Why Christianity Part III

Why Christianity Part III – So here I am in the beginning of a journey that has truly changed my life. All my life I had been around God, going to church here and there, being a Sunday Christian. My choices always seemed to lead to pain, and my heart was only focused on me. I knew something had to change and I knew I had to give this God thing a chance.

Instead of looking for a new religion, or a new doctrine that catered to what I was looking for, I decided to start this new adventure at the source by reading the bible. One thing that has always bothered me is how people only base their faith on what they hear from family, friends, or from the pulpit, never looking into the bible to make sure what they were learning was correct. I was guilty of this all my life. I wanted to start from the source and work my way out.

I asked my pastor for any suggestions on a good study bible and he pointed me to the “Life in the Spirit Study Bible”, edited by Donald C Stamps and Wesly Adams, and published by Zondervan. I started with the Book of Mathew since the New Testament relates most to our day today. I would hear sermons from Jerry Brooks Pastor of Oak Creek Assembly of God, as he would always encourage people to do their own personal study of the bible and how God tends to speak to us through his scripture.

As I started to begin my studies I could see this happening in my life. In the beginning my readings seemed boring to me, then they turned into interesting stories, and morphed into poetic words starting to grab a hold of my heart in a way I still can’t put into words today. The story of Jesus started to cause a battle with in my heart, a battle that was starting to consume me on a daily basis. The first battle was over true repentance.

Repentance – The act of a person seeking forgiveness from God because of a sin committed against the word of God. Act’s 17:30 lays this out nicely, “In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.” Many religions teach that all you have to do is confess you sins to someone, do some prayers and bam a person is forgiven. That is not the case, true repentance is followed by a sincere desire to never repeat the sin you are seeking forgiveness for.

That’s what I was battling, some of the actions I knew I need forgiveness for were actions I was having a hard time giving up. But I had a desire in my heart not to repeat this actions again so at night I got on my hands and knees and confessed everything I had done against him and asked him to forgive me and help me to never repeat the actions that were causing me to sin against him. I tell you after I was done I felt like I had 1,000 lbs lifted off of my shoulders.

The problem I was facing as I continued with my readings is I was really starting to feel this new love for God in a way I never had before. It was a feeling that I don’t think anyone can really put in words or appreciate until you feel it for yourself. I would read how God was a loving God whose only desire was to have an Earth full of his children who he could love, and in term love him back. I would read that satan had ruined that for mankind and God had a plan to get us back to where he had us. I would read how God wasn’t this all terrible being who desired to cause destruction upon the world but was in fact quiet the opposite. I began to see God through a different set of eye’s and understand why this world was turning into what it is. I started to understand why there is so much pain, suffering, hatred, poverty, and plain out chaos in this world today. The bible addressed this all.

I knew I had come to a cross roads in my new adventure. At this point I was still one foot in church and one foot in the world. I knew that if I was going to continue reading on that I had a choice to make, a choice…the biggest choice I would ever make.

Some people call this choice the prayer of salvation, or the choice to dedicate your life to God. It’s a serious choice because when you choose this route you are telling God that from this point onward you are going to live life according to his word, your life will be dedicated to him. It almost like asking your girlfriend to marry you. There’s a difference between dating and marriage and a huge difference in the comment level of the two.

I struggled with this because there were some things about this world that I was still attracted to and I didn’t think I could live a life in which I wouldn’t make mistakes, and I….well I didn’t want to fail God. Then I read the book of Romans, my favorite book of the bible, a book that helped me to understand where I stood with God a lot better. Why you may ask, because Paul goes on to show how every person in this world both past, present, and future has and will fall short of the Glory of God. He also went on to show that it is not through our actions that allows us our relationship with God, because in reality we all sin against God everyday most times without even knowing it.

Jesus died for our sins which covered all mankind, and it is through Christ that all mankind is redeemed. What does that mean? First read Romans 5:1-10. That means that we will always mess up in life because were not perfect, and that’s what repentance is for. Because Christ died for you, God now openly forgives those that earnestly seek him in true repentance. Go on to read Romans 6:1-23 compliments this discussion perfectly..

After I realized that my relationship with God was far less stressful then I was torturing myself with I new I had to do the next step. On December 3, 2008 at 7:00pm at church I privately prayed out to God first asking him to forgive me for all the things I have done against him, second I told him I believed Jesus lived and died for our sins, and thirdly I told him that my life was his and from this day onward I would do my best to live according to his scriptures and asked him for the strength to represent him in the best manner I could.

