Category Archives: FAITH ALONE
Fixed Horizons & New Perspectives
One of the things I find myself doing more and more lately, is observing how I Perceive & Understand the world around me. It goes with saying that my Perceptions affect my ability to truly learn and change. This is I am sure closely related to my desire to see beyond the Fixed Horizons I have built up over the years. Most of these fixed Horizons to my dismay are constructed more of fiction than fact, although for many years I have been loath to admit it.
This for me has been most acute in the area of Theology, which for many years I treated as an exact science rather than the art form it really is. There is a reason why the Theology Department at a liberal arts college, is not found in the Science Building. Because Theology uses some of the same tools of logic and language, I just Assumed it carried with it the same weight.
So let me tell you what changed, I simply stopped treating the study of an Infinite God as a Fixed Horizon. More importantly I stopped being fearful of questions that challenged by heretofore untouchable understanding and perceptions. If there is one thing I am most thankful for in this Post Modern Age of Derrida, Rob Bell, Peter Rollins, and a whole host of new thinkers. Is the courage by which these women and men ask questions that challenge Orthodoxy which holds the idea and assumption that it alone has the right of succession. Because after all only the Old Questions and the assumptive answers discovered in ages past, can rightly be called the Truth. It reminds me of how Dear Leader is chosen in North Korea, did anyone doubt it wasn’t going to be a Jong boy child?
Of course these types of environments are dangerous to challenge but without any credible threat other than a seven letter word (heretic), the questions are out of the bag. With the result that our passionate pursuit of God might actually begin to look like something, more than just a fortified castle with moat and burning oil included.
Let me give you an example from the other day, I had always assumed back in my Calvinist day, that Adam died spiritually in the Garden with Eve. Then one day I heard someone ask a question that would challenge all my Fixed Horizons. What if He only died Physically and it was His perceptions that changed His ability to see God clearly? Wow then man being born to die and go to hell was just a perception based on an assumption, pretending to be a Fixed Horizon.
What would my theology look like if God still thought it was all Good and the process is one of restoration, rather than a courtroom with God demanding payment for being offended?
What if God is Love?
What if I was partly or completely wrong?
So my New Perceptions and Assumptions are no more fixed than theirs, and are based on the Fluid Horizon of What if. I have discovered and infinite God there who Loves me, a God who must be forever discovered, Horizon over Horizon over Horizon! I have discovered faith again and the actual need for grace in the face of my ignorance, with eyes wide open.
ANZAHOLYMAN
From Law to Abraham’s Promise.
The Law of Confession
How did the message of God’s grace and power to redeem His good world, become hostage to one word? That one word being confess, modern evangelism hinges on this one word, confess you’re a sinner, then confess Jesus died for your sins and Jesus will confess you are saved before God.
This word confess has become The Law that the grace of God and the work of the cross of Christ must bow. Talk to most evangelicals about the death of anyone and they
will tell you “if that person did not confess Jesus as their personal savior, they are in Hell.” Confession is the new door and the power of the Cross made subject to words that roll off the tongue.
Salvation has been reduced to willful vocabulary repeated in the presence of the right company, with Eternal guarantees to follow. One can only hope God has contingency plans for the simple minded and those who are unable to hear or speak.
The tongue has become in this day the door to everlasting life, no exceptions or so some say. What if though confession is the last thing one does in order to proclaim that which God has already accomplished, and we have put the mouth cart before The Salvation of Lord. Then the Salvation of the Lord is not subject to the tongue and willful words, but rather the tongue as slave to His salvation.
In the classic movies and man and woman only shared a cigarette after they made love, never before.
ANZAHOLYMAN
XOXOXO FROM GOD
Abraham + Jesus = Gospel
Abraham + Jesus = Gospel
In reading the prophetic statement of Zacharariah, when he is filled of with the Holy Spirit at the birth of his son John. He says in talking about the Messiah “To show mercy to our ancestors and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham:”
I have a question when we share this Gospel why do we include Moses and the Law. Paul teaches the The Law is not of faith and yet most evangelism starts with a person’s obligation to have obeyed The Law Perfectly. This teaching comes about because the church decided to marry the Law and Grace with a side order of Hell.
So God swore an oath to Abraham, which was an oath that was 100% on God’s side. You will remember that God put Abraham to sleep and then consecrated the oath He made to Abraham. I will remind you that this was an oath before priest, temple, or scriptures and therefore before the Law of Moses.
Also remember that Abraham is a Gentile through which God promises all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. His decedents will be as the stars of the sky a clear indication of an unlimited number of souls, knowing what we now know about the size the universe. The Jews are the elect of God the chosen a special Galaxy within a Universe of Galaxies, but by no means the only one. It was their love of the Law of Moses that gave them the impression all others where less in the sight of God.
The Gospel starts with a promise made by God to man outside of Law, Bible and Temple. It ends with God’s fulfillment of that promise in His only Son Jesus Christ no middlemen, just God’s faithfulness.
We must return to the truth of God’s promise to Abraham, that is that He was in Christ redeeming the world back to Himself. No need for any willful act on the part of man for all those ways have failed greatly. We are all in a great sleep and if you have been awakened bless the name of the Lord, but do not think God is sleeping concerning His promise to Abraham the father of faith.
If you have been elected in this age do not dare think that you and your group are the only Galaxy in God’s Universe, that mistake has been made once before, but have no fear all of Israel shall be saved.
ANZAHOLYMAN
