Unrequited love

Guy meets girl. Guy falls in love with girl, but she has a boyfriend.  (OH NOES!) They become close, at which point she realises she loves him too, but because of some quarrel or obstacle or misunderstanding, they part ways. After approximately 10 minutes of screen-time, they realise they were meant for each other and reunite while dramatic music plays [optional slow motion running]. Roll credits.

There you have the basic plot of 50% of Hollywood films.

... and the other 50% is the same, with the genders reversed.

Do any of you realise that at least part of this happens in our lives too?

God made us to live in a loving relationship with Him and each other. We wrecked that by doing that ONLY thing He told us not to do. We rebelled and we ran from Him. This is the point in the movie where you're going "FAR OUT, GIRL, WHY CAN'T YOU SEE THAT THE GUY YOU'RE WITH IS A JERK?!"

But okay. The screenwriter makes it obvious that there is something charming about the guy she's with. For some reason, she's blinded and can't see that she's meant to be with the main guy.

In the same way, we're also blinded. We live in this broken world and fall in love with the things that are ultimately going to leave us thirsting for more.

The girl continually rejects the guy she's meant to be with and clings to that other dude. Male protagonist is left heartbroken. When we run away from God, His heart breaks. When we sin against Him, His heart breaks. He loves us. HE LOVES US. But we're too busy being obsessed with the world that we don't even see God half the time. We don't see the plans He has for us, and we demand to go our own way.

So anyway, the next part of the movie is where they grow close and she goes, "Hm.. maybe I should be with this guy." But obviously, every movie has to have conflict, and somehow they part ways. Some of us are lucky enough to have heard about Jesus. In fact, I'm fairly sure Jesus has revealed Himself to everyone reading this right now. We know about God's love for us and it's exciting. For a while. Then it fades and we start pulling away. We will have moments when we're really on fire for God, and then the moments where we're once again blinded by the world and all that it offers. Satan is a master of deceit; he will never stop using the things around us to try and pull us away from God.

But let's move on with our story. After a while, the girl realises she is meant to be with the guy, and the thing I've always found strange about these movies is that he never goes, "BUT YOU WERE WITH THAT IDIOT FOR AGES AND YOU REJECTED ME EVEN THOUGH I LOVE YOU," he just accepts her; no questions asked. Hrm. Somehow I don't think it works like that in real life.. but it works with God. The second we turn back to Him, He's there with open arms, waiting to accept us back.

Each and every one of you has heard about God. He has sent His Spirit to work in your life, and it's now up to you to respond. It's like Pastor Nelson said - if someone came up to you and handed you a million dollars, you can either take it or reject it. You don't add anything to the gift, but you do have to accept it, otherwise you're going miss out.

So are you going to make your crappy eighty million dollar budget Hollywood rom com have a happy ending, or are you going to stick with the jerk?

Idolatry

We read Psalm 23 yesterday in Bible study, and while we were reading it, I thought of these verses (but had no idea where it was in the Bible so I decided to keep my mouth shut and post it on here instead):
"But my people have exchanged their glorious God for worthless idols. My people have committed two sins: they have forsaken Me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water."
- Jeremiah 2:11,13

Do you see the difference between that and Psalm 23:1? "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want."

If God is our shepherd, we will never be lacking. He is the spring of living water; He quenches all our thirst. But if we look to earthly things, and worship other idols, it'll be like trying to fill up a tank with a hole in the bottom. If the hole is small, maybe some will hold for a while.. maybe we'll be satisfied for a while, but ultimately, we'll still be left with no water.

Suffering

Was going to write a little section on why there is suffering after yesterdays BS, but then realized I was seriously underqualified for it :P

Anyway, going to throw some ideas that have been bouncing around in my head to (hopefully) facilitate discussion. Just hope there are no hereseys in here...

-The statement "God is a loving all powerful God that allows suffering" is not illogical or self-refuting.
-All powerful = There is nothing God can't do =/= There is nothing God won't do
-God won't be untrue to his own character (loving, just, faithful)
-In love, God creates us with free will
-In justice, he brings about the consequences of sin i.e. suffering
-Only God is good, all of us have fallen short and so we can not say we do not deserve punishment, nor can we claim how much punishment we deserve.
-But bringing it back to God's sovereignty, He can use even this to create in us a more Christlike character. Examples include but are not limited to pretty much every character in the bible :P
-On the subject of people who never hear about Jesus or unborn babies, I think the bible says very little because it does not help it do what it is supposed to do, which is bring the good news to those who HAVE heard about Jesus. All it really says is that we should have faith that God judges justly on the last day and then turns our attention back to what we who have heard should do.

Yeah, I think that's pretty much it from me.

