It's lunchtime, i've just eaten some chocolate cake, and i'm sat on reception, so i thought i'd write on my blog.

Not much has been happening, although what is taking most of my thoughts at the moment is an essay that i have on the providence of God. basically How God is in control of everything at all times, how he is caring for his creation and how he is keeping his creation.

many people find it hard to beleive in a God that knows everything about us and our choices. This has led to a new school of thought called Open Theism, which after a brief look for my essay, doesn't really make sense. The open Theists basically say that God doesn't know the outcome of our choices, and he isn't in control of them. To my mind, this limits Gods power. It makes him not all knowing and infinite, but finite.

Another issue that people have is the issue of evil. If God is in control of all things then surely he can't have wanted evil to come into the world. So some people say that evil is outside of God and his power. On some level i agree with this. God hates evil, and cannot do evil. But if evil entered the world without God knowing it and wanting it to then that makes evil not in his control and therefore God isn't in control of absolutly everything, which again in my mind doesn't sit so well.

Now i'm not sure where my conclusion is taking me, as i haven't finished the essay and reading yet, but one thing i know and trust, is that God is an almighty, all knowing, all powerful God. He can be trusted to bring what he wants to pass in our lives. I know that he has a plan for us and he sent Jesus to earth, to take the punishment that we deserve for our rebellion so that we can be brought into his glorious new creation as his children.

Back to School

So at the age of 27 i have decided to go back to school. The school is the Wales Evangelical School of Theology, otherwise known as WEST, and i have gone to study there for three years on a BA in Theology.

it's an exciting time for me and my wife, and i look forward to what i am going to learn. I have already learnt the Hebrew alphabet and will probably keep writing some of the things that i have learnt.

One thing that i have learnt and will look into, is what use are the intertestamental writings, books like 1,2 and 3 Maccabees and the Testament of Job. Are they useful for interpreting the NT or are they all just a load of rubbish?

Currently i'm erring on the "they are pretty much rubbish" argument! Why look at them, when you could just look at the OT, which is probably what Paul did when writing his letters. However, it is a controversial point and will look into it some more!

Anyway, back to my Hebrew learning!

Faith that works?

After having spent 2 weeks up in the rainy lake district, at the Kewsick convention i have decided to put some thoughts down!

For 2 weeks we were looking at faith that works. First from James and then from Proverbs and Hebrews 11. Some very challenging stuff. But one thing that has stuck with me in particular is something that one of the speakers said (i can't even remember which one!)

He said Faith in God doesn't keep you from the hard times, but keeps you through the hard times.

Being a Christian doesn't make life easy but it does mean that we have something to hope for. I thought that was awesome, so thought i'd share it!

Chosen by God?

It's been a while since my last post, but i haven't felt like i have had much to say, but this is something that i have been thinking about today with the youth groups that i do on Wednesdays. It is based around this verse in 1 Peter.

1 Peter Chapter 2 vs 9-10 (NIV)
"⁹But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. ¹⁰Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy."

I was thinking alot about this, about what it means to be the people of God. It's quite hard to put into a blog post but being part of the people of God means so much. Peter lists these in verse 9

• A chosen people -God chose us. Can't be bothered to go into predestination here, but all we need to know is God wants us to follow him. That is why he sent his son to earth. That is why Jesus died in our place.
• A royal priesthood - the priests used to be the people for Israel who taught them about God, who interceded to God for them, who helped them worship. Now we don't need priests for that, because as Gods people we are all priests. We don't need to go to someone to get our sins forgiven, we just go to God. We don't need to pray through anyone else, we can pray directly to God. I'm not saying that we shouldn't have ministers and pastors and youthworkers, but that they are not neccesary for us to have a relationship with God. They are just gifted people who can explain the Bible to us, to help us worship God in our own lives
• A Holy nation - Our ultimate allegience isn't to our earthly country, like the BNP might have you beleive, but we have another nationality (Peter describes us as aliens, or foreigners in the world). Our nationality is as the Holy people of God, and our home is in heaven. Holy just means that we are separated for God, we are special to him.
• Belonging to God - This is my favourite bit, and one of my young people summed it up. He said "When we have belongings we often care for them and look after them because they are special to us, and this is what we are like for God." This really struck home for me. Belonging to God means that he cares for me, he wants to look after me, he wants the best for me, and he will never let me go. I am his. That is an extremely, awesomely, encouraging thing to know.

Why on Earth would God go to all that trouble? Why did he send his son to die in our place?

The end of verse 9 tells us the answer to that. He did it so we can praise him. So we can say how great our God is. He called us out of darkness. That is what we should do as Christians. We should live our lives as praise to him. That means our whole lives, every aspect of it. Everything we say, everything we think and everything we do. We should be thinking "hey i'm a holy nation, am i acting like it?" or "is this thing that i'm thinking about really praising God."
It's not easy, and it wont save us. But it sure is a good thing to do. Praising the God who called us to himself, who made us this special people, who cares for us should be what i want to do with my life.

