“Get Christianity out of government and society”

“Can you have truth without knowing why? Yes! Can you have knowledge? No!”; J.P. Moreland

Recently I have been reading how secularism is “attacking”Christians in the USA. How you are forced to conform to the dictates of an immoral legislature and even how your right to free speech should be monitored and punished if it does not conform with the immoral agenda. To this we can add, the supposed right of an individual not to be offended by others’ views. Here I bring some points that may help us now and in the near future persecution of the children of God.

I. The anti-Christian sentiment:
A- Immoral desires: The world does not want to look at morality in a traditional way. Like the Bible says; “they even invent new ways to sin”, societies of today want to convince the world that their aberrant and perverted ways are normal and should be accepted. The nature of man is sinful and natures’ desires, by enlarge, in human beings are immoral and against God.
B- No accountability for ones actions (societal schizophrenia) : The world in which we live hates to have to give an account for their undoing’s. Most of society wants to blame someone or something else for their behavior, ideas and troubles. Having an ultimate being that judges you is intolerable by most people, after all “they didn’t ask to be born”. Most people want to convince themselves they are the sum total of moral law, that outside themselves no one has the right to say they are wrong.

II. The religious pluralistic society:
A-Comparative Religion (“they all are the same”) Take all the mayor religions they all say they have the truth ; their adepts sincerely believe they are the “chosen ones” and they all want to convert you:
1-Islam wants you to convert: They want the whole world to be Muslim.
2-Christianity wants you to convert: They want you to have “eternal life”(communion with God).
3- Hinduism wants you to convert: They want you to not waste lives in the progress of soul.
4-Judaism wants you to convert: If you do the way for the Messiah to come is enhanced.
5- Buddhism wants you to convert: They want to free you from the bondage of creed.

Religious pluralism has rendered all religions the same thus invalidating their claims to the truth. Secularism has in fact delegated the religious idea as a private irrelevant pursuit. They in fact, want to do away with al traces of religious sentiment when dealing with secular life, government, business, and authority.

3. But are all religions the same? The adherents to this idea will say that no matter what the belief says, in its entirety and in the end, all preach the same thing. And this is when we as Christians have to say no; We do no believe the same, we in fact have the truth, and if we do, they (the rest of the world) doesn’t have it; what they do have is falsehood!

How do we support such a statement? Lets take a 6th person, whom the five adherents of the mayor religions will try to convince they have the truth! Can this be achieved?
1-Only if the religion makes logical sense. If its view of reality can be well established. If they can have the best argument, such as the “Case for Christ”, “The Case for the Resurrection” and what I called the case for logic; the why God must exist, why Christ is God and why the Resurrection (and redemption) is necessarily true.
If we as Christians can give the best argument for why our God is the true one, we can just leave it at that in a hostile world full of ignorance, they wont have a retort other than not wanting to believe, but we know that this is exactly what we face; most of humanity will reject Christ!

4- The right to choose a creed (religion and its view on things) against popular mores and secular legislatures. What are we to do when legislature tromps your religious freedom?
1-The self defense posture:
a) Non involvement in a secular life style (the right to be private).
i.You can practice your beliefs privately; examples:
1-Do not become an ordained minister or chaplain in order not to be forced to perform unbiblical marriages.
2- Do not become a service oriented business person, because sooner or later you will have to sell your product to benefit the ceremonies and lifestyles of persons that follow un-Christian practices.
3- Do not belong to an incorporated church (see: https://www.facebook.com/notes/tio-papo/important-definition/10204878397432069 )
1-Do not have an official “minister” or pastor.
4-Do not choose teaching as a career, for you will be forced to teach sinful tolerance; condoning same sex marriages as normal and acceptable, and teach the freedom towards sexual orientation.

III- The freedom of religion:
A-No one can actually forced you to not believe what you want (In my mind I am free).
The state will never force you to change your religion. But when in public, will persecute your right to your personal opinion or religious opinion while you conduct a secular public activity. They will do this according to the “law of the land” (their infernal legislatures that have changed our Constitution).

B. The need to be extremely general, globally acknowledged and philosophical trained in logic and argumentation: Be always prepared to give reasons that are logical and make sense philosophically for your views ;reasons that conform to the reality of the whole human race and not from a single minded agenda.
This will be effective in the pre-private church that is to come. We can’t really stop this onslaught of attacks. But be assured to know that this is a spiritual battle; the war of ideas. And by engaging in this battle with the proper weapons we can win souls to Christ in the midst or a hostile world that loves evil and darkness instead of godly pursuits and light.

IV- The catacomb church:
Eventually we will be forced to go underground, just like those brethren of ours in the beginning of our Christian era. Ours will be a life of private beliefs system much like those in the beginning. They suffered physical harm and death. We will face legal and livelihood attacks that will force us to not pursue a religious life in the public arena.

But like in those ancient times we will be spreading the gospel of Jesus of Nazareth to the ones open to it, those that Christ will call “my sheep” the ones that “hear Him” and respond. We have to realize that our savior already told us it is not the majority who will be saved, but a minority and to reach them we don’t have to be up-ground and making noise, we can indeed be publically witnessing while privately protecting ourselves from the onslaught persecution in the near future. This may mean that the public church as you know it today will be a thing of the past and instead of great numbers gathering at one location we may have to go back to meet behind closed doors and encrypt our language.

A one on one spiritual battle to those that God will bring to us to witness to, being fully prepared to do so. This means that our faith has to be well defined and it must compete in the intellectual arena better that the alternate falsehood of the world. We may indeed have to get closer to God and ask for, and be under, the guidance of spiritual discernment to recognize God’s sheep in need of spiritual help. Having this tool will protect us against the under covered evil doers who want to erase Christ from the face of the earth.

We have our work cut out for us and we as the organized church is ill prepared for the task. A recent poll found out that only 19% of all Christians who go to church regularly read their Bibles every day and some 18% never read it! But as The Bible seems to convey, we can take 50% of the membership of the church and know they wont make it with us in eternity.
The remnant will never be removed from earth, we as a minority still need to prepare ourselves for the task to come. We need to gather around us, brothers and sisters who are not worldly and who have a thirst for knowledge because they are the true free seekers, the true chosen church of Christ.

Pray every day, at least an hour. Fast whenever you can (make room in your life for the pursuit of spiritual training). Read your Bible every day, and study it with an interest for learning God’s message for the church. Learn how to understand God’s will on earth through good theological avenues and be engaged and interested in always answering the ones that need answers; and to those mockers, be ready to shut their ramblings with the truth,which you and I know is Christ!

“You shall know the truth and the Truth shall set you free”

Blessings,
Tio Papo

The Power of an Individual Choice!

Long time ago, well about 40 years ago, a child made a decision dealing with his future. He recognized the poor conditions in where he was born, siblings no better than him, sometimes not enough to eat and very much to say for entertainment. He was one of five, all in the same environment, all from the same parents living in poor neighborhoods and not planning much for a future.

This child knew from when he was five years old, he didn’t want to have an uncertain future and he decided his best answer was through education. As life would dictate he lived in one of the poorest countries in latin america, Honduras his parents were missionaries there. It served him to see first hand what extreme poverty was all about. He knew some of the members attending Sunday’s service meal was their only meal that week, people actually working seven days a week all year around and going hungry. This experience taught him compassion to such a level of existential empathy, he would choose his career accordingly. After the family returned to the US he applied himself to study and getting good grades. He was accepted into the university and paid for his own education. Midway while considering a career in business he attended a seminary on the subject. After the lecture he asked the presenter, an 80 year old retire professor in business, what advised he had for him. The wise professor asked him just one question:”Would cheating the little guy bother you?” This child now a man sincerely answered; “Yes it would bother me greatly!” ; then the professor gave him the verdict; “Then, son, a career in business is not for you” … This man understood what the old professor meant, his existential empathy was too real to him he had lived it as a child he had seen it as an adolescent. He changed his mayor to one of helping the world!