Sherman

For those who were in the psalms BS today, this answers the question "what will Jesus do when he returns"

http://www.marshillchurch.org/media/vintagejesus/what-will-jesus-do-upon-his-return

Not to advertise or anything, but the rest of the series is pretty good too and I'd recommend checking it out.

GG - God's Grace

Have a quick read of Genesis 9:6-7and you can realise how great God's grace was back then and of course onward till now.

Even after the human race was a big stuff up, God still remmebers he made man in His image.

Wasn't like Noah and co. ddi awesome on teh boat and the nGod said "Hey! You guys made it! let's party time!"

No tehy got off the boat as sinners; not as victors. They got off the boat facing a wet Earth only to be greeted by God's promises and grace. No longer faced with immeinent judgement, God has greeted them a new lease on life. And we find out later humanity still blows it lol but thats another article....

Paul steps out on teh back of persecuting Christians to only be saved by God. Peter steps out having denied Christ three times to be only saved by God. Thomas stepped out having refusing to believe Christ had risen only to be saved by God.

Likewise we step out of a baptism not because we're special or anything. not becasue we EARNED our salavation and our dunking is a symbol of our "holiness". Not at all. We step out of the baptism pool because we're sinners saved by GG... God's Grace.

"But God demostrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us"
Romans 5:8

GG guys.

Psalm 13

Hello Tehillahians . This is your captain speaking. Our engines have all exploding and we are expected to land in the middle of the Indian Ocean. But please remain calm and listen to all instructions cabin crew give you. I assure you we will be fine ^^

If you heard this, how reassured would you be :P... unless your pilot is an awesome flier as I was in Rouge Fighter or whatever it was called. They would have be the most awesome kickass pilot to ever flown these skies ever for u to go "Oh its going to be alrght." Not only that they would have had to have proven themselves in these sort of situations for me aleast to not go crazy and kill everyone ....

NOw replace the word "captain" with God and indian ocean with "trouble and strife" and "cabin crew" with bible/scriptures and the word assure with "am 100% confident"

Would you feel at peace? Sounds good but in that situation I'm still not entirely sure I would be D: ... And doesnt seem like David was with Psalm 13

Ps 13:1 How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me?
Ps 13:2 How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and every day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me?

Would the psalm sound better if it just skipped those verses? No I don't think so :(

Cos Psalms is meant to be King David's prayers and worship towards God and they should be as natural as they get. David is crying out from his heart and that's what God wants us to do when we pray to him. We're not to just kiss up to him, we are to lay it all down on him in humilty and in awe of our God.

David contuines with his cry/whinge with

Ps 13:3 Look on me and answer, O LORD my God. Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;
Ps 13:4 my enemy will say, “I have overcome him, ” and my foes will rejoice when I fall.

BUt yet finishes with

Ps 13:5 But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation.
Ps 13:6 I will sing to the LORD, for he has been good to me.

There's no for he WILL be good to me. It's for he HAS BEEN good to me. So David would have cried out to our God in his time of need. But what we know about God and what is he has done, is enough and sufficent to bring us to peace.

So when ur in that plane plumenting down in between Indonesia and the east coast of Africa, just remember God has saved us from our sin and he will constantly be always be there in our time of our need.

perhaps unoriginal, but hopefully still noteworthy.

First ever blog post! =) yay!

Well this is about something which I'm sure we've all noticed/thought of/tried to do something about, but I think it's rather important, and I have definitely been a little lax of late myself regarding this.

The point in question here is an aspect of fellowship.

DC said this a few nights ago, at Sherman's house after the NTE talk, and it wouldn't be a new thought to most of us - that we throw the term 'fellowship' around very loosely.

We use it to describe, and sometimes maybe even justify, basically anything we do together, whether it be a meal, a movie, sport, or just hanging out in general.

Of course all of these are great - we're having fun, building up friendships, etc.

I don't think anyone would suggest that we stop doing any of these things.

But there is one thing that I certainly tend to forget,

that at the heart of all Christian fellowship is God.

Perhaps the word forget is a little strong here, and overlook might be more accurate.

When we meet outside of church, (e.g. crashing Seb's house... heh)

How often do we stop and thank God that we are able to be there?

How often do we pray to Him together before/during/after?

Personally, I think that I'm falling down rather badly here.

When we're at church, there is the constant reminder of the presence of God.

But elsewhere, I struggle a lot to keep Him in my thoughts all the time. It's just so easy to get carried away in the things of this world, to accidentally lose our focus.

But God is our God at all times and in all places.

Whether our activity is Bible study or soccer, whether it's Mawson outreach or watching a movie,

surely acknowledging Him, keeping Him in mind, giving thanks and praying are equally important for each.

For Christians, fellowship gives us the opportunity to build each other up in our faith, to reaffirm and strengthen each other in Christ.

Well that's about all I can think of at the moment... zzzzzzzz...

