who sent us.
What do you say about yourself?”
23 John is saying, “I’m
‘a voice crying out in the wilderness:
Straighten the Master’s path!’ Is 40.3
like the prophet Isaiah said.”
 
24 Those who’d been sent were Pharisees,
25 and questioned John, and told him,
“So why do you baptize,
if you’re not Messiah nor Elijah nor the Prophet?”
26 John answers them, saying, “I baptize in water.
In your midst, one has stood among you.
You’ve not known him.
27 [He is] the one coming after me,
[who has got in front of me].
I’m not worthy to loose his sandal strap.”
28 These events happen in Bethany-beyond-the-Jordan,
where John is baptizing.

Now y’might notice the three people John said he’s not:

  • Messiah.
  • Elijah.
  • The Prophet.

These three are major figures in the Pharisee End Times Timeline.

Back then, same as now, people figured the End was coming, and might actually be upon us. And since John was getting a lot of attention, the Pharisees wanted to know whether John considered himself one of these End Times guys. They might’ve had their doubts. But John immediately silenced those doubts by saying nope, he’s none of those guys. He’s just a voice in the wilderness, like Isaiah described, telling people to get ready ’cause the Master is coming.

And no, this “voice in the wilderness” is not a specific prophecy about John the baptist. It’s just a verse John borrowed to describe what he was up to. Because anybody who speaks up for God in a lawless, fruitless, godless culture is a voice in the wilderness. Any Christian can be such a voice. Many Christians have been.

Likewise anyone who tells people to get ready for Jesus’s second coming—especially to a culture who’s more interested in looking like they follow God instead of bearing actual good fruit—is a similar voice in a wild, undeveloped, untended land. Wouldn’t hurt to have more of them.

04 December 2023

Scriptures for advent.

Each advent season I focus on scriptures which are related to advent topics. Namely Jesus’s first coming, and his second. So expect to see some such articles… but if you can’t wait that long, here’s some stuff I’ve written already.

Nativity stories.

Jesus’s genealogy, in Matthew. Mt 1.1-17 In which Jesus’s messianic credentials are established.
One heck of a birth announcement. Lk 1.5-25 Gabriel’s announcement to the father of John the baptist.
How Mary became Jesus’s mother. Lk 1.26-38 What sort of person God selected as his mother.
Mary’s visit to Elizabeth. Lk 1.39-56 When Jesus’s mother and John’s mother both prophesied about his coming.
The birth of John the baptist. Lk 1.57-80 And his father’s prophecy about just what sort of man he’d be.
How Joseph became Jesus’s father. Mt 1.18-25 Not foster father; adoptive father. God commissioned Joseph to raise his Son.
Joseph, father of Jesus, prophet. Mt 1.18-21 God didn’t just choose anyone to raise his son; he chose someone who actively listened to him.
Christ the Savior is born. Lk 2.1-7 The political circumstances at the time Jesus was born in Bethlehem.
The sheep-herders’ vision of the angels. Lk 2.8-20 Jesus came to save everyone. Here, some of the everyone hear the good news.
The prophets who recognized Jesus. Lk 2.21-40 In temple, two prophets confirm who Jesus is to his parents.
The magi show up. Mt 2.1-3 How Zoroastrian priests used astrology to find Jesus. (And no, this doesn’t mean we‘re to do that.)
Pinpointing Messiah’s birthplace. Mt 2.3-6 Why on earth did the priests tell their murderous king where Messiah would be born?

Messianic prophecies. (Or not.)

The first prophecy of a savior. Ge 3.14-15 After humanity messed up the universe, God indicated he has a plan to fix it.
The star coming out of Jacob. Nu 24.17 Centuries before Israel had a king, Balám predicted one.
The prophet like Moses. Dt 18.15-19. Moses spoke of prophets in general, but this particularly applies to Jesus.
The heir to David’s throne. 2Sa 7.1-17 The LORD told David his throne would last forever. In Jesus, it does.
Not allowed to rot. Ps 16.10 Jesus wasn’t in the grave long enough to rot… which resembles a line in a psalm.
Messiah and Melchizedek. Ps 110.4 How God’s chosen king is like this obscure ancient gentile king.
Jesus, our Immanuel. Is 7.14 How Jesus is like a prophecy about an oddly-named little boy.
The Son who was given us. Is 9.6-7 As disaster drew near to 8th-century BC Israel, Isaiah foretold a Messiah who’d set everything right.
One who brings justice to the gentiles. Is 42.1-4, Mt 12.14-20 A passage Jesus fulfilled—which is about Israel, but Jesus actually does it.
Plucking Jesus’s beard. Or not. Is 50.6 In stories of Jesus’s passion, we regularly hear of people tearing out his beard. It’s not in the gospels; it’s in Isaiah—and he’s speaking of himself.
Our suffering servant. Is 53 ’Cause usually people try to conquer the world by defeating others, not by suffering.
Rachel weeping for her children. Jr 31.15-17 The destruction of Ramáh is a lot like when Herod massacred Bethlehem’s children.
The Son of Man. Da 7.13-14 Jesus’s favorite description of himself comes from a Danielic vision.
“Out of Egypt I called my Son.” Ho 11.1 How fulfillment isn’t the same as a prediction coming to pass.
Christ is born in Bethlehem. Mc 5.1-4 Why the scholars figured Messiah came from that little town.
Is there a prophecy of Jesus’s hometown? Mt 2.23 No; it’s wordplay. But wordplay can be a type of fulfillment.