That was a year ago and this last year of my life has been the best ever. I haven’t touched an alcoholic drink since then, God helped me quit smoking, my marriage is the best it ever has been, I was blessed with a baby boy, I was promoted to wonderful job, we bought a house, I watch my mother’s life change dramatically as she not only starting coming to church but three months ago she gave her life to God, I watched my little sister follow in her foot steps, and my other sister go on to get baptized as well.

For all those reading this that are not sure about my testimony, by a good study bible and give God a try. It will be a life altering experience. God bless.

Why Christianity Part 1

As you can tell this blog started off as a journal documenting my thoughts as I began to read the Old Testament, but I thought it would be better to journal my life experiences as a Christian instead. Over the centuries Christianity has gotten a bad wrap and has participated in some of the worst events kown to mankind in the name of God. In fact, my conversations with individuals on religion and the bible have resulted in many painful testimonies as people recounted their experiences with religion.

I myself have my own painful experiences with religion that are still haunting me today. You see I was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness, and from this point I will refer to them as JW’s. My grandparents, cousins, mother, and other relatives on my mother’s side of the family were all JW’s. I became very active in this organization and was baptized at 16 and Auxiliary Pioneering by 17 (this is like being a part time missionary in your state).

I truly believed that I was a part of the only true Christian religion on Earth, and all others were Satan’s attempts to remove us from God’s true religion. As I got older and began to read the bible myself I would start to question the JW’s doctrine. I would start to see their punishments for sin, and how un-loving and opposite from God’s nature they were. As I kept reading the bible I came to a conclusion that God’s number one quality was love and all personality traits evolved around this concept of love, including discipline. Love is a simple word with such a complex meaning behind it, I could literally devote pages to this one word and its true meaning.

As I got older I decided that the JW’s were more like a cult than a religion and used the bible as a means of control in an extreme way, instead of helping one to grow in their personal walk with God. I never doubted that there was a creator to this world, I don’t care how much science there is; in my eyes none of their arguments can answer the question of creation the way the bible does.

Because of my decision not to be a JW my family has decided to outcast me and eventually I was disfellowshipped. In my families eye’s I am dead and they are not to talk to me in any way shape or form, or they themselves could face disfellowshipping. If I was in the hospital dying none would visit, if I was starving none would feed me, if I needed a place to live none would open their door. In fact in their eyes if Armageddon were to happen today I would be destroyed. Like I said God is love and according to his word his son Jesus died so that we could be forgiven unconditionally once we sincerely repented to God, not man, for our sins.

I have been married for three years and have a 10 month old son whose picture is my profile picture. To this day none on my mother’s side has seen either one. So I to know how it feels to have been wronged in the name of God, God never intended families to be separated in his name.

So why….why would I choose to be apart of a religion that has wronged so many people throughout its history? Why would I be a part of a society that is responsible for more deaths then all the wars of the US combined, because I believe in the source of their knowledge, the bible. You see it was Jesus’ apostles in the book of Acts 11:26 that called themselves Christians. According to http://www.merriam-webster.com their definition of Christian is “one who professes belief in the teachings of Jesus”. So you see in Jesus time there was only one Christian teaching (or religion), and that was the apostles of Christ. There was no Catholic, Baptist, Pentecostal, JW’s, Mormons, Evangelical, Unitarianism, Methodism, just students of Christ and the knowledge they just learned from him.

I believe, and once again this is just me, that religion is Satan’s tactic to take the word of God and his image and destroy it. Think about it, every Christian religion thinks theirs is the only way, none really have love for one another even though Paul teaches we are to be like one body under Christ, read Romans chapter 12:4-8. Religions tend to concentrate more on their doctrine and their laws then what the bible teaches. Most of all religion separates everyone from one another, and love and unity we are all suppose to have is gone. This includes all religions such as Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, etc.

I hate to stop here but there's much more to write.  In "Why Christianity Part II I want to touch on Church and how it is a vital part of being a christian and what lead me to believe in all of this good stuff.  I promise it will be good reading.

 Continued on Why Christianity Part II Coming Soon

Why Christianity Part II

Why Christianity Part II – This discussion is why did I choose to become a Christian. In the past blog I touched on my experiences with religion and how religion has hurt more people in the name of God then anything else. I am not bashing churches, just organized religious concepts. There is a difference between church and religion.

