Our lives are divided in many different areas: family, work, religious, education, recreation, etc. But how do we keep each one separate, and should we keep them separate? Men have a great luxury here. Men’s brains are able to focus on just one thing at a time and completely shut out everything else. Women can’t do that. Women tend to have everything running all at the same time. This is one of the reasons why they are able to know exactly where everything is, while knowing what each kid is doing often before they do it, all while having dinner planned, appointments in order, and never losing track. Both skills complement each other and are necessary. One is not better than the other, just different, and both are needed. See Joe McGee’s talk for more details (and some laughs).
This difference is why men are suited for war. Men are able to completely shut out everything going on and singularly focus on the task at hand. Then when the battle is over, after they take some time to settle down, they can shut out the battle, so their family doesn’t have to face the horrors they had to. But send Mom on vacation while Dad runs the house? We all know how that tends to turn out; not too well.
There are times where we need to compartmentalize life. Our spouses and our children do not need to know the ins and outs of work and how rough things are. They don’t need to fight those battles. But at the same time, there is a need for venting and seeking advise about how things are going on. Many people are so overworked that they have to bring their work home with them, and then the kids who want to spend time with Dad cannot because he has to work. As a teacher, as long as I am on campus, I don’t take my work home unless I have to, and that includes lesson planning.
However, the compartmentalization of things can be done wrongly too, keeping certain areas of life out from other areas when they should be included. Many of you know I teach about worldviews and I address five key questions regarding origins, purpose, identify, destination, and authority. Whether we want to realize it or not, our worldview colors how we see the world in every area of life. Our worldview is reflected in the religion we hold (or lack thereof). Yet many people have made it a prerogative to separate their religious life from all other aspects.
In the documentary “Patterns of Evidence: Exodus,” there were two Jewish scholars whom every year celebrated Passover with their family, as though they were there getting ready to leave Egypt. Yet in their academic life, they denied it actually happened. I wondered, “How can you do that?” Their answer: the celebration is their tradition, but the academic life is the facts. I’m still confused on how they think that makes sense, but I see similar things all the time. Scientists who claim to be Christians go to church, but when they leave church and go to the lab, their faith stays at church. It’s also seen in politics where the person’s “faith” says one thing, but their political views and approaches says something else. They’ve compartmentalized these things, and they are very quick to lash out at those who bring their faith into every area where it should be.
This comes, at least in part, from the false notion of the 1st Amendment, the “separation of church and state,” which by no means, hint, or fashion remotely showcases how it has been interpreted. This 1st Amendment only means that government has to keep out of the church and cannot formally declare one or the other to be “official.” That means Congress itself cannot pass laws banning churches or formally endorsing churches. But it does NOT mean that those in Congress cannot practice their religion in Congress. It’s a one-way door: keep the state out of the church. It does not say get the church out of the state.
As Christians, our faith is meant to cover every area of our life, from family to business, to education, to military and politics, to science, to entertainment, to everything. God doesn’t ask for your Sunday morning only and everything else is up to you. He asks for your everything. That means everything. You cannot be a Christian and only think about God on Sunday during church. Stephen Manley said to be a Christian means to be “obsessed” with Jesus, where He so dominates your life that He is all you think about. This should even be to the point where Jesus determines when you get up, when you go to bed, how you make your business deals, and so on. That is what it means to be a Christian. You are a follower of Christ, and Christ dictates what you do, how you do it, and when. (Please note, I’m not calling for perfection, but if you are saved, you will be heading this direction.)
Paul goes on to say “In everything by prayer…” Not some things. Not most things. In everything by prayer. A. W. Tozer has a very good sermon about this. He explains that we tend to do things by money, prestige, public relation, compromise, committees, and basically anything but prayer, when prayer gets it done faster and far more efficiently. Our faith should be in all areas of our life.
But that said, let’s also keep those areas out of our faith life. Our education should not influence our faith; our faith should influence our education. Our politics should not influence our faith; our faith should influence our politics. Our family should not dictate our faith; our faith should dictate our family. Same with careers, entertainment, everything. While we can keep all our main areas of our lives separate from each other, our faith should never be put into a box and only brought out for talking about our faith. Jesus is the supreme authority over all the universe. All things are under His feet. And we think we can let Him out just for our church services and Bible study groups? He doesn’t share the stage with us, nor does He take partial ownership over our lives. It’s all or none with Christ. We need to learn that. So, while we can separate our business from our family, our politics from our education, we must not and should never separate our faith in Jesus Christ from any area of our lives.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
In 2016-2017, I had the opportunity to participate in the Missional Leadership Initiative put on by the Churches of God, General Conference. During each of the six weekend retreats, author and speaker Reggie McNeal would teach us about living lives on God’s mission. One concept that has remained with me from those training times is Reggie’s idea of living our lives in different silos.
