But can you prove it?.

Rarely does a day go by that some nonbeliever doesn't tell me that I can't 'prove' that God exists or that I am 'saved,' etc. My answer is 'no, I cannot, no more than you can prove he doesn't exist or that I'm not saved.'

I know what I know. I know what happened to me. I know what's inside me and why I believe as I do. Most importantly, I 'know whom I have believed...' How do I know? By the eye of faith. How do we know anything? By what we see, hear and believe. I know there is electricity when I flip the light switch. I do not know all the ifs, ands and buts about electricity, but I know it exists.

There is an old gospel song that goes something like 'I can tell you the time; I can show you the place, where the Lord saved me by his wonderful grace...' Well, I can tell you the time and show you the place. You may or may not believe me, but you can't disprove it. I know because I know; I was there; I heard his voice; I believed. That can't be taken from me.

Romans 3:3 "For what if some did not believe? shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?" No one's unbelieve makes my faith without effect.

Romans 10:17 "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God."The nonbeliever, the mocker and scoffer even, have no faith because they do not listen to the word of God.

Galations 2:20 "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." Glory.. thank you Lord.

Go be set aside...

My very first pastor was a soft spoken but plain spoken man. He was counseling me on how to best serve the Lord, whether I should preach, go to seminary, etc. He said to me, and I've never forgotten it, 'none of that matters, John, if you're not set aside for Jesus.' I asked him what that meant, set aside for Jesus. He gave me this verse: John 15:16 "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you." That didn't clear it up a lot for me. I was bible and christianity ignorant, having been an agnostic for the first 30 years of my life. My pastor was patient, however.

He said that a Christian is unlike any other. Anyone will be appreciative and grateful for good things that happen, but the Christian must rejoice always, in times of sorrow as well as gladness. Christians are expected to rejoice in persecution for His sake. We are to be in the world but not 'of' the world. In other words, we are unlike others and it should show. The best way to know if you aren't close enough in your walk is if no one can recognize you as different from the other folks, the nonbelievers.

John 15:19 "If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.

If the world loves you too much, be on the alert. Worse, if you love the world too much, you are in trouble.

When one says 'yes' to Jesus, their 'fruit,' the continued product or growth of religion in their souls, is to remain, or to be continually produced, until God should call them from their work. The Christian, and especially the Christian minister, is devoted to the Saviour for life. He is set aside and his energies, love, devotion are directed toward Him. That doesn't mean he isn't a son, husband, father, neighbor, friend. It is that his 'main' preoccupation and devotion are to the Lord and his work. He who is set aside is to toil without intermission, and without being weary of his work, till God shall call him home. The Saviour never called a disciple to serve him merely for a part of his life, nor to feel himself at liberty to relax his endeavours, nor to suppose himself to be a Christian when his religion produced no fruit. He that enlists under the banners of the Son of God does it for life.

As my pastor said, set aside. Are you set aside?

Tags: chosen, elect, works, grace, devotion, faith, Christian

Unexpected pleasures...

I tend to be a well organized, well disciplined type, planning and structuring so not caught unaware by life's catastrophes. Others live as I do but some live more chaotic or impulsive lives. But to all of us, unexpected things happen and, sometimes, the unexpected pleasures in life are the sweetest.

I finally got around to going through some of my mother's things, her art work, dairies, papers, etc. I found a packet of letters from my father to her, in the early years of their marriage, when he traveled so much. I was amazed at the 'private' man, very different from the public man who was tough and arrogant and impatient. Now I know him so much better. It was an unexpected pleasure to read his words to my sweet mother and made me remember both my parents with so much love and wonderful memories.

Meeting Carolyn was an unexpected pleasure. I had scheduled lunch with a small publisher, hoping to pitch my series of articles on prayer into a book deal. I was expecting a long, dull lunch, but hopefully a successful deal. To my surprise, he brought one of his up and coming young editors with him to our luncheon. Carolyn. Talk about a beautiful unexpected pleasure. :)

Reminds me of the grace of God, the most unexpected pleasure of all.

Have you had an unexpected pleasure lately that you can share?

Tags: surprises, grace of God, structure, chaos

Daddy, hey daddy!