The main reason I wanted to write this was just to get us thinking a bit, and so that there is one more mention of it than there was before =)

At the (free) talk the other night, there was something about people not being able to recall everything they hear, but remembering best the things which are brought up most often.

Also, it's holidays!! Which means we will probably have a lot more time to spend in various forms of fellowship! =]

So perhaps this could be a little challenge for this long holiday - to always keep God right at the heart of our fellowship.

As Sherman said last week: Emmanuel - God is with us.

p.s. I just found this, and started reading through it, it seems pretty good, although a lot of it we would have already heard in sermons - http://bible.org/article/christian-fellowship

the old saying might apply here - patience is a virtue. ><>

In one of Don Carsons talks he talks about a friend who could tell the entire message in two minutes. Unfortunatly, he went on to say that his friend had drifted slightly and that in his telling he misses out the part about God's wrath. This got me thinking, could I tell people about the gospel in under 2 minutes? It's harder than it looks.

So here's my challange to anyone that reads this. Can you explain the gospel in under 500 words (that's about 2 minutes of talking time) to a nonchristian? It'd be pretty cool if you posted up your attempts as well so the rest of us can learn and be better equiped when we try to tell our non-believing friends.

Tree Man

Hey everyone, Seb here :)

Just like to share a few thoughts on something that happened recently.
I came across a video on YouTube today as I was procrastinating work, and I have to admit it made a rather large impression on me. Video is below:



Some of you may have seen this before. I can't say that I'm fully convinced of the validility of this report, but after browsing around for a bit more on the internet and looking at this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epidermodysplasia_verruciformis
I'm a leaning towards thinking it's genuine. Regardless, it still made me think about my own situation.

I think this ties in nicely with the post that Dot did a few weeks ago. There's just so many things that we take for granted, so many things that we ought to realise that other people don't even know exists. God's blessed us with all these gifts and we need to take these gifts with both hands, go out into the world and tell everyone about him.

So what happens for people like Treeman in the video? Why are we so blessed when other people haven't even heard of the good news? I'll be frank and say I don't have the answers to these questions, but I know one thing that we can do is pray. Pray for people like Dede, pray for people who haven't ever heard of Jesus, and pray that we might have the wisdom to realise what we have and do everything that's in us to help further Big Daddy's kingdom.

I was rushing about today in the city, and a recurring thought opened in my head;

Where am I, and what am I doing to serve for Christ and his family?

Sharing? Comments?

Love from sydney

tim

Who Am I Among Friends ?

For the next sermon I'll be giving will be on this topic of
Who Am I Among Friends
as it only 1 month away, I'm already excited about it !!


I'm opening it to Tehillah Blog asking to ask yourself
Who Am I Among Friends ?

Or perhaps you should ask yourself
Who Was I Amongst Friends in High School?


Please leave your comments

Jesus

"Christ will never be cool. Terrifying, life-changing, shocking, and iconoclastic, but never cool. Jesus is not my homeboy. The Gospel will always be "relevant" but never trendy." - Jon Foreman

I think this is really important to bear in mind. So often when we evangelise, we try and make God "cool", and in the process, we make Him a lot smaller than He really is. We try to fit Him into our little worldly definition of "cool", when He's so much bigger than that. Jesus has never been cool. Jesus wasn't cool when He was on earth.. He was despised and mocked. He suffered. He was murdered. He was not cool or popular or trendy. He is our Lord and Saviour, Messiah, King of kings.

Heyo kiddies, and....not so kiddies! :P Herro up from HK. While up here I was attending Island ECC (the church that my ext. Family goes to in HK) and we had a pretty interesting message.

So the passage was 2 Kings 5:1-19, and it’s the story of Naaman! Good ol’ Naaman, a familiar story from our days in Sunday school no doubt. Aaanyway, a bit of a refresher, Naaman, who’s this mighty warrior who serves under the King of Syria, sudden comes down with leprosy, and a slave girl, taken from Israel by Syrian raiders, suggests that her master goes and visits the prophet Elisha to seek help and to be healed. This is all in 2 Kings 5:1-5.

Ok, so now to analyse the passage. I know I know! I won’t go into too much detail :P Verse 1 is basically Naaman’s resume. And man, what an impressive resume it is. With everything there, being a might warrior, a great man, highly respected and captain of the army to the King, this guy is pretty much number 2 to the King of Aram (Syria). So he’s a big shot, basically the equivalent of the Governor General to the Queen (to put it into perspective). However, at the very end, the verse says “BUT” he was a leper. Those 5 words may seem small, but it apparently makes all the difference. We have to remember, that leprosy was one of the worst diseases that one could contract in those days. In modern day terms, it would be equivalent to getting AIDS. You were allowed to stone a leper to death if he walked towards you. Lepers were shunned from society and cast out of their house and homes. Not a nice thing to happen to anyone, let alone a person of Naaman’s calibre. Verse 2 is introducing the little slave girl from Israel, verse 3 is where she tells her mistress that Naman should go and see Elisha and verse 4 is Naaman telling the King of Syria what she said. Finally, verse 5 shows what the king is going to do to help Naaman and the wealth that he leaves with: “tent talents of silver and six thousand shekels of gold and ten changes of clothes”.

