Samaritans Today

As of January 1, 2012, there are still 705 Samaritans living in Israel. Samaritans are not Jews (mainnly descendents of "Jew-dah") but they descend from other tribes of Israel that have intermarried with other nations.

Amazingly, till today they have been preserved as a remnant in the land of Israel.

Here they are, worshiping on Mount Gerazim

During his lifetime Jesus had a lot of interaction with Samaritans. He was definitely and distinctly a Jew, and came for the Jewish people, but I believe that  He also had a great heart and love for the Samaritans. We ought to pray for the Samaritan people today! When we read John 4, Luke 17, may we receive the heart of Yeshua for the Shomerim who also call upon the name of YHWH. 

Renouncing and Repenting Christian Terrorism

It isn't as if church history isn't clear enough that at many points in history, traditional Christianity has been one of the murderous and vile instigators of evil. 

Our "christian fathers " have killed the prophets, and today we adorn their graves. Meaning, that many "Christians" in times past were against Martin Luther King, the Civil Rights movement, and segregation, but the majority of Christianity today would say that if they lived during those days, they would have stood up for civil rights. We adore the Christians who died in the Holocaust, and say that if we were in their place, we would have done the same. But the fact is, the majority of evangelical Christians in Germany supported Hitler. 

http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/mistic/religionsplanetearth11.htm

“National Socialism was a religion,” noted Professor George Lachmann Mosse of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, whose wealthy Jewish family fled Germany in 1933.

“The depth of the ideology, the liturgy, the element of hope, all helped to give the movement the character of a new faith. It has been shown that [Nazi propaganda minister Paul Joseph] Goebbels quite consciously used religious terminology in many of his speeches. Moreover, Nazism was a total worldview which by its very nature excluded all others.

From this it followed that traditional Christianity was a rival, not a friend. But here Hitler at first went very slowly indeed, for he needed (and got) the support of the majority of the Christian churches.”

Despite Nazi hostility to Christianity and thanks to Goebbels’s propaganda, many Germans believed that Hitler was heaven-sent.

 

A Cologne children’s prayer began,

“Fuehrer, my fuehrer, bequeathed to me by the Lord.”

And, with the notable exception of some anti-Nazi clerics such as Pastors Martin Niemoeller and the martyred Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German congregations all fell into lockstep with the Nazi government.

 

Violent Christianity! Martin Luther promoted the following in his book, On the Jews and their Lies

1. for Jewish synagogues and schools to be burned to the ground, and the remnants buried out of sight;
2. for houses owned by Jews to be likewise razed, and the owners made to live in agricultural outbuildings;
3. for their religious writings to be taken away;
4. for rabbis to be forbidden to preach, and to be executed if they do;
5. for safe conduct on the roads to be abolished for Jews;
6. for usury to be prohibited, and for all silver and gold to be removed and "put aside for safekeeping"; and
7. for the Jewish population to be put to work as agricultural slave labor.^[4]

 

One such outstanding example is the Ku Klux Clan.  A quote has surfaced all over the internet, but I cannot find it's source. It was quoted here: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080209170737AA7pm7H

"The hierarchy of the Ku Klux Klan was drawn exclusively from the hierarchy of the white Southern Baptist church. There were no Catholics, Jews or Jehovah's Witnesses in the Klan. There were a few Methodists in their ranks but their Kleagles, Exalted Cyclopses, Grand Wizards, etc., were all deacons, Sunday school teachers, ministers and preachers of that violent religion. The Klan was the enforcement wing of that white Southern Baptist church." ---http://www.mississippidays.com/murder

According to Wikipedia's pages on Christian Terrorism and also the KKK, 

Beginning after the Civil War, members of the Protestant-led^[64] Ku Klux Klan organization began engaging in arson, beatings, cross burning, destruction of property, lynching, murder, rape, tar-and-feathering, and whipping against African Americans, Jews, Catholics, and other social or ethnic minorities.
They were explicitly Christian terrorist in ideology, basing their beliefs on a "religious foundation" in Christianity.^[65] The goals of the KKK included, from an early time on, an intent to "reestablish Protestant Christian values in America by any means possible," and believe that "Jesus was the first Klansman."^[66] Their cross-burnings were conducted not only to intimidate targets, but to demonstrate their respect and reverence for Jesus Christ, and the lighting ritual was steeped in Christian symbolism, including the saying of prayers and singing of Christian hymns.^[67] Many modern Klan organizations, such as the Knights Party, USA, continue to focus on the Christian supremacist message, asserting that there is a "war" on to destroy "western Christian civilization."

  The Second Klan saw threats from every direction. A religious tone was apparent in its activities; "two-thirds of the national Klan lecturers were Protestant ministers," says historian Brian R. Farmer.^[82] Much of the Klan's energy went to guarding "the home;" the historian Kathleen Bleeits said its members wanted to protect "the interests of white womanhood."^[83]

Indiana's Klansmen represented a wide cross section of society: they were not disproportionately urban or rural, nor were they significantly more or less likely than other members of society to be from the working class, middle class, or professional ranks. Klansmen were Protestants, of course, but they cannot be described exclusively or even predominantly as fundamentalists. In reality, their religious affiliations mirrored the whole of white Protestant society, including those who did not belong to any church.<sup>[95]

The second Klan adopted a burning Latin cross as its symbol. No such crosses had been used by the first Klan, but the burning cross was used as a symbol of intimidation by the second Klan.[96] The burning of the cross was also used by the second Klan as a symbol of Christian fellowship, and its lighting during meetings was steeped in Christian prayer, the singing of hymns, and other overtly religious symbolism.[14]</sup>

I had never realized the normalcy of the KKK among many Christians. It was a Protestant movement! I feel convicted that the church has to "make full teshuvah". The KKK was really the tip of the iceberg after centuries of crusades, pograms, inquisitions, etc. We cannot afford to ignore the facts. We must face them, for only then can we be authentic followers of Christ,

1) Cry out to God for forgiveness for our pride, arrogance and selfishness
2) Utterly repent of, renounce, and turn away from racism, anti-semitism, Christian supremacy, and the pagan western-supremacist elements in our Christianity.
3) Ask for forgiveness from those we have offended.   
4) Pursue love and grace in our conduct. 
5) Spread awareness of the horrible history of Christian terrorism and antisemitism. Speak the truth about Church history!

Only then can we have a testimony in this world. How can we shine as lights if the world still accuses of the past misdeeds? The only way is for us to be completely broken over the wrong that is in the church! If only we would see as God sees.   

 

The World's Finger

"They are highly submissive to established authority, aggressive in the name of that authority, and conventional to the point of insisting everyone should behave as their authorities decide. They are fearful and self-righteous and have a lot of hostility in them that they readily direct toward various out-groups. They are easily incited, easily led, rather uninclined to think for themselves, largely impervious to facts and reason, and rely on social support to maintain their beliefs. They bring strong loyalty to their in-groups, have thick-walled, highly compartmentalized minds, use a lot of double standards in their judgments, are surprisingly unprincipled at times, and are often hypocrites."- Canadian psychologist, Robert Altemeyer.

 The world is pointing the finger at the church. They have much to contend with, and much to object against Christian fundamentalism. Are they wrong?

I believe that society's hatred of Christianity is largely justified. We have become traditionalists and legalists. Their objections are large not against Christ nor against His gospel but against the many, many, evils, or traditional Christianity.  

I have previously written on the "Fuhrer Prinzip", or the egocentric authoritarianism found in many, many, church groups and cults.

We are so inclined to worship a man, a teacher, and idolizing them. We become imitators of phrases and mannerisms. We respond to arguments with "typical" reasoning, trained and ingrained into our minds. The world is calling us hypocrites - how much more Jesus? We are walking according to the flesh - according to our carnal, irrational, subjective, closed and limited, minds and emotions. We are living the "Christian life" for our own selves. We fail to know Christ, because one needs to walk by the Spirit and not by the flesh.

Cult-like authoritarianism consists of two factors - a carnal, selfish, leader, and carnal, selfish, followers. They follow not after God but after a man.

But Jesus called them to Himself and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority over them. (Matthew 22:25 NASV)

 And 1st Peter 5 have more on the topic. It clearly states that leaders must not have the "I am the LORD, follow me" mentality.  

Anyway, just to summarize my thoughts.

Some of the things a "leader' must be:

1) An Imitator and disciple of Christ
2) The humblest of servants to all the flock.
3) Not one to "exercise authority" but to demonstrate godliness
4) Humble, repentent, and open about his own sins and failings
5) Encourage men not to be disciples of him alone and conform to his image, but of Christ over all.
6) Not greedy for money
7) 

There is no place for a dictator in the Kingdom of God. The assembly or congregation of saints is not a one-man show.

All of us must:
1) Have discernment
2) Be clear, truthful, and honest
3) Have a gentle, humble, spirit, not of course an arrogant and rebellious one
4) Know God the God's Word for oneself, and not depend on the "leader"
5) Have intellectual honesty (I stress on that a lot), not bury our heads in the sand, but know all the truth and all the facts
6) Not be reliant on exterior factors ("social support")
7) Free from loyalty and service to a man (idolatry)
8) Not be dependent on weak, repetitive, indoctrinated, arguments and phrases.
9) Take our beliefs to the extreme to mentally test their soundness. Absolute, rigorous, thinking!!!

Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. (1 Peter 5:5)

Scripture is so balanced. Taken out of context, this can be a pretext for authoritarianism. Yet, if we all supremely care for others more than ourselves, to put others first and not our own gain, there will be perfect unity and oneness in Christ, not of the fleshly, selfish, kind found in most of Christianity. 

The world is not wrong to call Christians bigots because many times we really are intolerant and unloving. We can still be principled, however, and not be a religious, rigid, fundamentalist bigot.

With Christ, In School

I want so much to be Spiritual and to walk in the Spirit, yet not be accused of sloppy thinking and believing. I believe that God's divine power has given to us all treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Truly, all there is to know is Christ and Him crucified, because to know God is to know all things because all matter originates in His being.

I believe there are many examples of learned disciples of Christ, who were teachers, who spoke and wrote with clarity, whose minds were shaped by the Holy Spirit. That does not make them less intellectual, but far more so, in the right way. They do not depend on their own intellect, and thus, have the gift from God of knowledge and understanding beyond all that they are capable of.

What does it mean to be "With Christ, In School"? I want so much to be on the right track now, while I am still being educated. That means that the choices I make and the lessons I learn now, I want it worthwhile and of God. I don't want to look back on my education and regret, or have to "count it all loss". I want an education that is cross-centered, and I believe that that is possible, and far more, necessary.

God must be brought into every square corner of my life. His Words, His call to absolute obedience, must penetrate even the "earthly" parts of life, including education.

The growth of a disciple is laid out as such in 1st Peter 1: faith, diligence, virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love.

Therefore, faith alone must be worked out with all diligence. Virtue, strength of character must accompany it, and also knowledge. Knowledge in a disciple is a great thing,  but it not enough to know, one must also have temperance and personal discipline. A complete education encompasses all these things.


And I end by quoting an old School-prayer taught to children.

Father of all! we return thee most humble and hearty thanks for thy protection of us in the night season, and for the refreshment of our souls and bodies, in the sweet repose of sleep. Accept also our unfeigned gratitude for all thy mercies during the helpless age of infancy.

Continue, we beseech thee, to guard us under the shadow of thy wing. Our age is tender, and our nature frail, and without the influence of thy grace, we shall surely fall.

Let that influence descend into our hearts, and teach us to love thee and truth above all things. O guard our hearts from the temptations to deceit, and grant, that we may abhor a lie as a sin and as a disgrace.

Inspire us also with an abhorrence of the loathsomeness of vice, and the pollutions of sensual pleasure. Grant at the same time, that we may early feel the delight of conscious purity, and wash our hands in innocency, from the united motives of inclination and of duty.

Give us, O thou Parent of all knowledge, a love of learning, and a taste for the pure and sublime pleasures of the understanding. Improve our memory, quicken our apprehension, and grant that we may lay up such a store of learning, as may fit us for the station to which it shall please thee to call us, and enable us to make great advances in virtue and religion, and shine as lights in the world, by the influence of a good example.

Give us grace to be diligent in our studies, and that whatever we read we may strongly mark, and inwardly digest it.

Bless our parents, guardians, and instructors; and grant that we may make them the best return in our power, for giving us opportunities of improvement, and for all their care and attention to our welfare. They ask no return, but that we should make use of those opportunities, and co-operate with their endeavours—O grant that we may never disappoint their anxious expectations.

Assist us mercifully, O Lord, that we may immediately engage in the studies and duties of the day, and go through them cheerfully, diligently and successfully.

Accept our endeavors, and pardon our defects through the merits of our blessed Saviour, Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Of Law, and then of Love

If our Christian life is still about what we can and cannot do, about what a true disciple does and does not do, then we are still living under "law". Our focus is not on love and obedience, it is on law and observance. It is about the flesh, and walking by the flesh. It is about judging others by what we see and perceive from our own experience.

Even if our Christian life from the point of view of the cross is about what we must suffer, what we must leave behind, about a set list of things we must give up, it is still missing something.  Discipleship is not a set course, or program. We are not members of a monastery. We are followers of Christ!

That leads to me to the point - love. Love is about obedience. It is about setting our eyes and mind of Christ. Our own sufferings, what we have given up to follow Christ, our nets, they have ceased. They have disappeared from our thoughts.

"Law" is when we look back at Sodom, when we groan about the "Egypt" we have left behind with its leeks and garlics, when we moan about manna and water. "Love" is when our eyes are set upon the Promised Land.

Without "love" we cannot understand God's Law, because at the heart of God's commandments was Love.

Jesus and the Pharisees. Two groups that practiced and believed almost the same thing. The imperceptible difference was that the focus of one was upon the Law of Love, namely the setting of our hearts upon God, and the other, the Law  itself. Note that the Pharisees loved God. Love was not absent from their belief and their practice. And note even more that Jesus was not antinomian. He did not command His disciples to murder and steal and to break as many laws as they could in some kind of libertarian defiance.

No.

"Do you still use the internet?"

"Do you still read secular books?"

These are probably not questions that stem from "love", but from "law".

What I mean by "law" is the kind of Christian life lived by observance of rules as opposed to allegiance to Christ.

It is ultimately about love, trust, and obedience. These are not contrary to the Law. If we truly understand the Bible then we know that love is the Torah. If we know Torah then we would understand Love. It our focus is fleshly, then we would react and say, "But that's not the only thing. Aren't we supposed to eat, to drink, to dress, to talk, in a certain way?"

The demands of Love, the demands of the Incarnate Jesus in person, the demands of a living God, will point a finger straight into the heart of the matter. Our fleshly evasions are to no avail.

Love is a heart, it is a perception. It we truly had that within us, quite naturally, the "things of the world will strangely dim."

 

Creepy?

Perhaps now I now what it means for Christians near and far, in times past and present, to share one mind, that is, to have the mind of Christ.

When hearing Biblical preaching, teaching, and reading, I sometimes have this deep connection with the preacher so much so that I hear my own words coming forth from another's mouth, or know what preacher is going to saw before he says it. It's kinda creepy in a way, but perhaps that is what is meant by us "having the same mind".

Perhaps the common denominator is the preaching of the gospel of the cross. Regardless of vocabulary, language, emphasis or style of expression, the message is the same. And no matter what the topic, whether it is prayer, or the gospel, or love, or missions, it is the same!

It just resonates in me, in complete agreement with Scripture. It's this remarkable feeling I get, that is more than a feeling. It's an identification. And it's not merely emotions because it composes of the whole being, a united being, knitted together with the body of Christ and Christ Himself.

When you read the words of Jesus, or Paul, or John, or even teachers past and present that repeated them, and you have a sense of the fulness of what they are saying, and when you read those words out loud, they are almost your own words. It that's kind of understanding, the rich, amazing, comprehensive, understanding.

It is not the fault of the mind that people are deceived. They are deceived in their whole complete being! Their emotions, their mind, their conscience, their actions- everything lines up to support their own self-deception. And they refuse the truth but choose to waddle in ignorance like a sow in the mire.

1 Corinthians 1 speaks of Paul desiring that the entire church to be of one mind, to think, to judge, and to speak, as if they were one body. How entirely impossible! Yet so entirely so, if one walks according to the spirit.

The Jerusalem congregation, the first and original Messianic community, were gathered in one body. That is a high impossibility, knowing that the nature of God's people is that they are very individual, vocal, and passionate about their difference so much so that today, they cannot even agree on a Constitution. They will never be mindless cult-like followers, blinded and ignorant. No, above all they are true to their own self and have intellectual integrity. They do not conform for the sake of conforming. That is the nature of Am Yisroel. And when that people are joined together in such a depth of unity, it is something far more than superficial cloning. It is far from socialism. It is richer, it is deeper, it is supernatural, and yet, very organic. 

Christianity of the Gospels

The Christianity of the Gospels predates that of Pauline Christianity. One cannot have Paul's writings and take them to be all that Christian life is. Far from it! Everything Paul taught and said was build on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. It is impossible to have just Paul alone, for they build upon the Gospels and Words of Jesus, which proceeded naturally and completely from the Hebrew Scripture, the Torah and the Prophets.

What I appreciate about the "Cost of Discipleship" is that it's premise is the return to Jesus alone and His Word, to the core of our faith, to what it first was, without which the rest of the epistles become meaningless.