This idea comes from his book Missional Renaissance: Changing the Scorecard for the Church. Church culture can either be considered as a “member culture” or a “missionary culture.” A member culture is when people join a particular congregation, and that congregation is their focus. A missionary culture is when the focus is on the Church as a whole, not just one particular congregation of it. Reggie writes:
“The member culture views society as a series of silos: politics, business, education, arts, media, technology, health care, social sector, and so forth. All of them are separate. The church culture has developed its own silo - a parallel culture in many respects - complete with schools, businesses, educational institutions, health care facilities, sports clubs, travel associations, and social agencies. Positioned as one silo among others, the church works to recruit people and resources from the other domains, vying for attention and money. In this way, the church effectively becomes a desalinization plant, sucking salt out of the community. Or a salt dome. Its activities serve effectively to take a lamp and put it under a bushel. The member-culture church violates the intent of God for his people by focusing the efforts on the spiritual silo” (Missional Renaissance, page 54).
This concept applies not only to the Church but also to our lives as individuals. Take a good, honest look at your own life. Do you have different silos? Perhaps you have a school silo, a family time silo, and a friends silo. Perhaps you have a job silo and a family/kids silo. Perhaps you even have different silos for people you know - these are my work friends, these are my church friends, these are the friends I go out to parties with, etc. My guess is that those different silos rarely, if ever, interact with each other.
As Reggie said, we in America learn the concept of silo-ing our lives from the very culture around us. We like to categorize things into nice, neat silos. This is the world of education, this is the world of politics, this is the world of religious things, this is the world of science, etc. We like to keep things in their categories so they don’t intermingle with one another, and everything is neatly placed in its own silo where we can contain it.
But is this concept Biblical? Last week, I wrote on many Scriptural passages that show us what Jesus said about discipleship. Go read that post and the linked passages if you haven’t already.
From what Jesus said, we see that discipleship should not be something reserved for church, or when we're feeling particularly spiritual. Rather, it should encompass our entire lives – work, home, school, church, and wherever else we go. It should become a way of life and not merely one part of our lives. We should not have a silo labeled “Jesus” in our lives. He is not meant to encompass only part of our lives, but we are called to surrender our entire lives to Him. That means EVERY silo, not just one.
But again, should we even have silos in our lives? Look at how Jesus lived with and taught His disciples. They literally did everything together for the duration of His earthly ministry. Jesus didn’t tell them, “Okay, guys, I’m going to take a break from this religion stuff and go be a carpenter for a while.” Jesus didn’t tell them, “You guys leave for a while, this part of my life doesn’t matter for you.” No! Jesus holistically formed His disciples by having them follow every part of His life with every part of their lives. Jesus’ disciples didn't keep working at their jobs and follow Him on the weekends or their off-hours. Instead, they gave their whole lives to follow Jesus.
Jesus addressed all of His disciples’ needs while they were with Him. He made sure their bodies were taken care of with food and rest, He made sure that they realized the love of God in their lives and taught them how to deal with their emotions through His own example, and He instilled faith in them and taught them all about Himself and God's plan for the world. Nowhere do we see Jesus separating out parts of His life as the Discipleship Silo and other parts into other silos.
For us to be holistic disciples, we need to let Jesus into every aspect of our lives. We need to allow Him to live with us and care for us in much the same way as He did for the disciples, though He is not physically present with us. We need to learn to trust Him to supply our physical needs, feel His love and presence through the Holy Spirit, and participate in spiritual disciplines for our spiritual health.
Does your love for Jesus encompass every silo of your life? Or do you tend to put Jesus in His own silo and only visit Him occasionally? Maybe you visit the Jesus Silo every Sunday morning when you go to church, and even throughout the week for a few minutes each day when you pray or have devotional time. But is that enough? Jesus is not content to be one silo in our lives; He needs to encompass every area of our lives. We are called to give up all the other aspects and things we run after in life to follow Him in everything.
Luke 9:23-25 says, “Then [Jesus] said to them all: ‘Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit their very self?’” We need to deny the silo-ing effect of this world’s culture and instead focus on following Jesus with our whole lives.