Ramses II, a pharaoh of Egypt died in 1225 B.C. At the time of his death, he had fathered 96 sons and 60 daughters. I am working on number three and may not survive it. :)

It's not my wife. She's handling her part quite well, and she looks wonderful and feels good. I, somehow, do not have my mojo working quite as well lately. From the time I get home to when I close my eyes at night, it seems one or other of the kids is saying 'daddy, hey daddy!'

It must be their respective ages, five and six, or something as yet undetected by me. How could two wee people have so many activities and interests? There are music lessons to discuss and practices to hear, languages to practice, home work to check (there should be a law about a 5 year old having homework??), soccer games to go to, to rehash again and again, sleep overs, unders and arounds, trips to Staples for school supplies, Target's for jeans, the computer store for what?? There are endless 'arguments' over which DVD to choose, what TV show is OK to watch, which snack to have, when and where, who will clean up after. There are baths to take, teeth to brush, stories to read, prayers to say, boasting to listen to, hugs and kisses to give and fears discussed, reassurances to offer. Does it never end?

I hope not. Thank you, God, for allowing me to be a father.

Mt 18:10 "Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven."

And God said 'who knew?'

Katrina, Rita, Stan, the earthquake in Pakistan... did these events surprise God? Does God really know all future events? If so, why doesn't he intervene and save the lives of thousands upon thousands of people? Can a God be a loving God who knows what will happen and does nothing to stop it? On the other hand, could a God who doesn't know what will happen really be sovereign and in control of things? IS God in control of things?

I have been asked these questions a lot lately, and I am finding that more and more Christians believe in 'open theism' AKA 'free-will theism.'

Open theism is the teaching that God does not know all things. If people make free-will choices in the future, God choosees not to know or doesn't know because the future is not knowable. So, if we destroy the earth with global warming causations, etc., God could not know the future catastrophes that will result because of our free-will choices and, thus, could not intervene. He deals with it all when it occurs.

These are some of the things that 'open theism' seems to teach:

God does not know the future; God takes risks; God learns; God makes mistakes (because God does not know all things and because He is dealing with free
will creatures [whose future choices He does not know], God can make mistakes in dealing with people);God changes His mind.

As you can see, this is a different view/belief from that taught by many ministers of the gospel, that God is all knowing, never changing, sovereign/in total control.

One man asked "If the future does not exist yet, how does anyone, including God, know what will happen? Does he guess?"

If my friend smokes a pack a cigarettes a day and has done so for 20 years, I would assume/think/feel that he will get lung cancer eventually. Is that 'knowing' the future or just speculating based upon statistics? Not every heavy smoker gets lung cancer although they will no doubt get some unpleasant health surprises. I cannot know 'for sure' what will happen in the future. Can God? If so, how?

Does it matter if one is an 'open theist?' Is it OK to believe in Jesus Christ, repent of one's sins and be baptized but believe in a different 'view' of God than other Christians? Is God what he is or is God what we perceive? Can we 'go home' by different routes, different beliefs?

Building a better mouse...

Most people are interested in improving their intelligence or, maybe more so, improving the intelligence of their children. Some are willing to go very far indeed, and there doesn't seem to be much worry over how ethical it might or might not be.

If a wealthy person hires the best tutors or employs an agency like Sylvan to improve their child's grades or intelligence, it is doubtful anyone would find that unethical. What if this same person pays a doctor to prescribe Ritalin for a healthy child to take before taking the SAT exam? Is that unethical? Is it more or less ethical if the parent is poor but saves the money and buys the Ritalin on the street? Is one kid more 'entitled' to have an edge than another? Ritalin has been shown to improve concentration in normal people, enough to raise SAT scores by 100 points.

Is it ethical for the U.S. Army to give Modafinil to soldiers? Modafinil can keep a person awake and alert for 90 hours straight, with none of the jitteriness and bad concentration that amphetamines or even coffee seem to produce. If there are no side effects and no detriments to the soldiers' health, what's the problem? We don't have to fight the enemy fairly do we?

We don't have to use drugs to make us smarter or more effective, there are other god-given ways, but they take a little work. Take eggs, for example. Eggs are rich in choline, which your body uses to produce the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. Researchers at Boston University found that when healthy young adults were given the drug scopolamine, which blocks acetylcholine receptors in the brain, it significantly reduced their ability to remember word pairs. Low levels of acetylcholine are also associated with Alzheimer's disease, and some studies suggest that boosting dietary intake may slow age-related memory loss.

