What are you fighting for?

Heyo!

I'm back from my trip with Albert. We traversed Nigeria for the week. Was quite fun. Should have some pictures up by the end of the week. Not quite as cool as the pictures from when I went to the EKA, but still pretty good. If I do say so myself. I'll post the exciting story stuff with the pictures. So, instead of pictures this time, you get blog. Enjoy!

Paul was a really smart guy. I've never really sat down and counted before, but he wrote a lot of the books in the New Testament - Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 & 2 Thessalonians, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon and maybe Hebrews. That's a lot. I've thought about writing a book, but 14?!? That's nuts. Now they're technically letters, but they hold a lot more useful information than most books I've ever read. So they're books in my book. I've been reading Paul's books quite a bit lately. Especially the ones he wrote to the different churches. Mainly because I'm still hung up on that topic I touched on a little while ago on what is THE church. Hate to bore you, but I'm at it again, but with a bit of a different approach. And for those of you who are only interested in Africa stuff, there's some African references and subjects thrown in here, so you'll have to read the whole thing to get what you want!

Now, I'm not expecting anything I say in here to be Earth-shattering or a complete revelation to you. But it is to me. This could all be totally elementary to you. This is more for me to get my thoughts out than it is anything else. I may say 'we believe' but I really often mean 'I believeD', not 'you believe'. This could all be heresy to you (hope not!) But this is all important to me right now. I'm learning a ton about faith, religion and God. To be more accurate:

I'm discovering how much more I have to learn about faith,
re-learning and un-learning a lot about religion
and I'm learning about God more than I thought I could every day.

I'm not what you would call a die-hard Canadian Reformed person. I don't mean that I don't agree with Canadian Reformed doctrine, that's not it at all. What I do mean is that when someone asks me my faith, I'd rather talk about how I try to live Christ-like. That I'm a Christ-follower. That God paid the ultimate sacrifice for me. I would much rather say this than try to explain to someone the difference between Canadian Reformed and any number of other denominations. When someone asks me my faith, I'd much rather talk more about God's impact in my life and less on the divisions in Christianity. You might say that to be Canadian Reformed IS to be a Christ-follower, and I'd agree with you, but to declare "I am Canadian Reformed!" - like that would explain everything - that just isn't in me. There's a whole lot more Christ-followers in the world today than there are members of the Canadian Reformed denomination. When someone asks your faith and you tell them your denomination, it only leads to confusion and the topic strays from the sacrifice God made to how we can't get along. I feel that in cutting ourselves up into little groups and refusing to go outside them we are feeding Satan's desire to create conflict - creating divisions, unnecessary divisions. I won't say denominations aren't necessary. They are. We're human. We won't get along on this earth. Ever. So we need them to get along in smaller circles. What frustrates me is how these smaller circles refuse to get along with each other.

Raise any eyebrows yet?
Don't worry, there's still time.

I find that how C.S. Lewis describes Christians and the body of Christ to be just what I had been trying to say earlier: "Christians are Christ's body, the organism through which he works. Ever addition to that body enables Him to do more…
"The whole mass of Christians are the physical organism through which Christ acts - that we are his fingers and muscles, the cells of His body…
"Christianity thinks of human individuals not as mere members of a group or items in a list, but as organs in a body - different from one another and each contributing what no other could…
"you and [other Christians] are different organs, intended to do different things"

To declare a specific denomination to be a part of THE church and another not is to do exactly what we've been commanded not to do in the Bible: judge. We know that to judge an individual is wrong, but we seem to be able to judge groups of individuals without a second thought.

