Two years ago I got a question answered that ended a six
journey.
The journey began six years prior after seeing a friend of mine wearing a
yumaka. At the time I had no idea what a yumaka was, so I asked him. He
explained to me that he was a Jewish/Christian. My reaction was, how can you be
Jewish and a Christian at the same time. The experience showed me that there
was a world outside the box I had grown up in.
I grow up in a Catholic church, a Catholic school, to me Catholism was
Christianity, and I never gave a second thought to what Protestants believed or
that the Orthodox Church even existed. In the same respect, I didn't truly know
what Catholics believed. I went to church every Sunday, half listened to the
priest, and went through the same motions that really didn’t have any true
meaning to me except that I had been doing them my whole life.
After discovering that I had a Jewish/Christian friend I
began my journey. Over the six years I covered the bases pretty well; from
almost atheist to active Baha’i. I asked a lot of questions, and I thought a
lot, and what it all came down to was:
What did Jesus do on the cross, and why is it important?
And believe it or not, I couldn’t get a straight answer. No
one could explain it to me in a way that made any since to me. Nothing anyone
said to me made any sense; it was like I was blind to the answer.
My idea of Jesus right up until a moment before my journey ended
was that the He gave was a message of peace and love. That we should just all
live our lives and be happy. If we’re happy and pursuing happiness, then what
else matters? What does it matter that He died on a cross?
Well, what does it matter?
Growing up in the box that I grew up in I didn’t know much
about the Jewish faith which doesn’t surprise me today of how lost I was back
then when it came to understanding the cross and Jesus’ sacrifice on it.
When sin came into the world after Adam and Eve sinned,
there was a barrier created between them and God. Why?
Because darkness can’t exist in the same place as light. God
is so luminescent that any darkness that comes into His present is destroyed. Someone
with the darkness of sin living within them is, as a result, disconnected from
God.
A more barebones way to look at sin is: at the heart of all sin
is selfishness. Any sin we commit is rooted in selfishness. God is the supreme
example of selflessness. People don’t realize how selfish they are, especially
in America.
It’s all about the individual. It’s all about what “I” want, what “I” deceive,
myself included. As time progresses and the realization of how selfish I really
am gets more and more clear.
After God rescued the Jews from Egypt,
He gave them a way to try and break down the barrier that sat between them and
Himself.
The sacrificial system called for the death of an innocent
taking the penalty of sin upon themselves. They sacrificed sheep, calves, etc,
all of which had to be flawless and in good health. The guilty party would
place their hand of the blameless animal and declare that the death the animal
was facing the punishment that they themselves deserved.
God’s presents existed inside the Holy of Holies. Once a
year the head priest would enter the Holy of Holies but before going inside it
he would have to go through cleansing ceremonies and sacrifices.If he was not complete cleansed from sin,
after entering into God’s presents, he would die. Darkness is eradicated by
light.
The Jewish sacrificial system was only a temporary fix
though. All through out their lives they would have to continuously make
sacrifices to break the barrier back down.
As God promises in the Old Testament, He would some day
bring about a prominent sacrifice that would once and for all break down the
barrier.
That sacrifice came in the form of Jesus Christ on the cross
2,000 years ago.
Just like with the animal sacrifices, those who accept
Jesus’ death as their own are cleansed of sin and the barrier between them and
God is broken forever. This was symbolized when the curtain that covered the
entrance of the Holy of Holies was torn after Jesus died on the cross.
When the barrier is destroyed we are able to stand in God’s
presents and He in ours.
And now enters the Holy Spirit.
Since there is no longer a barrier between God and them, God
is able to come and live inside of the believer. When this happens the person
is transformed forever, and begins to be made in the true image of God. Only
then is the believer able to truly follow God’s commands.
God’s commands are simple. The old Jewish covenant had two
sets of commands: ritual commands, and behavioral commands. The ritual commands
were cleaning rituals to make themselves pure and holy. That included not
touching certain things, not eating certain things. After Jesus’ death the
ritual commands became obsolete. The behavior commands still stand. But like I
said, only after someone had God in the form of the Holy Spirit living within
them are they able to truly follow God’s commands.