The "Cost of Discipleship" cannot be simply dismissed as "just one man's teaching" in the pejorative sense, because the whole book is about Jesus. It is also a plea for Christians to return to the Word of Jesus and to cast off all man-made dogmas, traditions, heresies, etc.

The Call of Jesus resurfaced in the 1930s through this book. Before, it had been forgotten and hidden, mentioned but not understood. Now all the dross was cast away and the  pressing issue, the heart of the matter, thrust into the faith of Christians - Christ demands obedience, absolute, single-minded obedience to His Word and His Word alone. Nothing less that absolute allegiance and adherence to Him, conformation to His image, and the death to all religious program.

Bonhoeffer was not promoting his own writing or interpretation. He wrote to direct men back to the Words of Jesus Himself. 

It is a call to the Narrow Way. 

Is Healthy Eating CONTRARY to God's Ways?

What would your answer be, that "Yes, because Jesus is healer". I find that too simplistic. The question is, perhaps, "Is my whole life consecrated to God as a living sacrifice and do all my actions deliberately reflect that?" Am I deliberate about what I eat, drink, and wear? 

The rule is Jesus First, Others Second, Yourself Last. Meaning, the rule regarding food is that it must firstly honor God, then be helpful to others, and lastly only nourish me.

I take eating a healthy diet the same as keeping God's moral commandments in this sense - Jesus is my Savior and the forgiver of my sins, and yet, I don't go out and murder and steal and wrong other people! That would make forgiveness cheap! Instead, I practice righteousness, knowing that my righteousness cannot save me.  In the same way, Jesus is my healer, and yet, I don't go out drink poison, and should avoid man-made foods that are just as good as poison in the long run! Instead, I practice wise nutrition and stewardship of my body, knowing that that cannot save me like Jesus can, but also knowing that I cannot ever take Jesus FOR GRANTED. My body is the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and all physical actions must correspond to that.

The question then is, in eating wisely, are we trusting God 100% or man? The same answer then would be, in obeying God and following Christ as disciples, are we trusting God's righteousness or our own obedience? Faith and obedience, trust and action are eternally inseparable. Jesus also said that if we are poisoned by snakes, we will not be harmed. In the same way, if we confess our sins, He will forgive us.

We don't walk by the flesh but by the spirit. But that by no means what occurs in the flesh does not count, but rather, the flesh must be a reflection and outworking of the Holy Spirit in me.

Meditating and thinking through Scripture avoids oversimplistic and ridiculous assumptions that will make the world mock Christians not because of the cross of Christ but because of our own lack of integrity and wisdom.

A Sharp Hit

A verse hit me sharply today. It is one of those texts of Bonhoeffer's, that he could meditate on for hours, seeking to grasp fully its meaning and implications.

"Therefore for him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin." (James 4:17)

I had memorized the book of James. Repeated it, over and over, but until today I had not really read that verse.

Today,after reading the headlines, going about my usual business, setting the corned beef to slow-cook, and sitting down to go through and review the book of James, mumbling and scanning through it, feeling guilty about not reading my Bible enough, suddenly, the verse hit me.

I repeated it again. I was stunned. Is that what it really means? Is that what it is saying?

This is one of those verses that  make you put down your Bible and reexamine your entire life. 

"Therefore for him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin." (James 4:17)

What excuse do I have?  That's it for me. I have to repeat this, over and over again. I have to put it into practice.



"Therefore for him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin." (James 4:17)

1. Know - connotes perception, seeing, to look, to notice, to discern, to know, to be skilled in,
2. Good - that which is beautiful, handsome, excellent, choice, surpassing, precious, useful, suitable, commendable, admirable, genuine, praiseworthy, noble, morally good, honourable, 
3. Do - to make, produce, construct, form, fashion, author, cause, produce, bear, shoot forth, acquire, provide, render, constitute, declare, act rightly, do well, to carry out, to execute, to make ready, to perform
4. Sin - to be without a share in, to miss the mark, to err, to be mistaken, to miss or wander from the path of  uprightness and honor, to do or go wrong, to wander from the Law of God, violate God's law, to commit an offence, a violation of the divine law in thought or in act

If I see anything that needs to be done, I have to do it!
If I, know, see, perceive and have discerned, and have the skill in, and notice, a need, which is useful, suitable, praiseworthy, and honorable, if I do not act rightly to make ready, carry out, perform, and execute it, I have missed the mark. I have wandered from God's Law.

This Law of God honestly should change my life completely.