Now when you have a look at the numbers, you’ll say: Wow, Six thousand shekels of gold that must be heaps. You’d be right, but in those days, probably even more than you think. Doing the math, in today’s monetary terms, Six thousand shekels of gold goes for $2,727,577.08 USD, the silver goes for $6,872.80 USD and for all you metrosexuals out there, you guys would have a good idea of how much 10 changes of ultra-high class clothes with be. Shoes and everything! :P Basically, in today’s money, approx. $3,000,000 ( I just like putting the zeroes :P) and probably worth even more than that in those days. That is a huge amount of wealth, so you can tell that Naaman and his king weren’t messing around. Apparently, smaller countries nearby and all their wealth combined wouldn’t have been worth that much. Fairly sure that half of us wouldn’t be worth that much even on Facebook!

We’ll jump ahead to verse 9, because I don’t’ want this post getting TOO long (too late). Naaman arrives at Elisha’s house with all his wealth and chariots. Now we have to remember that Elisha is prophet and he doesn’t live in the fanciest of establishments. In all his magnificence, Naaman arrives at Elisha’s house and lo and behold, Elisha’s messenger to him to tell him: “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh will be restored to you and you will be clean”. To put this into perspective, let’s imagine that 10 black SUVs rock up at you place, and the Governor General is waiting in his car to speak to you personally.......and you send your son to go tell him: Sorry, Dad’s too busy playing Starcraft, but here’s what you should do...”. I don’t know about the rest of you, but as the Governor General, I’d be pretty peeved, such as Naaman is in verse 11: “Naaman was furious and went away and said, “Behold, I thought, ‘He will surely come out to me and stand and call on the Name of the Lord his god, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper.’” I’ve emphasised the word ‘his’ because the Bible makes it clear that Naaman does not believe in God, as he refers to God as Elisha’s God.

The servants of Naaman manage to coax Naaman in verse 13 into doing as Elisha said, and of course, as the story goes, he did so and was cured of his leprosy. But the main part of this verse is what the servants say to Naaman: “My father (Naaman), had the prophet told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more then, when he says to you, ‘Wash and be clean’” Interesting...Let’s have a look

This is applicable to our lives today. We can relate to the “Naaman attitude”, the attitude that says: We’re worth something, we’ve achieved something with our lives and we should be worth meeting God face to face and to be put to face something magnificent or be set up to a task that will make use of our great potential. However, the story of Naaman and voice of the servants rings with us. We have no right to be furious with God when he asks us to do something simple instead of something complex. Are we that proud that when we have something simple asked of us, we walk away, furious that we weren’t given a harder challenge? That’s the pride in us talking, and it’s that pride that influences us to question God and his methods, his plans.

In Mark 1:40-42, a leper comes to Jesus and says: “If you are willing, you can make me clean”. Note that in saying “If you are willing”, the leper is in fact acknowledging that Jesus is the Christ, and asking, that if it is in God’s will if he could be healed. The leper is rewarded with the return of his health. This guy had the right idea. It is not up to us to question God’s will or methods, like Naaman, in his pride, tried to do by storming off, even after arriving with his chariots and wealth, but merely to follow his will and reap the consequences of his will, like the humble leper that Jesus healed.

P.S: In Luke 4:27, it says: “And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; and none of them were cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.”

Why do you think that is? Interesting ne? :3

Lot vs Abraham

Hello everyone!

Thank you all for the birthday wishes and thanks for signing that big ass card. Where Grace got that is beyond me.

Today at SBS (at church not the tv but theres been alot of good stuff on SBS atm) we read Genesis 13-14 and we read how Lot who only sees the immediate rewards of being in the awesomeland even if it's near the Sodomites who are dodge. And then we compared it Abraham who only is looking at God and kinda following his instructions lol.

Then Uncle Ken picked on me cos I was the youngest there....*shakes fist at DN and Andrew* so I had to give a 1 minute sermon on what we had learnt in front of of all the old people including deacons and elders...............................

Well here's what I thought about the passage:

Sometimes we only look at the immediate rewards and in computer science terms it's called greedy search. As students we sometimes put aside God for the time being and focus on what seems like the best choice at the moment. This could be like friends, relationships and even extends to our studies. Like Lot, we only see the immediate rewards and sometimes forget to listen to God and even cut ourselves away from him temporary. THat's what Lot did and put himself in a crappy position and 2 Peter 2:7 says he was not a happy chappy being there. He put himself away from God and suffered for it. :( So sometimes we see things that may seem like the best choice but in reality it might put ourselves away from God. It might be like "I'll go watch some dramas and read my bible later" or "Let's go to this party and pray when I get back". It could even be "Hey I need to study for this exam so I might give bible study a skip tonight".