Religion is a structure that cultures, communities, and or person(s) people create. It is their interpretation of the bible and their organizational structure of how its followers should live. Church in Christ time was a place in which individuals would meet to learn about God’s word and the concentration was set around a community of people who would help one another grow in their individual walk with God. It was also a place for people to gather and devote some personal time to worship God and increase their knowledge of the knowledge handed down to them.

There was structure, there was punishment for disobedience. Punishment wasn’t physical harm but more isolation like. For instance in 1 Corinthians 5:1-12 Paul looks at how the church was suppose to deal with those who openly lived against the bible and had no desire to live according to it’s laws. In 2 Corinthians 2:5-11 he expands his thoughts on discipline in the church. Once again we can see the love of God in these verses as he instructs them not to overwhelm the individual who may be at fault but forgive and comfort him so he will not become overwhelmed by excessive sorrow, and they were to reaffirm their love for the individual. Much like how parents would discipline their children.

Church is supposed to be a place of joy where people of like mind would gather in unified worship of their heavenly father. If it wasn’t for church I wouldn’t be writing this today. I guess in a way you can’t have church without religion, but I think I have found the closest thing to it in my church. So how did I get her, how did I get to a point where I could absolutely believe in the bible to the point of sacrificing my relationship with my own relatives as in the first blog? Why would I choose to live a lifestyle that is so opposite from the society I live in? Why not just live life to the fullest and enjoy all the pleasure available in the world today, besides we only live once right and life is short?

As I mentioned I was always around the bible in some way shape or form my whole life but never took a hold of it. I enjoyed drinking, smoking, partying, sleeping around, basically I enjoyed not being accountable to anything other then my moral conscious. That’s the thing about the bible once you read it you begin to see your accountable to God for your actions. As I got older I met my wife and she was a semi-religious lady at the time who was going through a rebellious phase in her life. We met at a club and started dating. Not the prime area to meet someone.

Our first three year would be on and off partly because we both were to self center and could never look past our own desires. After a while my wife got sick of the life we were living and wanted to go back to the Christian life she lived previously. So I started attending church with her to avoid arguments in our relationship. I wasn’t going because I wanted to; I was going to make her happy. That became a problem because her heart was in it and she wanted to start living a cleaner lifestyle which meant no more partying, having sex before we were married, etc. That’s were the problems began again, because I was still living this life and didn’t want it to change, so eventually we ended up breaking up because my wife wanted to be in a relationship with a person with equal morals. She still loved me tremendously but we would never work out with such different morals.

Before we broke up church was starting to make a dent in my heart and I was agreeing with the messages, but I never took it upon myself to make a one on one relationship with God, I was a Sunday Christian…come Monday I was back to being a non-Christian. But even as we were broken up I still desired to go to church, it was something about that two hour period in which you could close your eye’s and let the songs sink into your heart and hear all this wonderful news out of the bible that I loved.

So I continued to go to church on my own, but I hadn’t made it my own. I was still out there living the same life which was still opposite then what the bible was teaching and I knew it. I started to think I could never be a Christian or live the life that God wanted me to because I loved the sins of the world to much to let them go. Then one day 8 months after being broken up, which from day one my wife never saw or talked to me not once during this time, she showed up out of the blue.

Long story short things got a little better and a couple years later we got married, but during this time I slower went back to my old ways and my wife was miserable. Then something happened, a bad night that changed the rest of my life. It was December of 08 and I was out with some friends of mine clubbing it as I usually do and my wife was at home pregnant with my son. I was drinking and having what I thought was a good ol time as I became plastered.

During this period I believe my friends and I got into a verbal dispute with some other group of guys. As we were leaving the club four deep we were confronted by eight of these guys. One thing led to another and a real messy fight erupted. The only thing I could think is getting my car and grabbing my friends and burning rubber. As I ran to get my car I looked back to see a group of four guys chasing after me and eventually they caught up to me a couple blocks away in one of the nastiest darkest alleys in a neighborhood with a dangerous reputation.

I was face t face with these guy, and drunk as a skunk. What was racing through my heart is there is a chance I am going to be killed and two things rushed through my mind in those hard seconds…..if I die I know I am going to Hell, and my wife will have to raise our son alone with a $12 an hour job. I was eventually over taken by this group and they proceeded to do their best on me. In my mind I prayed out to God and I made a promise to him that I have kept to this day. I promised him that if he saved my life I would never drink again and I would try my best to live a better life for him.

