My version of the email forward specified that the student was Albert Einstein. Snopes.com says that’s false.

At any rate, it’s an interesting conversation and the student makes some very good points. So does the professor. And that’s the trouble with this argument. You can’t really win it either way, not without a “deus ex machina” situation. The best thing to do is to stick to your faith and go on, leaving others to believe what they will if they aren’t interested. At some point, they may find God for themselves, or they may not. Instead of lecturing, live exemplary lives. A concrete example always beats a good theory.

He now faces death for his beliefs. Al Qaeda has quoted Mohammed and said that “all who change their religion should be killed” when they referred to him.

The entire series of interviews done with him was posted to YouTube and is available for all to see. The thing that should grab you when you watch them and listen to him is how terrorism-oriented Hamas is, and how the idea of and encouragement to violence pervades Islam. Sure, there are moderate Muslims, and I applaud them, but they are choosing to close their eyes to some of the more violent verses to be found in the Koran.

I’m not saying Christianity has always been peaceful. The Crusades and the Inquisition, both foisted upon the world by the Catholic Church, are prime examples of the evils that are brought about when religion is allowed to dominate governments and world affairs instead of being kept in its place, but at least Christianity is peaceful now, thanks to the efforts of Protestants who were willing to die for their beliefs not too long ago.

It’s noble indeed to see that Yousef is also willing to die for his newly found beliefs, if it should come to it.

For me, that time has arrived. I now believe that it’s quite likely that the Ark of the Covenant was found, deep in a cave near Jerusalem, underneath the very spot where Jesus Christ was crucified for our sins. From what I understand, Jesus’ very blood came down from the cross and found its way, through a crack in the ground, to the very Mercy Seat of the Ark, where it acted as an atonement for our sins. The crack was formed when the ground shook at His death, and then closed again when He was resurrected and the earth shook once more. I’m not sure how to put this, other than it makes sense to me. It’s like the pieces of a Biblical puzzle are coming together.

I offer the following information for you to consider. You don’t even need to be sure of what you see or hear at this point. I believe that we will get more evidence in the near future to support or refute these findings, and at that time, the evidence will be conclusive.

The person who I believe quite possibly saw the Ark of the Covenant was Mr. Ron Wyatt, an American from Tennessee who conducted an extensive search for it in a cave system known as Zedekiah’s Cave, near Jerusalem. He financed all his trips to Israel himself, out of his own savings, and that’s what makes it more authentic for me. After his death in 1999, an organization that he formed, named Wyatt Archeological Research, continued his work. I can’t vouch for that organization, since some of the things they’ve been doing since then seem to refute Wyatt’s original findings.

There is, as is expected, plenty of controversy surrounding Wyatt’s work. After all, the Ark of the Covenant would be a very important find, of tremendous Biblical significance. His Wikipedia page doesn’t inspire confidence. Then again, there are plenty of people who support him, some of which refute the claims made on Wikipedia and say that any attempts to correct his Wikipedia page are always erased. What I can say is that to me, Ron Wyatt seems like an honest, God-fearing man (from the videos I’ve seen of him), and he looks like he truly believed what he found was the genuine article, so I think he deserves to be heard, and his evidence considered.

Certainly, what I’d like to see happen is that the Ark of the Covenant (if indeed it is the Ark of the Covenant) is revealed for the world to see. Perhaps there are good reasons to keep it hidden still, such as the possibility of a holy war erupting over it — I don’t know — but all I can say is that all this secrecy fuels speculation, and it’s not right.

This video from David Gates gives a good overview of the Ark of the Covenant find. Watch it from minute 10 to minute 15.

There are many videos of Ron Wyatt on YouTube. I chose two of them to show you here. First, there is a video of Wyatt made in 1999 (the year when he died), where he talks about the Ark of the Covenant. The second video is also of Wyatt, and here he talks about the dried blood sample that he recovered from the Ark, and of what he found when he sent it to a lab for analysis.

What I find amazing about the blood analysis, if true, is that Jesus’ blood only had 24 chromosomes, 23 from his mother, and a single chromosome from a divine source. It certainly make sense, from both a Biblical and scientific view, if you believe that Jesus was conceived through the Holy Spirit, and not through a sexual act.

Apparently there are people who are actively trying to discredit Ron Wyatt. Some have even gone as far as try try and destroy his archeological findings. His two sons gave a talk in Israel recently, and they show, first hand, how others have gone out of their way to destroy what Wyatt has found there. Some are even trying to extract the Ten Commandments out of the Ark, for reasons unclear to me.

Ron Wyatt’s sons, Danny and Ronnie, also talked about the six Levites that were sent in to retrieve the Ark after the Israeli authorities were informed of the find. Apparently, all of them died when they approached it, and Wyatt was called in to retrieve their bodies. Their deaths made front page news at the time, though the official story said they had died by driving their car into a field of landmines.

Look, I’m not saying Wyatt’s findings are conclusive. Wyatt could have been overzealous, and, desiring to find what he had been searching for, he could have glossed over certain things that might have led him somewhere else. Who knows… But what if what he found really is the Ark of the Covenant? I think that possibility deserves our consideration, especially when you consider that his findings have spurred so much discussion, and have convinced so many others to go and search for themselves in those areas.

There are many agendas at play here. Some, are trying to find the truth. Some are trying to hide it. And others are trying to destroy it. And that’s what I think makes this seem like the genuine article. You know the old saying — where there’s smoke, there’s bound to be fire. There wouldn’t be so much controversy over this if there weren’t some truth to it.