This child is my brother, by baby brother, the youngest of five who is now the sub-director of the EPA in his state. His individual choice to not be poor guided by the values his parents first and then life itself taught him, changed the traditional generational influence of being content with what life has given you, to a more challenging intention to achieve grater goals in life and be of greater service to humanity.

Like this child we too find ourselves in theological poor environment. Our family talks and behaves very simply in ignorance of the achievable truths available to us from an infinite in wisdom source, Christ. Our family-our church still despite of good intentions poor in the basic knowledge to operate in the world we live and we are no better than the generation before in helping others. Oh yes, we have great programs,conferences,entertainment and such. But our gospel we can’t share,m we don’t know how and God forbid someone with some education asking us a question…we usually say “well let me get back to you on that”, and we never do. Yes we have memorize the scriptures, but to what end? Are we to use verses with someone that knows for sure (thought they won’t tell you) the Bible is not “the Word of God”? How can we get out of this spiritual poverty environment?

This story of my baby brother should parallel what you need to do; educate yourself in a greater manner than your previous generation! But it requires you go out of the immediate familiar environment, to “the university”. This place of higher spiritual education where is it, how can you find it? Is it your local church? Maybe, but if you find yourself poor spiritually (not is not how you feel, rater is what you know) then you are still within that family that perpetrates poverty (ignorance). Where do yo go?

All I can say is that it is out there, not within the four walls of the building you call church which only entertains you for a couple of hours a week. If what you get from church is just a feeling , like when you go see a good movie, then it is just that, entertainment! It is not an educational environment, not a university and you are just stuck in your family forever, never to be able to have a progressive spiritual environment conducive to a greater commission of the will of God on earth.

Like my brother I was lucky in wanting to learn about my career to take in my spiritual life. I went to a higher education by reading and taking advantage of free theology lessons in the 90s. The interest from the power of deciding I wanted to learn brought to me books…yes books…then 7 different versions of the Bible…then lessons and books in the basics of theological studies, exegesis and hermeneutics. And since my greatest interest was my decision to know Christ, I started to spend time communicating with him. You may know how, praying, intensively, privately, and lengthy-one hour minimum. You see my church family preaches two out of the three requirements to progress to a higher knowledge of God; reading the bible and praying. But if you ask the average church goer honestly to tell you how much they pray and read the Bible, you’d be surprise…it is almost non-existence in our chur-family lives. This thought they preach it, the leaders and the church do not teach it, let alone practice.

So it goes that if we are to take the example of that child who made a powerful decision and then stuck to it we need to separate ourselves (spiritually) from our church-family. We need to find a different environment one that promotes not only theological education but one that promotes having an actual relationship with Christ rather than a virtual one! You cannot vicariously have a relationship with Christ, it takes an individual contact from a “The Power of an Individual Choice”.

God bless you!

Tio Papo

Holiness For Youth

Holiness

I- Holiness: What is it?
a. Something Saints practice!
i. What is a saint?
1-One who practices holiness!
b. Something holy = something good, perfect, devoid of evil!
i. Something not sinful!
c. Sin
i. What is not good, benevolent, virtuous.
ii. Distance from the good,God
iii. Absence of good, benevolence, God.

II- What does it mean to be a Christian?
a. Definition: A Christian is someone who follows the teachings of Jesus
of Nazareth.

III- Jesus’s teachings:
a. Love your God with everything you have!
i. Mind, body and behavior (what you do with your body)
b. Love your neighbor, as you would like him to love you,(even if he doesn’t!)
i. The good Samaritan parable – Luke10:30
ii. To give help to those in need,sick or in jail.`
1. Ignoring ii above has dire consequences:
a. “I never knew you” Matthew7:23
b. Matthew 25: 41- 46 “Because you didn’t help”.
c. To stay away from sin- to be holy. To stay away from a sinful
lifestyle.
i. “Go and sin no more” John 8:11
ii. “…stop sinning or something even worse may happen to
you” John 5:14

IV- Holiness: To stay away from sin.
a. Sins
i. Not believing in God (believing other gods or something else)
ii. Murder
iii. Stealing
iv. Lying
v. Lust (lasciviousness)
1. Causing others to lust after you!
vi. Adultery
vii. Fornication
viii. False testimony
ix. Greed
x. Envy
xi. Drunkenness
xii. Omitting to help (Mat 7:23; Matt 25:41-46)
xiii. Judging others

V- Sins that concern our Christian youth.
a. Lying,
i. Cheating on exams
ii. To friends
iii. To parents
iv. Exaggerating events, embellishment,plagiarism
b. Lust
i. Undo desire for success,things or people
ii. Behaving in such a manner that others desire you in an unholy manner.
1. This could be wanting admiration, a following, wanting to be popular.
2. Dressing inappropriately,gesturing and sensual walking, dancing
(dancing is primarily a sexual ritual)
3. Flirting
4. You should not tempt anyone to sin Mathew 18:7
c. Fornication
i. Having sexual relations outside marriage, like with your
boyfriend/girlfriend a person you met at a party,
the quarterback of your school’s team, a perfect stranger.
d. Adultery
i. Having sexual relation with someone that is married to someone else,
like a teacher, a friend etc., or having sex with a single
or married person while you are married.

VI- How can we maintain holiness?
a. # 1-Prayer
i. What is prayer? -You talk to God!
ii. How much should we pray? How many minutes have you guys prayed this
week?
1. Matthew 6: 5-9 (instructions on how)
2. Mathew 6: 9-13 “The Lords Prayer”
3. Luke 11:1-13 (Format and insistence-1stTesa 5:17;never stop praying)
4. How much do we need to pray?
a. Jesus’ example:
i. One hour- Mathew 26:40
ii. Mathew 14: 23 (alone in the hills)
iii. Mark 1:35 (isolated place)
iv. Mark 6:46 (praying in seclusion)
v. Luke 6:12 (all night)
vi. Luke 9:18 (praying alone)
vii. Luke 5:16 (withdrew to the wilderness)
iii. Prayer strengthen us so we can resist temptation: Mathew 26: 41
b. #2-Struggling not to sin.
i. Running away from temptation
1. Not attending popular activities of known sinful practices, like dances,
parties, bars etc.
c. #3- Guarding our hearts, eyes and senses Proverb 4:23
i. Eyes – Movies R rated and above (full of sins of others)
1. There is a warning in the Bible against liking the sins of others.
a. Romans 1: 32 (encouraging* others to do evil)
i. * = Rejoice, enjoying, liking, approve
ii. Have delight = extreme enjoying
iii. Have pleasure in (the sins ofothers) KJV
iv. “Applaud those who sin” – Complete Jewish Bible
v. The handing out prices to sinners –The Message Bible-
b. 1st Timothy 5:22 (do not share others sins)
ii. Senses – Music that is obscene or that moves to overly sexual
gesticulations, Remember dancing is a sexual ritual!
iii. Heart – Refers to our total consciousness, what we do with our
desires, how we express them and why – what is our real
motive to act and behave the way we do?
1. God will judge everyone’s secret life: Romans 2:16

VII- Conclusion: Holiness in our Christianity is a way of life, one that according to our Scriptures is apart from the rest of humanity. “We are in the world, but we are not of it” (John 15:19). We are called to be different in belief, learning and behavior.

Christ said it first, the many will be lost, the few will be saved. “Wide is the road to destruction and many go through it, narrow is the gate to salvation and few ever find it” (Matthew 7:13). We can’t admire how other people think, behave or act, because primarily they are under the influence of evil and will not be saved!

The advantage of a holy life is that we can ensure the real good life, there are no pleasures that humans can have that a Christian can’t. If we maintain our lives as far from sin as possible, God has promised us an abundant life, full of happiness and the pleasures of the bodies he created us with.
Notes: http://www.gotquestions.org/flirting.html

Galatians 6:19-21 [The first sin is sexual immorality]

Tio Papo
Approved by Dr. David Morton, DD
ARDELLA Baptist Church, Lakeland Florida

En Español—>Santidad

Why heaven cannot be another dimension:

A few days ago I was intellectually struck down by a comment a DD professor made in his university theology lesson (Phoenix University has free university video lessons we can access). I felt so down, this guy in a short comment seemed to destroy most of my theological findings in the better part of 7 years! How can that be possible? How can I be so wrong, so far off from good theological conclusions?