All this was happening for about 10 second in an alley with no lights were no would see us, where they could of taken there time. After I prayed, and I mean the second I was finished something had spooked these guys to the point where they didn’t just stop, they took off like a bat out of hell. They ran so fast that they didn’t even bother to open the gate as they took off. I believe to this day God somehow scared the ba-jesus out of them somehow because when I got up there was no one around us, no cars, no light, nothing to cause these guys to take off the way they did. I ended up walking to a police station because I was pretty beat up and calling my wife. I knew my life would be changing when my wife walked in the police station as the view of her pregnant, scared, and full of tears came across my eyes.

This is where my story really takes place in Why Christianity Part III

The Seperation of The Good and The Not So Good

So we have seen the creation of the Earth and the rise and fall of Adam and Eve. To date Adam and Eve have disobeyed the one command that God gave them, don’t eat the fruit. At this point in Genesis chapter five they have been banished out of the Garden of Eden and have been cursed to work the land, which won’t be an easy task since God cursed the land (read Genesis 3:17-19).

Eve would be cursed as well and all women today still experience the increased pains of child bearing, I guess child birth was never to be a hurtful experience. Adam and Eve also inherited a new gene in their DNA called “sin”. It was a result of ingesting the fruit from the Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Bad”. Sounds like a roman play up till now, but as we will see their children would go on to manifest sins side effects as we witness the first murder in the bible, and the lineage of Cain vs. Seth.

In chapter five we begin to read about the birth of Cain and Abel. We see that there is a big difference between the two of them. Cain is a farmer who reminded me of the problem child because in verse six we see God asking him why he is angry, and his face down casted. God goes on to tell him

• “If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”

Sounds simple but this advice is the theme to the bible, and life on this planet as we know it no matter what country, religion, or culture you live in. If you obey the rules, or live an obedient life, will you not be accepted? Will your life not be better, will you face less hardships, less headaches? YES. It’s what God said afterward that I see applying to our lives today

• "But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”

Even though the bible at this point doesn’t state that it was mandatory for burnt offering in this phase in history we see the two of them brought forth their offering to God. Abel bought the best and FIRST portion of his flock, while Cain brought the left over’s from his field. Cain became ticked when God rejected his offering because it wasn’t an offering of meaning or from the heart.

In this period up until the death of Christ you were to provide a sacrifice of your best fruits (ex: best of your heard, best of your harvest), you were to give God the first of your fruits. Today we can see this in tithing in a way. This is where a person would give the first 10% of their wealth to God, usually in the form of a donation to a church for most people. Tithing doesn’t atone for anyone’s sin, but the theory is close.

You see sin is a contagious disease that causes a person to want to buck the system or become disobedient to their culture. Sin also causes a person to do unthinkable things as Cain soon would kill Abel over jealousy. That’s what God’s advice in verse seven is so important for all of us.

• Sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”

I can tell you from experience that a Christian lifestyle is one of the hardest lifestyles to live. As you will see you choose to live a life outside of what’s considered the norm in our culture. Let’s take a closer look

• It’s normal to hold a grudge to someone, or hate someone you consider an enemy

• It is a norm to go out and drink to the point of intoxication

• It’s a norm for people to have casual sex, in fact it’s so much of a norm it is expected in today’s culture

• It’s becoming more of a norm for individuals in marriage to cheat and have affairs, come on it seems like the number reason why people get divorced

• On that note, it’s a norm for marriages to end in divorce ( over 50% end up failing)

• My sister is 12 years of age, and it’s already a norm for girls her age to have sex, sleep with individuals of the same sex, do drugs, and much much more.

• It’s a norm to include vulgar language in one’s vocabulary

• I could go on for ever

Now I’m not judging anyone who has participated or is participating in any of the above listed activities but all of these go against what God asks us not to do in his book. In fact, most people start out parent hood trying to teach their children not to grow up and live out these acts as well.

You literally have to learn how to master and take control of your body and its desires vs. allowing your body to control you off of what it wants. We see Cain lost that ability and ends up murdering his brother.

At this point in time God was still very active with mankind and dealt with them one on one just like a real father. His punishment for Cain, his trade would never work again. All he knew was how to farm and God would make it so he would never be able to make the ground produce his food, and his wages since he would use his crops to barter.

God would banish Cain from his presence and restore his plan for the birth of Christ through Adam and Eve’s newborn Seth. One thing I have learned through my readings of the bible is many people have tried to stop the will of God, which was to create Earth, create mankind as his children to worship him and give them a world beyond imagination giving them their every desire, including satan.

