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 - Endorsed - Indifferent - Contested
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| The Nashville Statement
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Name:Daniel
Home: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
About Me: I used to believe that evolution was reasonable, that homosexuality was genetic, and that people became Christians because they couldn't deal with the 'reality' that this life was all there was. I used to believe, that if there was a heaven - I could get there by being good - and I used to think I was more or less a good person. I was wrong on all counts. One day I finally had my eyes opened and I saw that I was not going to go to heaven, but that I was certainly going to suffer the wrath of God for all my sin. I saw myself as a treasonous rebel at heart - I hated God for creating me just to send me to Hell - and I was wretched beyond my own comprehension. Into this spiritual vacuum Jesus Christ came and he opened my understanding - delivering me from God's wrath into God's grace. I was "saved" as an adult, and now my life is hid in Christ. I am by no means sinless, but by God's grace I am a repenting believer - a born again Christian.
My complete profile...
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Daniel's posts are almost always pastoral and God centered. I appreciate and am challenged by them frequently. He has a great sense of humor as well.
- Marc Heinrich
His posts are either funny or challenging. He is very friendly and nice.
- Rose Cole
[He has] good posts, both the serious like this one, and the humorous like yesterday. [He is] the reason that I have restrained myself from making Canadian jokes in my posts.
- C-Train
This post contains nothing that is of any use to me. What were you thinking? Anyway, it's probably the best I've read all day.
- David Kjos
Daniel, nicely done and much more original than Frank the Turk.
- Jonathan Moorhead
There are some people who are smart, deep, or funny. There are not very many people that are all 3. Daniel is one of those people. His opinion, insight and humor have kept me coming back to his blog since I first visited earlier this year.
- Carla Rolfe
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| When I was a lad.. |
For the first five or six years of my life, I thought my parents could do anything. Didn't we all?
I never worried about food or clothing or shelter or safety. Yet I remember at least one time that I had a bad dream and my parents were impotent to help. Yeah, they pacify and comfort me - but they couldn't really help me, and if I made to big a fuss I would be punished. This was perhaps the first crack in that image I had of them being able to do anything. Whether it was the first such crack is not really an issue - it only matters that I noticed it at some point.
When my mother's uncle died (I was three or so) I remember learning about death for the first time. I remember everyone crying and I remember asking why they were all crying. My mother sat me down and I remember her trying to gently explain "death" to me. I remember what she said, though I don't remember the exact order of the conversation. She explained that everyone dies, and that she too would one day die (a serious crack in my "mom and dad are invincible" image) and that I too would die, and that she would not be able to change that. I cried and cried and cried.
She described death as gently as she could - that a person kinda goes to sleep and never wakes up (Okay - don't tell a three year old that if you ever want them to fall asleep again.) The point is she said that there was nothing she could do about it - we all were going to die, she was going to die, I was going to die etc. I cried and cried - but that didn't change it, and no matter how I wanted her to change it so that she didn't have to die, or I didn't have to die - she couldn't. Another crack.
Soon I learned that money figured significantly in the way things run - and jobs. I learned that bad things could happen even to good people - and somewhere along the way, the image of my parents began to fracture so that a shift began to take place.
I began to trust in my own wiles. I could lie and get away with it if I was good at it (and I was). I could steal if I had need, and I did. By the time I was fifteen, whatever "security" my parents could offer me was lost in my own self-sufficiency. I moved out when I turned 18, went on welfare, and lived in utter debauchery.
That loss of innocence is worse in some people, and we deal with it differently - but the end result is the same - our "sin nature" begins to exert itself in us - we begin to look out for ourselves.
When scripture says that we must come to Christ like a child - I wonder that it doesn't mean simply this - that we must give up relying on our selves - and even as a child relies utterly on (and has perfect confidence in) his or her parents - so too, we as believers ought to rely on God and I expect that in doing so we feel the rest and security that we felt when we had genuine trust in our parents... |
posted by Daniel @
3:16 PM
 
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| 3 Comments: |
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Nicely written Daniel. Which might also be why Jesus did not teach us to pray "Oh great and glorious God of the entire universe somewhere up in heaven....", but "Our Father..."
I think God hates pride the most because it is that self reliance, "I can do it myself, (and get the glory for it too!)" - when God really wants us to rely on Him entirely in all things - like the child that Jesus set before the disciples.
Oh, if we could only leave the worries and problems in God's hands, how much more joyful we could be. I know we talk a lot about 'faith', but isn't really 'trust in our Father in heaven' that we really need?
BTY -Whenever I start to think I am old enough (over 1/2 century now :>) to be self reliant, I think of how Lamech would have viewed Noah at age 50 - from the vantage point of 232 years! Then I compare my age and wisdom to God... Truly "I am a little child."
Eunice
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Enjoyed your scenerio #3 post over on Jim's blog... I also checked in on your other site. Sorry I don't have a comment directly about this post, but I just had tell you that I liked that analogy.
jazzycat
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Eunice - Lamech and Noah - great analogy!
Jazzycat - yeah my other site is more of a plaything right now. Thanks for stopping in.
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Nicely written Daniel. Which might also be why Jesus did not teach us to pray "Oh great and glorious God of the entire universe somewhere up in heaven....", but "Our Father..."
I think God hates pride the most because it is that self reliance, "I can do it myself, (and get the glory for it too!)" - when God really wants us to rely on Him entirely in all things - like the child that Jesus set before the disciples.
Oh, if we could only leave the worries and problems in God's hands, how much more joyful we could be. I know we talk a lot about 'faith', but isn't really 'trust in our Father in heaven' that we really need?
BTY -Whenever I start to think I am old enough (over 1/2 century now :>) to be self reliant, I think of how Lamech would have viewed Noah at age 50 - from the vantage point of 232 years! Then I compare my age and wisdom to God... Truly "I am a little child."
Eunice