His comment was in the text we read when Jesus told his disciples He was going to go to His Father’s house where there were many mansions where he was going to prepare a place for them. The professor alluded somewhat sarcastically to the location of heaven when Christ ascended into “heaven”. “Of course the disciples saw Jesus ascending into the clouds, but did Jesus take a left after pluto into heaven?” Then he added; “Many mansions is just, other dimensions”…What? But it could be possible… Then I thought: “Oh man, I have to rethink my entire position on this now”!

This is the trouble some of us go through when we set out to study more and more of our teachings, our theology. And frankly it is a fear that is validated by the many interpretations of the Bible and what it must say within our vast theological world. But if we have done our basic work in the principles of the Christian faith, and have used one of those “earthly things” Jesus say we have to (John 3:12) in order to “believe” the heavenly things, then we ought to not be afraid of what we find in the pursuit of strengthening our faith. One of those things I use (a lot) is logic, a branch of Philosophy, common linguistic sense, which is not an easy discipline, but one that nevertheless has proven time and time again to be the best one for me to use in the endeavor to know more about my savior Jesus of Nazareth, my Christ! Here is my answer!

Heaven is a place, created, correct? Every thing that has been created has to be in time and space-created a time ago/ in a place, location. Everything that we know exists (except God) exists within time and space, what we understand as the four dimensions of time and space, the universe. Then heaven is in our universe, where else! But that place in the universe we call heaven doesn’t have to be near us, it could be a distant planet or galaxy. Why do I think this must be so?

Lucifer, thrown into our realm: If there was another universe or another dimension Lucifer existed as an angel when he was thrown to “earth” (our time space continuum) why was he thrown to our universe-realm-dimension? If there was a possibility of existing outside time space, Lucifer would be there in another “dimension”, “realm”. The fact that he is in the universe makes for the impossibility of created beings dwelling outside time/space. He didn’t have to be thrown into my universe to mess it all up!

Enoch and Elijah: They were taken to heaven (not ascended, like Jesus) and as creatures on a four dimensional matrix, heaven has to be a place they can be taken to.

Why there are not other dimensions possible: If heaven was “another dimension” same question about Lucifer applies. If Angels are in a different dimension and get to ours, then is possible by God transporting them to ours from time to time, and that is true, but I think Heaven is a distant galaxy, because God can also easily tele transport them to earth (Phillip was transported to another town). That angels and demons can travel from distant areas of our universe to earth is possible by the fore mentioned God power, or they could have access to the bending of space or traveling faster than light since they are mostly spiritual beings.

Heaven: A place where sin cannot dwell: True, and God can quarantine it from sin as He will hell (lake of fire) once He eradicates the fallen state of the universe in general. So it is very plausible that heaven and hell are in our universe!

To me I find no better explanation precisely because Lucifer was thrown here where I exists. Ok,I haven’t explained this, but here it goes:

If God punished Lucifer for rebelling and throws him somewhere, and if there were other dimensions and or universes he could exist, God would have sent him there instead of the one universe and or dimension I was to be created in. This argument goes along the character of God, he cannot create sin or any thing with the purpose to sin. Free will does not work here since 2/3 of the angels did not rebel. So we didn’t have to have the influence of Satan for us to have free will, God when he creates beings he creates them already with free will, the ability to choose, weather to align with Him or distancing from Him; angels are an example, for one of them chose differently!

Conclusion: There are no “other anywhere’s” where sentient beings can exist other than in the three spatial dimensions and the one of time. Invisibility, or materializations (angels can appear, disappear, go through walls-maybe) doesn’t not prove other dimensions or other universes.

God bless you,

Tio Papo
PS. The atheists who for decades were denying a first cause just got a cosmic wrench thrown into their hopes that string theory could prove the theory of multiverses and thus our universe popping into existence from nothing: The proof they expected from all their predictions of the string theory was an evidence from a particular particle decay they theorized as necessary from the string theory. The Hadron collider performed the test and no such decay was found. Some physicists are saying now they should be looking elsewhere. This is for us good news, since their famous “fact” is again just a theory, just a “philosophy”, but one which has no basis on the essences of this discipline, the love of wisdom!

Signs, wonders and “special supernatural evidences”!

Some time ago I was listening to some very impacting testimonies from the Middle East! How God is revealing himself to people with actually no interest whatsoever in becoming Christians in that region of the planet.

One of the most striking testimonies was of a woman in Iraq who converted from Islam to Christianity. Her husband a devout Muslim vouch to kill her if she did not recant her belief. She didn’t and one morning the husband woke up with a burning ache in his right thigh, when he went to se the name “Jesus” had been carved into his flesh like a tattoo. He wanted to go and pull his skin out so that his name would not be in his thigh, the next morning he felt the same sensation and to his surprise the words “loves you” were now carved into his skin. At this he “had” no choice but to consider his wife’s conversion and accompanied her to the next service with fear that if he was seen he could be arrested and killed. He gave his life to Christ and is recently serving for the cause of Christ in his town.

This one is one of many testimonies one hears from far away lands of how God is operating in the supernatural to bring people to his feet. This is wonderful news to us here who see that part of the world as a lost cause due to the persecution an the almost total rejection of the gospel of Jesus of Nazareth. One could even draw a conclusion that after all, God will bring whomever He wills, no matter what the person believes or is doing, that if God wants it, no body will be able to reject the truth because ; Hey God can after all, carve his name on your thigh…!

Did this testimony really happen? I wasn’t there, you weren’t either! How do we know that this written account actually happened? We don’t , we will never know! But why do we believe it? Because it could have happened, it rings true, and we would like it to be true! But that doesn’t make it true, does it? And suppose it is true, what are the implications of this supernatural experience?

For one, it seems to invalidate the persons God given free will, for after all he had no interest in believing his wife! I have argued here in many posts that we are free to choose because we have to weight the validity of the options presented to us and then exercise our God given free will in choosing one. Obviously in order to choose, the options have to be competitive so as to you reason which one has more validity. If one of the options is so strong as to not providing any reasonable doubt then you are not choosing freely, you are choosing cohesively and I just don’t think that this is the intent of John 3:16. If option A is so overwhelmingly stronger than option B, your instinct not, your reason, is the one determining your action to choose, then you are determined in your decision and not freely choosing by fully understanding (believing) the truth!

Testimonies like this one bring a sense of power to us and we rejoice with “what God is doing” in other lands, but the implications if not studied are contradictory. Lets take a Biblical example: The call to the disciples to follow Jesus:

Why were these twelve called and not others? What was so special about them? You could say, “well God had to choose someone anyway”! But why these twelve? They were content in working and providing for their families fishing for a living like many others, what made them targets for the call? Here many don’t really like what I say; that God knew these twelve really had a thirst for knowledge , that these twelve had in them, the burning desire to know the truth and that the other thousands of fishermen did not! Many objet to this, because I have accuse them of lacking that thirst for knowledge and they reject the idea that God will reveal himself to yo only if you desire to know him in your heart and not if you don’t. So many object to learning, to study, just because they can’t comprehend the need for this pre-qualification to salvation. They are sadly mistaking that God arbitrarily will supernaturally reveal himself to you if you are to believe; well that is determinism , not free will! Some of my brothers go that route, I do not, and I have explained why in my book “What I Wish Christian Would Tell You”. God does not arbitrarily choose to reveal himself to you-you have to desire him at some level in your conscience. Hebrews 11:6 tells it: You need to desire to know God by being interested (wanting to know) He exist prior to come close to Him! God can not, will not invalidate your free will, for “you are condemned to be free”, and that means you have to freely choose him, rather than not!