The Holy Spirit also declares the believer to be a child of
God.
God’s commands are simple. In the Old Testament you’ll find
not only the Ten Commandments, but dozens of other commands as well. Jesus sums
them all up with, “Love your God with all our heart, mind and soul, and love
your neighbor as yourself.”
People quote that all the time, but how many actually think
about what that truly means, and then truly lives it? To sum Jesus’ summary of
the Old Testament commands even more, it would simply be: “Be 100% selfless”.
We’re called to be made in image of God; the image he originally
made man in, until sin was allowed to deform the world. And since He, Himself,
is 100% selfless, then we two are called to be 100% selfless. Though no one
with achieve that in their lifetime, if we truly have God living inside of us,
then we are constantly moving down the path of being made completely in His
image after Christ’s return.
Part of being selfless is realizing that our lives, nor
nothing in it, belongs to us. Everything is God’s. That includes other people,
our time, our year salary, etc.
**This is a lot… Basic summary, GO!:
* There is
a barrier between us and God.
* Jesus destroyed that barrier when
He died on the cross.
* Only after we accept
that Jesus destroyed the barrier are we made right and are able to stand in the
presents of God.
* When we are
able to stand in the presents of God, He is able to live inside us in the form
of the Holy Spirit and we begin to be made in His image.
* And only when
we have the Holy Spirit are we able to truly follow God’s commands.
* Then when Christ
returns we will be made completely in His image as man was originally meant to
be and will fully be in the presents of God forever.
Something else that others might not thing about is when we
believe in Jesus we know we are worshiping the one and only true God, and not
something else, like fake gods, demons, material goods, or ourselves.
Before my eyes were open all of this would have sounded like
craziness to me. But it was after I understood what the cross meant, and why
Christ’s death is important that my eyes opened and could understand what I
just typed.
Jesus to me was once a hippy of sorts, as most of my ideals
were right up until a moment before the end of my journey. But people who see
Jesus as a hippy only see part of His message, and to pick only part of what he
proclaimed, and choose to ignore the rest of it, makes Him out to be a crazy
liar.
His words:
“Do you suppose
that I came to grant peace on earth? I tell you, no, but rather division.”
Luke 12:51
But that’s something for a later time.
I don’t know exactly how the story went that opened my eyes
and changed my life. It was a kid’s story, not some long, big worded philosophy
written by some guy decorated in a long white beard. It was something about
someone trying to cross a great canyon and couldn’t find the way over so they
tried all these different ways, until they found an already constructed bridge
that brought them to the other side.
It was probably the single most amazing moment of my life
when everything just clicked into place. I was filled with so much amazement,
and tears of joy, but at the same time I was greatly troubled. The first words
out of my mouth were, “There’s a lot of people who don’t understand this.”
And there still are. Especially in my life. I don’t think
I’ve done the best job at reaching out to them. But I’m still trying to figure
out how to do that without being overbearing, psychotic, or scary.
But I guess all of this is a step.
So how does someone accept Jesus’ sacrifice as their own and
begin their own journey, similar to the new
journey I’m on now?
A good start is to say this prayer and believe what you’re
saying:
Heavenly Father,
I come to You in prayer asking for the forgiveness of my sins. I confess
with my mouth and believe with my heart that Jesus is your Son, And that He
died on the Cross at Calvary that I might be forgiven
and have eternal life in the Kingdom
of Heaven. Father, I believe that
Jesus rose from the dead and I ask You right now to come in to my life and be
my personal Lord and Savior. I repent of my sins and will worship You all the
day's of my life. Because Your word is truth, I confess with my mouth that I am
a new creation and cleansed by the blood of Jesus!
In Jesus’ name, Amen.
If you’re still not sure about all this, or still have
questions something good you can do is just pray to Him and ask Him to reveal
His truth to you. That’s what I did years ago. I prayed and prayed for Him to
show me His truth. I spent years defining God the way I thought He should be
defined to the point where I almost hated Christians. And when I least expected
it, He spun me in a 180 and showed me His definition of His self in His own
good time.