The pattern of this world is that our lives are siloed into all these different areas. But we are told, “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will” (Romans 12:2).
Yes, we will still have different areas of our lives. We can still have a job, a family life, attend school classes, etc. But we need to be sure that Jesus is not hanging out in His own silo, but that He’s fully invited to everything in our entire lives.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
The Shawshank Redemption is considered one of the greatest movies ever made. It’s about a banker who was charged with the murder of his wife, when it wasn’t him, and sent to prison. He befriends another prisoner, Red, who acts as the narrator of the story. In one scene, a prisoner, Brooks, who had been there for nearly 50 years was released on parole and he couldn’t handle life outside of prison, committing suicide. When the other prisoners got word about it, they couldn’t understand why, and Red explained it perfectly. Brooks had been “institutionalized.” Red said, talking about the prison walls, “First you hate it, then you get used to it, then you can’t live without it.” Brooks was a well-known respected person in the prison, but outside the prison, he was a nobody and it made him snap. But the truth Red speaks about being “institutionalized” extends far beyond the prison system.
We humans are creatures of habits and we love institutions. We love to build ourselves concrete structures that define what we do and where we go and when we do things. But we are prone to something with that: we get so attached to a process or a way of doing things that it becomes “institutionalized” and we don’t know how to think outside it. Traditions are the same thing in this case. My pastor describes a tradition as “something you do without knowing why you do it.” There are many institutions and traditions we do where we don’t know why we do it and they’ve become a “prison” without walls or guards.
Remember when I wrote about Brainwashing a few months ago? Institutionalization IS a form of brainwashing. It gets you used to a system to the point where you are dependent upon it, and to the point that you cannot comprehend getting the services from any other means. A great example is the welfare system. Once a person gets onto welfare, it is easy for them to get “institutionalized” with it, and they cannot comprehend life without it: a life of actually doing quality work, earning what you get, and truly living freely. (That is not a blanket statement, as there are many people who truly don’t want to be on the system but cannot make ends meet at that time.)
Public schools are another example. Yes, I am a public school teacher, so I can talk about this first-hand. Did you know that the “summer vacation” was scheduled in so kids could join their parents and work the harvest for the farms? Now we do it just to do it. I love my fellow teachers and I love my administrators; they are doing the best they know how to do. However, the school system has failed. When I was in college, 85% of incoming freshman had to take remedial math courses. The schools are turning out people who are literally uneducated and illiterate all the time, just passing them on to keep “failure rates” down and so they can get their federal funding. And when parents pull their students to go to “charter schools” or private schools, the main public schools whine that they are losing money by these “competition” schools. But do we have to do school THIS way? The arguments for shutting down the Department of Education have nothing to do with shutting down education but actually getting the government out of it and to revive what it actually should be: training and equipping students to be independent thinkers and able to live and operate without being dependent upon the state, and to be able to test what they are hearing. It’s the complete opposite of what students are getting now.
Science itself has become institutionalized. Two weeks ago I spoke for a mini-conference about radiometric dating and I quoted John Woodmorrappe from his book The Mythology of Modern Dating Methods where he points out how “Deep Time” has been institutionalized and so thoroughly that no one ever questions Deep Time itself or the methods that showcase it. They’ll examine every detail about conditions etc. but never the methods themselves. An example is when soft-biological tissue was found. No one ever thought to ask, “Are these fossils really millions of years old?” Instead they asked, “Wow, what could have preserved it this long?” They never question the ages.
Guess what? The church isn’t immune to this either. Voddie Baucham has an intriguing interview in which he suggests we abolish the “youth ministry” programs as we know it because they obviously aren’t working, and they have produced a very dangerous side effect. Parents have abdicated their role in raising their children, giving the spiritual lessons over to the youth pastor, and expecting the 1-3 hours the youth pastors have with the kids to undo the 40+ hours kids spend each week in the public schools. Parents need to be involved, yet the churches not only are not encouraging this but they get on parents’ cases (including church staff) if their kids aren’t in the youth programs (Baucham gives anecdotes about this). Youth ministry has been institutionalized, and doing anything different is a strange concept.
Beware that COVID right now is “institutionalizing” us with all the masks and social distancing regulations. The whole “new normal” is exactly this: institutionalization. I know MANY people are frustrated with these rules and know they are utterly ridiculous, however, they have been institutionalized enough themselves to not know how to operate outside the system or how to question it. As our president Jason DeZurik has been saying, “The way forward is back.” For our country to return to what it was, we must go back to when the government did not have such overreach. The only way this can happen is if we as a nation return back to God and get elected leaders who also fear God.