On the first advent.

When the fullness of time came, God sent his Son. Ga 4.1-5 God had good reason for delaying the first coming till that time.
The Carmen Christi: When Jesus made himself nothing. Pp 2.5-11 An early hymn about how God became human.
The ikon of the invisible God. Cl 1.15-20 Y’know how the LORD forbade graven images? It’s because he reserved that for himself.
Foreknown before the world was founded. 1Pe 1.17-21 The coming of Christ Jesus was always the plan. Not the backup plan.
The living word. Whom the apostles have seen. 1Jn 1.1-4 These guys weren’t writing hypothetically about God; they knew Jesus personally.

On the second advent.

The Son of Man’s returning. And everyone will see it. Mt 24.23-28 It won’t be any secret rapture; it won’t happen quitely in some obscure corner of the world; it won’t be something only Christians can see.
Jesus describes his second coming. Mk 13.24-27 After Jesus describes the great tribulation, he talks about his return.
When is Jesus returning? Mk 13.32-37 Jesus didn’t say. So watch out for his return.
The Five Stupid Teenagers Story. Mt 25.1-15 Don’t get tricked into missing the second coming.
The Lambs and Kids Story. Mt 25.31-46 Those who are headed for the kingdom are already acting as if they’re in it.
The Talents Story. Mt 25.13-30 What’re we doing with our king’s investments in our lives?
The Wheat and Darnel Story. Mt 13.24-30, 13.36-43 Till the second coming, we gotta put up with the weeds.
When Jesus got raptured. Ac 1.6-11 What goes up must come down.
Apostasy before the second coming. 2Th 2.1-12 Before Jesus returns, there’ll be a lawbreaker running amok.
Set your hearts for Jesus’s return. Jm 5.7-8 The End takes place on Jesus’s timetable, not ours.
No, seriously: When’s Jesus returning? He’s taking forever! 2Pe 3.1-9 I know; it’s been 20 centuries. Don’t give up hope.

There’s a nice pile of reading material there. More to come.

27 November 2023

Happy holidays!

In the United States it’s the holiday season. As soon as Halloween is over, out come the Christmas sales, and people start putting mint in everything. You know what we’re ramping up towards.

Javascript isn’t working this Christmas!

Some elf overdid it on the sugar.

I get why the holidays bug people. It’s the commercialism. The merchandising. The obligatory traditions which hold no more meaning for you. The mandatory functions which aren’t any fun, like the Christmas pageants where you gotta watch kids and earnest church members, who have no business singing in public, charitably permitted to nonetheless sing in public. Or the naked, unadulterated greed which sucks the soul out of this time of year.

It’s why I advise Christians to redirect our attention to Advent, the four weeks before Jesus’s nativity. Eastern churches start it even earlier, 40 days before Christmas, and make a fast of it, like Lent. Which you could do, if you’re into fasting; I’m not. But Advent’s purpose isn’t to deprive ourselves so Christmas seems way better by comparison. Nor is it to ramp up the pressure to make ready for a super-blowout Christmas Day. Properly it’s the time to set our eyes on Jesus. He came once before… and he’s coming back again.

21 November 2023

#Blessed.

I have certain people whom I follow on social media, who love love love the hashtag #blessed. They have a nice meal, or get a nice view of the sunset, so they post photos of it on Instagram, tagged #blessed. They find a sweet parking spot in front of their building, so they xeet about it and tag it #blessed. The kids achieve something at school, or make ’em a craft, or otherwise give ’em a fun day instead of screaming their head off because Dad won’t give ’em Froot Loops for dinner; it’s on Facebook, tagged #blessed.