It didn’t, and it doesn’t, seem to matter that’s what’s being put forth as “what’s right” isn’t necessarily what the Bible says is right. No, as long as you can marry a candidate to the church, you can rally the troops and call for jihad against the infidel that dares to go against your cause. It doesn’t even matter if that choice candidate of yours is far from being a real Christian. As long as they secure the endorsement of the right, church members are bullied into voting for them.

This is due, in part, to the two-party system that dominates US politics. When your choice for a candidate boils down to A or B, it’s incumbent upon A and B to polarize you and make your choice easier. Moderates are not what this two-party system wants. It wants frothing leftists or rightists that can be counted on for full support. Other countries where governance is shared among multiple parties tend to be more centrist, more moderate. Election winners have to build coalitions, otherwise they get nothing done. Here in the US, extreme views seem to be par for the course, and are encouraged from pulpits everywhere, particularly in the Bible Belt states.

Another reason for this governmental fallacy is the desire to bring religious views to bear upon political/public policy, when in fact the two should be kept completely separate. Sure, be a Christian in your private life. Go to church, pray to God, read your Bible, but don’t make the mistake of wanting others to do the same. Don’t force people to believe what you believe. Don’t legislate your beliefs. Civic matters should be kept completely separate from religious matters. That’s the principle of separation of church and state at work.

For example, as a Christian, I believe homosexuality is wrong, but no more wrong than any of the other sins outlined quite clearly in 1 Corinthians 6:9,10. As a citizen of the US, I think there should be equal rights for homosexuals and they should be allowed to marry one another if they so choose. That’s because I choose to keep my beliefs to myself, and I realize that from a civic point of view, everyone is entitled to the same rights as citizens of the same country. One of the most important principles of our Christian faith is that of free will, which says everyone is entitled to choose whether to serve God or not. Unfortunately, others don’t feel the same way, and want to legislate their religion, not realizing that is one very slippery slope toward persecution and injustice on a grand scale.

Those of you who think all this has somehow gone away just because Obama won the election are in for a surprise. The past couple of years has been a warm-up exercise. There is some nasty stuff afoot, stuff that will do away with some of our most basic religious freedoms. Misguided churches are gearing up everywhere in order to polarize their members and begin what I would call a campaign of religious oppression against anyone that does not agree with they way they see life and government.

One of the things that this misguided religious right plans to get passed is a Sunday Law, under the guise of a “National Day of Rest”. This is not a new concept, but this time, its execution will be enforced more severely. The concept has been bubbling up in discussions lately, and unfortunately, no solid proof (other than opinion from groups and organizations) has emerged that something is in the works, but I, along with others, believe there are things going on that are laying the groundwork for it. You can choose to believe me or not on this one, and if I’m wrong, I’ll eat my crow, but I don’t think I am — time will tell for sure.

In the past, Blue Laws were passed to force people to worship on Sundays, and thankfully, they were repealed. Now, a whole groundswell of support is building up from Protestants and Catholics alike. What will make this attack on our collective religious freedoms more effective is they’re working together, thanks to the decades-old ecumenical movement, which I wish did not exist. Various reasons will be offered in its support, such as the economy, the environment, our societal morals, lifestyle choices, etc.

This is a small sample of sources I dug up this afternoon:

• Pope and Christian Coalition met to discuss the Sunday Law and other topics
• Some Democrats are calling for a National Day of Rest
• Christian Coalition proposes National Day of Rest
• Catholic church urges National Day of Rest (this is something that Pope John Paul said numerous times, and his successor wants to see it come to fruition)

This small sample of articles is by no means representative. I invite you to search for the terms “Sunday Law” and “National Day of Rest” on your search engine of choice and see what comes up. Or, you could do nothing but wait and see. I don’t think you’ll have to wait for long.

A few months ago, a certain number of closed-door meetings were held between high-ranking members of Protestant and Catholic churches when the Pope visited the US. No one can say what went on during those meetings, but given that both sides of the table want to see a “National Day of Rest”, it’s not impractical to assume that it was one of the items discussed there.

I for one was shocked when I heard President Bush exclaim that he “saw God in [the Pope's] eyes”. Wasn’t he supposed to be Protestant? Has he forgotten that countless people died, by sword, torture, or burning, in order to win the right to worship God apart from the Catholic Church? That’s not something you forget, unless you have a different agenda.

Some may say we shouldn’t worry about Bush, because he’s a lame-duck president. To that, I say this so-called “lame duck” is signing bill after bill while he still can, while he’s still in office. Also, let’s not forget all the stuff he did during his two terms in office. Will he try to sign some sort of National Day of Rest legislation into law before he leaves the White House on 1/20/09? I don’t know, but it is possible. Even if Bush doesn’t sign such legislation, that’s not to say it won’t happen. We have a good combination of economic, societal and religious factors that are creating a situation where a Sunday Law can pass, especially one couched in such nice terms as a “National Day of Rest”…

What bothers me in all this is that somehow forcing people to worship on Sunday is supposed to make everything better. Why? How? It’s ridiculous when you think about it.