The answer to this and other “supernatural revelations” is twofold. One is that they never happened , they are just urban legends. The other and one we can justify is: God sees the heart of the individual , He knows your desire for Him in your heart, no matter what religion you happen to find yourself in. If you so desire Him, He will find a way for you to really know him. After all many that profess actually knowing Him, will be casted out when Jesus tells them “I never knew you…” Why? They will understand clearly, completely…they never really wanted to know Christ, to be his friend, they just used his name to get their way in life…

Do you really want to know Christ, really? Do you really desire to know everything there is to be known about Him, really? What is your basis for answering “yes”? If you desire to be friends with someone, is because you desire to know that someone, what is the evidence for that desire, what is it you do with that person?

Do you think it is different than desiring to be friends with Jesus, to get to know Him, better and better? Is that of value to you?

God bless you,

Tio Papo

Omission/ “Do you have a beter answer?” Now would be a good time!

I just took Dr. Phil’s test…I scored 75; someone people “handle with care”, someone people see as vain and self-centered”. Others may admire, wishing they could be more like me,but don’t always trust me, hesitant to become too deeply involved with me. Somewhat seemingly domineering highly confident and coming out as having a chip in his shoulder. The test didn’t surprise me at all!

I have been there, done that. Perhaps a rebel “without a cause” some may say, but I do have a cause; the passion I feel about learning the meaning of life in general and the life as a Christian in particular. For the past six years I have observe how we who are “in the truth” think primarily, for behavior usually follows consciousness, or at least it should. It is surprising how after 27 years absence from Christian circles I find not much progress in knowledge and wisdom. 

Knowledge is:facts, information, and skills (the ability to do something well; expertise)

acquired by a person through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject. Here one’s experience is from skills (how to apply or do somethiing), information  (facts provided or learned about something or someone). So when we so superficially talk about knowledge we often fail to really understand what knowledge is.Knowledge has to do with facts in a sequential logical manner that informs the person about reality. It has to do with how things are the way they are and why.
When applying this single word to out Christian understanding, we often fail to realize what we are saying. It is a statement of fact Gd sees us as lacking in knowledge and perishing because of it! This is nothing new and though we often subconsciously realize it, we can’t fix it! The primary cause of this is due to what I call the sin of omission.

Dad used to preach a lot about this and though as a youngster I often though “what’s is he talking about?” I understand his prophetic message, 27 years later manifested. We do omit a basic mandate in us all;seek knowledge (learning, studying). His preaching was right on and he didn’t even realize the scope of this sin. It has actually contaminated all aspects of the church from top down! It disguises it self in knowing “what” but totally ignoring the “why”. One can memorize the entire Bible, yet still be ignorant of the why is the Bible true. Most say “because it is the word of God” and this is just not good enough for this is the sort of “faith” all religion pretty much profess; “It is the truth because of my holy book says it”! By omitting the study of the truth you engage in the omission of pursuig the greatest talent God has given mankind.

The parable of the talents now comes in clear. If you burry (not use) your talent God eventually will take it away. Has this happened already? I would say “Yes! Just look around; How many Christians can successfully defend their faith against a Muslim, Hindu, or Atheist? Not many and the ones you find that can are nowhere near our level of education or social status. This should tell us we ned to do something else other than bury our minds (talent) and how do we do this, how do we not bury it? 

What does the mind do? Would be the first question. It thinks! And what is thinking? “Using thought or rational judgment; intelligent”. So rational, has to do with reason and reason is a process of logic sequences of thought  in analyzes. Therefore the mind thinks, reasons and analyzes items that occur suddenly in it. Where is that mind? We experience it, but it is an openness to the world we experience is no-where and every where to us in an open to the world state, see Heidegger. But we can get an idea, thinking is not merely  “accepting” as the last leg of faith suggests. Way before one can accept anything one must think thoroughly about what one is to believe. Here lies most of today’s “lack of knowledge” in our groups. 

First it is an omission to what knowledge is, then compounds it with a lack of wisdom, for the “love of wisdom” is no where taught today. God has given mankind a mind to use but man has buried it. In the parable the bad manager did not get rid off the talent, no he buried it! We make the mistake in the idea that the simple statements of truth and the logos we so rhetorically teach equals the multiplication of the talent. But in fact this is just burying it! Having the knowledge (the rules written in a book) is not enough, that is just the raw talent God has given you. You need to put it to work, to multiply it. And if the talent is the mind it most be you are going to use it to multiply what it does…thinking, reasoning,analyzing. 

How do we know if we are burying our talent? Well, we are talking here about the Christian mind, what you believe and why! You are a Christian, why? You must answer this question logically and reasonably to someone who is non-christian, lets say a Hindu. You need to make a statement that is clear enough for them to realize your reasons for beliefs given the premises where it is found are logical and reasonable. You need to define God, what is it and how do you arrived at the conclusion He exists. Again yo most use reasonable arguments for your statements. Whey is it that you believe a man that lived 2000 years ago who only taught for three years is actually God! What is your reason to believe he is a being, a person. Do you know how to define “being”, “person”. I know we take these for granted and it works in the everyday mundane explanations of what we do; but when it comes to belief it is necessary to defined them, then bring a logical argument whey you thin God is a being and a person,rather that a force or a current of some sort. If you do not know the above you could be burying your talent, you really have not progress in Christian knowledge in 20 years , you just remain a spiritual midget and there is danger if you remain like this!

The danger is illustrated in the parable itself, the one who omitted multiplying his talent was rejected and the talent given to someone else! This would look like in todays times, like a Christian unable to process much theology, one tat can’t witness to most his friends or family because it really doesn’t make any sense what he believes. A person following the rules of the group and getting an emotional high by attending a service or a meeting like someone going to the movies but that whatever they got in the “Sunday theater” is completely gone on Monday. 

“Do you have a better answer?” Now would be a good time to hear it…Do you? Really? The answer to the question of why we are so incapable to answer the world with our youth so that they do not loose their faith in the first year of college? The answer to are you confident in your witnessing? Do you have a better answer to these questions by the Wednesday study preparing you to answer them, Sunday school or 52 sermons per year?
Are you just wasting time, filling space in a social context where just seeing faces satisfies your hunger for true knowledge and wisdom?

You may say; “Well, there is no one teaching me”! And though this is the reality of todays world, the talent is within you not outside of you. It is your mind and you most cultivate it. The system is not going to help you out, it is contaminated by perversion (see Ezequiel 9). You most take the initiative to multiply that talent, how?

Start by trying to answer the basic questions: Why are you a Christian, why do you believe God exists, what is God (definition), why is there a Hell in your belief (does it actually make sense), why is evil in the universe if an all good God created it, why is Christ device, what’s up with God paying for my sins-after al is me who sinned, why is there so many (the majority of humanity) that will not believe at all?   

As my last section I don’t want to only point to faults but it is my sincere wish you do progress in your Christian life. Therefore I will point to where you can find answers to them. 1-You will read your Bible but not just a Bible. No , get the most advanced study-aplication Bible you can find (the NLT for me). Such a Bible has already done a lot of the legwork in exegesis (extraction)  and hermeneutics (interpretation of the extracted universal meaning for all time, all people). You need to understand the text in your contemporary understanding of language, literature. 2-You will pray an hour a day (Christ’s example). Here you most make a schedule of prayer, if you do not have one you are not praying. And you follow Christ’s example, an hour away from the crowds (activities of the day) in isolation with God only. 3-Follow the advice in “Sodom and Gomorrah” under “Making a study plan”. If you can not then used the following resources: Gary Habermas webpage; The Credo House webpage and the Veritas Forum webpage. 4-From these pages and other apologetics resources you will get references to books they use, make a note and purchase them and read them, reading is the best thing you can do for your  Christian knowledge. J.P. Moreland suggest you most be reading (always a book that is slightly above your comprehension and educational level and he has very good recommendations for high school level, AA degrees level, BA,MA and Phds. Follow his advice and start getting interested in your Christian knowledge.

A good practice is to read a book then make a book report for your records, this will increase retention and it is a god practice to start using the knowledge. Also make a report of the sermon you just heard, write it down and see where it helped you, take notes as you get the main points of the sermon and Bible studies. If you have a partner,  talk to them about what you thought the sermon was all about, what you learn new (good luck with that one) and how can it benefit you personally and in your testimony to others. 