Now, do not hear what I am not saying. I am NOT calling for antinomianism or anarchy or a free-for-all. I know more than many others the necessity for structure, but structure should not exist for the purpose of structure. Jesus constantly got on the Pharisees’ case for this. Yet, Jesus still gave commands, even though they are easy and light. The difference is why are they there: because of man’s traditions or because of God’s order? When we follow Jesus, He gives us freedom. Freedom to do so much more than we could possibly imagine, but it’s not whatever we want to do. We must have boundaries. A common analogy is if you want to swim the ocean you are free to do so. You can go wherever you want, but you lack the resources to get anywhere. Instead you need to confine yourself to a ship and you can sail the ocean. But it takes a master navigator to get you to certain places that you can’t get to on your own. Jesus can get us there, but to get there we have to let Him direct where and how the ship goes.
The rich young ruler and Matthew the disciple were both very wealthy men. One was institutionalized; he could not figure out how to live his life outside his system of a lavish lifestyle. The other gave it up in an instant. Jesus did not come to set up an institution (the church Jesus envisioned is not an institution), but a Kingdom. This Kingdom does have structure and order, but that order comes out of the headship of Christ and the counsel of the Holy Spirit, not an institution. And often we’ll be asked to “break the rules” (man’s rules, not God’s) just to get us out of institutionalized thinking and into an even greater freedom. As Jesus told Simon Peter after calling Matthew to join him in The Chosen, “Get used to different.” The life of a Christian means we need to “get used to different.”
I used to be very institutionalized. My worst tantrum as a child was when my babysitter put me to bed 30 minutes LATE. It threw me off my schedule. That said, my journey with Christ has been amazing, where for 20+ years now, I’ve known nothing but my general direction/calling and what I am doing at this moment. Tomorrow, it can all change (this year has been a LOT of change), but if it does, I know the faithfulness of my God and it will be challenging, but it will be an adventure worth taking. Let’s break free from our “institutions” and instead enjoy life with true order and structure found in Christ.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
by Steve Risner
Climate change is real. It’s been changing rapidly for at least the last 4400 years, after the Flood. If you don’t believe there was a Flood, that’s fine. The data confirms what I’m saying about the climate regardless. When people complain about climate change (almost always meaning man-made climate change) I usually ask a few questions: is the climate changing for the better or worse? How do you know? Is it warming up to the right temperature? Or cooling down to the right temperature? How do we know the right temperature? We have tropical fossils all over the globe including in the Arctic and Antarctica; it seems like it must have been warmer in the past. There have been several periods in the past where the temperatures were much warmer and colder than now. For example, the Medieval Warm Period a thousand or more years ago and the Roman Warm Period 1000 years before had temperatures warmer than today. I don’t think SUV’s were doing this then. And the Little Ice Age four or five hundred years after the Medieval Warm Period had the opposite effect.
A great deal of “evidence” the planet is warming is based on the starting point. If we start with the Little Ice Age, we find we’re much warmer. If we start with the Medieval Warm Period, we find we’re actually much cooler than 1000 years ago (when we didn’t have massive industry allegedly destroying the atmosphere). For some time, we saw scientists claiming we were heading into another Ice Age as it appeared temperature trends were falling drastically. But it was much warmer during the time of the Romans as well. The Romans wrote about growing wine grapes in Britain in the first century and then it got too cold during the Dark Ages. Ancient tax records show the Britons grew their own wine grapes in the 11th century, during the Medieval Warming, and then it got too cold during the Little Ice Age.
A large portion of arguments we often hear (which is a logical fallacy in and of itself) is that almost all scientists agree climate change is real. What they don’t say is that everyone agrees climate change is real. What most of us understand, though, is that it’s natural. Man-made climate change is a farce.
S. Fred Singer said in an interview with the National Association of Scholars that “the number of skeptical qualified scientists has been growing steadily; I would guess it is about 40% now.” A 40% rate of doubt that man-made climate change is a thing doesn’t seem like “most scientists” or a consensus to me. In fact, it’s absurd to suggest we can even know this. We have such little data to go off and we’ve kept our own records for such a short time it’s amazing anyone wants to think we know what we’re talking about here.