It's a pretty hard thing to think about really. I'm not saying read all of chronicles and fail your exams but if we're thinking like this... "Hey the footballs on tonight. I'll just study after that and maybe I'll find time to read my bible..." then we're setting up camp near Sodomites. I've been a student for about 17 years now and there's been alot of "Oh look what's on TV" "Georgeeeeeee ... this is God. You have an assignment due in a week" "Nah don't worry I'll jsut watch this and get that started..." then BAM. It's 12 hours away from the deadline and I have fifty of these things:

which means I panic and cry and get a bad mark.

So God was right. I should have got that assignment started ages ago (maybe I was too over confident in my programming l33tness?). But how can I even hear the warning from God?

Well that means you have to listen for God's voice. That means reading your bible, praying to God and encouraging and learning from your brothers and sisters. I'm not having an attack on us bailing on YF to study cos I know what it feels to feel the pressures of exams and assignments. But I'm more directing my attack on the attitude that puts us in a situation that we have to skip bible study or our devotion for our studies. Maybe we picked the wrong choices and didn't listen to God when he said go this way, and now we're in a position we don't like.

So I hope you guys in this time of exams and assignments, I hope you guys don't neglect your time with God. It's far more important that getting good marks (but getting good marks should be like your 2nd or 3rd priority >: ( ) and pray to God to help you with your studies. Listen to God and he will guide you in your time of stress.

Hi guys from Sydney!

I guess this is the first time that I've posted anything up here, so yay! :P I thought I'd share this particular Bible study that I've just had on campus. Be warned, may be slightly confrontational, thought-provoking and hopefully discussion worthy.

God's Judgement: Questioning and Understanding

The particular passage that was addressed was Ezekiel 25-33. Yes, 8 chapters, I know, but thankfully, you don't have to read through all 8 chapters to get the gist of things. In these chapters, God has spoken through Ezekiel and prophesied that he will judge the surrounding nations around Israel. Let's just step back for a bit. In this particular section of history, Babylon has just conquered the nation of Israel for Israel's attitude towards God, and yet, God is punishing the nations around Israel?

In chapter 25:6-7, the Lord says: "Because you have clapped your hands and stamped your feet, rejoicing with all the malice of your heart against the land of Israel, therefore I will stretch out my hand against you and give you as plunder to the nations. I will cut you off from the nations and exterminate you from the countries. I will destroy you, and you will know that I am the LORD."

As we can read here, the surrounding nations revelled in Israel's judgement and celebrated. Think about it, when you see someone else's misfortune, is it not part of our thought process that thinks: "at least it wasn't me". Some may ask themselves, "Why isn't it me?", and our logical, human conclusion is: Because I didn't do wrong, because I'm better than them, and in this, comes the main idea of how these chapters apply to us today

First of all, as Jesus said in Luke 13: 2-5, when Pilate had horrifically murdered some Galileans (Gentiles):"Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish.Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish."

We are all equal in sin, so Jesus tells us not to look at others' misfortune, but to look within ourselves, and put ourselves in their shoes. Again in Romans 3:9: "What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin".

Looking back at the passage in Ezekiel, Tyre and Egypt are both centres of great power and the kings of those nations have proclaimed themselves powerful! How can we not see ourselves as having power, especially when we have accomplished so much, and in their case, conquered many nations, gathered much wealth and prosperity. Perhaps we don't see things to such an extreme, but we do see ourselves as having a great deal of control, and the world tells us that

The world tells us, very early on that we have the power to do what we want with our lives, we can change the world! We all have once looked up to people who have achieved something magnificent, such as winning a gold medal in the Olympics, or won a worldwide Starcraft tournament (to put into perspective :P), and when interviewed, they tell us of their determination, their struggle to achieve, the hardships that they faced and won over along the road to achievement. Not to belittle achievement, but 95% of the time, it is due to circumstance, opportunity and God-given talent. We attribute these positive achievements to our own doing, to our own reasoning and our own efforts, and I'm sure that we have all felt like this at least once in our lives. This is the heart of human arrogance. No matter how small, it is in human reasoning that the world decides to rely on today, and in human reasoning that the world prides on.

the world prides itself on human reasoning, and through that, we think that it is the greatest force. One example of this is Darwinism, and the theory of evolution; one of the fundamental views in atheism. Using this example, can we find the human reason? Darwinism proclaims "survival of the fittest" and in order to survive, one must continue reproducing the "fittest" of the species. Now for another look on Darwinism. If you posited to an atheist, the idea of culling the "bad, stupid and ugly" from society to create a far superior gene pool in order to continue "survival of the fittest", I'm sure that they would find the idea abhorrent, and yet that is the reasoning behind Darwin's theory of evolution, and by human reasoning, we have to establish that, in order for our species to survive, we must become the "fittest". Why, then, do we have the moral set that we do? Why is it that we must be a "good person" to function in society? Is this not against human reasoning? Is this not illogical according to Darwin's theory of evolution?