Music lessons will help your child be smarter. Six-year-old children who were given music lessons, as opposed to drama lessons or no extra instruction, got a 2 to 3-point boost in IQ scores compared with the others. Similarly, Rauscher found that after two years of music lessons, pre-school children scored better on spatial reasoning tests than those who took computer lessons.

The benefits of exercise is known to most of us, improving most areas of functioning, not just the brain but especially the brain.

Then there's 'use it or lose it.' A very interesting study was done with a bunch of nuns who were 80 to 100 years old. How did Sister Matthia and the others cheat time? The study (Snowdon's) has found several common denominators. The right amount of vitamin folate is one. Verbal ability early in life is another, as are positive emotions early in life. Activities, crosswords, knitting and exercising also helped to prevent senility.

If we are smart enough to invent technology or drugs will will increase our brain capacity, shouldn't we? It would just add to the 'survival of the fittest' theory, right? Evolutionary theory suggests that if we are smart enough to invent . As noted psychologist Corneliu Giurgea stated in the 1970s, “Man is not going to wait passively for millions of years before evolution offers him a better brain.” Is there any danger that we might change a nation of achievers to a nation of drug takers? To get ahead... to have an edge, that's what counts, isn't it?

Many “smart” drugs are in clinical trials and could be on the market in less than five years. Some will help Alzhimer patients, but some will end up enhancing the brains of normal people. What's the harm in that?



Technorati tags: psychology, smart drugs, Alzhimer, Ritalin, eggs, exercise, music lessons, ethical, unethical

My baby is having a baby!

This is just an update on the family since we got back from our long vacation.

We got the official news this week. We are having a baby which is due toward the end of March 2006. I try not to be one of those men who looks at his pregnant wife and thinks 'look what I did.' Yet... look what I did! lol One of my associates said that my pleasure in my wife's pregnancy is pride, one of the seven deadly sins. He is not a Bible scholar. :)

There is a difference in being pleased with one's accomplishments and the kind of pride of the seven deadly sins type, a pride that leads to self destruction or destruction of others. That kind of pride is deadlier than even lust by those who 'grade' or 'rank' the seven sins. For those who get offended by 'gluttony' (waste), it is the least deadly of the seven sins. :)

Anyway, I was born to be a family man, a husband and a father. This will be my third child. I would be like Robert Kennedy and have ten or so if I had a wife like minded. Since this is Caro's first, we'll wait and see. :) JW (my son insists on being called that now as he is too 'old' to be called Peeps anymore :( and Melina are cautiously optimistic that this child is a good thing. Of course, JW wants a brother and Melina wants a sister. With the history of twins in Caro's family, we might get both.

JW and Melina are in school, the second year at their 'academy.' My son is in 2nd grade and Melina in first. I got to do show and tell with my son this week. :) Caro is manning the infirmary next week. There's a lot of parent participation in the school year which is good. They are also into soccer, tennis lessons, piano and languages, so they stay plenty busy but have a lot of fun too. Caro, the help and I take turns at driving them here and there. I'm not going to complain for JW will be driving in ten years!

Besides my usual 30 hour week as a pschologist/therapist, I often do concerts or revivals or 'guest' preach here and there. I have been offered a pastor postion at a small church which would not require that I leave my current work. I've also been asked to run for a slot on the city council. I'm thinking that over a lot, not sure I want to go in that direction, although I definitely have my opinions on how things should be run.

Other than all that, we are winterizing the house and the cars, capping the pool, etc. as Iowa's winter is just around the corner. It has been down in the 30's at night already.



On a sad note, my oldest dog had to be put to sleep. I called him 'Beast' but he was the kindest, gentlest dog one could ever have. I got him when my son was born. He had developed a form of cancer and was suffering. I must say, it is killing me. I grieve for him as do the others. He was the big 'boss' dog, very protective of us and the puppies. Well, this is not helping so I'll call it a night (acutally, it's 1:14 a.m. central time). Hope you all had a wonderful Lord's day.