The Family of Christ

As Christmas draws near, I would hope family would draw near, too. Not just Moms and Dads and sisters and brothers, but the intimate family of Christ. In America, we celebrate freedoms other countries may seldom, if at all, have the opportunity to share: speech, religious expression, property rights. But in life, we have the freedom to live in the fullness of Christ's open arms.

But am I fully open to Christ? We? The church? But of course! - for the most part.

It is the other part of Christianity - indeed, we all can be the "other part" when all feels inside out - that makes non-believers shake their heads and laugh or scoff at our convictions. Who are you to judge our values? they ask. I heard about the crusades. I heard about the Scriptural basis for slavery.

Now, this is no entry on biblical interpretion: it's an interpretation of the Christian lens, and I say it's quite dirty, or at the very least, convoluted. It's an ugly word, but those who don't know Christ are quick to point the convolusion out to us and others (Golden Compass debate, anyone?).

Check out my podcast below for some Scriptural encouragement, because we have cause to be uneasy, unsatisfied, and yet fearless all at once . . . just pause the playlist a bit to listen in. :)

finalpodcast1.mp3 [right click the link at left to open audio seperately, or click below to begin the audio right away]

TRT: 3:00 with music bookends (2:30 original audio)

Today's musical accompaniment by the Christian-esque a cappella jazz group, m-pact.

God bless, everyone. May your heart be warm, and your spirit light.

-PD

Links for Thought

[right click this post's title to begin the podcast in a seperate window]

"It is after you have realised that there is a real Moral Law, and a Power behind the law, and that you have broken that law and put yourself wrong with that power - it is after all this, and not a moment sooner, that Christianity begins to talk..." ~ C.S. Lewis, MERE CHRISTIANITY, p. 38-39

Hey everyone, nice to have you visit. :)

Here are a couple links for you to check out while you're listening in on my first podcast.

"America's 'New Atheists'"

"I Don't Believe It: 'Atheist Golden Compass'"

I haven't yet found a freely accessible online version of C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity, but hopefully you can hear me well enough. I know the quality's rather rough (no, I don't have a lisp or w'isp), but I hope to learn how to clean it up via better software, better hardware, and an all-around better understanding of podcasting technique. ;)

The podcast itself is taking some time to get on here, so please be patient. I expect to have it up in the next hour or 2 (Wednesday night). Thanks. -PD

When You're Caught in the Middle

Have you ever wondered at how the weather can affect your mood? Your day?

I have, and on mornings like today - clear, breezy and crispy cold - I often contemplate and even marvel at how one day rain may uplift me, and another day bog me down; how one day the sun may be the last thing I want to see, and on others, well, it doesn't really matter - the weather doesn't hold so much sway over my feelings. It's an amazing thing, and it reminds me of the smallness I am, and the big-ness that God is. ;)

Seriously: who am I, and who are we, to exert our free will over God's? I didn't include the subject of free will in my original set of questions, but perhaps I'll dig into it later.

In the mean time, please enjoy the playlist I've added this week. While you're at it, feel free to involve yourself in a couple new polls, as well. :)

On that note (haha, pun...anyway), it's equally amazing to me how music can also affect our moods, thoughts, feelings. We're often indifferent to its effects - maybe we're busy, or don't care - but other times, we truly get affected by what we're hearing, even feeling, even loving or hating it. One of the most humbling and awe-inspiring realizations I've experienced in the past few years is how, in all my finite ability, God will take whatever I shoot straight from my heart, whether it's real music or the harmony or dischord of my life, and consume it. Life is more than the whims of music and the weather: it's about worshipping the Father in all the rhythms, syncopations, harmonies and crescendoes of our days on Earth.

Don't you know that we are all living lives as the apples of God's eye, and that our ins and outs should glorify Him through it all? That He longs for us to worship our Creator with every blink of our precious eyes?

Amazing.

and Interesting.

Skimming the Surface

Here's my beautiful (tres jolie!) wife and I on the right about an hour or so following our wedding in Hawaii, almost 3 1/2 years ago now. Great picture. :)

~ ~ ~

Time for some questions, and I raise these hot button-esque issues as questions because questions have a way of stirring up how people truly, deeply feel about things. They won't all be answered at once (or will they?) but they're bound to incite something . . . ;)

So, I ask you as a Christian believer,

*Is the act of burning music you bought, so that someone else may also listen in (be it a mix, a whole album, a single track)...OK?

*Do young children go to heaven?

*Is the act of eating meat - any kind of meat - in a country where much healthier alternatives exist (regardless of price) OK?

*Should women hold "official" pastoral positions?

*Can homosexuals be "born again"?

*To what extent does the "greater good" trump "fundamental" human rights?

*Is it OK to support a political figure in the U.S. who will help employ the unemployed, yet kill the unborn?

These questions skim the surface of deeper ones, but even for these, I'd love to have answers in clear, precise terms, and without a shred of confusion. Oh, how I'd love that, and yet I'm well aware such answers likely don't exist, at least not in the way our feeble minds could understand. But how many of you know the burden of joy that Christians carry to live freely and fully in His Spirit, without fear of muddle and haze? How many of us actually live in that type of state of being?

I sure don't, but my spirit burns for it. I know I'm not the only one. And you...

. . . what do you think?

Heartbeat Seven-Hundred and Twenty Million...

Hi there - welcome to my beat. My heart for you to read.

Before you dive in, allow me to introduce my wife, Katy and I via this lovely recent picture of us getting ready for an 80s party. I call it, "Gamer Geek Hooks Up with Dance Aerobics Queen." :)

I will most likely include pictures of us and our family throughout my postings; video, too, eventually.

_____

These days, I hear quite a bit about poorly constructed consumer products, like these Aqua Dots, and that's putting it lightly. That, and utterly raw videos like this one from Iraq show that things are amuck in the world these days.

Nothing new. But neither is the Gospel, and people who either give their lives for it, or give their lives against it.

On that note, however, I must use this first post to just throw something out there, ready to be torched, tossed, tassled and/or mangled by whoever sees fit:

Is it godly for Christian churches to fight one another?

Honestly now, put yourself in a hypothetical nonbeliever's shoes, and ask me a very real question on your [hypothetical] mind: "why should I join the church when they can't agree on so many things?"

(But wait, more questions bombard you...)

"Why should I join a religion that's killed thousands in the past several decades in the name of God's Manifest Destiny, be it North America 300 years ago or the Middle East 1000 years ago?"

"Why should I join a religion with like 20 different translations of your Bible that I read only borrows most of its beginnings from other ancient religions' books? Not every man can pay for Bible college to learn EVERYTHING about your Bible."

"And hey, why should I join when so many of YOU turn away? When you can't even agree as much as Muslims can agree or Mormons can agree?"

"Why should I waste all the pleasure I'm feeling right now that, quite frankly, I've never seen you enjoy - ever? Always so burdened."

"Freedom? What freedom from sin are you talking about? I'm already free from guilt."

...

Whoa there, well now... are "Christians" prepared to answer these questions?

Am I?

Am I prepared to thrust into the limelight the issue of Christ's body fighting one another over things ranging from worship music to immoral cartoons to acceptance of homosexuality?

I am.

Christianity has been used to justify mass killings, slavery, and a host of other crazy things. I'm not blogging about my side here, not yet. Here, I'm blogging about the journey. -PD