Scary Mary Poppins

This is a very funny link: Scary Mary Poppins

Shows what happens when you take things out of their context!

making model grass and meadows

making model grass and meadows

While researching how to make Jamberoo's lush fields etc, I found this website.

They have several methods to make grass. The new and revolutionary one at the end of the page is worth reading. Even if you do not like trains.

Cat sculpture

This marvellous piece of art was created by our cat, BJ.

It was a shame to have to tidy it away, but it kinda stunk.

Guidance!

My blood is boiling and it is boiling because of the pagan teaching that 95% of the Western evangelical world purveys regarding the idea of knowing God's will.

You know the standard teaching (follow the link at the top of this blog for an example).

The 'standard' teaching is something like this:
1) If what you are seeking to discern is not against the Bible it's ok IF and only IF:
2) God "opens the door for you" AND/OR
3) Your prayer and fasting leads you to 'discern' God is 'telling' you to go that way AND/OR
4) Your church leaders and/or other leaders in your church affirm it for you AND
5) You try it and it 'works'.

I esteem Dr James Dobson highly but I remember watching a video he made where this (well-chosen) pretty blonde teenager asked with tears in her eyes how she might know God's will. "Well, the Bible tells you" Dr Dobson replied. Phew!

He quoted Psalm 119:105: "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet".

Clear as mud! The good doctor then went on to outline 5 or 6 ways to discern (or divine!) God's will based on anything but the Word of God.

What about those people who tell us to shut up and listen to the still, small voice of God (1 Kings 19:12)? As if we are somehow to be like quakers and we just shut up and wait until God speaks to us. Or, trying to read 1 Kings 19 in context, we go and camp at the foot of a mountain until God speaks in his still, small voice. And yet it is better rendered "the sound of thin silence" (cf. the NRSV)... the context is thus:

1. God threatened to wipe out his people after the Golden Calf incident in Exodus.
2. He wanted to start a new nation beginning with Moses.
3. Moses interceded.
4. Elijah runs to Mt Horeb (Mt Sinai of Exodus) to seek to take God up on the offer he made Moses.
   
5. There is thunder, lightning, earthquake, fire: but God is not in the fire. Then there is the sound of thin silence and (elipitically) God is not in the silence.
   
6. THEN God speaks to Elijah and, in summary, tells him to pull his head in: unlike Moses he is not the only one to remain faithful to God; there are 7,000 who have not bent the knee to Ba'al. So there, Elijah, go figure... there will be no new nation, no new revelation of God here chum.

In other words, 1 Kings 19 tells us the OPPOSITE of the popular reading... rather than seeking to hear the still, small voice of God, 1 Kings 19 tells us to pull our heads in and keep on being faithful to God.

Ok, so what about "Be still and know I am God" (PS 46:10)?

What about it? It's a Psalm about God being our strength and refuge in times of trouble. Contextually, God is shouting... the wars will be ended, the nations subdued. It's not the "still, small voice" of God: God is SHOUTING to all who rail against him to shut up and listen.

So, boy meets girl. Is she the one (another bugbear: where does God say there is only ONE TRUE LOVE for anyone? That's Harry meets Sally not Mary meets Joseph)? How do I know if I should marry her? Oh, my church teaches me to listen to the still, small voice of God.

Man, if you have a nagging doubt, then isn't that the wisdom God has put in your head telling you to call it off? Don't blame it on God when you break the woman's heart!

Here's a biblical view of God's guidance: The whole Bible tells us what God's will is: that people should be saved and live to his glory. If you are saved and living to God's glory then you are IN HIS WILL. Explicitly, he also tells us things like to be joyful, prayerful and always thankful, for this is the will of God for you in Christ (1 Thess 5:16-18). If you are doing those things then, brother, you are in God's will.

For everything else God gives us his biblical parameters and wisdom to distill them into life.

So, is the chickybabe a Christian? Is she not related to you? Does she love the Lord Jesus? Then to marry her satisfies God's will, ok! So if she is 'right' for you depends not on biblical characteristics but on wisdom... do you want to be a missionary in deepest, darkest Africa and she wants to minister to Muslims on the Left Bank in Paris? Maybe one of you needs to change or perhaps it's UNWISE to wed.

But to 'divine' God's will by means other than I've described is rank paganism. Young man, if your church leaders taught you that, pray for them, for they will be judged more harshly for being God's teachers.