Never mind that the Bible, when you study it, says quite clearly that Sabbath is the proper day of worship. Never mind that the Bible talks about religious tolerance. Never mind that other religions worship on the Sabbath or on Friday. Never mind that forcing people to worship the way you want them to worship never works out. Never mind that God doesn’t force people to believe in Him, but He gives them free will to choose what to do with their lives. Never mind that the US is a country whose very foundations were built on the precepts of religious freedom. No, somehow legislating a day or worship will make everything better. And of course, Sunday is picked because it is the day when most people in this part of the world go to church (or would go to church, if they did go to church) even though it is not the Biblical day of worship.

In effect, when that law gets passed, and it will get passed in the near future, because the Bible prophesies that it will get passed, what will have happened is that government will have effectively entered into an unholy marriage with religion. It means a return to the days of religious persecution that have haunted our collective histories as countries of this world. Sure, the National Day of Rest sounds good, but make no mistake about it, it is, at its core, as evil as the Inquisition. It is the start of religion once more dictating how governments will behave. It is the start of the end times.

Don’t believe me? Read up on Bible prophecy and make up your own mind. I recommend the following resources:

• Focus on Prophecy: Article Collection
  
• The Most Amazing Bible Prophecies
• Focus on Prophecy: Daniel and Revelation
• Storacles of Prophecy
• The Discover Bible Guides
• Amazing Facts Bible Study Guide

I’ve been reading my Bible more lately, and in a lot more places, thanks to the Bible iPhone App, a very useful (and free) app put together by the folks at YouVersion.com. I downloaded the app right about the time the App Store launched, and have been using it ever since.

It’s gone through multiple updates, and has gotten better with time: more versions, more options, more languages, and lately, even downloadable, offline editions of the Bible. I’m grateful this app exists and is being maintained, because the need is obviously there, particularly for me. I use my iPod Touch a lot, and it’s so nice to be able to get in bed and night and read my Bible before I go to sleep.

The helpful folks at YouVersion have even put together a nifty video tutorial to demonstrate the app:

While some people voice the complaint that not enough downloadable editions of the Bible exist for this app, making it necessary to connect to the Internet when you want to read the Bible, you should keep in mind that only public domain Bible editions can be distributed freely. Licensing agreements must be respected for the more popular and modern editions, and this makes it necessary to read them directly from the YouVersion website, through the app, instead of being able to download them to your iPhone or iPod Touch.

For example, I like the NIV (New International Version) and the NJB (New Jerusalem Bible). The NIV is only available online, and the NJB isn’t even available at YouVersion. DoubleDay and the Catholic Church, the publishers for the NJB, have only licensed the NJB to one website, at least for the present time. A few years ago, I wanted to use the NJB for my podcasts — to read chapters from it so people interested in hearing the Bible could download them — but I got turned down (they were nice about it though).

This is a long way of saying you shouldn’t blame YouVersion or the app if there aren’t more offline editions of the Bible. They’re doing what they can. I read the NIV when I can get online with my iPod, and the KJV (King James Version) when I can’t. It works out just fine in the end.

Image used courtesy of YouVersion.

How is that possible? It’s possible because he relied not only on Bible prophecy, but on statements made by the Federal Reserve Chairman more than 30 years ago, and on studies published by certain institutions in Europe a couple of years ago. All of these different sources predicted an economic collapse, right here in the US, and the European studies even predicted the month (they named September 2008 specifically).

I’d love to find out the exact sources (the speech made by the FRC sometime in the 70s, and the studies published in Europe), so if you can find them, please let me know. The important thing to keep in mind is that his speech PRE-DATES the current crisis by a few months, so he couldn’t have faked it. It really happened as he said it would, and I only saw the video for the first time tonight.

In the video, he also makes other statements about what might happen in the near future, but he doesn’t put any time frames on those, because they are based on Bible prophecy and no dates are given in the Bible, as you might expect. We could have a few more months or a few more years before things get really bad. I don’t know. But I think I owe it to you, and you owe it to yourselves, to see this video in its entirety and to make up your own minds about it. At least you’ll have the information that many others won’t have.

This is the video: David Gates - The Coming Crisis. It can be found at revelatia.ro, on this page. It’s a Romanian website, but the video is in English, with Romanian subtitles. I’m mirroring the video on my site, just in case, and you can get it here. The original video (English only) is on Google Video.

Please, take an hour or so out of your lives and watch this video. If you’d like to find out more about David Gates, here’s his website.

Let’s look at those six verses where religion is talked about:

• Jeremiah 6:1 The verse itself is not relevant, but the chapter heading is. It says “False Religion Worthless”.
• Acts 12:19 “Instead, they had some points of dispute with him about their own religion and about a dead man named Jesus who Paul claimed was alive.” Here Festus, the Roman ruler over the region, discusses Paul’s case with King Agrippa. Paul, if you remember, was about to be killed by the Jews because he strayed away from the religion, when the Roman soldiers intervened. Paul was then put in prison for his safety, to await a hearing by Festus and later King Agrippa.
• Acts 26:5 “They have known me for a long time and can testify, if they are willing, that according to the strictest sect of our religion, I lived as a Pharisee.” Here Paul defends himself before King Agrippa.
• 1 Timothy 5:4 “But if a widow has children or grandchildren, these should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God.”
• James 1:26 “If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless.”
• James 1:27 “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”

Religion is not something that God cares about. If it were, we’d see a lot more verses about it in the Bible. Religion is a man-made concept, introduced as a differentiator, or, if you prefer, a discriminator. Certainly, if you look at history, you’ll see how the term has been used through the ages, and it seems it’s always used to polarize, differentiate or discriminate. Organized religion always seems bent on influencing or controlling governments in one way or another.