Every time they feel blessed, they gotta post and tag it. Even for little minor stupid stuff. “Drove to work; nothing but green lights all the way! #blessed

I know what brought this on for one of ’em… ’cause she said so. A few months ago her pastor challenged the people of her church to notice all the blessings God sent their way. He blesses us a lot, y’know. And a lot of us first-worlders are mighty big ingrates about it. We presume a smooth and easy life is the way things naturally oughta go. As if our ancestors didn’t struggle mighty hard (and take advantage of lot of other, weaker people) so we descendants could enjoy peace and prosperity and comfort. Anyway, the pastor told ’em to be mindful of their blessings. So she’s trying. She looks for them. No surprise, they’re everywhere. And she’s trying to be grateful to God for them.

Thing is, some months ago she took her husband to this really fancy restaurant for his birthday. She posted a photo on Instagram wearing a nice dress, with a nice plate of shrimp in front of her, nice wine, nice view of the ocean behind her, and the tag #blessed. (I’ll just point out her husband, whose day and life they were celebrating, isn’t even in the photo. Likely he took it.)

Okay: God didn’t grant her this experience. Her husband didn’t surprise her with it. She planned it; she paid for it. I hope she could afford it, and doesn’t have to pay off credit cards for the next several months, but even so: Is this a blessing?

Some would say yes, others no. One could argue the blessing comes from being able to have such experiences: She has a job which can fund these activities, grant the free time, and a kind husband whose life she’d like to celebrate. Although one doesn’t have to celebrate it in that particular way. Nor post a selfie on Instagram.

I can speculate about her motives, but for pagans it’s way more obvious: They’re totally showing off. “Lookit how #blessed I am.” They get to eat the fanciest food, hang out with the coolest people, smoke the finest weed, enjoy the priciest hotels. They’ll even take selfies and tag ’em #blessed even though there’s nothing in them but themselves—because they’re showing off their “blessing” of being attractive. It’s not about gratitude; it’s about ostentatious wealth.

Since pagans have a deficient relationship with God (as even Christians will when we get irreligious, or take God and our salvation for granted, but mostly I’m talking about their distorted beliefs about God), when they tag themselves #blessed, it’s not any acknowledgement of the Father of lights who grants us every good and perfect gift. Jm 1.17 Most of the time they’re thanking the universe—the impersonal cosmos, which they imagine is granting ’em good karma in exchange for… what, all the good vibes they put out there? Assuming they even put any good vibes out there other than happy Instagram photos.

Are these people blessed? Did God grant ’em these blessings? Or did they really just bless themselves?

17 November 2023

Trusting God… versus trusting doctrine.

I’ve posted before about the “doctrines of grace,” as Calvinists call ’em—the things they believe about God and how he saves us. The doctrine they focus on most is God’s sovereignty, which they believe is so absolute, it overrides everything else: Everything in the universe happens because God decreed it.

Not merely allowed it to happen, even though he could totally intervene if he wants, ’cause he’s almighty and unlimited. Determined it would happen. Everything happens because God has a singular plan for the universe, meticulously decided what’d happen and what wouldn’t, and it’s playing out right now. It’s all part of the plan. Trust the plan. Trust God.

Calvinists call this “the doctrine of sovereignty”—doctrine being one of Christianity’s formal fixed beliefs. It’s something they insist Christians must believe. Not should believe; not can believe, ’cause it’s optional. To them, it’s not. You must believe it, if you call yourself Christian. If you don’t—if in fact you teach otherwise—you’ve gone wrong. You’re heretic. Or worse, you’re not even Christian.

So since I dare to say the “doctrine of sovereignty” is fatalistic rubbish which comes more from Platonism than the scriptures, certain Calvinists are convinced I’m heretic. Or, again, not even Christian.

One of ’em put it to me thisaway recently: “I trust God. You don’t.”

No, you trust your doctrine. Which isn’t God. Although you might not recognize the difference. There is one, y’know.

14 November 2023

The word became flesh.

John 1.14-18.

Historically we Christians have had the darnedest time translating and explaining this passage. While it’s written in really simple Greek, it’s deep. It’s profound. It tells us the word of the LORD, the Son of the Father, God of God, God from the Father’s womb (usually translated “bosom” like the KJV, because human fathers don’t have wombs, and any language which gives God feminine qualities tends to creep out certain preachers), the one-who-comes-after-me who’s really the one-who-came-before-me, grace and truth personified, the visible image of the invisible God Cl 1.15became flesh.

Flesh. Meat. Blood and bone and muscle and tissue and nerves and fluids. An animal. Yet God.

People still find this idea alarming. Even blasphemous. I keep coming across pagans who insist God cannot be mortal. God can’t bleed. God can’t die. God can’t suffer from the same limitations as humans; he’s gotta be mightier, if not almighty, or he’s not really God. Or no longer God; he got banished from heaven like Thor from Asgard in his first movie, and lost his powers till he gets ’em back with good karma. (Wait, didn’t Satan get banished from heaven? Meh; nevermind.)

