A question has been rattling around inside my head since last Sunday’s message and following discussion. In relation to telling the difference between God’s will and your own will, this was really well illustrated by Christa’s dramatic description of her struggles over the last few years. (Similarly, I have felt completely stymied in every attempt to accomplish anything in the last year , so this is really important to me.) Her suggestion was that when you know you’re doing God’s will, you just have to keep truckin’ no matter how discouraged you may become or how hopeless things seem. This is a common concept in both Christian and secular contexts - perserverance, fighting the good fight and all of that.
So… You’ve gone through the steps - prayer and study, talking with others, examined your motives and inspired desires - and you’re confident in your role in the body of Christ. You knew it wasn’t going to be a cake-walk, but you now realize its going to take an Abraham-sized helping of faith to follow God through this.
But what if God is telling you that you shouldn’t be doing what you’re trying to do at all? What if you misinterpreted God’s will? To persevere when God is trying to accomplish something different by you - that’s just plain foolish.
So… how do you tell the difference between when what you are trying to do is so important that Satan and all of his henchmen are out to discourage you at every step, and when what you’re doing is simply your own will and not God’s?
This is an update from Ian — keep him in prayer as he looks to finish raising support (see below for more information if you feel led to help out in this regard) and prepares to leave for Asia.
>> I thought I’d give you an update on where I’m at now. I just came back from our team orientation in Vancouver. I met everyone on the team and we had some good training time. I also found out that I will be in the same city that I went to on the other two short term missions a couple of years ago. All of the missionaries in that city have left, so our team is brand new and we will be pioneering ministries on two new campuses as well as continuing with another campus. There are 8 people on my team including myself.
I will be in Ham to meet up with people next week and say goodbye. The good news is that I need 90% of my full support before they’ll let me on the plane and I already have close to two thirds. To put it in perspective so you can know what to pray for… if 9 people committed $100/mo for 11 months or if 18 people committed $50/mo for 11 months or if 36 people committed $25/mo for 11 months, then I’d be all set to go and start reaching people for Christ.
I also don’t know if it’s a possibility, but I’ll keep you posted on the upcoming vision trips. Twice a year they send one week trips of supporters and potential stinters to our city to encourage us and see what the ministry is like.
I’ll try to be there soon. If you want to reach me, 519-438-9656.
We’re still looking for people who are willing to help out with ClubsFest on Wednesday, September 8 at McMaster (find out more about ClubsFest at http://www.getchurch.org/oxygen/clubsfest.shtml ) The poster board needs to be re-done (it’s at The Vine), an information brochure needs to be produced, and volunteers are needed to man the booth from 10AM until 3PM on September 8. Talk to Luke or Rick on Sunday if you can help out!
This is quite advanced notice, but if anybody is interested in enjoying the last long weekend of the summer by going to either the zoo or the Science Centre in Toronto on Saturday, September 4, let me know — I’m leaning toward the zoo, but I’m flexible. Admission for both places is in the $15-$20 range and I can provide transportation to at least the first four people interested. Just let me know by commenting on this blog or by e-mail if you’re interested.
Here’s another interesting piece from today’s Star about the growing differences between Canadians and Americans in attitudes toward religion (it’s really quite stark the contrasts!): Minding the God Gap Among the most interesting facts in the article: only 30% of Canadians classified religion as “important”, as did nearly 60% of Americans.
Also, since he will never do this himself, Kevin started a blog which is pretty entertaining (just don’t look for any deep insights — you can’t get too deep talking about Saved by the Bell) — http://sparse.blog.com
A few people have mentioned borrowing movies from me lately so I thought I would post my collection.
There are a lot of excellent films in this group but many of them would only appeal to specific tastes. This includes next weeks bible study feature “The Seventh Seal” which as we know has been described as a film which “at first glance…..would appear insufferable” (it actually isn’t).
The link will allow you to view a brief description of the films and some have my comments in the “My Details” section. All the movies are on dvd.
Thanks Jason, great idea — I set up a PhotoBucket account for our group (login - PMC-oxygen; password - same as the contact directory password I sent you by your e-mail last week). It’s really easy, just login, select the picture you want to upload (use the “browse” button and find the picture on your computer) and hit “Submit” - the picture will appear below the submit box. Try to make your pictures as small as possible before you upload so the blog doesn’t take five years to load!
When you insert an image into the text of a new blog you are writing (use the mountain portrait icon in the editor), just use the URL provided in the box underneath the picture on the PhotoBucket site as the image URL (all the other fields can be left as their default values if you like).
By the way, those were my Tobermory pictures (note to self - stop posting blogs at 1AM when eyes are awake but brain is asleep).
Thought I’d post a couple of pictures I took when I was camping near Tobermory (at the tip of the Bruce Peninsula) a couple of weeks ago — it is always so spectacularly mind-blowing to see God’s handiwork in person! The right-hand picture is at Flowerpot Island, a definite must-see if you’re ever in the area.
FYI - if you’d like to post a picture here, send it to me and I’ll send you back the link to refer to when you’re inserting it.
Have we truly grasped the Christian message if we take a great deal of pleasure in thinking about the destruction of non-christians? The final events, and judgement are neither ours, nor for us to think about; is it too simplistic to say that ours is simply the focus on the message of salvation, and to trust God with the details.
The condemnation of the Bible Belt is what turns many people away from Chrsitianity, and who can blame them? I don’t want to be around a bunch of sadistic, trigger happy judgers either.
Our conservative –conservative is an oversimplification of a body of beliefs. Not all conservatives believe the following, but the vast majority. I apologize to other conservatives - counterparts recognize the importance of justice,but define it improperly – Indeed justice lying within the will of God, consists solely of Compassion, Mercy and forgiveness (from the human perspective; God includes judgment for himself)… That is, Justice is an act of Love.
Sorry for the tangent, one last point; I will back down from my beliefs when I find a related passage that instructs me to not forgive, but to punish… (I’m condensing a rather large point here, as I only have a few minutes left on lunch.)
The books are tripe, and only help to hinder the true kingdom.
This article appeared in the Toronto Star recently — it’s an interesting non-Christian’s perspective on the events of Revelation (we had talked about this in our small group over the last couple of months). Obviously we would all disagree with many of the arguments made in the article, but it is well-written, very “geopolitically-relevant”, and raises many issues to which we should likely have some reasonable answers.
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