Instead, we see that “faith” is something God cares about. “Church” is another concept that is important, but it is only introduced in the New Testament and mentioned 112 times. Most of all, God cares about “people“. There are 2221 instances of that word found in the Bible.

Why am I writing this post? James 1:27 is a verse that stuck to me when I read it. There it is, spelled out in black and white. The only religion that God accepts is to look after orphans and widows, and to keep from being polluted by the world.

Any time some religion or other claims to have some exclusive benefit over another, or worse, claims that they’re in the right and others aren’t, beware! That’s not Biblical, that’s not Godly, and it’s certainly not something you should be involved in, unless you want to get further away from God.

Want to do the right thing? Care about your faith, and care about people. That’s what’s important. That’s what’s Godly. That’s also what’s right, thank God!

“Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for.” [reference]

Not even my favorite translation, the NJB (New Jerusalem Bible) comes close to capturing the heart of that definition. (You can read the NJB version here.)  It’s surprising how many translators missed the boat when it came to the meaning of this verse, and the meaning of this very important idea. Who knows, given that these translations were written at different times in history, perhaps the language used in them made more sense to their contemporaries than it does to me or you.

We English speakers are very fortunate. We have over twenty translations of the Bible that we can look through and compare verses in order to arrive at the best understanding of a certain passage or concept. And online tools like the Bible Gateway make it incredibly easy to do this.

Other people are not so fortunate. If you look at other languages, you’ll see they have only a few translations, and some only one. They’re left at the mercy of that single translator or group of translators when it comes to understanding the Bible. As well intentioned as that one person or persons might have been, it is impossible to translate every verse correctly in a single translation, particularly when that translation draws upon not the original, but a secondary source.

And yet faith, this powerful, but hard-to-define concept, which I can only find clearly explained in a single version of the Bible (out of over 20) is so hard to find in action in English-speaking countries — the very countries that have the incredible benefit of so many translations and so much learning to illuminate the meaning of the Bible to them.

Should you go to a country where the translations are scarce or even non-existent, you’ll find that faith is abundant there. You see it on the faces of simple people and in their behavior. They understand it implicitly and put it into practice. Back here, it’s not fashionable to have faith or to talk about it — unless one is a politician and is stumping for public office, in which case we all know (or should know) that they’re lying.

Why is that? How can we so readily throw away the privilege of so much understanding and not apply it in our lives? I’m reminded of the following verse from Luke 12:48:

“From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.”

That’s a sobering thought.

If this psalm was indeed written by Moses, then it was put down on papyrus at a very interesting time of his life. Given the tone of the psalm, it was composed before Moses set out to free the Israelites from the slavery of Egypt. It may have even been written while he was still a prince of Egypt and had just discovered his true origin, or — the more likely possibility — while he was living a quiet life of dedication to the Lord in the deserts of Midian.

The psalm as a whole doesn’t necessarily stand apart from others — it is a prayer to God for the deliverance of Israel. There are numerous psalms like it. But the possibility that this one is written by Moses makes it interesting. And the tone in general is more subdued, more wise, less whiny than in other psalms.

Verse 10 in particular draws my attention: “The days of our years are threescore years and ten [70]; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years [80], yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.”

Isn’t that true? Even nowadays, our life expectancy is generally around 70 years. Some people live to 80, and much fewer live to 90, but mostly through the help of modern medicine, not “by reason of strength”. At the time he wrote this, Moses didn’t know it, but his life was to be especially long. He lived to the ripe old age of 120 years (40 years more than he’d predicted), and his strength and vision were unabated to the moment of his death. That’s amazing!

If you’d like to read Moses’ life story, the Bible (book of Exodus) is your best bet. But if you want a good summary, you can find it here. That’s where you’ll find out that Moses’ life was divided into three periods of 40 years. He spent the first forty in Egypt, his second forty in Midian, and the last forty years leading the people of Israel out of Egypt.

Given this information, I think you can understand his reluctance to be their savior when asked by God. He still thought he was on the brink of death — after all, he was 80 years old when God asked him to go back to Egypt, and according to his own calculations, he didn’t have much more to live.

Finally, does God answer prayers? Yes. This psalm is a great example of how God answers them. It is usually not when we want Him to answer, and not how we want Him to answer, but He comes through, and miracles occur. The impossible becomes possible. Moses kept praying for Israel’s deliverance, all the while not realizing he was going to become their deliverer, and at an age when he thought he was going to be in the grave.

Furthermore, God performed so many miracles for Israel during their exit from Egypt, and their time in the desert, and while re-establishing them in their original lands, that no one, in their wildest imagination, could have predicted how much God was going to bless them.

Isn’t this amazing? You sit there praying, and you wonder if your words even reach God. Have faith! They do! And He will act on your prayer, in order to bring about the best possible outcome for you. It may not be what you expect, but it will be just what you need.

Then, in verse 37, the other shoe drops. We see now why he’s been praising God so much: it was all done because he wants to take Him to task for failing to live up on His promises — or so the author would have us believe. The whole three quarters of this psalm taken up by the excessive praises are a setup — a farce — and when the author reveals the truth, we see him for what he is: an angry person who’s been lying to the reader — and to God, one might say — all along.

Even the psalm’s byline is false. It’s called a “hymn and prayer to God the faithful”. Hah! Look what the author says in verse 49: “Lord, what of those pledges of your faithful love? You made an oath to David by your constancy.” And then he goes on and on, throughout verses 37-52, reminding God that He is NOT faithful. That’s mockery, plain and simple as the nose on my face.