All Pacino in “Scent of a Woman” was asked the question: “Why can’t you remember her name?” He answered; “Because it is not important for me”…And here is something for you: If your progress in knowledge and wisdom as a Christian is “not important” , you will soon forget this and other advice towards growing in your faith. In fact you just “forgot” (omitted) to multiply your talent!   

Be courageous enough to ask a question, be diligent in pursuing excellence!

Tio Papo

 

31 years ago, left the faith…same reasons I find today, why?

31 years ago right at the same time of the year I had my greatest disappointment about the meaning of life. You see, I was looking to make sense of my childhood and adolescent years of instructions in the ways of Christianity. I went to the one person I thought could answer my questions those are:

Why is hell forever? Why is Christianity the truth? What evidence do we have? What is the reason behind, creating souls that would be lost in a place called hell? Why is there suffering? And why is this thing called Christianity not working for me?

The one person I admired as to his intelligence and depth in theology (or so I thought) couldn’t answer me those questions and since he didn’t win the arguments, he then attacked me right out, personally. I remembered troubling prophesies about the end of my life and how horrible my existence here before I die was going to be…

He pushed me so far away from Christianity that I ended up in New Age Hinduism…

But I did come back to my first love, it just took me 27 years to do so…and since 2007 I  have been growing in my faith, learning a lot of good things about my newfound ways of thinking about those same things I was thinking 31 years ago but now answered through one thing in particular, the amassed information about Christian theology found today in cyberspace. Yet when I talk to leaders at the same level of the one I once sought 31 years ago, their response today is surprisingly the same…It hurts, it hurts a lot!

You see I write from my heart, sometimes hard criticisms from a perspective of what is reasonably the ideal, and one thing comes back….a “No, you can’t say that”, or “No, though there is value to your ideas, no one in Christendom today is going to be able to see it”! A “you will not fit in todays church”, or even, “if you think like that you are not saved”…it hurts…it really does!

I am a bit opinionated say some, and perhaps, I do get passionate about my reasoning and yet I have to find someone who seriously challenges my reasoning in theology. Most even Christian leaders in my circle are highly uneducated and very obtuse about their beliefs, or better said, way of doing theology. I have written two articles in Spanish about this and will translate them soon. Needlessly said, the leadership seems in today’s church environment to fall within the scope of the temple in Ezekiel 9, which God destroyed, they are so blind to the real truth.

My brother warned me coming to Florida; “That culture there won’t be able to assimilate your progress in theology”. He was referring to the backwards way in which the Hispanic community believes and does church and theology. And we have a phenomenon happening in our community, ministers from other countries are coming here to try and teach 50  -100 year old theology and they have degrees…yes of some type of seminary or other and why is it they are coming here? They are saying, “Because I am tired of living in poverty”…Well that is the gospel of prosperity from a third world perspective. You see if these so called “ministers” could be even at the same level of theology understanding that our graduates here, I could see a fair exchange. But even if they were, why is it that they can’t serve Christ in their countries? The truth is they don’t want to…in other words, their “call”, their “ministry” is not from God, rather is a ministry from financial gain, a better life in the promised land of the USA. They come here to teach ignorant theology and strange and tiresome teachings. Churches without pastors sometimes make the mistake of hiring them and, oh boy, once they can convince the majority of the simpler members, these free loaders are here to stay! They will invoke every rule or past practice of a certain church, will try to convince everyone that this is the way is done in the organizations (and, it is not if the organization has autonomous church governments) and will take groups by surprise with their so called wisdom which the church soon find out it not there but now it is too late and have to either leave or put up with yet another false teacher. False not in the sense of false doctrine, false in the sense that the normal progress of believers in churches pastored by these, will be thwarted!

I was recently engaging one of these “ministers” and yes he has the format of the rhetorical intonation of a speaker, but frankly after two sermons he just tires you out, it seems you are hearing the same exact sermon day after day. This is caused by a lack of true logical ideas, ones that speak to the contemporary life’s of todays citizens, workers, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, …believers! You see they come from a very different world, and don’t have the humility to understand that unless God has actually sent them here they shouldn’t be here! The measure of a ministry is the quality of teaching and growth of the church and if the believer is only going to get the same progress as the “depraved” churches already in trouble,; why do we need these immigrants?

Talking to him was actually more frustrating than talking to home grown ministers, for at least the homey ones can understand where I come from, this one is an alien that will try to shut you up by saying “God sent me, and here I am and you will have to accept it!” He couldn’t reason, didn’t have the patience to reason and told me right out “I don’t want to talk theology any more…” Oh well…!

I have been getting this whole thing too clear now. Not only this incident but by listening to other leaders troubles within leadership colleagues… I am hurt…very hurt of how these so called leaders, so called, “ministers of Christ” actually treat each other. The amount of disrespect amongst them, harsh criticism and discriminations is horrible…Like 31 years ago; I am saying now, “if that is the Christian mind, I don’t want any of it!”

I will not forsake Christ, He is my saviour…as far as church going is concern…no thanks, don’t need this type of aggravation! I find fellow believers here with you in cyberspace, besides this is where I have received all my newfound truth not within the four walls of the depraved ones…All I have found within those four walls didn’t amount to much…interesting isn’t it?

I do find pleasure in small groups discussions, one such a group I had at work and perhaps this is my best environment, but finding like minded persons is not so easy, I just hope I can…and the dream to start from scratch with minds not contaminated by dogma and perverse theology still a dream…perhaps someday….for now Tio Papo ….rests!

Blessings!

Love and service: John 21:15

 

”Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?”

This question from Jesus to Peter really tells us of the love Jesus had for Peter and in extracting the universal truth of Jesus question, the love he has for each and every one of us. We can appreciate several issues Jesus is addressing in this passage fro verse 15 to 17. These issues in our Christian life are not easily identified and can make us act just in the same manner Peter did in denying Jesus as his master and leader.

It tells us of a sequence of actions and attitudes we automatically go through in our lives, perhaps daily although unaware we do; we are no better than Peter!

The passage deals with love, the love we should have for Christ, which is a reaction of his infinite love. The sequence is one of love to betrayal to repentance to service, and it needs to be analyzed at each step.

Lets talk about love. In this context is the love relationship Jesus had with Peter. We know God loves us infinitely and with such patience and compassion that we forget often to realize this, thus living a life of undo guilt. But his love for us is so wonderful he already knows how and when we will betray his love for us. This happens usually in the struggle of the lost battle with our flesh, we need to realize we have no power in ourselves to win this battle, It is evident in Peter’s betrayal how even after witnessing the life of Jesus, the greatest teacher he could ever  have for three years, Peter was so quick in denying he ever knew him. The love here would represent our understanding of our faith, our belief system. We can intellectualize our faith and convictions all we want but if we remain just students, children in Christ we will betray our Lord, there is no escaping this since it is a natural stage in what is supposed to be our growth and progress in Christ.

We often are too content in remaining in this love, the one that Christ takes us by the hand and our lives are but blessings and loving experiences.  You can easily spot a Christian in this stage of the path to Christ. They boast of how much God has blessed them; they have acquired a lot of evidences in their lives to suggest they are in the truth; good family life, neighbors, jobs and church positions. Yet they have not been tested, they have not seen their source of strength in the faith, beaten, made ridicule of, crucified! This testing can be experiential or intellectual. Experiential in that prayer, when we need them the most are not answered in loss of livelihood or loss of socio-economic status and loss of loved ones. Intellectually it can be a challenge of ones beliefs when the experiences of life do not quite square with our beliefs; the lack of knowledge when confronted with science and or other beliefs; and lack of confidence our beliefs are actually true. This area of lack of confidence could last a lifetime if it is not corrected and can be a chronic betrayal state in the believer, a very sad reality found within our groups.  So the “love” that we profess can be indeed a chronic state of betrayal.