No matter what God’s will endure on. His will immediately after Adam and Eve sinned was the birth of his son Jesus Christ to redeem mankind from the mistakes of Adam and Eve. As you will notice our time frame and God’s is very different and his plans usually take a llllooooonnngggg time to come to a completion. Please let me know what you think of my writings and how I can make them better. As I have mentioned this is me putting my thoughts and putting them onto paper as I read through the bible and as I continue my walk as a Christian. Next time we look at Chapter five and the flood in chapter six

Why Did They Have To Eat The Fruit

Our first Parent’s

Well we just got done looking at how the earth was created. We also looked at how that one single act really shows how loving God is, and that same love ties into Chapter two. In chapter two we start to see the rise and fall of mankind. Now we see that God creates Adam from the ground, in fact Adam means ground (Adamah). What’s interesting is God says man was created in “our image” in vrs 27 in chapter one. Why would he say “us”, or begin that with “let us”. As we will learn Jesus was up in heaven with God helping him shape the universe, and it also shows the equality of God to Jesus.

Mankind was created to inhabit the earth, and create a family and become God’s children on Earth. He wanted to live amongst his children and love us as we love our own children today. We were to live in peace with one another in harmony while working the land. In fact the Earth was in such unification that even the animals and mankind were in peace. Adam and Eve would walk amongst lions and Bear’s, and never fear one another or fear one’s life. Death wasn’t a word known to the animal kingdom or mankind at this time.

The Earth was perfect in every sense, no pollution, no sickness, no violence, hunger, poverty, no class system, just utter perfection. Adam and Eve would be the epitome of beauty. Their bodies would be the picture of fitness, never to know what obesity was. They were created to never feel pain, aches, fractures, arthritis, headaches, just pure pleasure because they were perfect in every sense of the word.
They were given this wonderful world called Eden where any pleasure they desired was at their finger tips. God only asked one thing of Adam and Eve, just one thing. That was to never partake of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Sounds weird but Adam and Eve never thought like we do today. They never comprehended evilness like we do. Their minds never looked at the human body with lust, in fact they never had clothes on at this point they were nude. It actual says they felt no shame

They never thought of deceiving one another or felt a sense of selfishness. Their minds only had the thoughts of good. God informed them, you eat of this tree and “you will surely die”. Why would he even put something in front of them that could lead someone into temptation, to test their obedience. We do this today in our work lives, home lives, and lives of our friends. We have alcoholic drinks in our houses and tell our children to never touch it. We smoke cigarettes and tell our children never smoke. They are temptations that we ask our children to never partake of to test how obedient they are. The more they listen the more you trust them, and in turn the more responsibility you entrust to them.

The Fall of Mankind

In chapter three we learn why earth is the way it is today. We also get introduced to a very real entity we have on earth today Satin the devil. The chapter begins by Satin approaching Eve as a serpent or snake and he begins to challenge her to eat the fruit. You see Satin started out as an angel in Heaven. In fact he was one of the most elegant angels ever created. In Psalms it states he was in charge of the worship of God and was looked up to by a lot of angels in heaven. Eventually he let all of this go to his head and felt that he could challenge God. His challenge was that he could turn all of God’s creation (us) against God and would put his throne above God’s. He would go on to turn over a third of Heaven’s angels and today we call them demons.

In order to do so he would have to turn mankind in its very beginning, and that’s where we begin in Chapter two. He approaches Eve and tells her she should eat the fruit of the tree of good and bad. He tells her she won’t die, but God knows she will become like him and have his knowledge of good and bad. Satin since the beginning of time has tempted humans to think they can be like God and survive on their own with their own decisions, knowledge, and judgments.

In the end she eats from the fruit and Adam did as well and tyhey would be bannished from the Garden of Eden. That very decision created something we were never meant to have in our DNA….SIN, and as a result from sin imperfection. You can see this in our children today. For those who have older children, have you ever noticed bad trait in yourselves that have manifested in your children? My family is a lineage of alcoholics and studies show children of alcoholics are more prone to become an alcoholic themselves…why is that? Sin works the same way. Once they ate from that fruit their bodies and the bodies of their entire lineage would all inherit this disease called sin.