Because the whole first three quarters of this psalm is a farce, I’m not even going to discuss those verses. Instead, I’ll focus on the “rebukes to God” section…

In verse 47, the author writes: “for what pointless end did you create all the children of Adam?” What the man is really saying is why he’s still alive, and why Israel’s enemies exist. First, let’s remember that everyone on earth, back then, and now as well, is a child of Adam. As to why God created us, and we we live, and why things are happening to each of us that we may not understand, I answer with God’s own words: “Who is this, obscuring my intentions with his ignorant words?” (Job, 38:2).

I encourage you to read God’s entire answer there in the Book of Job, from chapter 38 to chapter 41. If you don’t understand any of it, it’s okay. That’s the point. We don’t understand God, and no matter how hard we try, we never will. When He chooses to reveal something to us, He does so of His own will, and only when we can understand it.

As for this whole blaming God thing, I understand the author’s viewpoint. We all tend to blame God when things go wrong. And when they’re right and we’re doing great, we tend to ascribe the credit for that to ourselves, not to God. Because we can do it all, right? Well, if we’re so damned smart and capable, why can’t we manage to get ourselves out of situations like the one that the author of this psalm writes about?

The author acknowledges that when God made the covenant with David, He said:

“Should his descendants desert my law, and not keep to my rulings, should they violate my statutes, and not observe my commandments, then I shall punish their offences with the rod, their guilt with the whip, but I shall never withdraw from him my faithful love, I shall not belie my constancy.” (verses 30-33)

What did he expect? That God would wag His finger at Israel and say “No, no, bad country! Don’t do that again!” Did he expect God’s punishment to equate to a slap on the wrist? God made it clear through the ages (and even when He made his covenant with Israel during the time of Moses), that He would punish Israel severely if they did not stay faithful to Him. He threatened to dissolve their country and to spread them throughout the world, and that happened repeatedly throughout history. The longest such punishment took place after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD.

God’s wrath is awesome. Don’t take His punishment lightly. I think that’s the lesson to be gotten from this psalm. His blessings are bountiful and go beyond measure. Our cups overflow when He pours them out, but let’s keep in mind that they will overflow as well when He pours out His punishments. He is to be feared. He is God. Don’t mess with Him, and don’t attempt to understand Him. Don’t blame Him, either, especially after He made it clear what would happen to you if you didn’t obey Him. The author of this psalm doesn’t seem to get this part, but I have a feeling that he learned his lesson at some later point of his life.

The subtitle offers somewhat of a clue, by attributing the psalm to “the sons of Korah… Poem for Heman the native-born”. If this was indeed a psalm written for someone else, that might explain the overly dramatic stylings. At the same time, the sons of Korah are indicated as authors on many psalms.  Whether they were the same people, or whether they were the descendants of a certain family, they were still closely associated with religious service, and thus should have known better than to describe God in these terms, even if it was done to humor a depressed, suffering individual.

Another clue is offered by the NJB. In the footnotes, it says: “With this anguished prayer, compare the complaints of Job.” When you put it that way, yes, it’s quite similar to what the Book of Job contains. Then again, we have no other information to place this psalm or Job’s writings before or after each other — although it is commonly thought that Job’s writings are the oldest in the Bible. And even if these two are intended to be similar in composition and effect, it’s still not right. God rebuked Job for his complaining, and Job admitted he was wrong in wailing so much. Why then replicate troublesome writing in this later psalm? It makes no sense.

The only good things I can say about it are found in verses 9 and 13. I’ll quote them below:

• “I call to you, Yahweh, all day, I stretch out my hands to you.”
• “But, for my part, I cry to you, Yahweh, every morning my prayer comes before you.”

That is indeed what we must do, every day, and especially when we don’t understand what’s happening to us. We must persist in our prayers and continue to hope for an answer and salvation from God. He promises He will respond, and He also promises us the ultimate salvation. It’s within our right to ask it of Him.

Taken literally, the psalm sounds awful. Certainly I do not share its view. Jerusalem (Zion) as a real city is not a prize, and is not where I want to originate. It’s a mess where too many churches and people and cultures live and argue and fight. Biblically speaking, it is no longer the seat of God. It stopped being the seat of God when the original temple was destroyed and the ark of the covenant lost for good. God’s shekinah is no longer there. (See Old Testament for the details on this.)

At the same time, the psalm also brings to light an ugly perversion in the dogma of some Christian churches of today, particularly the charismatic ones, which believe that restoring Jerusalem to its former glory, and rebuilding the temple, will automatically bring God’s physical presence back there. These churches waste their money on supporting this false ideology, and fuel the war and hatred that goes on in the Middle East between the Jews, Westerners and Muslims. It’s a real problem and it’s most certainly not what God would want. It has no Biblical basis. I challenge anyone to go through the Bible and show me where God gives any indication that He wants this whole ugly mess to come to the conclusion that the charismatics want to see.

On the other hand, we can treat this psalm as a prophetic one, and interpret it in the light of the prophecies of the book of Revelation, where the New Jerusalem is talked about in great detail (see Revelation chapters 21 and 22). When looked at in that light, it starts to make more sense.

From Revelation, we know the New Jerusalem will sit on the “holy mountains”, and we know that Yahweh will love His city, and that indeed “He prefers the gates of Zion” to anything else. We know the new Zion will be a glorious city, and we know it will be the supreme and the largest city on the new earth.

Furthermore, we know that “every one” will be “born there”, in the sense that they will receive eternal life (at Jesus’ second coming) as they are taken up to the New Jerusalem. The mention of God’s “register of peoples” (aka the Book of Life) in verse 6 drives home the point that this is a prophetic psalm. And the fact that the saved are all called “princes” in Revelation, and that it is said repeatedly there that they will live in the New Jerusalem, clarifies beyond any doubts the prophetic interpretation of this psalm.

Christ is risen!

This is a photo I took yesterday during Easter service at my church (CMC). Service started on a somber note, with the cross enveloped in a black canvas sheet. At the end of the sermon, the pastor took off the black sheet to reveal the white base of the cross and the many bouquets of fresh flowers that you see in the photo. Deacons then walked in with the baloons, we sang the closing hymn, and we were each given a baloon as we left the sanctuary to go downstairs for our usual Sabbath potluck. The sermon focused on the celebration of our new life in Christ, which is in stark contrast with our “dead” state before salvation, so the imagery really drove home that point.

Curious to see last year’s Easter photo? There’s a story behind that as well.

At the risk of sounding rude, I could phrase it something like this:

“God, you’re amazing. You do all these things for me and for others, and everyone fears You. I fear you and obey Your commandments. Every one already adores You or will adore You. You’ve done a tremendous amount of stuff for me already. So, since You can do all these and are so amazing, why don’t you help me? I’m in trouble and it would be a piffling thing for You to help me. You wouldn’t need to move a muscle. You’d just will Your help into existence, and poof, my enemies will be put to shame.”

When you consider the whole thing from a distance, it looks cheap, doesn’t it? You’re resorting to outright flattery with an ulterior motive. It’s pretty distasteful, and it doesn’t befit us as Christians to engage in that sort of behavior.

Yet, it’s so easy to do, isn’t it? It’s so easy to fall into that mindset and let our fallen human natures take over our interaction with God. It’s so easy to think God needs our flattery, that He needs to be deceived and manipulated the way we deceive and manipulate other people in order to move Him to act on our behalf.

He can see right through that. You already knew that, didn’t you?

Don’t think I’m blaming the write of this psalm and pinning the blame on him. Not at all. We are all guilty of this. I’ve done it plenty of times, too. But it’s important to step back and realize that it’s wrong. It cheapens our relationship with God. It saddens Him to see that we’re not truthful with Him.

A simpler, more natural prayer for help would have gone something like this:

“Lord, I come before you to ask for your help. [Tell Him what's going on in a sentence or two.] I know you already know all of this, and you know how lonely and helpless I feel. You’re the only one I can turn to. Even though I don’t deserve it, as I don’t deserve any of the gifts you’ve given me, including that of eternal life through Jesus Christ, please come to my aid. I will wait for Your powerful Hand to protect me and carry me through this. Thank you for this and for all that you do for me. Amen.”

If you’ve doubted that a progressive like Obama can appeal to Christian voters, and that he is a Christian man, then I highly encourage you to watch the video, because you will be amazed.

I support Sen. Obama for president, and I encourage you to see the entire video (40 minutes). Find the time, you will not regret it. I wrote about my thoughts on Obama and this video in more detail on my personal site, should you be interested.

God replies in verses 8 through 13. Verse 8 says:

“I am listening. What is God’s message? Yahweh’s message is peace for His people, for His faithful, if only they renounce their folly.”

It sort of leaves you wondering what these people’s “folly” is, doesn’t? Remember what Solomon wrote once? “Fear of God is the beginning of wisdom,” he said. I imagine this “folly” of theirs must be the opposite of wisdom. They must give it up and move toward the opposite side of the spectrum, toward wisdom. To do that, they must begin to fear God. Verse 9 confirms this. The pieces are starting to fall into place, aren’t they?

“His saving help is near for those who fear Him, His glory will dwell in our land.”

God is waiting for these people to start fearing Him, and He will right then offer His help, which is described quite beautifully in verses 10 through 13. You might think this “fear” that keeps getting mentioned here is some sort of unnatural fright that God inspires in believers. Not at all. This psalm is a great example of true repentance, because it shows its two important stages, which show whether it (the repentance) is genuine or not.

Stage 1 is asking for forgiveness and for help. That’s done in verses 4 through 7. Forgiveness is implied here, and that’s the way it is. God is ready to forgive us as soon as we ask for it. His love is boundless. But our repentance isn’t complete unless Stage 2 occurs, and that’s where “fear” comes into play. What the Bible means by “fear” is that we should be concerned about God when we are next faced with a choice to sin. We should be afraid of causing Him pain and suffering. Because He suffers every time we sin, and He suffers even more after He’s forgiven us and we commit the same sin, again and again.

That’s what “fear” means. It means having enough respect for God to think about Him when we are faced with choosing to sin and fulfilling our trite, flesh-driven desires. Do we have enough respect for Him? Do we fear Him enough? Do we realize that we’re hurting our all-powerful Creator, who gave us life and who could take it away in an instant? Do we realize we’re hurting the One being that is always ready to help and bless us, no matter what, if only we’d turn to Him?

That’s the question this psalm poses. It’s a powerful question, and one that we all need to ask ourselves.

