so its 2 am. i have a 10 page research paper due tomorrow at 2:15. well, i guess that would be today. i got tired of writing it so, naturally, i am doing something else. i took a 5 hour energy drink at 11 and it didn't really work at first, but now i feel awake. i got a lot of thoughts tonight.
i am amazed at life. life constantly changes, and so do our relationships with people. i have only been out of high school 2 years, and there have already been a few people who have entered into my life, made a lasting impression, and are slowly leaving.
i haven't been home in about 4 months. this has been the longest stretch of time since i moved to ohio. i miss home, but its more than that. i feel like a piece of me is there, waiting for the rest of me to return. i know who that piece is, but i need to return to familiar faces and places in order to feel whole again. i know i am speaking metaphorically and all of me is right here in ohio. i just feels like once i step of that airplane, i will be able to go "oh yeah. now i remember".
God has a way of using people and places to teach us about life. a familiar voice can bring so much comfort and peace. the same with a familiar scent or sight.
i am learning how once you really start to love people, you never fully separate. there are times of long absences, but love bonds people together forever.
i think that is all i got for now. im gonna get back to that paper. my mother is probably reading this and i know she would probably want me to. and i dont wanna get an F.
JN
hi mom. :)
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Sunday, April 24, 2011
reflections on easter
so today is easter. about the 1,981st one since humanity started celebrating it. i was thinking today about the holiday. over dinner the practice of communion came up. i live in a predominantly Anabaptist area, and communion takes place about once or twice a year around here. this is much different from my home church in Massachusetts, which was Baptist, that celebrated communion monthly. one person thought communion monthly was a good idea. another said she would like it weekly. someone else made the comment that weekly was to much. that it would become a ritual if we did it that much.
and that made me think.
I think we need to be reminded of the cross more, not less. If doing communion weekly would become a ritual, then we have completely missed Jesus. If our response to weekly communion is apathy, then our souls are what Jesus called the Pharisees "white washed tombs."
i look around at our world today, it seems that Christianity is getting significantly less tolerated than it used to be. more countries are becoming closed to the gospel, Islam is spreading like wildfire, and relativism is the God of the west. so when a holiday like Easter is still celebrated, it makes me think.
i was searching the web the other day and i came across a term i had never herd of before. New Atheism. Basically, it is a movement of atheism which encourages atheists not just to live with religion, but to actively oppose it. CNN described it as follows: "What the New Atheists share is a belief that religion should not simply be tolerated but should be countered, criticized and exposed by rational argument wherever its influence arises."
That is just scary. three of the four leading proponents of New Atheism are, you guessed it, Americans. Richard Dawkins, the lone Brit of the bunch, wrote a book a few years back entitled "the God Delusion." Our American rights will not be inalienable much longer.
it is just crazy to see the world just as the bible depicts it. Christians truly are foreigners here. The world system operates totally anti God.
so as today is easter, i was thinking that we, the Church, need to live louder lives. especially in the west. we can't be ashamed of what we believe. God has blessed us with an incredible freedom to meet in public, fellowship, and partake in celebrate of our risen Savior. we are not in danger of being sawn in half like many believers in communist and Muslim countries are today.
i was thinking about the words of Paul today. "If Christ has not been raised, then you are to be pitied more than all men." That is so true. I don't know if we realize it, but often times we live like that. I live like that. The church of the West lives as if the gospel is just a story to make us feel better about life. We live as if it isn't real. We live as if the words of the Bible are dead words that carry no meaning beyond bringing us temporary comfort. We live as if Jesus is still buried in a tomb somewhere in Jerusalem. But the verse doesn't end there.
"Christ has indeed been risen!" "Therefore my beloved brothers, be steadfast and immovable always abounding in the work of the Lord because you know your labor is not in vain."
It is not in vain because we do not serve a dead God. We serve a God who is very much alive. A God who is very much on the throne. And a God who more real than the world around you.
we need to wake up America. We are called to more than this. He deserves it.
JN
and that made me think.
I think we need to be reminded of the cross more, not less. If doing communion weekly would become a ritual, then we have completely missed Jesus. If our response to weekly communion is apathy, then our souls are what Jesus called the Pharisees "white washed tombs."
i look around at our world today, it seems that Christianity is getting significantly less tolerated than it used to be. more countries are becoming closed to the gospel, Islam is spreading like wildfire, and relativism is the God of the west. so when a holiday like Easter is still celebrated, it makes me think.
i was searching the web the other day and i came across a term i had never herd of before. New Atheism. Basically, it is a movement of atheism which encourages atheists not just to live with religion, but to actively oppose it. CNN described it as follows: "What the New Atheists share is a belief that religion should not simply be tolerated but should be countered, criticized and exposed by rational argument wherever its influence arises."