When God created mankind he never intended us to feel any of the pains we see today on this earth. He never created his children to feel hunger, abuse, death, poverty. He never intended us to kill one another, rape one another. I read an article today on Yahoo about these people in Las Vegas that live under the city in the sewer system. This population is over 300 people who are addicted to some of the worst things humans can experience. They live among rats, roaches, black widow spiders, and all the waste from the city above. That is not how God intended this earth to be like, and that’s why he makes a promise in vrs 15. In there we see the first prophecy of Jesus. You see God is watching from Heaven right now and sees all of the suffering that every single person on this Earth is going through and it breaks his heart, that’s why he gave us his promise in the bible that he will come back and restore this Earth back to his original design.

I have met a lot of people who have had some hard…hard lifestyles. Some of the worst have come from my wife’s cousins adopted daughters from Africa. No children, or human for that matter, should have had to see or experience the things they did before they turned 10 years of age. God see’s and those that lean on him and truly try to live according to his word often times find relief from this hard world. That’s what God does…he calls you in your heart..then he waits. He waits for his children to CHOOSE to listen to his word and seek him out. Don’t believe me, why are you reading this blog? Something entered into your heart that leads you to read my long blog, could it be God calling you to him wanting you to learn more about him and how much he really does love you?

From there he welcomes people with open arms and does everything he can to show them his love. Anywho I have begun to bunny trail and that’s another Blog just on this subject. If you can get anything out of these two chapters is that God hasn’t left us we left him, he has always been here just waiting for us.

In the end Adam and Eve are banished out of the Garden of Eden and the Earth as we know starts to begin it’s new life with struggles, and the introduction of evilness.
Next discussion will be on Cain and Able and the start of civilization. Chapters three & four.

Should God Have Started Over Again

In the Beginning…...Many of you may know that Genesis starts off the bible covering the creation of Earth and the rise and fall of mankind. Did you know that the author of Genesis was Moses, the famous guy who introduced us to the Ten Commandments? Did you know that it may not have been to the first book ever written for the bible? Some say the book of Job, author not quite known, could have been written before Genesis..cool hey.

Genesis covers more history than any other book of the bible from the beginning of the earth to the creation of the twelve tribes of Israel. It is also a book of firsts, for example

• Records first marriage
• First family
• First marriage
• First birth
• First sin
• First murder, etc

Creation

Some may look at the first chapter of Genesis as a boring catalog of action sequences that resulted in the creation of the earth that we live in today, and the mankind that inhabits it. But let’s look outside of the box on this one. One thing I have come to believe in my heart…and I can only speak on my behalf…is that God is love. Let’s think about this. God loves us so much that he created us knowing that Adam and Eve would sin and we would turn out the way we are today.

God created mankind knowing we would evolve into a world that would question or even deny his very existence. He created us knowing that we would take this blessing we call life and destroy it with the filth you see today. He would later send his Son Jesus Christ to sacrifice his life for every human who has ever existed, so he could redeem us from the mistake our ancestry parents made.

Some might say..well that isn’t very loving at all, in fact that isn’t fair at all…do you know what I have been through. Why should we have to suffer, why should people have to starve, why should people experience genocides, prejudices, and poverty. Why would God create a society knowing how bad it would get?

Let me ask you a question for those of you who have children. I want you to think of how you felt when you first held your child, and how you felt watching them sleep. How did you feel when they first called you dada, or mama…or that feeling you had when you came home from work and saw the joy and excitement in their faces as you walked through the door, or the sound of their first laugh.

Now imagine if someone sat down and said your child could grow up to murder many people, or grow up and become a rapist, and gave you the choice to end their life at that very moment. They look you in the eye’s and say don’t worry you can just try again. Would you terminate your child’s life or would you do everything you could to raise that child to the best of your ability, trying to instill every good moral you could as a parent. In reality it’s the truth, your child could grow up to become a cruel or evil human, one never knows. I don’t think Hitler, or Bundy looked any different as a baby then me or you and I don’t think their parents thought they would grow up to become the adults they did.

Let’s take a look at your story. What have you done with the life your parents blessed you with? Some reading this may have committed some outlandish acts to humanity. Does that mean your life should have been terminated before you had a chance to redeem yourself? I know people who have murdered, been addicted to drugs and did some pretty offal things to get those drugs. I know people who have molested others in their past. The difference is they have done very extraordinary things to change their lives, seek help and give back to humanity. They are what I consider assets to our society, and many of these individuals had back stories that lead them down those dark paths they rose from.

In God’s eye’s we are all his children…literally, and he knew not all of his children on this earth would grow up and turn into bad seeds. He loves us so much that instead of cheating and starting over or creating a human race of robots that would adhere to his every command and never have the freedom to choose what path they would like to go on, he created us with free will. The ability to make any choice we desire whether it goes against his desire or not. The ability to make a choice that could lead to your suffering or cause suffering the others…other children of god. All while he watches on in agony like any father would.