The psalm expresses the writer’s desire to be close to God. The terms used are God’s courts, His altars, His House, Zion, His threshold. Earthly counterparts are contrasted with these Godly places in verse 10: “Better one day in your courts than a thousand at my own devices, to stand on the threshold of God’s house than to live in the tents of the wicked.” Notice how the author doesn’t make apples to apples comparisons here. He refers to God’s threshold, which is the entrance to the house but not inside the house, while he talks about living “in the tents of the wicked”. This is to make the contrast even more evident, which is the same reason for the “one day” to “thousand” days comparison as well.

I chuckled at verse 11 when I read it: “Yahweh refuses nothing good to those whose life is blameless.” After all, whose life is blameless but Christ’s? But one has to look at this in the historical context. The Feast of Shelters occurs five days after Yom Kippur, which is the most important Jewish holiday of the year. It is the Day of Atonement, when one obtains forgiveness for all of the sins from the past year. Therefore, it stands to reason that a person going to the Feast of Shelters would rejoice at having obtained reconciliation, and thus, a blameless life, in the eyes of God, after Yom Kippur. They could refer to their lives as “blameless”, more or less, if they hadn’t done anything bad in the few days between the two holidays.

By the same token, our lives can be blameless as well. You see, a Jew could obtain forgiveness from sins by making a sacrifice and confessing their sins over the head of that animal or bird. Their record after that reconciliation with God would be blameless. We too, can confess our sins and claim the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, thus reconciliating ourselves with God and obtaining forgiveness for our sins. Christ’s sacrifice rendered individual animal sacrifices unnecessary, since He was the sacrificial Lamb that the Old Testament prophesied.

While we do not have a Feast of Shelters, we can sing this psalm, if we so desire, on our way to church, knowing that we have obtained forgiveness through Jesus Christ and our prayers, encouraged by the hope of the new life that awaits us after this one, a life of eternity spent with God, in His courts.

• Color scheme (just a bit)
• Location of logo (now on right, to match up with the sidebar)
• Overall site width has increased, so I can post larger photos within the content column. The total site width is still under 800 pixels, since there are some readers who still use that screen resolution. Over the past year, approximately 7% of site visitors had that resolution. When the number starts falling under 3%, I may make the site wider.
• The Bible Podcasts are featured more prominently on the front page.
• Summaries of the last seven posts are given on the front page instead of the full text. This is so the home page loads faster.
• New site categories are up. I’ve also introduced tags for my posts. I’m going through and re-categorizing the posts as needed.

Hope you find the new look and feel more useful!

The basis for the argument of tolerance here is simple: it’s all about free will. Should anyone say Christians are forced by God or their church to do anything, please point them to this chapter. Should your church force you to do anything, point it to this chapter.

Truly, this chapter sets the record straight when it comes to one’s relationship to God. There need be no intercessor. We can have a direct relationship to God, and what we do because of faith in Him, we do for Him. We are only responsible to Him for our beliefs. It is so important to realize this, because it takes the onus off the church or church members to “set someone straight” when it comes to their religious beliefs. Yes, people ought to be told what’s right, and it’s our duty as Christians to inform them, but everyone should and must make their own decisions when it comes to their own beliefs.

No one should ascribe blindly to a set of beliefs, just because… Again, it comes back to free will. If God gave us such an important privilege, should we waste it by saying we believe such and such a thing because our family or our church believes it? No, far from it! We should diligently search the scriptures to arrive at our own conclusion on the matter. Why? Because we are each personally responsible to God for what we do and what we believe. It is up to us to study for that divine “exam” — should we fail it, we all know where we’ll go.

Does this scare you a bit? Well, it should. Free will is a huge responsibility, with tremendous repercussions. When God chose to create us in His image and bestow upon us free will, He took a fantastic risk. He knew what would happen. He did it anyway, risking the destiny of one third of His angels and of the entire human race, because He wanted us to be able to choose for ourselves whom we should serve. He took that risk knowing full well that His Son, Jesus Christ, would have to pay with His life for our sins. The price is more than we can ever imagine, but He did it so we could have free will.

Knowing all of this, can you treat your own free will lightly? Can you treat the Bible and its laws and principles lightly? I think not. It would be a grievous sin if you should do that.

But do you know where you should tread lightly? In your relationships with others, particularly those who share some of your Christian beliefs. Romans chapter 14 says just that. Why? Because of free will. We need to worry about our actions, our deeds, our beliefs and our faith, and let others do the same. This chapter is a cautionary note to those of us who would act like busy old ladies, gabbing away all day about what we should or shouldn’t do instead of tending to our own spiritual needs.

The following points are made in this chapter:

• Do not argue about religion with new believers (verse 1)
• Do not argue about clean or unclean foods (verses 2, 3, 6, 14-17, 20, 21, 23)
• Do not argue about which day of the week to worship God (verses 5, 6)
• Do not judge one another (verses 3, 4, 10-13, 17)
• God alone decides who is right and who is wrong in their beliefs (verses 4, 9, 10, 11, 12)
• Let us each be fully convinced of what we believe (verses 5, 22)
• What you do, do to honor the Lord (verse 6)
• We all belong to God (verses 7-9)
• We will each be judged by God (verses 4, 10-12)
• Do not discourage or place obstacles in the path of your fellow believers (verses 13, 15, 20, 21)
• You commit sin when you do something that conflicts with your own faith and beliefs (verses 14, 15, 23)
• Do not put yourself above your brothers in faith (verse 10)
• Serve God by showing His saving justice, peace and joy to others, not by showing them how to eat and drink (verses 17, 18)
• Seek peace between Christians and ways in which you can support one another (verse 19)
• Worry about your own behavior, and let not your words condemn you (verse 22)

Given this list, tell me, do you think it gives you free rein to eat, drink, be merry and worship God on whatever day of the week you please? I think only a very superficial person, or one with ulterior motives, would think that after reading through Romans 14. After all, verse 21 says the following: “It is best to abstain from eating any meat, or drinking any wine, or from any other activity which might cause a brother to fall away, or to be scandalized, or to weaken.” Again, it is your own responsibility to find out what these foods, drinks and activities are for you, and to stay away from them of your own accord.