The not-so-simple answer is: Human reason is malleable, it is open to change. A prime example of this is the comparison of our society today, and the Holocaust. On branch of human reasoning leads to a moral community and the ethical and moral treatment of other members of society, whereas the other leads to the massacre of millions of people based on physical characteristics in order to create a superior race. Which of these is more logical? In fact, both outcomes are derived from human logic and reason, with each step as logical as the next, and yet we look upon one situation as vastly different and horrific. Yet we pride ourselves on our logic and reason and demand explanations from God for his actions.

The kings of Tyre and Egypt in Ezekiel saw their own power and pretty much proclaimed: "I am God". Although not to this extent, this is the demand of human reason. Some of the big questions are: Why does God let suffering continue? If he's so loving towards us, why does he punish us? Perhaps slightly more ignorantly: Who is God to judge us? Is it fair for God to judge us? Is God just not a bully by judging us? I found this short story online. Please have a read, and if you guys are at Tehillah, provoke some discussion at this point? :)

http://atheistblogger.com/2008/12/19/short-story-an-atheist-on-judgment-day/

There are many answers to these difficult questions, but the answer could go something like: Who are we to question God? Who are we to put God into a box and limit him to human reasoning? Has the world's pride in human reasoning and logic grown to the capacity in which we think that our reasoning surpasses that of God? The short of it is: God has no need to explain himself to us, as expressed by Jeremiah 18:3-4, he is the potter, and we are the clay. He is the creator, we are the created. If anything, it will be us who has to explain ourselves to God when judgement comes. God cannot be placed in a box, and cannot be limited to the finite boundaries of human reason.

From all that I've said here, it seems like that there is a lot of negativity surrounding God's judgement and the puffed up concept of human reasoning. However, amidst all the judgement, fire and brimstone in the passage that is Ezekiel 25-33, there is a small space, and eye of the storm that gives a small bit of consolation. This is found in 28: 25-26:"This is what the Sovereign LORD says: When I gather the people of Israel from the nations where they have been scattered, I will show myself holy among them in the sight of the nations. Then they will live in their own land, which I gave to my servant Jacob. They will live there in safety and will build houses and plant vineyards; they will live in safety when I inflict punishment on all their neighbours who maligned them. Then they will know that I am the LORD their God."

These two verses in the midst of a long list of judgement shows the restoration of God's people. God is no bully! He takes no delight in the death of the wicked. He knows just as well as we do the pain and suffering that we experience when he judges us. How does he know? He's felt it. Through Jesus. When he gave us his son to die on the cross, he came down to earth as a man and experienced the suffering of man. God knows the extent of his judgement upon man, and takes no delight in it, unlike the nations surrounding Israel.

God knows that he must judge the wicked, but he also gives hope for his people. God's judgement is in his own logic, his own reasoning, and as such is beyond the comprehension of man. Would a creator be obligated to explain himself to his creation? No, and as such, it is not the place of a creation to question his maker. The message of this is: Do not fall into the pride of human reasoning. Do not look on at misfortune of others and see the human reasoning of who has done wrong and who has not. Instead, look at yourself and see what would be the case if you were the one being judged. How would you answer to God for your actions? What will his judgement be? Be not afraid for your body but for your soul, for that is what is important, as Jesus said in Matthew 10:28 "Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell". God will not let the arrogance and the pride of the human heart continue. Look into yourself, and look at how you will answer to God.

Hope this has made you guys think, I only summarised what i heard and wrote down what i got from notes and memory.

for further reading have a look at:

http://www.1timothy4-13.com/files/proverbs/potter.html

http://www.forananswer.org/Top_General/Schaefer_questions.pdf

Love from sydney!

Tim

An article that I received in the mail

Hey guys, just thought I'll share with you an article I got in my mail. It's just a newsletter from my campus bible study back in UNSW, to keep me updated on things. Thought the article was encouraging -

"Note from Carl:

I met Joseph, a young guy of Eastern European background, at orientation week last year because his Muslim friend wanted to have an argument with me. Joseph and I met and chatted about Jesus twice after that and then I was heartbroken to hear that he had dropped out of university in about week 2. Can you imagine my surprise when I met him again in week 1 this year and he told me the story of what had happened in the previous year!"

Joseph’s Story

My family always called themselves Catholic but did not go to church or do anything religious; I had never even read the Bible. I more or less believed in the existence of God but I just never had an interest in him.