Would you have children knowing their fate? Would you have a child knowing he / she would grow up to become a drug addict and end up overdosing wasting the very life you gave them? Would you give birth to a child if you knew they would grow up to become a murder? God did, because he loves everyone unconditionally no matter what their stories are, or what skeletons you have in the closet.

The truth is everyone on this earth has the opportunity to follow God, and he put his bible on this Earth for all to read. He makes promises that he will always be with those who sincerely seek him. I can tell you that this last year that I have tried my hardest to apply what I have read in the bible and it has been one of the best years in my last 29. Many people think if you live according to the bible your life will be so boring, I beg to differ. I decided to live life outside of a club and bar this last year, and that alone has helped me enjoy life and to see more of this earth then I ever have.

I had more opportunities to see family and friends, and to travel throughout Wisconsin to parts I have never seen before. I have had more opportunities to show love to my fellow neighbors by sacrificing time to help those who truly need it. I have had more opportunites to see the good in humanity in a time where watching the news almost causing one to seek counseling. I thank you for joining me today as we looked into Genesis Chapter one, “The Beginning” and apologize for my length. I promise the story gets better as we look into chapter two and learn how Adam and Eve’s one act of disobedience affected our very DNA and created the world we have today.

God bless

Great Another Religious Blog

I know what you’re thinking, oh great another boring, bible beating, trying to convert me, pushing your views onto mine blog. I can promise you I come in peace but I do have a purpose as to why I am creating this blog, and we’ll get to that soon. I have been around the church life in some way shape or form my whole life, and have experienced three different religions (all in Christianity). I never really made God or religion a part of me and to me church was just a routine I had to go through while I was in the care of my Grandparents.

As soon as I moved out at 17 I never really set foot into another church for a long time. Not that I didn’t believe in God, I just didn’t see the value of going to church or practicing a religion in that chapter of my life. I will omit though, that I always had a void in my heart for God and started to miss him as I got older.

It wasn’t until I was 28 that I would really come to see God and the bible in a different way, and that’s why I’ve decided to create a blog about my bible reading adventures.

I have never seen God with such clarity in my life. In this last year I had the opportunity to read the New Testament from Matthew to Revelation and it changed my way of looking at God and the way I would choose to live my life. Over the summer I decided to get a little more active in my church and community and had an opportunity to talk to a lot of people about their thoughts on God and the bible.

I found that more people have been hurt in the name of Jesus than anything else. I also found that man made religion has taken the bible and destroyed its fundamental meaning and worth. Paul an author of over ¾ of the New Testament states that we should all be like one body under Christ, working together unified as one fluid entity. Sadly religion has removed that love and uniformity from the equation. Today we have Catholics, Lutherans, Baptists, Pentecostals, Jehovah’s Witness, Mormon’s, and many more who all read out of the bible and worship the same God but have no love for one another. Every religion has created its own set of creeds and moral laws from the bible and interpreted it in their own ways.

Each believes they are the true religion and that all others are false, but all base their theory off the very same scriptures their counter parts read as well. Because of this the bible and God have become obscure unknown creatures to this world, and their value has been reduced or erased. As a result individuals have lost their zeal for the bible and have formed many negative views about God and who he really is. Many ask, if God were real why would he allow such suffering, violence, and why would he let this earth turn into the decaying ball of chaos it has become.

Good question and believe it or not the bible tells us why, and this is something we will touch on soon. In reality most people base their religious beliefs off of what they hear on the podium, or what they hear from friends and family. Statistics show almost more than ¾ of you reading this have never read the bible and that statistic gets higher for the amount who have read the bible in its entirety.

This blog is designed for those who fall into any of these categories. Consider this my bible journal and you are free to follow along. Each day I will go over what I read, and write a discussion about it. I will also add on some side articles that cover some of my ministry experiences which I think many of you will be able to relate to. I promise to try to keep it lively and I encourage you to join along. I am reading out of the “Life in the Spirit Study Bible” It’s a NIV version published by Zondervan. It was edited by Donald C Stamps and John Wesley Adam’s. They are the two that narrate the study notes as you read along. You can find one on Amazon.com for about $35-$50, http://www.amazon.com/NIV-Life-Spirit-Study-Bible/dp/0310922429/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1263590573&sr=8-1.

