Jesus Course

I spend a fair bit of time listening to what atheists have to say. I think it’s important for Christians to understand what others say and to really listen to the opinions of others.

There is something I find very interesting about why people declare themselves atheists. Some seem to have reasoned things out for themselves and taken that step of saying that they don’t believe there is a god, but the vast majority don’t take that reasoned approach. Of course they do try to make reasoned arguments but ultimately their declaration that there is no god stems from two assumptions. I’m not saying any of this to attack anyone – by the way – I’m not interested in name calling but I am interested in finding the truth.

The first of these, it seems to me, is that a great number of atheists assume that atheism is somehow the natural result of being intelligent. “How can anyone who is clever believe in all that superstition?”, they might well want to claim. They assume that religious belief is something that poor uneducated peasants believe in. The kind of thing that a Granny might believe because she didn’t get a proper education and likes to think the world is all lovely and fluffy. Or the kind of thing a country yokel, who also believes that drinking cider and dancing around a tree drives away the evil spirits to ensure a good harvest, might believe. But that belief in god is not for the more sophisticated and educated city dweller.

The thing is that this is all assumption and just plain rubbish. There are plenty of very intelligent people who believe in god. I’ve got a bit of paper somewhere from an I.Q. test I once had to endure (took 6 hours I seem to remember) that declares that I’m a pretty intelligent person myself (modesty prevents me from saying how high) and yet I’m convinced that there is a God. I can also appeal to many very intelligent people who are convinced that god exists, whoever that god might be (I’m not arguing for a Christian view of god here but just a view that there is a god).

There does seem to be a certain anti-god snobbishness in certain academic circles but this is often based on prejudice more than any evidence or argument.

This comes out in the claim by some atheists that theists (those who do believe in god) have to prove their belief where a-theists don’t. However an atheist can’t assume the non-existence of god and then say that theists have to prove it – both sides need to have good reason to say what they do. A-theism is a truth ‘claim’ just as much as theism.

I’d better get back to subject because this could get to be a very involved discussion for a blog.

The other assumption that is often made is based on bad experience with an organised religion. Something like ‘I don’t believe in god because I hate organised religion – after all look at all the wars it has caused’, etc. Or it might stem from a bad religious school experience, or perhaps a bad vicar/priest/minister, or even an over zealous evangelist, or even worse a corrupt evangelist. It doesn’t take a clever person (or perhaps it does) to see that anger at organised religion doesn’t prove that there is no god. The best you should be able to come up from this is that you hate god because his followers make you angry.

The first thing to point out is that it isn’t the fault of organised religion that some people in a religion (and sometimes even the leaders) turn out to be nasty, despicable people. If we took this line then we would have to also hate organised sport, organised politics, organised education, organised news reporting (e.g. newspapers), organised businesses, organised holidays, organised families, organised anything. It isn’t because something is organised that makes it bad but sometimes people abuse that organisation for their own ends.

Everyone in an organised religion hates the fact that some people have abused their position in that organisation for their own ends. In that sense we don’t like organised religion any more than anyone else does- but you see sometimes being organised can help.

Schools, for example, come out of organised religion and if their was no organisation their would be no schools (same goes for Universities).  What about hospitals? What about helping the homeless? What about charitable works? All these and many more stem from organised religion.

Of course I can’t claim that no one would ever have come up with the idea without organised religion but there is plenty of history to show that organised religion played a key role in pioneering many good things which we often take for granted.

Bad things do not stem from organised religion but we who are a part of it (that is organised religion) need to work hard to make sure that corrupt people don’t get the chance to abuse the organisation for their own agendas.

Anyway if you are someone who claims not to believe in god: a) because you think intelligent people don’t – please think again because this is simply not true, or b) because an encounter with a crackpot organised religious group has made you angry – please think again because the majority of those in organised religions are really quite good people.

If you are going to claim to be atheist then you need better reasons that these.

Thoughts atheism, god, organised religion, organized religion, religion, theism

Fasting has always been a controversial subject for Christians – ever since Jesus defended his disciples who didn’t fast (Matthew 9:14ff). It’s a mistake, however, to think that Jesus had anything against fasting – he did it himself after all.

Fasting in the bible

Fasting pops up many times in the bible and tends to be associated with a need to pray about something. It could be that people wanted to express how sorry they were or that they were asking God for something very important to them.

Jesus was keen on the idea that when people fast they shouldn’t tell others about it. Fasting is something that is done for God and not for others to observe and conclude how spiritual you are. I know that danger myself because I’ve fasted on several occasions and if people find out they are often very impressed (and sometimes confused) – this leaves me wondering if perhaps I shouldn’t have bothered now everyone knows about it.

Is fasting just giving something up?

I think it’s important to not get fasting confused with giving something up for your own benefit. It’s not unusual for people to give something up for a while to try and improve their life (e.g. T.V., alcohol, chocolate, etc) but this is about self and not about God. This is commendable but has little to do with fasting for the spiritual life.

Fasting does involve giving something up – mainly food. This can be a difficult experience and it does have the benefit of helping break dependence on the thing you fast from (e.g. food). However fasting really is about your relationship with God and not the thing you are giving up.

Feeling hunger is a good way of learning to hunger for God

Going without food, for instance, is a good way of learning to depend on God more. The hunger acts as a reminder to think about God and after a while without food you start to feel it constantly. You have to turn that longing for food into a longing for God (it’s easier than it sounds).

Give it a try

So I encourage all Christians to try some fasting, but make sure you do it all for the right reasons.