Like I said, I've been reading a lot by Paul. Specifically, Romans 14-15 has been standing out in my mind. Hopefully if you've read this far and you've seen how much farther you've got to go, you won't mind reading a couple chapters of the Bible. Here it is in The Message. It really stuck out for me. Paul is telling us to do everything to God's glory, and if someone does it differently, it doesn't really matter, because they're giving God glory. In other words, there's more than one way to give God glory - even if they're opposite things. For example: dancing. (It can be a touchy subject in Canadian Reformed circles - probably why I picked it as an example). One may feel that dancing is sexual or offensive; something worldly and to be avoided. While another may feel that dancing helps the individual express their love for God through their body. The first person is bringing glory to God by avoiding things he/she feels are worldly and the second person is bringing glory to God by expressing his/herself through rhythm. Neither is sinning, neither is wrong. Unless one starts to judge the other. This method obviously doesn't apply to everything. One can't say they're brining glory to God by sleeping around… This applies only to the smaller details of things, not to something that has an obvious yay or nay in the Bible. To be blunt, God is pretty clear in the Bible about the important stuff like salvation. If two different people can 'prove' opposite points on the same subject through Biblical passages, it's obviously something that's not vital to salvation, so agree to disagree and get along. "If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone" Romans 12:18

Let me give another example, one with less controversy. Jaywalking. It's illegal. (I think, humour me). To jaywalk in Canada is to break the law, something as a Christian we are not supposed to do, as we are to respect the government God has placed over us. So if you were to jaywalk in Canada, you would, in effect be sinning. Law is law, even if it seems silly. But in another country, like Nigeria, jaywalking is not illegal. So you can jaywalk to your hearts extent (unless you get hit by a car) without having broken any laws (or sinned). Two people have done the same thing in this case, but the one by doing it has sinned, and the other has not. It would be completely unreasonable for the person from Canada to call the Nigerian a sinner for having crossed the road on the basis of the Canadian law, just as it would be unreasonable for the Nigerian to consider the Canadian 'old-fashioned' for refusing to jaywalk. To the Canadian, jaywalking is wrong. To the Nigerian, it's not. The Canadian uses the cross-walk, the Nigerian goes in the next break in traffic. Both get to the other side. I trust you can see where I'm going with this.

You may feel it is a sin not to pray before a meal. That to not pray is to not thank God for the food He has provided you. I find that when I do not pray (as a conscious decision, not a slip of the mind), when I choose not to pray, that I thank God for each bite - the entire meal becomes focused on God, as well as me consciously thanking and praising God for the nourishment He has given me throughout the entire day (leading up to, during and after the meal), rather than a reflexive "I'm supposed to pray now because that's what I've done since I was a kid and that's what I'm supposed to do or else it'll rot in my stomach". I'm not saying my different way is better. I tend to take prayer for granted and I think I'm safe to say that I'm not alone. (I don't think I'd be too off target to suppose that you've once forgotten to pray for a meal and felt that twinge of guilt disappear as soon as you quickly rambled off the Lord's Prayer). It would be wrong for someone to notice I've not prayed for a meal and tell me that I have to pray before I eat - even though I am giving God glory in a different manner. Different is not necessarily wrong. Prayer here in Nigeria is much more active for everyone in the room. If you feel strongly about a point in the prayer, it's not unusual to say "amen!", "yes" or just "mmm" during the prayer. We often recite the end of a prayer together. Jesus never taught us to pray like this, so you could, theoretically, argue against it. There doesn't seem to be a need to grunt in approval during a prayer, so I'd agree that it’s not necessary. But on the other hand, is it necessary to remain quiet? You might be wondering where I'm going with this. You're probably tired of this long blog and just want to hear about how I crossed the Benue River on a barge last week or how it rained two nights (rare this time of year). You might even be thinking I'm not even making a point. That whether or not you recite 'Amen' at the end of a prayer is trivial. But that is my point. It is trivial. It's two different ways to bring praise to God. One way works for one person, one way works for another. The African feels that prayer is expressive, while the Canadian may feel that prayer is to be reverent, and therefore silent. One way is not better or worse than the other as BOTH bring glory to God. There is no way to 'sort of' bring glory to God - you either are or you aren't. So don't judge a denomination based on the specific way they bring glory to God. First off, it's not your place. "blessed is the man who does not condemn himself by what he approves" v. 22b. To put it another way, you're condemning yourself when you think there is only a specific way to bring God glory; that there is only one TRUE way to worship God. There is more than way to skin a cat. There's more than one way to worship. While the manner in which I pray for a meal may be unusual, it's not taking glory AWAY from God, and therefore no reason for conflict.

