Origins of the Universe

My brother in law just alerted me to a great website on the origins of the universe, creation, evolution, intelligent design, etc.--from the intelligent design perspective:

origins.org

Others I was aware of included answersingenesis.org, reasons.org, discovery.org, and probe.org. Each has a different slant, but when taken in total they present all the sides of the issue from an overall 'Christian' perspective.

Summer Class--Holy Spirit in Book of Acts, Week 1

Below are the notes from the summer class I'm teaching on the Holy Spirit in the Book of Acts, week 1. I see that in posting them, all my fancy formatting doesn't translate over into blogger....but at least you'll get the information!

Come join us!! 10 am Sundays, 'Family Room' (first room on right from north entrance).



Class: Holy Spirit in the Book of Acts
Week 1: Intro to the Holy Spirit
Format of the class: 15-40 minutes of interactive lecture; 10-30 minutes of Q/A discussion. Led by Nathan Custer and Greg Ahrens.
Introduced ourselves in first class: Nathan, Alex, Monica, Lew, Jo, David, Mrs. S., Steve, Mia, Adam.
My bias (Nathan): Christian, Wesleyan-Arminian Christian, United Methodist; biblical theology; apostolic hermeneutics. (If none of that makes any sense to you…that’s fine!)
Why this class?
1) “Christianity” basically developed into what it is today following Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension…and those first years after Jesus’ ascension are recorded in the book of Acts.
2) After Jesus’ ascension, THE deciding on whether or not someone was fully a “Christian” was whether or not they were fully connected to God by having the Holy Spirit dwell WITHIN them.
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On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: "Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. 5 For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit."
6 So when they met together, they asked him, "Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?"
7 He said to them: "It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."
Acts 1:4-8 (NIV)

1 When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. 2 Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 3 They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. 4 All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.
Acts 2:1-4 (NIV)
Had a short class discussion here where we emphasized that the power of the Holy Spirit that was promised by Jesus was said by him to be for the action of witnessing, and then when the HS came at Pentecost the gifting the HS gave the disciples was that of speaking known languages for witnessing! The Pentecost arrival of the HS fit the mission of the HS’s power told by Jesus.
9 You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
Romans 8:9 (NIV)
Note: Spirit of God, and Spirit of Christ are synonymous!
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3) SO: For us to be fully Christian, we must have the Spirit of God—the “Holy Spirit”—within us, and when that happens it leads to a “new life.” We learn about this explicitly throughout the book of acts, and learning about it can lead us into new LIFE!

Who is the Holy Spirit?

Class’s input on question, ‘what comes to mind when you hear the words HOLY SPIRIT’:
Helper, Moving, Force, Always with us, omnipresent, omniscient, perfect love, part of the Trinity active in the world, gives understanding and insight.

Notes:

HOLY—set apart; pertaining to God—ENTIRELY
SPIRIT—living, interactive existence not confined to our typical spatial and chronological dimensions
THE Holy Spirit—the Spirit of God who acts in conjunction with God en total, but in a distinctive way from the other two ‘persons’ of God.

SPIRIT—Ruach = “moving air” in Hebrew, language of the Old Testament (and remember that the New Testament writers always inherited the essence of their religious terms from their use in the Old Testament, since they were all Jewish). Thus translated in natural terms as breath or wind, and then as “Spirit” when pertaining to the supernatural.
Emanating from God en total (the “Godhead”), but then acting in a distinct way…as our own breath is a part of us one moment, then expelled from us into the world the next even though it was the same breath-stuff, so the Holy Spirit is identical God-stuff to the Godhead but is also distinct.

Old Testament to New Testament description:

Old Testament:

Genesis 1:1 and hundreds of other places in the Bible, the Hebrew word for God is “Elohim”—a plural word, always used as a singular word grammatically.

Genesis 1:2—the Spirit/Wind/Breath of God is moving over the waters. Common in OT to refer to the spirit/wind/breath of God, though was not thought to be anything beyond a manifestation of a singular God.

Genesis 2:7—God breathed into humans the breath of life, and gave them life. Therefore human life has some sort of divine spark from God’s spirit, but is not technically God’s Holy Spirit within us—as if his spirit gave us the energy to animate our complex molecules, but was not ‘God in us’ as is available now.

Spirit Charism—filling of individual with God’s spirit for particular task:
--Gen. 41:38-39, Ex. 28:3, Dt. 34:9 (including to give wisdom)
--Judges 14:6, 15:14-15 (to give military leadership, strength)
--1 Sam. 10:6, 19:24; Is. 61:1 (to give prophetic visions and words)

New Testament:

(Scripture verses above from Acts and Romans)

John 4:24—God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.

Mt. 28:18-20—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit equated by Jesus in baptism.

1 Timothy 3:16—Scripture is God-breathed (God-Spirited)

Galatians 5:22-25-- 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. – Didn’t get to this set of verses.

Various NT and OT passages—Spirit also gives gifts, abilities and power to do tasks God calls us to do.

VERY IMPORTANT:
The ‘trinity’ shows us that God in essence is RELATIONAL. And the creation narrative shows us that God’s essential position in association with us is as loving relationship—as God ‘himself’ is in a loving relationship in essence.

Thus, our ideal is loving relationship with God and with each other. In sinful present, that’s broken, and much works against that….and the Spirit helps restore it!!

Important functions of the Holy Spirit: RECONCILIATION and EMPOWERMENT

CHRISTIAN THERMODYNAMICS

I believe it was the ancient Christian leader St. Augustine who described evil as 'the absence of goodness.' That is to say, the less something is good and godly, the more it is evil and sinful. A person who focuses less and less on goodness will therefore become more and more evil and sinful.

