God Spot

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God Spot
This Christian Resource Blog has been created by a group of friends from around the world. Our purpose is to provide links to useful resources, some commentary on topical or doctrinal issues, a place where anyone can come with questions and a means whereby we can share our faith. And above all, to grow and encourage each other. As Christians, we believe we bear God's image in this world, and seek to glorify God's name in this endeavour. Any Christian who wants to join with us is very welcome!

Thursday, July 31, 2003

Being Good Without God!

Interesting article by Pamela Bone in Saturday's Melbourne Age "To be good, you don't always need God".

Here are just a few "grabs":

This is a secular society. We must find human reasons for our decisions.

On the sense of community Pamela finds in the Red Cross Blood Bank:
- I look at those around me, arms hooked up to bottles filling with blood, and think that these are all decent people.

- Our intuitive responses, or gut reactions (or the yuck factor, as some describe it) are not a reliable guide to morality, when it is considered that the "yuck factor" once meant white people in America could not share a bus seat with a black person.

- The Bible has some very strong things to say about wealth, yet there was the Reverend Gordon Moyes, a staunch opponent of gay ministers, bragging on ABC television that his Wesley Mission has an income of $150 million a year, and threatening to "turn off the money tap" to the national church body.

- Why are there not as many debates within the churches about the possession of wealth as there are about sexuality?

- To people who don't believe in God, quoting the Bible is as useful as talking to a brick wall. Close to a third of Australians don't accept that God exists. If formal religious observance is any guide, it is likely that far more do not believe strongly that God exists.

- It is not enough to say an act is wrong because God forbids it, unless the wrongness can also be justified on moral grounds.

Some challenging stuff for us Christians!

# posted by geoff @ 5:27 pm

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Disunited Uniting Church

Hard on the heels of the decision by the Uniting Church in Australia to affirm support of gay and lesbian clergy, there is much disquiet and talk of the various factions splitting off.

The Rev. Gordon Moyes ("I am committed to remain within the Uniting Church and change it") writes about how this situation has come about.

He tells that the Uniting Church is an agglomeration formed from Methodists, Presbyterians and Congregationalists some 27 years ago. And he's scathing about the leadership.

How do theologically liberal clergy, out of touch with the members in the pews, gain control of church structures? Why are views expressed by the hierarchy so often out of tune with their members? Dr Jim Heidinger, of the United Methodist Church, says the hierarchy "often have difficulties in the parish because of their views, and then they begin searching for power . . . Conservative evangelicals, on the other hand, tend to stay out of the political side of church life and concentrate on spreading the gospel. The result is a liberal takeover of church authority."

My Christian training leads me to understand that there are many accepted practices in today's society that are not OK under orthodox Christian doctrine. Perhaps the church cannot expect to force its standards on society, but neither should society expect the church to conform to its mores.

The "Uniting" Church needs to comprehend that to be a Christian is to be counter-cultural.

# posted by geoff @ 5:24 pm

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Sunday, July 27, 2003

Who Is a Christian?

What defines a Christian? Born again, certainly (Jesus speaking to Nicodemus, in Jn3 - "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God").

Follower of Christ? (term often used to emphasise a commitment, rather than the sometimes glib "I'm a Christian" which can mean no more than "not muslim, hindu, whatever"). Certainly the disciples were given this tag when Jesus was physically with them and able to be followed in the literal sense. But the term wasn't applied to them after Pentecost.

Because by then they had received a life-changing revelation (Thomas to Jesus: "my Lord and my God!") and a life-changing gift (of the Holy Spirit; Comforter, Helper, Counsellor). Rather than having Jesus with them physically, they now knew the incredible privilege of having God's presence in them, never to leave them! Poor description, "followers", for this new relationship, God's holy and eternal life now within them, their very own, as they yielded control to Him.

So we would define a Christian as someone who has entered into this living relationship with God (Jesus), someone spiritually alive through receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit come to dwell within them. Someone who has appropriated the life of Christ as their own, and who accesses the power of the Holy Spirit by yielding control of their own wills to God's will.

Someone who lives by the example of Christ when he said (Jn14:10) "Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works", and again in Jn5:19 "Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of his own accord, but only what he sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise". The example of living in utter dependency on the strength and wisdom of our Father God in every situation.

So in every problem that is too big for us (as well as those within our human capabilities!) the Christian is someone who, in a practical sense, trusts God to work, and in the process thanks Him for His sufficiency, strength and wisdom.

Thus fulfilling the purpose of creation - that we bear God's image, living in a way that shows something of the holy character of God to others.

# posted by geoff @ 1:10 pm

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