God didn't create anything wrong or sinful in and of itself. Go through Genesis, you won't find a passage saying "and God created _______ and saw that He made a mistake, but thought He'd leave it so that years later one denomination can point its fingers at another and single them out as being evil". Maybe I took that farther than I needed, but what I'm trying to say is that God didn't create anything evil. It's what we do with His creation that makes it evil. As soon as you throw a human in the mix we mess it up. We're the ones who turn God's wonderful creation into a place of sin. Take one thing on it's own and it's good. Your hand. It's good. It's amazing. (Mine's a little on the skinny and knobby side, but I'm sure yours is really nice.) Fingers are bendy. Thumbs are opposable. But as soon as you bend those fingers and oppose that thumb and smack someone up-side the face, you've got sin. This doesn't mean we should conclude that hands are evil and we can't use them anymore. (Just try to type a reply about how you think I'm way off with this blog using your elbows.) Because hands CAN be used for sin doesn't make them sinful, it just means we need to stop hitting people and use our hands for good. God created us all and will use us all for good - if only we could stop slapping each other and hold hands. Denominations have their differences, but the beautiful thing is that we can work around them.

Paul talks about food a lot in Romans 14, that's because food happens to be what the Romans we getting hung up on. They judged other people based on that they had been brought up to believe certain food was unholy. We judge other denominations based on what they teach on any number of equally trivial matters. For some reason we think that the specific way we do something is the way to do something. There is a difference in what is important to YOUR faith, YOUR relationship with God and with ANYone ELSE's relationship with God.

"For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's" v8, NKJV
We're God's, not our denomination's. Something I've always found kind of an example of our stubbornness against other denominations is when many of us go camping out of our denomination's circles. Rather than enjoy the fellowship of believers in a different denomination's congregation in worship to God, we will listen to an old sermon on tape or skip altogether. Many feel it would be 'wrong' to attend a different denomination's service. Do we feel we will be tainted? God going to cross us off His list as soon as we enter the doors? Is going to a different denomination's service, even for one week, such a terrible thing? To do so on a regular basis would probably mean you get a good talking to. Suppose I deserve a good talking to then. I haven't been to a Canadian Reformed service in two months…

"let each be convinced in his own mind" v. 5
It's not our job to convince other denominations to adopt our manner or doing things. They're already saved, so join in spreading the gospel.

Fight the good fight that Paul speaks about to Timothy in both his letters to him. Run the race. Compete. Stop looking around at everyone else who is running the race and telling them they're competing wrong. You're not the one giving away the prize! If you keep your eye focused on how other people are running 'wrong' you'll just trip yourself. All Christians are running the same race. We are fighting the same fight. Stop fighting each other. In World War II, the Allies put aside their differences to fight the Nazis. They recognized that they had the same enemy. They didn't refuse to join because one country didn't 'hold their guns the right way.' If each country had focused on trying to get every other country to do things the same way as them, the Nazis would've walked right over and won. If you bicker and argue about mundane details, refusing to join in allegiance, Satan will get stronger. Earth is at war, has been since the Fall. Don't give in. Fight the real enemy, not your allies.

I know this has been long, but I'm going to end this speech with some quotes that stuck out for me.

Paul, in his letter to the Romans: "Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others"

Paul, in his first letter to the Corinthians: "For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body - whether Jew or Greek, slave or free - and we were all given the one Spirit to drink… there should be no division in the body, but that it's parts should have equal concern for each other… Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it."

Paul, in his letter to the Galatians: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."

Paul, in his letter to the Ephesians: "We are members of His body"

Paul, in his letter to the Philippians: "The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached… Forgetting what is behind and straining to what is ahead I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

Paul, in his letter to the Colossians: "His body, which is the church" ..."Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord."

Paul, in his first and second letter to Timothy: "fight the good fight"

Paul, in his letter to Titus: "But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless."

Paul(?), in his letter to the Hebrews: "May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen."