I was watching YouTube videos tonight from Christian apologist John Lennox. Someone asked him the question about how we can know that having faith in Christ isn't delusional.
That's really the #1 thing I get told the most from atheists. They come from a position of thinking faith in God is this crazy, delusional thing. If you can have a relationship with a Being you can't touch and feel, He must not be real. Talking into the sky must seem downright nuts to people who don't believe.
Later in his explanation, Lennox talks about mankind and its relationship to God. He said a lot of people treat God in ways they wouldn't ever dream to treat their loved ones.
Modern Christianity has become very self-focused. We really only talk to God when we want something and if He doesn't deliver, or something bad happens in our lives, we blame Him. We don't trust Him and His plan.
I once knew a girl in one of the young adult groups I used to attend who told me and a friend of mine that if God didn't give her a husband by her next birthday, she was going to stop going to church and never believe in God again.
Would you ever treat someone you claimed to love this way? "Give me this or I'm gone!" This is what Lennox was referring to in his speech.
The tough part about Christianity is realizing that you don't exist to serve your own desires. The bible clearly lays out God's desire for us to die to self, take up our cross and follow Him. Without hesitation, we must forgive people who harm us, turn our cheek rather than hitting back, and live an upstanding life in service to Him.
Do you give because it pleases God, or because you hope to get something back?
Do you live for Him or for yourself?
Do you doubt God because something didn't go the way you thought it would?
Do you often insert your own desires as the will of God?
The toughest question of all: Are you alive for you or for Him and His glory?
I don't want to treat God like He's a nuisance in my life. All He's ever done is protect me, bless me, and get me through some incredibly difficult situations and tragedies.
There were so many times when I felt I was so angry at God. I blamed Him for taking my dad and allowing me to go through all the things I did. All the pain, suffering, abuse, rape, poverty, and struggles I faced were not His fault.
Now, as I reach my mid-30s, I can look back on it all and see the purpose behind the pain. I see the reason for my existence and why God allowed those things to happen. I can also see His hands protecting and holding me.
You might be asking how I can say God protected me when I endured so much. It's hard to explain, but I see God's fingerprints on everything. I see times when I should've starved to death because I didn't have any food, but somehow, it was provided.
I can't count the number of times I was about to be homeless, but I never was.
It's not even about material possessions as we understand them today, and that's the point I'm trying to get at. Even the poorest among us have it better than most people could've ever hoped to have throughout the history of the world.
Loving God isn't about me and what I can get out of it. It's not about position and power. It's not about receiving gifts and pretending I'm better than anyone else.
You were meant to shine, but you don't have any light within yourself. We're like the full moon. A full moon is incredibly bright and it fills the darkness in a way nothing else can. But the moon has no light of its own. All it can do is reflect the greater light.
I've used this example before. It's a good one. You are the moon. You have purpose and that purpose is to reflect God's light into a dark world. If you're too focused on self, figuring out your worth, trying to live as comfortably as possible, then you've created your whole existence about you.
You can't earn your salvation. There's no getting by on merits. There's no work you can do that will make you better than the greatest sinner. We need to stop treating life like it's a competition, each other like we're a toy we can play with, and God like He's a genie who must give us what we want most.
That's really the #1 thing I get told the most from atheists. They come from a position of thinking faith in God is this crazy, delusional thing. If you can have a relationship with a Being you can't touch and feel, He must not be real. Talking into the sky must seem downright nuts to people who don't believe.
Later in his explanation, Lennox talks about mankind and its relationship to God. He said a lot of people treat God in ways they wouldn't ever dream to treat their loved ones.
Modern Christianity has become very self-focused. We really only talk to God when we want something and if He doesn't deliver, or something bad happens in our lives, we blame Him. We don't trust Him and His plan.
I once knew a girl in one of the young adult groups I used to attend who told me and a friend of mine that if God didn't give her a husband by her next birthday, she was going to stop going to church and never believe in God again.
Would you ever treat someone you claimed to love this way? "Give me this or I'm gone!" This is what Lennox was referring to in his speech.
The tough part about Christianity is realizing that you don't exist to serve your own desires. The bible clearly lays out God's desire for us to die to self, take up our cross and follow Him. Without hesitation, we must forgive people who harm us, turn our cheek rather than hitting back, and live an upstanding life in service to Him.
Do you give because it pleases God, or because you hope to get something back?
Do you live for Him or for yourself?
Do you doubt God because something didn't go the way you thought it would?
Do you often insert your own desires as the will of God?
The toughest question of all: Are you alive for you or for Him and His glory?
I don't want to treat God like He's a nuisance in my life. All He's ever done is protect me, bless me, and get me through some incredibly difficult situations and tragedies.
There were so many times when I felt I was so angry at God. I blamed Him for taking my dad and allowing me to go through all the things I did. All the pain, suffering, abuse, rape, poverty, and struggles I faced were not His fault.
Now, as I reach my mid-30s, I can look back on it all and see the purpose behind the pain. I see the reason for my existence and why God allowed those things to happen. I can also see His hands protecting and holding me.
You might be asking how I can say God protected me when I endured so much. It's hard to explain, but I see God's fingerprints on everything. I see times when I should've starved to death because I didn't have any food, but somehow, it was provided.
I can't count the number of times I was about to be homeless, but I never was.
It's not even about material possessions as we understand them today, and that's the point I'm trying to get at. Even the poorest among us have it better than most people could've ever hoped to have throughout the history of the world.
Loving God isn't about me and what I can get out of it. It's not about position and power. It's not about receiving gifts and pretending I'm better than anyone else.
You were meant to shine, but you don't have any light within yourself. We're like the full moon. A full moon is incredibly bright and it fills the darkness in a way nothing else can. But the moon has no light of its own. All it can do is reflect the greater light.
I've used this example before. It's a good one. You are the moon. You have purpose and that purpose is to reflect God's light into a dark world. If you're too focused on self, figuring out your worth, trying to live as comfortably as possible, then you've created your whole existence about you.
You can't earn your salvation. There's no getting by on merits. There's no work you can do that will make you better than the greatest sinner. We need to stop treating life like it's a competition, each other like we're a toy we can play with, and God like He's a genie who must give us what we want most.