Less than a year ago my life pretty much fell apart. My two year relationship with my then-girlfriend Radha ended, and I was devastated. Radha was from a strict Hindu family that was very opposed to our relationship. After sneaking around for a long time we were open about our relationship and they used all kinds of emotional blackmail to force her to leave me. In the end she decided to listen to them.

My attitude to life completely changed. I went from having a high distinction average and being on the Dean’s list to dropping out of university. I didn’t know where to turn. My desire to find a purpose to my existence led me to search for God and, as the Bible promises, I got answers.

I decided to go to Campus Bible study (which is the equivalent “FOCUS” group in UNSW) where I met several Christians. They were so approachable and friendly. I met Carl a few times and he was always willing to talk and pray for me. He gave me a book to read: “A Fresh Start” by John Chapman.

I began reading and researching Christianity to make sure I wasn’t just being gullible because of my emotional state. Eventually I was convinced. Through a friend from high school I went to a church close to my home. It struck me how comfortable I immediately felt even though I was a stranger.

I have been committed to God for almost a year now. I have a personal yearning for God and a thirst to read his word, the Bible. I now have a purpose and a guaranteed future with God. As a result I have had an uncontrollable urge to tell people about him, and any of my friends and family can testify to that.

A few months ago, Radha contacted me after months of being apart. We started to talk again as friends. Naturally, our conversations revolved around God. I know she just wanted me to shut up sometimes, but that didn’t stop me in any way. Her attitude completely turned around through the changing power of Christ, and she committed her life to him. Our relationship also resumed, with both of us now living for God. That decision for Christ led to her family disowning her and that is one of the challenges we face together. We have recently married with the support and love of our wonderful Christian friends and I have started studying again.

God used our circumstances to lead both Radha and myself to a faith in Christ, giving us the gift of eternal salvation through his death on the cross, and has brought us together in a loving, Christian marriage. I am full of thanks to God.

**********************

I thought this part of the newsletter was quite encouraging for us, esp. now when we always talk about evangelism. A lot of times when I talk to some of you guys, we tend to think that some ways of evangelising aren’t effective or just extreme or stupid. But here we can see a simple example that every little bit we do counts. Here was the guy who wanted to argue. But by just having the contact point with a Christian, it lead to all this trail of things that happened which eventually lead him to Christ. Sometimes by just saying Jesus to someone may actually be prompted up in times of desperation or devastation as seen with Joseph. Instead of saying that doing walk up, advertising or Bible bashing is ineffective and then doing nothing about it, we should really be thinking of what we could do, regardless of effectiveness. Ultimately as Joseph said, it is the changing power of God that changes people’s hearts. We are just God’s vessels to do his work. It is God’s work and power that draws people to believe in him. So for us, instead of worrying about God’s part of work, i.e. the whether people will end up believing or not, we should start thinking about our work and what we should be doing.

It may be talking to every stranger you meet on the street about Jesus so that they will know who to turn to when they are in need. It may be directly talking with someone you have in mind and continue to pray and talk with this person. It may be to organise events, or go out and meet lots of new people so that you can have contact with strangers and build up a relationship. At least, we are doing something and this is done with a purpose in mind.

Modesty

I just heard about a pastor talk about Purity, a whole sermon about it.

I'll begin with saying we look upon Jesus who sets the standard of purity
Hebrews 12: Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith
Romans 12: Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind

The pastor continues to say, "people are going to look at you when you cooperate with the Spirit of God & say I want what that person has. They are going to see that the righteousness of Christ will be manifested in your life. But it's not going to happen if we are not going to cooperate. Are you cooperating? Are you conforming to the worlds standard Or out of insecurity or out of desperation to be loved ? Our hearts should be looking to Him & not to the world"

& then goes onto say how we dress, what clothes we wear pretty much says it all of our personalities. i.e Insecure ? Sometimes saying I'm cool (pride), I'm easy? I'm sexy, I'm hot, some say Will you just love me? I'm hiding, Some clothes say I'm pretty important

Some clothes to the person who is perusing purity say, I'm pure I'm chosen, I'm loved, I'm holy.