Betrayal has many disguises but the most obvious is the sanctimonious attitude. This attitude makes us believe we and only we have the greatest grasp of the truth of God and we push it outwards to the entire world. This attitude betrays love in that it usually defends its wall of righteousness behind Scripture itself by bad theology or hermeneutics. It depends a lot in personal experiences or group specific culture and or ways. It seems true in  interpretation of others testimonies and experiences, the fuel for this attitude. In fact if the person only knows how to see something through a narrow window of reality, his hers realization of it is quite limited.  One of the greatest walls is their belief that everyone is guided to their actions by the Holy Spirit, thus not needing instructions or advice.  This notion of “direct’ knowledge” is the greatest wall of this attitude and one that makes the heart hardened and betrayal is a way of life in their actions an justifications for their actions as Christians. You can easily spot these Christians dwarfs (they have a spiritual DNA disease that won’t allow them to grow) by their unloving actions towards others.; Always siding with “the law” and or legalistic dogma which they justify, again, with Scripture (usually not having good theology behind it).  They feel good about themselves at the expense of the problems of others, always quick to judge and never respecting hierarchy in Christ kingdom and church. They focus on blessings and never on sacrifice, they wont witness because they don’t know how and defend their ignorance in the will of God in their lives, content only to be church goers who their only participation in theology is limited to church operations an social context. This wall of “I have the Holy Spirit guidance” will make them spiritual midgets because they have no intention to learn, it is too hard for it would mean intellectual engagement and they have convinced themselves that standing behind the wall of ignorance (the love stage above) is a lot easier. And it is, but they will never have the potential for being tested towards real growth in Christ, they remain forever as a disciple who’s Christ was never beaten, ridiculed, crucified.

Repentance: After the betrayal (most Christians experience as a chronic condition), there should be repentance! This is the real beginning of the progress intended by God in our lives, one not many actually achieve, why? Well first it involves betraying your betrayal. Let me explain. In your “normal” way of doing Christianity you have worked for many years into a betrayal condition and you have gotten use to this condition, it is a chronic one. Your attitudes of un-love, gossip, feeling holier than thou and the like has gotten you ingrained into a life of lies, deceit and justifications; and you don’t even know it! It is impossible to repent if you think you are fine and your Christian life is in no need of correction. So in order to even approach the next step in your Christian life progress you need to realize your condition of betrayal.

First of all it take your willingness to examine yourself honestly, not comparing yourself to the evils others do, but to search for your own. Questioning yourself is the first step and it is necessary to realize your betrayal. This examination can’t occur if you have incomplete data (bad theology) to even allow introspection into your life. That is, your first move here is to acquire real knowledge of your intellectual beliefs. You most start by reading, yes; not only the Bible, but one that has exegetical and hermeneutical application notes; usually an application-study Bible. I have found the best to be NLT but I recommend you purchase (yes, it takes money!) several versions including paraphrases. Second you must purchase (again money) a good dictionary (ask your librarian, it doesn’t have to be a Biblical one) and have the ability for critical thinking (usually acquired when you get an AA degree in Jr. College).  Now you start getting the idea, don’t you? Well read proverbs 2:1-11 and you will get an idea, go ahead and read that passage now! Read anything you can get your hands on in Christian Theology, from St. Augustine to Gary Habermas; God didn’t waste his time having theologians writing the wisdom of God for 2000 years, and it would be disrespectful of you to think this work of the Holy Spirit throughout the last 2000 years is just nonsense. Part of examining yourself honestly is questioning where does this attitude of disrespect towards God comes from. If our God is the God of history it means we need to learn the lessons others learned so as not to make similar, or worse, new mistakes in our understanding of who we are and who God is! This is in fact how you repent from your mediocre knowledge Christian life, so that you become a better Christians God can actually use for His cause.

Repentance means you are convicted by the Holy Spirit of the betrayal in the condition you have been, a distant follower of the passion of Christ and denying to even being his friend. You need to realize your sanctimonious life is disconnected from Christ sacrifice and that you don’t even qualify as His friend, since your lack of love, your apathetic life towards growth and your complex of superiority makes Christ ask you for the third time; “do you love me?”, that is “are you even my friend?”  This is a real question brothers and sister for we often times treat our own less than friends, as a matter of fact, we are contaminated with a sense of enemy to fellow believers and friends to the unbelievers! You need to realize what you have done to Christ during these last 20 years or so in church (less if you are a newcomer). You really need to be sad, deeply sad of your attitudes towards the Gospel, brothers and sisters in Christ, and about your miserable waste of time learning nothing for these so many years. The lack of ability to witness effectively, the lack of understanding definitions (starts there) such as “God”, “Love”, “Justice”, “Grace”; and in terms like “the destiny of the un-evangelized”, “Gods original ideal for man, current condition and prognosis for mankind” . You really need to learn why Christ is necessary for the atonement of man, why God couldn’t just  forgive humanity from heaven, for forgiveness has a price!

This is the beginning, the conviction of the evil in you after the examination of what your beliefs tell you your condition as a fallen creature. Then the repentance* (going back to a higher plane) takes place in the correcting of the evil within you. You can’t say “oh well, God can do that”, no; because God himself asks you to repent, to change your evil ways to correct your steps. But in order to do all of this you need to learn how, and this is what “believe” as a command means. To repent is to change but in order to repent you have to learn how (believe through learning). This believing, this learning in order to repent is a process, it will not usually come to you by supernatural means: that is not normal, that is the exception, that is not the way we learn how to be conscious and further that is not how God intended man to progress. Scripture itself is an example, for why does it take 66 books written by 40 authors through the span of 1400 years, if we just could get all that by the “Holy Spirit” directly telling each and everyone of us, “the elect” how to do this? It is obvious one has to read Scripture and it is also obvious that our minds would only get a glimpse of the written word had not God made available interpretation of His infinite word through 2000 years of Christian theology!

Repentance is a process, one painful analyzes of who we are and what is our progress so far. True repentance doesn’t just stops at understanding the pain (when Peter cried after he denied Christ), no; true repentance is the surrender to Christ’s love in our corrected lives and further acknowledgement we do love Christ by our willingness to serve Him. But we can’t get through service until God gives us the power in his command to “feed my sheep”. There are three elements in the three times Christ’s asks Peter if he loved him, global, individual and relational.

The first comes as global “do you love me more than these”. That is, when we compare ourselves to what others are doing; are we any better? The questions is a statement, don’t tell me you love me more than “these” (other believers) if you are just doing worse things than they do. Here one can appreciate that though others abandoned Christ in his suffering, Peter who was closer to Christ, actually denied him publicly whereas others were never put in that position. This means to us that our sanctimonious attitudes and our dogmatic ways in which we unloving attack one another is a greater sin to God, a betrayal far greater than most others. This talks to leaders of churches, pastors, evangelists etc., more than to mere members of congregations. The betrayal is a lot greater and so it is the repentance that this betrayal calls for. And this talks to us ,mere members of congregations as well, who have been put in such a society where knowledge and theology is out there to be freely grabbed yet we reject this opportunity in our active ignorance (we don’t want to learn anything) and continue betraying one another and God himself.

The second “do you love me” talks to our individuality, our introspection and realization we need correction and are willing to change, repentance. Knowing who you really are, what you really believe and then why (reasons) you believe it, is what God is asking us through Peter. Have you really repented? Have you really understood your behavior, attitudes and actions towards others? Do you feel the pain of betrayal or are you numb to it by the sanctimonious idea you are “elected”, “saved”, or “better than others”?  What is it you don’t realize when you read that all your righteousness is but filthy rags, what? This second questions really drives into Peter and into us the fact we are very, very distant from a Holy God and that we can’t really perceive his will for us unless we realize the following.