That is just scary. three of the four leading proponents of New Atheism are, you guessed it, Americans. Richard Dawkins, the lone Brit of the bunch, wrote a book a few years back entitled "the God Delusion." Our American rights will not be inalienable much longer.
it is just crazy to see the world just as the bible depicts it. Christians truly are foreigners here. The world system operates totally anti God.
so as today is easter, i was thinking that we, the Church, need to live louder lives. especially in the west. we can't be ashamed of what we believe. God has blessed us with an incredible freedom to meet in public, fellowship, and partake in celebrate of our risen Savior. we are not in danger of being sawn in half like many believers in communist and Muslim countries are today.
i was thinking about the words of Paul today. "If Christ has not been raised, then you are to be pitied more than all men." That is so true. I don't know if we realize it, but often times we live like that. I live like that. The church of the West lives as if the gospel is just a story to make us feel better about life. We live as if it isn't real. We live as if the words of the Bible are dead words that carry no meaning beyond bringing us temporary comfort. We live as if Jesus is still buried in a tomb somewhere in Jerusalem. But the verse doesn't end there.
"Christ has indeed been risen!" "Therefore my beloved brothers, be steadfast and immovable always abounding in the work of the Lord because you know your labor is not in vain."
It is not in vain because we do not serve a dead God. We serve a God who is very much alive. A God who is very much on the throne. And a God who more real than the world around you.
we need to wake up America. We are called to more than this. He deserves it.
JN
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
roots
I was reading Acts this morning and I came across a passage that speaks incredible truth about the mercy and providence of God. In Acts 13, the people in Antioch ask Paul to speak to them a word of encouragement before they left again on their travels. Paul starts by reminding them of their Jewish history, from Abraham to Saul to David, and then to Christ. But in verse 37, he tells them something that often goes overlooked by the american church today.
"For so the Lord has commanded us, saying
"I have made you a light for the Gentiles,
that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth."
And when the Gentiles heard this they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed."
What struck me about this passage is we, the American church, are the Gentiles Paul is talking about. The message of salvation did not start in America. It came from a few, poor, radical Jewish men in Israel. In America, I think we often forget that. We forget where we came from. We forget that we were Gentiles. I think we bring a sense of entitlement to God. We have this idea that because we are American, we have the whole Christian thing down the right way. We think other nations should be doing church like we are. We forget that as Ephesians says "we were separated from Christ, alienated form the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world."
The amazing thing about this passage is that it was not first written by Paul. Paul quotes it from Isaiah, who prophesied that the Jews would be lights to the Gentiles, 700 years earlier. To the Jews, this idea would have seemed crazy. To think that their God wanted to bring salvation to the ends of the earth and use them as an instrument to accomplish it. And here we are, 2700 years after that prophecy was made, the so called "The Christian Nation". I think if we understood our roots, we would fall flat on our face in the thankfulness before the living God. He didn't have to choose us, but he did. He didn't have to send anyone to tell us about Jesus, but he did.
Know today that you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, and a holy nation. Not the nation of America, the nation of the redeemed of Christ.
JN
"For so the Lord has commanded us, saying
"I have made you a light for the Gentiles,
that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth."
And when the Gentiles heard this they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord and as many as were appointed to eternal life believed."
What struck me about this passage is we, the American church, are the Gentiles Paul is talking about. The message of salvation did not start in America. It came from a few, poor, radical Jewish men in Israel. In America, I think we often forget that. We forget where we came from. We forget that we were Gentiles. I think we bring a sense of entitlement to God. We have this idea that because we are American, we have the whole Christian thing down the right way. We think other nations should be doing church like we are. We forget that as Ephesians says "we were separated from Christ, alienated form the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world."
The amazing thing about this passage is that it was not first written by Paul. Paul quotes it from Isaiah, who prophesied that the Jews would be lights to the Gentiles, 700 years earlier. To the Jews, this idea would have seemed crazy. To think that their God wanted to bring salvation to the ends of the earth and use them as an instrument to accomplish it. And here we are, 2700 years after that prophecy was made, the so called "The Christian Nation". I think if we understood our roots, we would fall flat on our face in the thankfulness before the living God. He didn't have to choose us, but he did. He didn't have to send anyone to tell us about Jesus, but he did.
Know today that you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, and a holy nation. Not the nation of America, the nation of the redeemed of Christ.
JN
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