Timothy 2:9,10: And I want women to be modest in their appearance. They should wear decent and appropriate clothing and not draw attention to themselves by the way they fix their hair or by wearing gold or pearls or expensive clothes. For women who claim to be devoted to God should make themselves attractive by the good things they do. (NLT)

It's in what we do, how we live, our actions speak louder than our words

On that note, a Modesty Survey done by 1,600 Christian guys was recommended for Everyone to look at:You may have heard the Rebelution. Check out Modesty Survey
http://www.therebelution.com/modestysurvey/browse
- Read the main page &
- Go into Survey Results

George the Red

Hello yall!!! Being back from China makes me sad *no more unlimited wontons* but happy *yayyy i missed you facebook!! ... eh I mean yayy i missed you guys!!!*

Being in China was a very fun and good experience. Been ages since I went overseas so I despreately needed to get out of Canberra even if it meant missing two assesment pieces :D It was quite awesome. Food was awesome and clothes were cheap. even though theres nothign for winter... jsut summer clothes.... but still it wsa awesome. I often thought "man i could jsut live here"

but then I started to notice vital differences from Canberra? Can anyone guess what that difference is??? Yes your right! Where are the churches? Where are the koroongs or the hillsong or the crossroads? Where are the pastor nelsons and pastor maks? Where are the tehillahs, jabezes or solomans? There are alot of cantonese ppl but no cantonese youth fellowship :( (well there are cantonese youth but u know what i mean lol)

Sometimes living in Australia for your whole life you start to take thins for granted. ONe of these things I've taken for granted (And maybe a few of yous) is that in Australia we are so lucky to be able to worship, go to bible studies, talk to randoms about Jesus, go to awesome church camps (Which i heard was awesome btw) and listen to Christ Tomlin. In china, you have to be 18 to participate in church activities (Well not legally aleast)!!!

To live in a country where you can be arrested and perseucuted for your faith is kinda scary. It's something in Australia we're so lucky to have that every sunday, bible study and even minute we should be so thankful for. God has truely blessed our awkward island with our freedom and there shouldnt be a morning that we shouldn't thank God for allowing us to live as his children without fear.

I love China to bits but when I hear news of pastors beign dragged out of church and ppl getting beaten up because they tried to share the gospel, first reaction is to try to igrone anything negative about hte motherland (yes i know tpyical mainlander behaviour :P) but in Acts we see the early church was perseucted like crazy and even paid the ultimate sacrfice for the hope Jesus has given us. So I reliase that its reality. :(

But God being awesome, turned Saul to the cross and gave him a new name. I hope one day that God will turn CHina to the cross (and we can see he has been!! Over 40 million unregistered christians in china... that's TWO AUSTRALIAS D: ) and give China not a new name but a new hope for a mighty gold medal factory nation of 1 billion people (yes take some commie properganda >: D ).

It's not easy to pray for those ppl doing the persuceting but rememeber "For God did not send his son to condemn the world but to save the world through him , John 3:17" so everyone is to be saved, even the Sauls and the Pharisees and the Neros of our time.

So pray for China and many other parts of the world where being a Chrisitan isn't easy. Pray for our brothers and sisters in those places (don't forget about von !! :D ) . Pray that God will touch the hearts of people in those places as he has touched our hearts. pray that the message of the salvation and hope we have in jesus is spread all over the globe so that every knee should boy and every tongue confess that Jesus is LORD! (Eh kinda from philemon 2:10?? lol). Never stop thanking God too!

It's good to be back too :P

The Life Of Jesus

Yehee, it was long (...it was only liek 1.5 hours though....) but a good watch. I highly recommend watching the Life of Jesus!! Ask Andrew if u want to borrow his cos I reckon its a good watch. Esp if ur too lazy to introduce Jesus to a non-christian friend.

Funny cos my friend was asking the night before how I could believe in the bible and the gospels even though she thinks its all so far-fetched and there's no actual proof of anything in teh bible and theres all this sciencey stuff I don't understand which seems to disprove God. THe DVD doesn't explain it all but a least it gives me a few answeres out of the hundren million questions my pagan friends have.

It's so important to be able to answer your friends when they ask some quite challenging questions. It says in 1 Peter 3:15 we are to give reason for our hope. It's prety simple right? U don't need the leader of the early church to tell us that we should be able to explain why we believe. It's reasonable to ask for an explaination for our faith and it would be unreasonable to refuse. But 1 Peter 3 contuines we have to do this with gentleness and respect and the suffereing we experience for believing is for hte glory of God. It's not harassment if I ask why Seb likes korean dramas or why Nate won't get a haircut. It's just normal :P If my brothers can give a defence to their hobbies or hairstyle choice, how much more should we be motivated to defend and explain our salavation to others?

In a book I used to owned (if you know where my Case for Christ/Faith ... I forgot which one it is... you can read it but tell me you have it ;) , it was a story on our a journo who wasn't a christian but researched everything and interviewed a pastor and in the end becomes Jesus-hugger ^^ (well I think that was that book... could have been another or jsut my imagination). Who knows? Even If you don't have answers, God might spur your friends on to find answers through urself or other ppl and open their heart :D

I like this song too :D but i couldnt find any youtube videos so I have to perform copyright sucicde and put up my own video ^^ Not so good. Rushly made

Hello

Hello one more day till mission ^^

Just a wondering point. what does tehillah think aobut christian soldiers or christians who work in the military?????