Something else you can do I read the Bible everyday. Maybe a
chapter a day, it doesn’t have to be much. A good place to start that goes
along with what I’ve just written is Romans 3, but Romans can be kind of tricky
when you first start studying the Bible. Some of the first books I read were 1
John, James, and Mark.
Also become active in a local church. We’re called to seek
out fellowship with other believers. Our faith is personal in a way, but God is
a proactive God, and He wants His believers to help each other grow, give
encourage, and gather together to worship Him.
This is a lot longer then I anticipated. But thank you for
reading; this is something I’ve wanted to write for awhile now. Sort of like
the end of my second year recap on where I am and what I’ve learned, and what I
believe. So thanks again. In His awesome name, Nick.
What does the Bible’s teaching on creation have to do with the Gospel of Jesus Christ?
Are these just two separate and unrelated biblical teachings?
Christians often ask us, “Shouldn’t we just worry about the basics? Why
worry about a teaching like creation?” Indeed, we should be concerned
with basics.
But what happens to Christ’s work of salvation if creation as displayed in the Bible is not true?
If evolution is true, then death came into the world long before the
first humans and their sin. If death is not a result of sin, why did
Christ have to receive the penalty of sin – death on a cross.
So in challenging human origins, evolution challenges the origin of sin
and its effect on humanity. And in challenging this, evolution
challenges the very reason Christ came to Earth! He becomes just a
misguided being on the wrong planet!
The Bible tells us that all Scripture was given to make us wise unto
salvation. That includes Genesis. The first chapter of St. John’s
Gospel tells us that all things were created through the Word – the
Word who became flesh.
We see that Word in action in Genesis 1 when we read, “And God said…”
That Word who made us and everything is the very same Word who came and
purchased our salvation.
So Genesis, beginning with the first chapter, is actually the beginning
of God’s revelation to us of the Person and work of the Son of God –
our Savior Jesus Christ. If we reject God’s revelation about our Savior
in Genesis 1, we have only part of a Savior – and only part of Christ
is no Christ at all!
"God created everything through him, and nothing was created except through him."
John 1:3
Also I started looking into evolution and found
out that it’s a very shady put together theory. They take a lot of liberties in
the theory. Like constantly changing the way they draw dinosaurs to make
them look more and more birdlike. I once saw this chart that had a line of
dinosaurs supposedly advancing to the modern day bird. I did some research and
found out that the animal they had listed as being right before the common
bird, according to their “evidence”, lived before the Velociraptor, which was
the first animal they had listed. Their own evidence doesn’t even fully backup
their claims.
And using horizontal evolution and downward evolution (which
just means that species can adapt to their environment) which are true to prove
upward evolution (which is that new species come from old species). They do
this because upward evolution has never ever been replicated or observed.
Also, a lot of the sediment build up and geological changes
can be explained by a global flood. Take the Grand Canyon
for instance. I was always taught that the Grand Canyon
was formed by the Colorado River slowly craving it out
over millions of years. Well, they have changed their minds on that one now
because the sediment from the Grand Canyon is located on
the opposite side of the way the Colorado River runs.
Now they are saying it was made by a flood. Hmmmmm.
Also, I love how they are always finding dinosaur fossils in
sediment they say was caused by a flood. Especially when there are horse, dog,
cat, lion, elephant, human fossils mixed in with them and you never hear
anything about that.
I also love how they construct a large gorilla-like animal and
say it’s a link between ape and man, when all they have from the creature is a
couple of teeth and half of a jaw bone. They made a life-size replica of the
creature and named it Gigantopithecus,
and everyone blindly accepts that’s exactly what the creature looked. This is a prime example of how they bend findings to conform to their theory instead of letting the findings depend on science.
They made this creature out of a couple of teeth and half of a jaw bone:
I just finished a new song, and my I say I'm super excited about it. It's titled: "Reflections". I would have loved to have given it some really long name, but this owe cares a lot of meaning behind what this song is all about; from the obvious, to the less obvious. I can't wait to get the vocals recorded, and this song's demo finished!
Also, here is another song, "Two Years and Running but Not Slowing", that I just recently finished writing, and I'm looking forward to recording as well. This is the first acoustic song I've written since "Corona".