It’s why heresies keep cropping up to claim Jesus isn’t really flesh. He only appeared to be human, but peel off his human mask (eww) and you’ll find a God under it. He only looked like meat and bone, but he’s really an immortal spirit. He only looked real and physical, but he’s really a mass hallucination which confused the whole world, or at least his parents, siblings, those 12 guys who kept following him around, the Romans who killed him, and the senators who put him in a tomb. He only looked like a man, but was a superman, demigod, alien, hybrid, or new superior species. You know, the usual new-agey bulls--t.

But nope, he’s human. Fully, permanently human. And God.

John 1.14-18 KWL
14 The word becomes flesh and encamps with us,
and we get a good look at his significance—
significance like we’d see in the only begotten son of a father,
full of grace and truth.
15 John witnesses about the word,
and has called out, saying,
“This is the one of whom I say,
The one coming after me has got in front of me,’
because he’s before me.”
16 For all of us receive things out of the word’s fullness.
Grace after grace:
17 The Law, which Moses gave;
grace and truth, which Christ Jesus comes to be.
18 Nobody’s ever seen God.
The only Son, God who’s in the Father’s womb
this one explains God.

13 November 2023

Once we accept the light.

John 1.9-13.

The apostle John described Jesus as the light of life, and says in 1.9 that he’s coming into the world. Not everybody accepts him—even his own people, the Israelis, don’t—but in today’s passage he states those who do accept him, Israelis included, become God’s children.

John 1.9-13 KWL
9 The actual light, who lights up every person,
is coming into the world.
10 He’s in the world, and the world comes to be through him,
and the world doesn’t know him.
11 He comes to his own people,
and his own people don’t accept him.
12 Whichever of them do accept him,
he gives to them, to those who believe in his name,
the power to become God’s children.
13 These people aren’t children by blood,
nor by carnal desire, nor by a man’s desire,
but are begotten by God.

Which was a mind-blowing idea for Pharisees of the first century, who figured they already were God’s children. They figured God had made them his children by befriending Abraham, rescuing Israel from Egypt, giving them his Law, shepherding them through history… Israelis still think they’re God’s children just because they defied the odds and established the state of Israel 75 years ago.

But nope; John states it here pretty clearly. Everybody has the potential to become God’s children; Jews and gentiles alike. But only those who trust the light—trust Jesus, in case you forgot who this “light” metaphor represents—are granted the power to truly become God’s children.

Because we’re not automatically his children just because we’re human. That’s a common idea which plenty of pagans will insist upon: God’s the creator and we’re the creation, so God’s our father and we’re his daughters and sons. Automatically. We automatically have a relationship with him; we’ll automatically go to heaven because of it. Even if we spend our entire lives wanting nothing to do with him, refusing to believe in him, worshiping any and every other god there is, inventing our own gods for fun and profit, even deliberately defying him and being as evil as we can just to show off our autonomy. Pagans might make an exception for truly evil people… but then again they might not, because they believe so very strongly that God’ll save everybody, regardless.

Nope. God wants to save everybody, 1Ti 2.4 but like John the apostle said, it’s whichever of us who do accept the light—again Jesus.

And lemme reiterate: Light, in this passage, means Jesus. Yes, elsewhere in the bible light means other things. Like truth and wisdom. And yes, Jesus is truth, Jn 14.6 and Jesus is wisdom. 1Co 1.24 But don’t mix the metaphors. In accepting the light, we accept Jesus.

Yes, we oughta accept truth and wisdom too, ’cause there are way too many brain-dead Christians out there who believe all the dirty lies and stupid beliefs their favorite preachers and pundits tell them, and won’t even practice basic discernment because they think they’re saved by orthodoxy, not God’s grace. They think they’re saved by trusting all the proper beliefs about Jesus, instead of trusting Jesus. They think all that other stuff is the light because they’ve mixed their metaphors. And y’notice, in so doing, they stop trusting Jesus, and trust their own wisdom, and made-up “truths,” instead. You can tell by their fruits; they get bad because they lose sight of whom they’re meant to be following. That’d be Jesus.

Not for nothing does John point out Jesus’s own people didn’t accept him. Because they figured they had truth and wisdom already; because they figured they were God’s children already. Christians today tend to get the very same attitude. We think, like first-century Judeans, we have the light; we know so much, and we said the sinner’s prayer and were baptized, and we’ve memorized tons of bible verses and Christian pop songs, and “once saved always saved.” We trust all that crap—’cause without Jesus, it’s all crap. We leave the Sermon on the Mount undone, because we trust that crap instead of Jesus.

Pretty dark stuff.