What Romans 14 seeks to do is to free us from bickering with each other, and to spur us to search the Bible for ourselves and find out where we stand with God. Seriously. Do it now, for tomorrow you may die. No joke. None of us knows how much longer we’ll live.

What Romans 14 also does NOT do is to give churches free rein to enforce certain days of the week, as the Catholic church has tried to do for entire centuries, and as certain Protestant churches or foolish Christians have also tried to do since the 1800s. During the Middle Ages, also known as the Dark Ages, the church persecuted those whom it considered had strayed from the church’s beliefs. And in the 1800s and early 1900s, there was a strong movement toward establishing Sunday laws here in America and in other countries, when there is no Biblical support for Sunday as God’s Holy Day whatsoever. As a matter of fact, the weight of the evidence is clearly in favor of Saturday, also known as the Sabbath. Besides, Romans 14 clearly condemns any sort of movement that would force people to worship on a certain day. We are each responsible for our own beliefs, and will answer to God for them. Again, it is our responsibility to search the scriptures and to find out which day of the week to consider Holy.

I know there is a LOT of advice in this chapter, and I don’t want you to read this post and be confused. Therefore, let me repeat that the general message of the chapter can be summed up by the following verses found in it:

“For none of us lives for himself and none of us dies for himself; while we are alive, we are living for the Lord, and when we die, we die for the Lord: and so, alive or dead, we belong to the Lord.”

“Let us each stop passing judgment, therefore, on one another and decide instead that none of us will place obstacles in any brother’s way, or anything that can bring him down.”

“Blessed is the person whose principles do not condemn his practice… Every action which does not spring from faith is sin.”

I tell you, this chapter is shockingly candid about what we should do as Christians. It left me speechless when I read it, and although I’d read it and even transcribed it by hand before, the message didn’t sink in. I’ll be the first to admit I’m guilty as charged. I’ve been judging others left and right, and I shouldn’t have done it. I’ve been an obstacle to others in the past. I should have been more tolerant. I will do my best to be more tolerant in the future.

We really need to become more accepting of one another as Christians. As long as we believe in the Bible and pray to the same God, we should try to live together peacefully, in harmony, and help one another grow in our faith. In the end, we are each responsible only for our own actions to God. And if we stick close to Him, I’m sure He will reveal His truth to us and guide us lovingly on the path to salvation and heaven. Mahatma Gandhi said it best when he said Christianity has wonderful principles, but we as Christians don’t live up to them. What a wonderful world this would be if we did!

So with that in mind, it was amusing to watch this video, where a guy in the parking lot of Burger King gets approached by two LDS youth on bicycles. They start talking, and he completely rips apart their arguments. Toward the end, they get angry and try to push the Book of Mormon on him. Needless to say, they don’t succeed, so they leave.

For more on what the Mormons really believe, have a look at ExMormon.

I’m going to quote from the New Jerusalem Bible, whose translation of this passage is superb. Here is what the apostle Paul writes in verses 14 through 25 of that chapter:

“We are well aware that the Law is spiritual: but I am a creature of flesh and blood sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand my own behaviour; I do not act as I mean to, but I do things that I hate.

While I am acting as I do not want to, I still acknowledge the Law as good, so it is not myself acting, but the sin which lives in me.

And really, I know of nothing good living in me — in my natural self, that is — for though the will to do what is good is in me, the power to do it is not: the good thing I want to do, I never do; the evil thing which I do not want — that is what I do. But every time I do what I do not want to, then it is not myself acting, but the sin that lives in me.

So I find this rule: that for me, where I want to do nothing but good, evil is close at my side. In my inmost self I dearly love God’s Law, but I see that acting on my body there is a different law which battles against the Law in my mind. So I am brought to be a prisoner of that law of sin which lives inside my body.

What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death? God — thanks be to Him — through Jesus Christ our Lord.

So it is that I myself with my mind obey the Law of God, but in my disordered nature I obey the law of sin.”

Wow! If I had tried to put my own struggle into words, it wouldn’t have been half as good or half as honest as this. Aren’t Paul’s words so true? It seems the more we want to do good, the worse we fare — our lives are then constantly assaulted by either internal weaknesses or external factors that exploit our weaknesses, and we end up doing worse, never coming close to the heavenly standard. Then again, we have some days when we feel really close to God, and things go just great.

One thing I’ve learned, is to not trust my feelings. They come and go, they’re up and down, and if you rely on them, you can end up happy one day and depressed the next, depending on how things go. The important thing is to keep your faith, and make a fresh effort every day to stay close to God. Whether you succeed or not is not for you to judge, but for God. I think that if we keep trying to do what’s right in our walk with God, and have faith that Jesus Christ’s sacrifice sufficed to forgive our sins, God will supply our poor record with the grace we will need to be counted as saved.

We must keep trying, persist, and struggle against that human nature of ours, and we will succeed with God at our side!