thoughts out !oud

a Christian’s news, views, opinions and occasional poetry …

Jesus ain’t no happy hippy in a dress

Sometimes ( … okay, a lot, I think!) Christians need to be reminded that Jesus is no tree-hugging, free-loving wimp, that he’s no happy hippy in a dress that our metrosexual societies and luke-warm churches make him out to be. Jesus has come, not to just redeem with the fire (Luke 12:49) that it is the Gospel, but to also (be the occasion to) divide, setting son against father, daughter against mother, family against family (Luke 12:51-53).

In the end, a great and just war will be waged, with Jesus acting as Commander-in-chief, getting up to his elbows in the blood of the enemies of God:

I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and… Continue reading Jesus ain't no happy hippy in a dress

The only Jesus they knew

Christians can be a reprehensible lot; they can be the self-refuting testimony of an otherwise marvelous and positive influential Christianity. And I don’t excuse myself from among them, only to try to be aware of my own shortcomings and to be open and honest with them and then to deal with them.

I have no doubt that Jesus looks at the state of the wider church today and weeps over its lack of cohesion, strength and unity. Church is Satan’s favourite playground (he attends more religiously than anyone) - and he knows all the rules, better than the vast majority of Christians, and his pawns are those in church who hold prominent positions of office. Not only does he have pawns in his ranks, but also some of… Continue reading The only Jesus they knew

Your love is like a beetroot stain

There are many grand, romantic, humorous and satirical quotes on the topic of love that anyone could find nowadays. It seems that we toss the word ‘love’ around quite freely – perhaps we have even diluted it to an extent – so that it becomes just something that is so abstract as to be almost meaningless or at least devalued. We say things like ‘I love Nutella’, or ‘I love my cat.’ What we really mean, of course, is simply that we really like the object of our ‘love’. Yet scripturally, love means something much, much stronger than for what we give it credit. Truly, there is no greater love, as the Lord Jesus says, than to give up one’s life for another.

CS Lewis wrote… Continue reading Your love is like a beetroot stain

Lazy Myth: Christianity oppresses scientific truth and is closed-minded, aka the Galileo case

As Christians, it seems we are forbidden to ever broach the topic of who the Western world’s fathers of science were. Heaven forbid, especially, that we mention that many of them were faithful, Bible-believing Christians and then follow this up with the bold (but factual) claim that the methods employed by modern science today, and that science as an established and sustainable institution, happened within only one period – and in one part of the world – in history: that of Europe, in the period then known as Christendom.

I made the fatal mistake of dropping this claim into a little discussion on a related topic and it wasn’t long before someone piped in with their contrary piece of wisdom: “Just ask Galileo what he thought about Christendom [sic] great… Continue reading Lazy Myth: Christianity oppresses scientific truth and is closed-minded, aka the Galileo case

Lazy Myth: Christians believe because they are told to

This Myth has at its core one main assumption: Christians blindly accept what they are told - they are brainwashed. The follow-on for this myth is that children who grow up in Christian households simply adopt - without question - the beliefs of their parents. Seriously, are there any people out there today who still hold to this myth? I know the ardent Reverend (sorry, evolutionist) Richard Dawkins has gone on record as saying that your religion is dependant on where you are born in the world. For instance, if you’re born into a Muslim household, you’ll grow up as a Muslim; if a Christian household, you’ll grow up as a Christian.

With sentiments like that, I do wonder why Mr Dawkins never had aspirations to become… Continue reading Lazy Myth: Christians believe because they are told to

How to get your fear of death to drop dead

I wonder how many of us fear death? If even only on a subconscious level, perhaps? I think it would be fair to say that the majority of people really don’t give much time thinking about death. I mean, why dwell on something that is so morbid and dark, right? Wouldn’t we rather just think of the happier things in life and tend to what is present than to waste our grey matter thinking of death?

Since you’re reading this, do you? Are you scared of death? Or are you somewhat like me … not really fearing death itself but not looking forward to how it might actually take place?

At one point, I used to think that Christians had the monopoly of not fearing death… Continue reading How to get your fear of death to drop dead

Lazy Myth: There is no reasonable evidence for Christianity

This somewhat blasé objection goes something along the lines of: I don’t believe in the Christian God for exactly the same reasons you don’t believe in Odin (a Norse god) or the Tooth Fairy.

(This argument is actually a softer variant of Stephen Roberts’s argument: I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.)

Firstly, the issuer of this argument (which is actually nothing more than fluffed-up rhetoric) is attempting to pursuade his opponent and/or audience not by reason nor by contradictory evidence, but purely - and unjustly - by association. He is stating, by inference, that only the misinformed, immature and childish… Continue reading Lazy Myth: There is no reasonable evidence for Christianity

Dinesh D’Souza and evolutionary theory - a short take on his evolutionary defence

What’s so great about Christianity, by Dinesh D’Souza, has so far been a great read. He provides a detailed account of historical Christianity and proceeds to demonstrate the positives that Christianity has since brought into the world - and which, he argues, would not have come if Christianity did not exist. He claims that Western society today has benefited greatly from a Christian heritage - and that it is this same heritage that society has slowly - and voraciously - been turning against.

Our Western cultures today now bite the hands that fed them - the irony is that the tools in which anti-theists in general, and anti-Christians in particular, now wield have been afforded to them by the spread of Christianity. The cherished freedom… Continue reading Dinesh D'Souza and evolutionary theory - a short take on his evolutionary defence

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