The third “do you love me?” is a call to true repentance, one that drills your most inner instinct for God. A reflective “are you even my friend?” for “friends don’t betray friendship as you did”! Here Christ is telling Peter and us as well “well I know what friendship looks like, but you just showed me the opposite”! It asks us about our actions, of love, compassion, friendship, brotherhood, students, disciples, followers. In other words are our actions attitudes and understanding looking like what love looks like?   Do our actions show what compassion, discipleship, brother, follower (of Christ and our superiors) actually looks like? Or are we in a chronic state of betrayal? “Are you even my friend?” talks to us from a direct call by Christ to us, wanting us to realize we do in fact need a deep friendship with him before we can boast of his disciples, servants, and vessels. He asks you and I ; what kind of friend is an unfriendly person? What love are you declaring is needed when you yourself can’t sacrifice you ego for others?

If the enemy of my enemy is my friend then the friend of my enemy is my enemy. Likewise if I am an enemy (showing an obvious lack of love, compassion and friendliness towards another) to God’s friend, what does that make me? Definitely not a friend of God! You may want to excuse your enmity to God by trying to say’ that “friend” of God is really an enemy; but you just did bad theology for you can never know this! Give you a hint; “My sheep know my voice and come to me”! Using bad theology here is interpreting that by the call of another sheep others know where the Sheppard is, and “by their fruits you will know them” interpreting sheep for non-sheep! In other words when you use Scripture anyway you want without proper theology it is very easy to justify your betrayal and though you may want to further justify this by the lack of good theology available, you are still wrong! It is the responsibility of every Christian to get this right: You are responsible for your growth in Christ and this include not betraying the natural way in which humans attain knowledge, studying reading, investigating, analyzing!

Service: Once true repentance has taking place and you have completely surrender to Christ’s love in wanting to be your friend, now you can be in the service of our majestic savior. By truly showing what love, friendship, compassion, follower (as opposed to always being right and wanting to be a leader), disciple (student and not teacher) looks like, you become closer and closer to that level where God can call you his friend. You can’t be an enemy to God’s friends; you can’t show disdain, hate, unloving acts, and prejudice towards them or even feeling superior to them. Once this ,which could be a life-long endeavor is attained, you can turn your application and resume of life to God and wait (as oppose to “feeling” God as hired you) for God’s work. This process should really tell you the difference between you and those God has already employed in his service in ministry. It should humble all of us with a deep respect for those who God has appointed to lead and watch over us.

Once we can have a good spiritual resume, meanwhile we are hired (called for ministry) by God, we should be humble in our path to follow, one of sacrifice (verses 18-19) and understand we will die for Christ by showing what love, friendship, compassion, really looks like. We have to prepare our churches for the hard times ahead and that can’t start from a betrayal state. We really need to repent of our ways by re-claiming the higher knowledge God has given to the church in these past 2000 years. Re-pent means going back (re) to a higher (pent) place, the place God wants us to be, and if anything can tells us how to achieve this is Christ’s example, infinite humility in that being God he became a man!

Verses 20-21: Our faith and love for God has nothing to do with how others work and are used by God.  If we compare and or criticize and or admire others, we won’t grow as God’s friends to Him, our friendship to Him is unique, he and us, no one else!  We should not prejudge ministries nor criticize others for what they are doing in the name of Christ, nor should we have “celebrities” to follow and glorify. Celebrities in Christ are an oxymoron. Everyone with greater knowledge than us is there not for our praising; they are there to teach us exactly how we can attain their understanding. A PHD in divinity that can’t teach his flock greater understanding of Scripture than an unlearned humble pastor is guilty of spiritual envy, a sign of betrayal! The job of a highly educated Christian is to teach others his knowledge by using his greater understand and really under-stand (bellow God) by teaching others exactly what he knows, nothing more!

Verse 23: How can we misinterpret Scripture? Here even the ones hearing Jesus’s statement didn’t get it! The rumor was that this disciple would never die…Likewise by lacking the proper tools in theology exegesis and hermeautics. we can end up way off from God’s communication with us. Here is an example of the comparison and or criticism of the previous paragraph. Jesus is simply telling Peter “what is it to you if he doesn’t die like you will?” In other words, I will deal with you different than with him, what is your problem? The idea is that in our pursuit of the truth, we can’t rely too much on the status or achievements of others let alone compare ourselves to them. We have a tendency to do this and in many a group all teaching is reflective of the so called vices of others, they themselves have nothing to offer, no news to announce, just criticism and or praises of admiration of celebrities! This is simply another evidence of bad theology prompted by the pre repentance betrayal we find ourselves in todays evangelical Christianity.

”Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” It is a questions to us all, lets embrace it in the love of Christ!

Blessings!

Personhood, dichotomy and the Trinity:

 

We are persons and as such we are not part of anything, rather we are a whole unit. As a person we understand as a unit of consciousness and my consciousness cannot be divided; my person cannot be divided neither.

 Traditionally we understand persons as having minds, souls and spirits, but these adjectives are only pointing to the same unit, the person. These different descriptions of my person cannot be subtracted from me, they are not parts different than me, and if one of them is taken I cease to exist. For example if as a person you subtract my mind I am no longer a person, I am just a physical body, more like an animal that by the way, are not persons.

 What we say we are. soul, body and spirit are just the one unit. If you take my soul from my body I am still a person because I am still consciousness. But if you take my body then it is no longer part of my person, it is physical matter. This is why we are two things only; body and consciousness, we are a dichotomy, two things. In other words we are not three things as persons we are only one thing as persons and two as humans. That is God created us bodies with consciousness called the man unit. But within this creation there is a unit of consciousness that retains its personhood on its own.    

 If you are a creationist this makes all the sense in the world and you can see that we, men are two separate units of consciousness and the physical matter, the body. But if you believe in the traducing theory of soul creation then you see that though original creation of the first human (Adam) involved two distinct objects, the body and the breath of life (soul/spirit/consciousness), the procreation of all other souls have the distinct requirement of body/consciousness as a necessary whole units we call persons. We don’t see God creating any more humans outside the process of procreation.

If you are an evolutionists, then the person is a process of conversion; matter-energy-consciousness, that is a heated point of contention currently. There are plenty of arguments against how is it possible for matter to evolved into consciousness and some Christians have compromise the available data to suggest an evolution of matter that at one point was evolved enough for consciousness, thus the illustration of the breath of life to Adam. They suggest that at one point the humanoid species was evolved enough for God to breath consciousness into the first “Adam” . This sort of idea would seem to contradict Traducianism, which theologically makes more sense than creationism (see my note in Traducianism vs. Creationism). So perhaps for the time being this field should be put on hold awaiting progress  from the two different disciplines, science and philosophy.

Nevertheless we now can clearly perceive we are persons, complete units that though in need of the body to be humans, nevertheless we are whole in our personhood. The idea that we are more than two things, i.e., body-soul-spirit it hard to defend logically and scripturally weak since the Bible have the terms soul/spirit as synonyms of each other. Further, the resurrection of the body would suggest a need for men to be the two things as persons that is immaterial and material beings. Here Traducianism and by that matter, evolution makes more sense since in order to be humans we need both the body and the soul. We are created different tat the angels for sure why we don’t know but it is clear that man was created body/not body stuff. The logic of the fall in Genesis indicates an ideal existence without death, no separation of the two things we are. It seems that death is an accidental from the fall, but not really the ideal. I think it is safe to say theologically we as units of consciousness (persons) are only temporarily separated at death from our physicality which we need to be mankind, and that God sustain the immaterial in us (soul/spirit) through His special action.

As we saw before if you take my mind from me I am no longer a persons because I wouldn’t have thoughts, emotions, self-awareness or reflection. My person is a whole not parts. So if I am soul and spirit, how is it possible to separate the two. When is it possible tat my soul be one thing and my spirit another. The defenders of trichotomy would say we are a reflection or image of God who is triune, Trinity.