It is astounding this passage. It really challenges me, but it also encourages me. I belong to God. He cares for me, he will look out for me. Living my life for him is the least i can do!

What, Jonah again?

Yes, i know i wrote about Jonah last time, but i thought i'd write a bit about what i learnt writing some stuff on this at the youth conference i just done!

The Book of Jonah tells us a lot about God. He's in control. Of everything. Firstly, the storm. God sends an almighty wind, so big the sailors are scared. Secondly he's in control of the dice. God makes the dice fall on Jonah. Thirdly, God is in control of the fish. He sends it to swallow Jonah and then puke him back up again. Fourthly, God is in control of the weather. He makes it hot so Jonah gets hot. Fifthly, God is in control of the bush. He makes it grow. Sixthly, he is in control of the worm. He sends it to kill the bush. That covers quite alot of things, both big and small.

We also see from the book of Jonah that God loves to save. He saves the sailors from the storm, he saves Jonah from drowning (this might sound odd that we class being in a big old fish saved, but Jonah sees the depth of the see as dead, or Sheol, and the fish isn't) and then God saves the Ninevites because they repent. God ends with a question - why shouldn't God care for a city of 120,000 people that are lost and don't know how to not be? That is the point. We see fully that God cares for everyone, not matter who they are and if they repent then he will have mercy and turn away from his promised judgement, because he hates sin.

That is why he sent Jesus. To take the punishment in our place, so all we have to do is repent, turn our backs on our sinful life, and live for Jesus with him in charge of our lives. Then we are called heirs of God with Christ. Which means that we have a place in heaven with God, which is pretty amazing.

Come listen to my tale, of Jonah and the whale.

So I'm off to a conference in a week or so, it should be a good time. Unfortunately I've gotta prepare some stuff on Jonah 1. So i thought, for my first post, why not tell you some of my findings so far.

What was Jonah thinking? "God has told me to do something so hey I'll just run off to Spain, the totally opposite direction. He'll never find me." Yeah that sounds highly likely doesn't it. But then thinking about it, that isn't so strange is it. Don't we all do that? We ignore God, we do what we want, we think it doesn't matter. I don't know about you, but I often try to do it with many things - books, Cd's, computer games, writing a blog. People will try to run to their job, or to science to try and hide from God. That is what Sin is all about, ignoring God, doing what we want. Jonah gives us a good overview of creation and stuff - he gets chosen by God, but he ignores him and thinks that he knows best instead.

So a storm comes up, but Jonah is having a kip in the boat - impressive, bit like me really. On the way back from my honeymoon we were flying between Guernsey and Jersey and there was like a load of turbulence and my wife was bricking it (she doesn't fly well anyway) and there was me having a bit of a snooze, it was like being rocked to sleep! But anyway, enough about me, back to Jonah. So these hardy sailors were bricking it in the storm, they wake Jonah, they draw straws, and oh what a surprise, Jonah gets the short straw. He tells them that he's running away from God and he tells the sailors to throw him over. The sailors show a bit of guts and humanity here, they don't throw him over and try to sort themselves out their own way (don't we all try to do that too - not the throwing overboard bit, but trying to save ourselves by doing good stuff etc etc). When that still doesn't solve the problem. So they decide to do what Jonah says, but they sorta cry to God not to hold them accountable for killing a guy. So they heave him over the side and the storm stops. How relieved would you be? These guys were so relieved, but also pretty scared, i mean God had just sent a storm and then stopped it just like that. So they offer a sacrifice and make vows. Basically they turn to God because they see he is like all powerful and awesome!

Things haven't gone all that well for our "hero" really have they. He runs away from God, ends up in a storm and then gets thrown overboard. Fortunately, God isn't a vengeful God so sends a great fish to save Jonah. Now to me that doesn't sound overly safe, with all the stomach acid and semi-digested things, but hey. So that is Jonah chapter 1 in a mingle-shaped nutshell. But what on earth is it going on about?

Well like i said earlier Jonah running away from God is like the whole sin thing and us ignoring God. Just like Jonah that route is heading for destruction. Rebellion deserves punishment, just like at school not doing your homework means that you get a detention or lines, or not tidying your bedroom means you get grounded, when we disobey God and do what we want, God ain't so happy with that. This first chapter in Jonah seems to end on a bit of a downer, things don't seem to be going well for the main character of the book. But like every good book, the chapter ends with a bit of a cliff hanger, but also a bit of promise there. God sent a fish to swallow Jonah. There's a promise that maybe it isn't all going to end to messily (well for Jonah i guess i may end in big fish goo, but that's less messy than it could be!)

So what can we learn from this bit of Jonah? Running from God has its consequences, but there is hope on the horizon. What that hope is we will just have to wait and see.


Eegads, that post turned out to be quite a waffle, but hey Jonah is a bit of a muppet!