And what of all the predictions that the world will end? We heard a teenage girl last year angrily rage against the world as she painted a scary picture of the world she believed she would inherit. I, personally, believe she’s been abused mentally, and I feel very badly for her. She was appalled that anyone would question her dark forecast, repeatedly saying, “how dare you.” Come on. We’ll look at these predictions in a moment.
What’s interesting is the chronic forecast of earth’s destruction due to man-made climate change (once called global warming until cooling seemed to be the trend) has continually gotten a pass on being completely wrong. Modern doomsayers have been predicting climate and environmental disaster for nearly 60 years. They continue to do so today.
1967: dire famine in 1975
1970: Ice Age by 2000
1970: water rationing by 1974 and food rationing by 1980
1971: new Ice Age coming within the next 50 years
1972: new Ice Age by 2070
1974: new Ice Age coming fast
1974: ozone depletion will end life on earth
1978: no end in sight for cooling trend
1980: acid rain will kill life on earth
1988: drought will plague the 1990’s
1988: DC will go from 35 to 85 days a year over 90 degrees
1988: Maldives will be completely under water by 2018
1989: rising seas will obliterate nations by 2000
1989: NYC’s west side highway to be under water by 2019
2000: children won’t know what snow is
2002: famine in 10 years
2004: Britain to have Siberian climate by 2020
2008: Al Gore says Arctic will be ice free by 2013
2009: only 8 years to save the planet
2009: 50 days to save the planet
2009: Arctic ice free by 2014
2013: Arctic ice free by 2016
2014: 500 days to climate chaos
And the list goes on and on. The only thing worth noting in this list is how NONE of it has come to pass. There are other predictions that are 50 to 100 years in the future, but we don’t know yet if they were right. But if we compare their predictions with previous predictions, we’ll quickly see they are highly unlikely.
Apocalyptic statements like these have real-world impacts. In September, a group of British psychologists said children are increasingly suffering from anxiety from the frightening discourse around climate change. See talk of Greta Thunberg above.
Some scientists are honest enough and bold enough to stand against the establishment:
“I also care about getting the facts and science right and have in recent months corrected inaccurate and apocalyptic news media coverage of fires in the Amazon and fires in California, both of which have been improperly presented as resulting primarily from climate change… no credible scientific body has ever said climate change threatens the collapse of civilization much less the extinction of the human species.” -- Michael Shellenberger
All of this seems rather pointless, however, when the left and the media are so bent on the doomsday scenarios, regardless of what the data really shows. For instance, there are major stories from 2009 and from 2015 concerning government manipulation of the climate data to make it appear that it’s getting worse when, in reality, it is not. This was to get us deeper into a war on climate change in ’09 and to get us into the extremely impossible Paris Climate Accord in ’15. Whistleblowers have come out several times claiming they and others cooked the books (no pun intended) to make it appear that we are in a warming phase and that the climate is rapidly changing because of man-made pollutants which will result in the end of the world. It’s all bogus. The failed predictions outlined above prove it, but the fact that some scientists with a conscience have come out saying they’ve been doing this makes it case closed. Let’s move on and fix real world problems.
What’s really curious to me is why the left continues to act like this is a major issue for Americans. It’s not. First, in the top 12 issues reported by voters, climate change is #11. That’s not high on the list. Secondly, we are a small contributor to the problem. China is pouring massive amounts of pollutants into the air and into water all the time. They account for 30% of the world’s pollution. India accounts for 7%. The U.S. is between these two nations. If we cripple ourselves over this, we’ll make a very small impact if any to the total amount of pollutants that our environment is taking in. This will further make nations like China, Russia, and certain Middle East nations very, very happy. Thirdly, man-made global warming or climate change is not really a real thing. The climate is changing, sure. It always has. But to suggest we are responsible when the same things have happened in the past is just denying reality as far as I can tell. Also, since we know the data has been fabricated, it seems rather silly to continue to push the narrative. We know it’s false and we know the actions some want to take to fix a problem we have no control over will bankrupt us as a nation. The world needs America strong. We can’t be strong if we don’t have energy.
God has given us dominion over the earth. This doesn’t mean we’re free to destroy it. We need to be responsible and take good care of the earth. It’s the only planet we’ve got. However, making a major issue of fixing a problem we didn’t cause, couldn’t cause and can’t fix is nonsense. We are to be good stewards, but we are not God.
