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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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| Powerless Christians |
The Jew, the Muslim, the Catholic, even the secular humanists, can all live impressively moral and generous lives. Their religion, like your own, produces an external morality. What does your religion offer them that theirs does not?
You might say that their religions are "wrong" and yours is "right". That is, you might say that your religion offers them the truth where theirs offer them a lie; a counterfeit or false religion that has usurped the only genuine religion.
That's fair. I mean, all things being equal we want to be in the right religion.
But is that what sells your faith to others? Is that what draws people to your God? Do people approach you, or has anyone ever approached anyone else (for that matter) saying, "I think your religion makes more sense than mine, so how do I become a Christian?".
Consider that however your faith looks to the world, there are people of other religions who are also on display. If an agnostic person were trying to discover the one true faith, what in your life sets your faith apart from the faith of the world? It's correctness? The fact that you teach a small group study on Thursday night? Because you volunteer your time at a woman's shelter? I mean, what is it that sets your religion apart?
I am going to be blunt here. Unless you truly walk in the Spirit, your religion is going to be just as empty and pointless as theirs. We all know what human effort looks like and produces, and listen: their religions are producing it also. The outside observer cannot tell the difference between Judaism, Islam, Catholicism, Greek/Russian Orthodoxy, and walking-in-the-flesh Christianity. They all attempt to live according to some moral standard, and they all do so in their own strength. Their lives, though projecting an aura of moral superiority when compared to the world, and while some might paint this, in their ignorance, as a spiritual thing, do not differ from the lives of those Christians who habitually walk in the flesh.
I just want to encourage you, reader, if you are a believer, to walk in the Spirit, for God's glory, for your joy, and to set your light on a hill. Anyone can conform to a religious ideal - but religious ideals have no power above what man can produce. |
posted by Daniel @
7:23 AM
 
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| 3 Comments: |
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"..to walk in the Spirit, for God's glory, for your joy"
I like that phrase. I like the whole post really. Thanks.
Jesus said that our Dads give us good things, so how much more will our heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask. That's a terrific truth in Luke 11:13.
I realize the Spirit has baptized me; washed me; and regenerated me back in 1984-85, and He shall never leave me. And yet, I try and pray each morning for our Father to give me the Holy Spirit; to fill me, to help me walk in the Spirit, to have His wisdom and love working in my heart and life this day.
And you know, every day is different, even then. Some days I may share the good news of Christ with unbelievers, and other days I stumble and fall all over the place.
But, the truth that Christ died for me, and His precious blood has brought forgiveness for all my sin is embedded deep in my soul, and this good news is powerful.
Jesus said, "It is finished!" And how I love that verse.
I think the difference mainly is we do have the Gospel in it's pureness, and simplicity. We are not trying to earn our way into heaven.
Even when I'm not walking in the Spirit as I should, the Gospel is the Gospel.
When I am with the Spirit as I should be, then the fruit in my heart and life is love. Love for Jesus, unashamed. And the aroma of this fruit is a heart of gratitude; being very grateful to Jesus Christ for dying for me, and taking all my sins upon Himself, and the Father condemning with His wrath all these sins forever. They are all blotted out. The hundreds of thousands of sins I have committed, and will commit are graciously taken from me, as far as the east is from the west.
This is the difference. And I wish I looked like I believe this every hour of the day, but I don't.
Thanks for the good word to make me think.
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Walking by the Spirit is definitely the key, and the fruit of the Spirit is the demonstration of a life profoundly different from any man made righteousness.
Our words stand or fall based on our reality of experiencing His presence each day.
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Thank you brother.
Your posts have been very influential on me the last few months. To God be the glory.
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"..to walk in the Spirit, for God's glory, for your joy"
I like that phrase. I like the whole post really. Thanks.
Jesus said that our Dads give us good things, so how much more will our heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask. That's a terrific truth in Luke 11:13.
I realize the Spirit has baptized me; washed me; and regenerated me back in 1984-85, and He shall never leave me. And yet, I try and pray each morning for our Father to give me the Holy Spirit; to fill me, to help me walk in the Spirit, to have His wisdom and love working in my heart and life this day.
And you know, every day is different, even then. Some days I may share the good news of Christ with unbelievers, and other days I stumble and fall all over the place.
But, the truth that Christ died for me, and His precious blood has brought forgiveness for all my sin is embedded deep in my soul, and this good news is powerful.
Jesus said, "It is finished!" And how I love that verse.
I think the difference mainly is we do have the Gospel in it's pureness, and simplicity. We are not trying to earn our way into heaven.
Even when I'm not walking in the Spirit as I should, the Gospel is the Gospel.
When I am with the Spirit as I should be, then the fruit in my heart and life is love. Love for Jesus, unashamed. And the aroma of this fruit is a heart of gratitude; being very grateful to Jesus Christ for dying for me, and taking all my sins upon Himself, and the Father condemning with His wrath all these sins forever. They are all blotted out. The hundreds of thousands of sins I have committed, and will commit are graciously taken from me, as far as the east is from the west.
This is the difference. And I wish I looked like I believe this every hour of the day, but I don't.
Thanks for the good word to make me think.