Christian living christian, devotions, fasting, jesus christ, religion

One of the things that people notice about Jesus is how he cares about people. He wants to put people and their relationship with God above systems and organisations. When the religious leaders of the day try to stop people doing things just because it is wrong Jesus steps in and tells them off.

Some have mistaken this to mean that Jesus thought that you could ignore God’s laws if those laws were upsetting you. Jesus never says this and in fact is quite strict in how he interprets the law.

What Jesus didn’t like was ‘religiosity’. When people compain about organised religion they often mean that side of religion that seems to make people feel bad just to suit the religious leaders. Jesus hated this. He had no time for any religious leader who was using people’s faith as an excuse to gain a little more power.

Jesus described people as ‘sheep without a shepherd’ meaning that people need some guidance but sadly all they get are these impotent religious leaders. Jesus saw himself as the good shepherd, by the way.

So Jesus didn’t say ignore the law but he did say that he wanted religious leaders who helped people. Sadly even the followers of Jesus at times have made too much of the authority of the church and not enough of the compassion of Jesus.

Uncategorized compassion, jesus christ, religion

I like to do most of my Christmas shopping on the Internet. It’s easy and convenient and I can find lots of things that you just can’t get on the high street. However I am then dependent on deliveries – not so good. But now it’s too late to order anything more.

Mary and Joseph would have taken about three days to get the Bethlehem. Setting aside the fact that Jesus was not actually born on Dec 25th, by now (e.g. two days to go till Christmas) things were well under way. They would have been a day into the journey. We don’t know where they stayed on the way. They might have found somewhere with friends or perhaps slept in the open air.

After all that planning it was now just two days away from the birth of Jesus. What must things have been like in heaven at this point? My children are having trouble sleeping with only two days to go and that just over a few toys. What must things have been like as the great event was about to take place.

I don’t think God ever leaves anything to the last minute but no doubt there were still things to get right.

I guess most of us are pretty busy about now. Some of those who are still working will be stopping off at the shops on the way home or at least spending some time thinking about anything they might have forgotten. By now though some of those things will be too late.

But there is one thing that is never too late when it comes to Christmas and that is thinking about the message of Christmas. God so loved the world that he sent His only Son to save it.

In all the busyness of the season don’t forget to give a thought to Jesus. Why not start a new tradition on Christmas day – perhaps you could light a candle or say a prayer at dinner time or something. Just remember who Christmas day is about.

Thoughts Christmas, Jesus, religion

There is an advertising campaign run by atheists claiming that there is “probably no god” in the U.K. at the moment. I haven’t seen them myself but I believe that they exist.

Perhaps that is the nub of my problem. I can believe things without having to see them. Like I believe Australia and the Antarctic and India and Mount Everest all exist even though I have never seen them.

It seems to me that we have got so hung up on philosophy (and I like reading philosophy by the way) and the meaning of words and what truth is that we have missed out on some basic parts of life and how we actually know that something is true.

For instance it is possible to make an argument about colour and that we can’t really know that what one person sees as a colour is actually what another person sees. My blue may be red to you. We see the same thing, the same wavelengths etc but how do we know that we see the same colour?

It’s thinking like this that leads some to conclude that there is no god. If we can’t be certain about anything then we have to doubt everything and if we doubt everythng then we have to doubt that god exists, etc.

All very boring I know.

And yet I can turn to my youngest son and point out the beauty of a rainbow or the stars in the night sky and together we enjoy the experience. In some way we just know that we are sharing something together and finding pleasure in it. I can have a conversation with my wife and we end up concluding the same thing. I can watch Harry Hill on the T.V. and enjoy his humour.

There is a part of us that longs for certainty about everything but sometimes that search for certainty gets in the way of knowing and of truth.

Some scientists have tried to claim that they know the only and whole truth and yet ultimately what they claim is based on probabilities only. Science only works if the universe works to a pattern or rules but perhaps we have just made those rules up and in fact the universe is completely random. It is possible for people to see patterns where none exist.

In the end everything we know can only be known by faith.

So then we come back to the existence of god. “Probably”, injects an element of doubt but that doubt works both ways. To say there is probably no god is to say that there might be. If there is even a small chance that god exists then we need to be living as if god does exist. We should also be looking out for the evidence.

Of course I believe that the evidence for the existence of God is overwhelming and so it only takes a little faith on my part to believe in God. After concluding that God does exist I felt a great release and sense of peace about things. Since that time I have even met God, felt his presence. I could now no more deny the existence of God than I could deny the existence of my wife.

Philosophically I can only say God probably exists but in my heart I know He does. Philosophy is great fun but it’s rubbish for working life out.

Thoughts christian, faith, god, Jesus, religion

The vatican recently commented on the supposed quote from John Lennon when he claimed that the Beatles were bigger than Jesus. Well to be fair to Lennon he didn’t actually say that the beatles were better or bigger than Jesus but just that they had a bigger influence on teenagers in the U.K. at the time, and he was probably right.

After 40 years I guess we ought to take stock and see if it is still true.

In the U.K. maybe the beatles are still big but there are plenty of young people who know nothing about them or who have never listened to their music. In certain generations, however, there are probably more people who listen to the beatles than who pick up a bible to read.

However more people will listen to modern popular music today than will go into a church so perhaps the situation is even more stark today than it was then.

Of course worldwide the Christian Church is still growing fast and shows no signs of dissapearing. The only place we see a real decline is in western europe. Are europeans just not interested or perhaps it is rebellion against the way the church in western europe had behaved in the past. However recent surveys suggest that people are as interested in Jesus as they ever were.

Thoughts beatles, beatles 40, Jesus, jesus christ, religion