God Himself sustains us and His creation. The Word reveals that God is at the helm. He’s in charge and will continue to cause these natural cycles to persist until He restores all things—bringing in the new heavens and new earth. I don’t believe it’s correct to assume the only cycles He sustains forever are those listed. The list is just an example and, I believe, reflects natural cycles that we see happening around us all the time. I trust Him. I encourage you to do the same. We can see evidence of temperature fluctuations throughout history. Why would we conclude this time we’re doing it when we know we weren’t in the past? Let’s take care of what He’s given us but also understand that we’re not in control of everything—far from it! And ruining ourselves, our livelihoods, our economy, our nation or even our world to stop a problem we’re not causing is ludicrous.
I look forward to all the links and opinions contrary to my own that people will want to share with me. Please understand that while I’m open to honest and thoughtful information, I believe it’s getting harder and harder to find such information. We’ve seen that scientists can change data or omit data to support their needs. We’ve seen censoring of information and censoring or even cancelling those who supply contrary information. My first response to any of the issues we see in our world today is, “What does the Bible say?” I start there.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
“And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers. Then fear came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. Now all who believed were together, and had all things in common, and sold their possessions and goods, and divided them among all, as anyone had need.” (Acts 2:42-45)
I have had a number of people ask me to give an update on how being in a health co-op has been for me and my family. You can read my post on this from 10 years ago here.
Many people are now beginning to realize that expanding government-run programs, departments, and power is really nothing more than a huge loss of freedom and liberty. Still others want to expand the government’s power and influence in the lives of individuals across our nation. Just one way people are struggling in this thought process is how one deals with their own or their family’s health care.
I would like to challenge you, dear reader, to think through this whole thing with a Biblical worldview instead of a secular humanistic worldview. The choice really is yours to make. Are you putting your hope and trust and faith in a broken and what I will call a slave-making system, or are you putting your faith and hope and trust in Almighty God and His people (the Church)? As you can see from the text above, the Biblical answer is to look to God Almighty and His people. We need to share with and care for each other in the Church. We need to show the world that we are Christians by our love for God and for one another.
My family and I have been a part of a Christian health co-op since 2008. With our family of 8, we have dealt with many, many health concerns over the years. Just one of those concerns happened in 2017 when I suffered a life-threatening stroke and needed to be life-flighted to a hospital in Columbus, Ohio where emergency lifesaving brain surgery was performed on me. To this day, I am still amazed and thankful, not only for those that took care of me but for the incredible healing hand of Almighty God on me as a person. Friends, the very fact that I am still able to communicate with you in this way is miraculous. I can share more about that part of the story some other time, but for today, I would like to just share how awesome God’s people are when God’s people allow God Almighty to work in and through them.
Not only did we receive an amazing amount of help from people around the country, but we also received help from our local church friends and families. We were blessed as well to have all of our medical bills paid by being a part of this incredible health co-op called Samaritan Ministries. As a group, we try and model Acts 2:42-45 in the best way we know how. When my wife and I received hospital bills for this medical need, we received so many personal checks from people all over the nation; it was very humbling. I can tell you this: it works! When God’s people do their best to try and put Biblical ways and examples into practice, great things happen. Since 2008 with Samaritan Ministries, we have always had our medical needs paid in full. When others in the co-op have needs, we share with them to help them. There are other health co-ops out there, but I can tell you that we have been very satisfied being a part of Samaritan Ministries.
Believers in Christ, we need to look to Almighty God and His ways and put them into practice in the real world, allowing God to get the credit where credit is due. If this idea interests you at all and you are wanting to join this health co-op, please let them know that Jason and Jaya DeZurik sent you. God Bless.
To learn more about Jason and Jaya’s life journey, read Jason’s book, How Being Consistent Changed Everything.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
by Chad Koons
“Do you also want to go away?”
A fracture has occurred within the American Church. From Evangelicals to Catholics, those who would call themselves Christians have been rapidly falling away from Biblical truth. Are you one of them? On what basis are you sure?
John chapter 6 is absolutely heartbreaking to me. Here, we witness the account of Jesus presenting Himself as the Bread of Life. Referring to His crucifixion, the Son of God harkens to His violent and sacrificial death. By saying to “eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood,” Jesus likens Himself to being consumed and to the necessity of believers partaking in the benefits of His death by coming to Him and believing in Him.
“He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me.” (John 6:56-57, emphasis mine)
Something of particular sadness to me is found at the reaction of His disciples. Disciples: His disciplined followers who had made it their life point to be led by Him. Today, we may call them “Christians.”
“Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, 'This is a hard saying; who can understand it?' When Jesus knew in Himself that His disciples grumbled about this, He said to them 'Does this offend you?'” (John 6:60-61, emphasis mine)
This was a “hard saying” not because it was difficult to understand but that it was difficult to accept. The idea was offensive to them. Following Jesus was fine as long as it would benefit them and cost them nothing. Good things happening and celebration? YES! The sick and outcast finding relief? YES! Being close to the Big Guy when He comes into power? YES! True fans of Jesus, yes they were.
Yet Jesus spoke and broke their bubble. His role as the Bread of Life meant that He would be consumed. This suggested that He would be sacrificed. If their Lord was to be sacrificed, then what sacrifice would be required of them? This didn’t fit their opinions. They wanted out. It seems they did not want Jesus for who He was, but for what they wanted Him to be. Their false idea of Jesus was more acceptable to them than the truth. Offense came at this realization, and they left.
Here it is: the infamous John 6:66, one of the most heartbreaking verses in all of the Bible: “From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.”(emphasis mine)
I feel like these words could have been spoken of Christians in 2020.
In January of 2020, Dr. George Barna and the Cultural Research Center conducted a poll entitled “American Worldview Inventory 2020,” which was an annual survey that estimated how many adults have a Biblical worldview. The assessment was based on 51 worldview-related questions drawn from 8 categories of worldview application, measuring both beliefs and behavior. AWVI 2020 was undertaken in January 2020 among a nationally representative sample of 2,000 adults.
From this cross-section of American Christians, we find that:
• Evangelicals are embracing secularism: A majority (52%) of evangelicals reject absolute moral truth; 61% do not read the Bible on a daily basis; 75% believe that people are basically good. The study found that one-third to one-half of evangelicals in the survey embrace a variety of beliefs and behaviors counter to biblical teaching and longstanding Evangelical beliefs.
• Pentecostals and charismatics take secularization a step further: Two-thirds (69%) reject absolute moral truth; 54% are unwilling to define human life as sacred, with half claiming the Bible is ambiguous in its teaching about abortion; and 69% say they prefer socialism to capitalism. A full 45% did not qualify as born-again Christians.
• Mainline Protestants are the most secular of the four faith families: Sixty percent (60%) of mainline Protestants’ beliefs directly conflict with biblical teaching. Three key values define this group: truth and morality are relative; life has no inherent value or purpose, so individuals should pursue personal happiness or satisfaction; and traditional religious practices are no longer seen as central or essential to their Christian faith. Only 41% of mainline Protestants are born again.
• Catholics are increasingly secular and permissive: They are most likely to falsely believe in salvation through works or living a good life, and least likely (28%) to be born again. Today’s Catholics are more permissive than other groups, being most likely to accept sexual relations outside of marriage, lying, speeding, and refusal to repay a loan as morally acceptable behaviors.
“Then Jesus said to the twelve, ‘Do you also want to go away?’” (John 6:67, emphasis mine)
To partake of Jesus means that you live a sacrificial life. It will absolutely cost you. You will stand out in the culture and often not be celebrated. The notion that the world will LOVE you is absurd and most likely of Satanic origin. Jesus said quite the opposite, in fact. “If the world hates you, know that it has hated Me before it has hated you.” Following Christ means hard sacrifice, ridicule, and persecution.
A separation is occurring, Church. Many Christians are adopting unbiblical beliefs in the name of being “woke,” inclusive, relevant, and “loving.” You must realize that we don’t get to reinvent Jesus; we only receive Him as He is, as clearly seen within the Bible. We may not like it that Jesus is exclusive and that He has rules to be obeyed, especially rules regarding sexuality, personal holiness, protection of life, and many other deeply heated topics, yet He does. He cannot be separated from His Word.
Instead of scrambling to reinterpret the Bible to accommodate our views, we must submit our thinking to align with His, if we simply come to Him and believe. I would much rather lay aside my flawed opinions and abide with Jesus than I would protect my error and live a weak, counterfeit Christianity.
Do not fall for the bait of Satan. Jesus knows who are His. Are you His? Is the Father drawing you? Lay it all aside, come to Jesus and partake. No other but Jesus has the words of eternal life.
I leave you with this… John 6:66-68.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
You may have noticed that last week, I said Thomas was the last on our list of Jesus’ twelve disciples. While that is true, today I want to address one more group of disciples: us.