My next Blog will e one Genesis chapter 1-3. I hope you enjoy my future blogs and I pray it helps put the bible in a whole new view for you.

A side story on the road less traveled

Mathew 7: 13, 14 - 13 "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

It's such a simple scripture but it has such a huge meaning.  When I read this I think of a hiking trail that goes along a mountain and along the way you come to a fork in the trail.  One sign reads trail difficulty easy to moderate.  You look down this trail and it is wide open, very little obstacles. Water fountains everywhere, every mile has a nice food court waiting to fulfill that hunger you'll have from burning those calories.  What’s nice about it is you can see a lot of your friends are going down that trail so you know you won't have to bare it alone.

Then you look to the right and there is this worn out sign that has foliage covering part of its words.  You go to dust off this sign and it states Difficult to impossible.  To be honest if this sign wasn't there you would have a hard time seeing the trail.  As you look down it you can see it is a ruff trail, with many difficult obstacles in its path.  There are layers of vines that you will have to clear; there are hardly any bathrooms or water fountains around.  You will have to pack your own food.  You can tell that this trail hasn't been traveled in a long time.

But there’s a manual next to this ruff trail and in the introduction it states: before is a trail that is one of great difficulty, but do not fret because if you follow this manual you will succeed.  In this manual it tells you what obstacles you may come into contact with and how to prepare yourself.  This manual also states what tools you will need to equip yourself with in order to achieve a higher level of success.  The manual lets you know that if you follow its directions you will be provided a way out of any obstacle no matter what the difficulty level is, but if you try to find a way around these difficulties yourself you will fail or even die.  The manual gives you a choice, you can choose the wide trail but you will achieve nothing and even though this trail is easy it has a higher rate of death then the trail less traveled.

So you choose to take the trail less traveled but within 15 min you start to feel as if you have bitten off more then you can chew.  You start to feel as if your all alone in this dense jungle, and then it happens you hit your first hurtle.  You look up at this huge cliff and think there is no way I am going to be able to make it over on my own.  You open the manual and it states: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

So with a loud voice you scream help me overcome this cliff, you feel a tap on your shoulder and a guide has shown up to help assist you through this hurdle.  In fact as this guide opened up your manual and helps follow its steps you realize that this hurdle wasn't hard at all in fact you can't wait for the next.  Your guide tells you, "you may not see me but I am always here for you.  All you have to do is call on my name and I will be here".  As you turn around your guide is gone but you begin to realize you are not alone on your journey.  Every time you face an obstacle your manual provides a way around it and at times a guide to help you through it.  Before you know it you have grown stronger and are now able to overcome hurdles better with more confidence.  You learn that you can rely on the information in this manual because it hasn't failed you.  Along your way you have even made friends with others who have taken this trail on and choose to travel with one another.

But along your journey you can see the wide road on the other side and as you travel further down the road you begin to see their wide trail has less and less people, and it is starting not to look so appealing.  Its water fountains are dirty and the water it produces is yellow.  The restaurants are dingy and its food smells spoiled.  The people traveling down this road no longer look happy, but look sick and confused.  You have had opportunities along your journey to traverse to the wider more appealing looking road, but you decided to listen to your guide and follow your manual that warned you of the consequences of such actions. You begin to find joy in the choice you made, and start to understand why your guide has directed you in the manner he did.

Then one day you look and you can see the end of the trail is nearing, and you can't wait to see and thank the creator of this manual for he has changed your life.  He has helped you overcome obstacles you never dreamed you could.  He has helped you remove habits from your life that were destroying your very being.  You are different in every aspect and all you can think about is wrapping your arms around him and thanking him.  So you run with everything you have to finally reach the end.  As you clear into the light you begin to see people gathered by your trail speaking of their experiences and how their lives have changed.  Then you look over and see that no one from the easy wider trail is coming through.

In fact the end of that trail looks like the beginning of your trail.  It looks as if it has never been traveled.  The sign is old and worm out; the trail itself is barely visible.  You look over at the creator of your manual and you ask where is everyone from this trail.  Why do I see no one coming from it?  The creator looks at you with tears in his eyes and states that they have all gotten lost in its obsticles, and were overcome by its difficulties as a result passed away; they choose the trail without the manual.

I implore everyone to take an opportunity to seek out the manual that Christ laid out for us which is the bible.  Take in its teachings and apply them to your lives.  Choose the road less traveled and I promise you it will become a road you will never want to leave.  God Bless