What then is the best way to keep from falling into self-destructive behavior and habits that gradually drag our minds and actions into realms of darkness and selfishness and greed and self indulgence? The answer is to avoid the absence of goodness--which means that one will focus on being continually filled with goodness.

Can you imagine what a day would be like if we all focused on the godly, good things all day for one day, and looked at each person in as good a way as we possibly could?

I dare say that if we listen to music that promotes the goodness of God, and we watch movies that promote godly goodness, and we look at people and make ourselves think, 'regardless of how they act, they're created by God and God loves them and so do I,' etc. etc.--we'll be well on our way to being filled with such goodness that evil will naturally decrease because of our increase in God's goodness.

"God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with him while we are walking in darkness, we lie and do not do what is true; 7 but if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin." -- 1 John 1:5-7 (NRSV)

Telling a 6 yr. old about poverty

Our church participates in the national Christmas service project called "Operation Christmas Child" in which plastic shoeboxes are filled with presents for a boy or a girl who receive the box via Christian airmail.

Recently I was preparing to go shopping for the items to go in the shoebox we were going to donate, and was explaining to my shopping partner--my 6 year old son--why we were going to buy these gifts for a 6 year old boy in another country. "Well, a lot of other countries don't have the stores we have. Remember when I went to Haiti not long ago? Many of their villages don't have stores even as big as that gas station store over there." And then I tried to explain how some parents were only able to make 1/3 or 1/4 or 1/10 of the money I make, and so their children may only get 1/3 or 1/10 the number of presents he gets...including some that don't get any at all.

Then it hit me that this was a lot for a six year old to take in!
And THEN it hit me that it's a lot for the six year old to take in who doesn't get a present but knows that others do.

So, here's a little tidbit: If you ever have to explain poverty to a 6 year old, be sure to buy everything we've been putting off buying up until that point BEFORE giving the explanation. Because afterwards it's going to be pretty tough to justify a lot of those expenses! :)

Appalachia and you

I'm getting ready to go to Good Works, a ministry in Athens, Ohio to what would technically be called--for the most part--low income people in Appalachia. I was born in Appalachia, and lived the first 15 years of my life in Appalachia, so I suppose I should expect to see a lot of people I'm related to...

The funny thing is that while Appalachia has certain stereotypes--some of them good (beautiful scenery, hometown feel, wilderness) and some of them questionable (yes, I have all my teeth; no I'm not married to my sister; no, I don't drive a pickup truck)--the ministry to the poor of Appalachia is remarkably similar to the ministry to much of the rest of the nation.

Once I was on a trip from an "urban" region of Appalachia (relatively speaking) to a "rural" area of Appalachia (as in, yes some of the homes have dirt floors...really). Any outsider would say, "you idiots! There's no place to work here! There's no future life for your children! You're in poverty here...so MOVE!" Of course, there are some people in Appalachia who are making some very poor choices that are causing terrible poverty, and others who are enslaved in a system that brings about hunger. But, moving is probably not a necessary answer--and they know that, because they response to the idea usually goes something like this:

"My parents are here, my grandparents are here, my friends I've known for my whole life are here. My brother's buried over there in that cemetery. The owners of that store will let me pay for stuff a little late if I have to. The most beautiful sight in the world is on top of that ridge, at dawn, in winter with the snow in the valley. Five generations of us have survived here...and we will too."

In that they're saying, "I'm not going to play the game of life by the rules of what is deemed to be popular culture. There are things more important."

There's something noble about that.

"What I've Done" --Song i referenced 9/23

Was Jesus a pacifist?

(Just a quick post here on something I've been kicking around with a friend of mine.)

The most violent thing we have Jesus doing ON EARTH that I can think of is driving the corrupt merchants out of the temple. And in that act, he certainly was violent to an extent. On the other hand, nothing he did would have caused permanent physical damage...so it would be a long shot to try to use that to justify war or something.

I had a professor at Trevecca once say, "I'm pretty sure Jesus was a pacifist and that I should be too, but I'm not brave enough...at least not yet." (Henry Spaulding)

I resonate with that. On the one hand, I've let someone spit in my face before and others call me names without retaliating with violence...but try to hurt my kids or wife and I'll likely beat the crap out of you.

And yet, God says via the bible that vengeance is his--not ours to take. And He promises protection to those who love him. I'm not sure it's always literal, but what if it is? What if I'm afraid to be a pacifist because of things like the fear that if someone would break into my house and hurt my family I'd ideologically be obligated to not harm/kill them...when all along God may be saying, "Uh, pray about it, and I'll keep that from happening!"

I believe it was G.K. Chesterton who said that the tragedy in life was not that Christianity had been tried and found to be wanting, but that it had been left untried.

On a related note, my grandfather who still has shrapnel in his body and a missing finger from fighting in WWII (after being the kind of tough leader they make movies of) would you think be like, "Yeah, we whupped up in WWII and saved the day, just like we should today!" But he's exactly the opposite....totally against war whatsoever if it can in any possible way prevented.

Stanley Hauerwas says that Romans 13 was used by the Allies AND the Nazis (many of whom had Christian upbringings, remember, and considered themselves Christian) to kill each other; but had they used Romans 12 as their ideology they would have spent the years trying to overcome each other by doing good!

Anyway...thought I'd throw this on here and see if it brought out any wisdom from you all. Any pacifists out there who can explain how they deal with it?

Nathan