All of us who follow Jesus today are also His disciples. No, we’re not part of the group of twelve men who walked around and did ministry with Jesus during His time on earth in physical form. But we are still commanded to be Jesus’ disciples, and He tells us how to do it. Throughout the gospels, Jesus provides us with many descriptions of the various aspects of discipleship. While His whole life was a model for being a disciple, He spoke of discipleship and following Him specifically many times.
In Luke 9:23-24, Jesus outlines three key points of discipleship: denying ourselves, taking up our cross, and following Jesus. Denying ourselves means that we are no longer the top priority; Jesus is. Taking up our cross means submission and obedience to Jesus, giving up our rights, and thinking of others. Following Jesus means a deeper commitment to the continual process of following where Jesus leads.
In Luke 14:27, Jesus looks at the negative of that situation. If a person does not carry his cross, he cannot be Jesus’ disciple. Carrying our cross means surrendering to God the things that we struggle with. By carrying our cross, we give up our rights to have things the way we want them, and instead to follow God’s leading.
In Luke 9:57-62, Jesus provides us with three examples of the cost of discipleship. These costs are losing the security of a place to live, making Jesus a priority over other people and emotional attachments, and focusing our lives on the goal of discipleship to Jesus.
In John 8:31-32, we learn that we must obey Jesus’ teachings to truly be His disciples. This leads us to the truth of God’s Word and who Jesus is, and through continual study, this makes the Word part of our souls. Similarly, in John 14:15 and John 14:23-24, we learn that we show our love to Jesus by obeying everything that He commands. Because of that love, we will receive God’s love and have a relationship with Him. We must “do” discipleship by obedience to his teaching, and we must be disciples through a relationship with God.
In John 15:9-17, we see that obedience leads to remaining in God’s love and bearing fruit because of it. We are dependent on Him, not ourselves.
Some of the most difficult words to understand about discipleship come in Luke 14:26. It appears in this passage that Jesus is instructing us to hate our family members. However, the meaning of the word that is translated as “hate” is more like to “love less.” Jesus is saying we should love everyone else (including our close family members) less than we love Him. He should be our top priority in life. Similarly, when we are disciples, Jesus tells us that the world will hate us, as in John 15:18-19. This again reflects that Jesus must be our top priority. If pleasing the world is our priority, then we are not disciples, because the world will hate us when we follow Jesus.
In Luke 14:33, we are told that we must give up everything to be a disciple of Jesus. This also sounds very harsh, but unless we give up everything that is of this world, we cannot truly follow Jesus and make Him the highest priority in our lives. If we do not, or are not willing to, give up everything, then we are not true disciples.
In Matthew 28:18-20, we read some of Jesus’ last words to His disciples. We are instructed to make disciples as we go through life, and we do so by teaching them to obey His commands. This concept of disciple reproduction is very important because without it the church will die in a few generations. We exercise our discipleship by discipling others – being an example for them to follow so they, too, learn to obey Jesus’ commands.
The American church culture today, as a whole, views discipleship as something that is optional in the church and not required for being a Christian. Being a Christian no longer appears to require a total transformation of our minds. The fact that this has been occurring in the American church for multiple generations has created a culture of non-discipleship – believers who are not truly disciples following Jesus daily. There is a lack of obedience to Jesus’ teaching in the church today. We call Jesus Lord but do not do what He commands us, as He Himself said in Luke 6:46.
The church culture sees discipleship as being all about “me” rather than about God. People go to church to serve and fill themselves and their own needs, rather than for the sole reason of worshiping God. Living in a consumer culture is a huge barrier to being true disciples because our mindset is to take care of ourselves and be served rather than to serve. Transforming ourselves to living as Christ did – for God and for others first – is a key factor in the discipleship process, and is essential for being a true disciple.
Examine your life and what you are actively doing to show that you are a disciple of Jesus. I hope this blog post series has helped you get to know the twelve men who were Jesus’ original disciples, and that through their lives, you have been encouraged to follow Jesus more in your own life. We can only claim to be Jesus’ followers if we are actually following Him. Keep reflecting on the above Scripture passages, and pray about how you can live them out more in your daily life as you continue your walk as one of Jesus’ disciples.
This forum is meant to foster discussion and allow for differing viewpoints to be explored with equal and respectful consideration. All comments are moderated and any foul language or threatening/abusive comments will not be approved. Users who engage in threatening or abusive comments which are physically harmful in nature will be reported to the authorities.