The trinity is best understood through the argument of love; three persons (One God, don’t ask me to explain that one, it is impossible for us finite beings), that is three whole persons that are not part of God yet whole persons. Unlike us if you take my mind or my soul from me, I am nothing; God can separate in a sort of way we can understand as Jesus on earth and The Father in Heaven and still be God. There have been attempts at trying to explain the trinity from our perspective and thus having a kind of “proof” that we are three things by some strange illustrations. One not so popular was the egg; the egg yolk and the white are two distinct parts of the whole egg yet it is one egg. The trouble here is that neither the yolk by itself nor the white is the whole egg, in other words the egg can be divided but it can’t retains its egg-hood, because the egg is both inseparably. Likewise I as a person cannot be divided, for which part of me can survive on its own? If you take out of my person the soul, (mind lets say) what is it that is left? Can my soul and spirit be separated and have their own self-awareness in a separate state? What part of me is the one that sins, the soul “that will die if it sins” or “the spirit which returns to God”. If I am both a soul and a spirit, which one is my person? If I am not my mind for example, do I have an excuse to enter into heaven no matter what I have done with my mind (reject Christ for example) under the excuse I had schizophrenia on earth, or that it was only my mind (Hinduism)?

From a human and biblical standpoint it seems like soul, mind and heart refers to the same unit of consciousness one indivisible unit. I don’t believe there is an evidence of the trinity in us , we are not three things but only two, body and soul (spirit) that means my person. In mankind field of experience you can have bodies without personhood, animals but you can not have persons without bodies, it seems this is how God meant us to exist. The resurrection  in general and the resurrection of Christ specifically seems to give us the evidence of our essence.

Another strange example is water. The adherents of this idea take the three states of water in chemistry, liquid solid and gaseous to illustrate the Trinity. I believe the failure is in not realizing water weather liquid, solid or gaseous is still H2O. There is no separation of the two, for if they separate they are not water, their essences become gaseous elements separate fro what water is. Some may want to compare us and say we can be a son, father and still be part of my family. That family is essential to its parts and that may be so, but family refers to a union of separate beings, son, father, mother etc. The essence of a family is its distinct individuals and if one individual is subtracted you still have a family. In contrast we are not the same, you cannot divide me into sub-parts because I will no longer be a person. You take my consciousness away and I do not exist as a person any longer (not that this is possible, it is not). I believe that almost every thing we could compare us to, has a duality to it, for example: As a family member I can be a father or a son and though some would argue a brother too (meaning a trio of things) in reality by brotherhood is the same as my son-hood, because my brother is accidental to my fathers procreation not essential to my essence as a son or a father to my children.   

 Unlike a person who can be in the role of father or son, or water that can be solid liquid or gaseous and that are essentially one thing, God is not a conversion to three by any process. The son in the Trinity is not a procreation of the father and accidental to the Holy Spirit. They are rather three complete persons that share god-hood. I believe the oneness of the Christian God relies in that they share god-hood undifferentiated from each other thus making the essence of the Christian God one. If they were three Gods like some want to say, their essences or god hood would be slightly different and thus the definition of God invalid; for God means “the greatest conceivable being”. If there is even the slightest difference in god-hood you have both three gods and no god by definition. It is also very hard to conceive the Christian God as divisible from its essence of Father-Son -Holy Spirit!

 In one side you have the indivisibility of God as three distinct persons who is evidenced only if God is love, and he is. In the other hand you have three persons that can not be three Gods because this invalidates God’s definition as the “greatest”; for if there is three, one of them has to be greater than the other two, in order for one of them to be God by definition.

So it is impossible for us dual individuals (body and soul) to even comprehend the trinity let alone identify our essence to it. The trinity is probably one of the most difficult concepts to accept in Christianity and it maybe that we will ever fully understand how it works, even in heaven. But from the argument of love for example we know there is no other way God can be love aside from a multiplicity of persons. We too often fail to realize what love really means and t is easy for us to take “thyself” as in “love your neighbor as you love thyself” to mean love is a natural essence of one, it is not for to love there has to be more than one!

 In conclusion, the Trinity’s essence and ours are not similar; we are not triune but dual and my person is indivisible.

 Blessings to all,

 Tio Papo

 

Authenticity

We hide well….we do it all the time; here, at work, at home and at church. No one really knows who we are. We cary hidden traits, character flaws and even hidden sins; some even unknown to us…but we hide them, inside ourselves and try to portrait an image…and image of us, incomplete ,inaccurate, deceitful. And we go on our mary way allowing the world to just see enough of us so as to not be rejected, rather accepted socially and within our group. But who we really are, that “Dark Passenger” we don’t dare show, for we might after all, end up rejected by the group,the church, friends,family and society as a whole. We open up to the emergent world every morning with one agenda in our being, hide very well the real us to the world. We are in fact inauthentic human beings, lying through both sides of our mouth and often times, in a contradicting ways!

 What does it mean to be authentic? It is a hard questions nowadays since definitions are of no concern to todays ways of thinking. No one seems to care about virtue, good neighboring, altruistic compassion or even introspection into the self. Most are concerned about acceptance, assimilation, comfort and popularity. So it is obvious that we have to start by rejecting “all of the above” to find real authenticity in our beings. If when you reject “all of the above” and find yourself void, then you must realize you are an empty self! Don’t get discourage that is the first step towards authenticity, recognizing you are just an image of behaviors and not a reason for them! “Who am I,really”?, “What have I learned in this outward thrown into the world”? Have I used knowledge to understand what is the real or to just exist without really living?

Once you get a sense of authentic self worth you have to make a hard choice; Do you conform to the world or do you try to make sense of it? Here lies most of the difficulty in exercising authenticity; in that it may oppose the ways of others, their thinking, their reasons for what they do what they do. You may find out quick enough you are described as  crazy, different, geek, intolerant, odd, maladjusted, strange, weird! It is a high price to pay for being yourself, but one that is required if you want to be really authentic. After all you have been given free will and you shoul have the courage to use it if you want to be an authentic human being. Conforming, compromising, following the crown, group or belief system in order to be accepted is not the road for if what you follow is not real, you are just a reflection from an empty self, inauthenticity is your way of life and at the end of it, you will have regret, for not being who you really were.

Great part of authenticity is being sincere with what you believe and how you see the world around you, a sense that “this is not the way is supposed to be” comes to all authentic thinkers throughout human history. The reformers, founders of social and religious paradigms and philosophers, all saw clearly that things were not the way they ought to be. That is why they make such impacting contributions to our human history and that is why we have the knowledge about the world in science and technology we do today. Pioneers of human thinking, different,strange,weird… in comparison to their social environment.

Since authenticity and popular mores are usually diametrically opposed, here are some of my beliefs that I can’t betray if I am to be authentic. Clarification is needed here for without proper training in thought in whatever discipline you engage your mind, authenticity may be in fact, conclude erroneous reality. What this means is that without the frame of reference from epistemology,logic,metaphysics ,ethics and aesthetics you could well end up authentically wrong.

Having said that here it goes:

1- I am a dichotomist (we are two things; body and soul/spirit)

2- I am a trinitarian (believe in the Trinity-the love argument)

3- I am a Cristian (believe Christ is God-the infinite/justice argument)

4- Believe in God (from cosmological an ontological arguments)

5- Believe the image of God in us is our consciousness

6- The Word of God is both the Bible and Science/Philosophy (Special/General Revelations)

7-  Soul = mind, heart,consciousness

8-  Both Heaven and Hell are in our universe (for why would Satan be thrown into ours?)

9-  God’s providence is directly proportional to human development ( exceptions = miracles)

10-Hell is not a chamber of horrors and torture, rather simply an existence devoid of God in it!

11-Cristians sitting in churches, are learning very little about reality.

12-Churches are more concerned with membership than with truth

13-Inspiration in music, discernment and introspection in ones beliefs are practically non-existent!

14-Not enough Apologetics and Philosophical Theology is taught in Christian circles.

15-Active ignorance (the willful act of not learning) is an epidemic in our churches.

16-Spiritual envy (teaching so that nothing is learned) is rampant within our leaders and “celebrities”.

For these and other more “strange” beliefs I am being told I don’t fit in any church…Well another high price to pay for being authentic….I surely don’t “conform” to anything, but there is a difference; I neither “make them up”, rather “come to” conclude in them after arduous study ad research, in my case six years so far, and authentically happy in that it won’t end any time soon, this research is a reality for the rest of my life!

Blessings!

Tio Papo