I’m hoping that everyone had a nice Christmas, reflecting on the true meaning of the day, the real ‘reason for the season’, and that you all got to spend some time with those you love dearly.

I spent the day with my immediate family, we’ve got a sick one so we stuck close to home, and later in the evening we drove around the block (literally) to my cousins house and had dinner with her. Today I’m spending the day with my little girls but it was a long night with the little one so sick again. We’re hoping for an easier day but I’m allowing us some grace to just have an ‘easy day’ today.

I’m making plans to begin blogging more at the beginning of the new year, I intend on blogging at least once a day like I normally do, just whatever is on my heart/mind – just say a few words with what God gives me to, (or . . . errrr, wherever my mind takes me, lol) but also to write another blog with my affiliate partners consistently. I’m now partnering with half a dozen corporations and need to be actively setting up articles linking back to them and their products. But that won’t interfere with my purpose here.

This afternoon I’ve been reading in the book of Acts and some things just kind of stuck with me. So the first thing that kind of stood out to me was when I got down to Acts 17 and Paul stands up during the meeting of Aeropagus and tells them he gets it, they’re totally religious, but that he walked by a statue that was marked to “an unknown god” and he tells them they’re just ignorant to the very thing they worship.

“So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship.” Acts 17:23

It just made me think.

I had skimmed through (or scrolled is the word, I believe) my Facebook feed this morning and I was reading stories that family and friends had posted from their Christmas holiday. I’m conflicted sometimes when I see people “praising” (and I use that term loosely) God for everything that they have, and thanking God that their family made it safely, and thanking God for all these material possessions and food and for healing . . . but the same people have a Modus operandi for this. They thank God for everything good in their lives but the minute something goes wrong they are cursing and asking how could this happen, or even if things are still peachy (that’s the word I’ve used to describe being “just fine” for the past two decades lol), then they’ll still be cussing and talking nasty and foolish.

Sometimes I see some of these people dressed up and headed to church and singing in worship, just to go home and act exactly the same, all I can think (and yes I judge, because I’m a hypocrite, if you think only God can judge you, and that should scare you, by the way, no – anyone can judge you) I just think you don’t even know who you’re worshiping. You are ignorant of the very thing, the very God, that you worship; that you aren’t even at the heart of worship. It’s no about us. But what I keep thinking about is: yes, the world is seeing a bunch of hypocrites at every turn. (Yes, we’re all hypocrites in our own right; we all miss the mark and have double standards and what not) There are so many people who are claiming to be Christians, just because they believe that God exists, or because they’re desperately trying to relate to something; or they’re maybe really Christians but they’re in serious trouble. Have you read about the parable of the soils? Know where your faith is and what it’s about. I keep seeing a lot of these people talking about what “Jesus” is doing or how “God” has blessed them and my heart flutters wildly in pain; when we tell others the Gospel, and what God has done in our lives, but then show them our lack of faith by cursing and asking where God was at the first sign of trouble, that’s not deeply rooted faith. Where’s your anchor? This is why people call us hypocrites, reject what we say, and then never want to hear from us again. Or maybe they listen to what we have to say and even accept what we’re telling them, but then continue on with their own reservations because we didn’t model faith over fear.

I understand doubt. I understand fear. I understand disbelief.

I falter, too.

I remember a time when someone was up in my face (right. up. in. my. face.) telling me how nice it must be to be able to just live my life and do whatever I wanted to do and to be able to get away with it and just tell some “god in the sky” that I was sorry and “magically” be forgiven.

Yeah. That must be real nice. <<<Insert Sarcasm Here>>>

I suppose it is nice for those who don’t have anchors who truly live like that. But that’s an illusion and any Christian knows that’s not how our relationship (no matter what your relationship with the Father is like) works. I wanted to explain to them. I wanted to tell them how wrong they were, how twisted and disillusioned the whole idea was, and how I live less for myself now than I did before I followed Christ.

I didn’t.

That person had already heard the gospel, they had rejected it and rejected hearing anything more from me or anyone else around me, and they were increasingly becoming hostile. Fortunately for me, I had someone lovingly watching from the sides come up to me and graciously lead me away. That person was under attack, of that I’m sure, after hearing them talking about the demons they had faced. Growing up in a “strict” home, straying, struggling with homosexuality and drugs and self esteem issues, then not having family support. Feeling shunned by their family and not willing to go back to their families church even though they had, at one point, wanted to.

The Bible, God’s holy word, has set the standard for marriage. That’s it. It’s not changing, it’s unequivocally set: one man and one woman uniting for life; as two becoming one flesh. I believe marriage should be between a man and woman because that is the standard the Bible has set for my life, I didn’t just wake up one morning and think, “You know what, I think I’m not going to agree with same-sex marriage, because I want to hurt peoples feelings and shun people.” Absolutely not. I love you regardless of what personal choices you make, including who you are married to, but don’t ask me to change what I feel personally. It’s what the Bible teaches me. Let it [sic: Bible] be offensive. Just because that’s God’s plan for, His plan for the world and His people, that doesn’t change His love. He loves you regardless of if you’re straight, homosexual, married, single, old, white, purple, short, tall, wrinkled, too slim, too chunky, way too hairy (like my hubby), wear glasses, OR A SINNER! WOW!

WHOA!

A sinner! That’s all that matters! You just have to be breathing and be a sinner for God, the maker of heaven and earth, to love you.

You’re beautiful.

But you know what . . . I falter. That encounter with that person made me fear. Made me doubt – not God – but myself. Made me doubt my abilities to share God with others who were filled with hatred, made me doubt if I could have a backbone to be bold and brave when faced with hostility, but that’s the beauty of the gospel: we’re called to love God and to love others. Simple. We can be kind and loving. We don’t have to be offensive, the Bible can be offensive for us. Remember those cheesy bracelets we all wore in the 90’s that read: W.W.J.D.? – Think about it? What would Jesus do? He would love. Simply, He would love. Our job is to love others. To share the gospel with others. To love them some more. To keep loving them. To keep sharing the gospel with people. But to love them. Jesus would meet people where they were, so why can’t we? Meet them where they are and love them there. So love them . . . So keep doing that. But I’ve doubted and I’ve feared, “How will I ever stick up for Him (God)?”. But He doesn’t need me to stick up for Him. I’ve doubted, “How can I be loving without be mean when I don’t agree with their most intimate life choices?” But He doesn’t ask me to agree with them, He asks me to share Him so they can know Him – so He can love them. He asks me to be kind and be love, because He first loved me.

“We love because He first loved us.” 1 John 4:19

I hear people say they won’t follow “a god like that” because “that doesn’t benefit me.” Okay.
It’s about Him knowing best what’s best for us. It’s about, “Help me, let the desires of my heart be what You desire for me.”.

If He’s willing to give His son – No. This has been one of the biggest blocks I’ve come up against. So many people have told me they wouldn’t want to follow a God who would let His own son die like that. He loved us so much that His son died for us. Stop. Please. You can’t fathom it, because honestly, we can’t either. I, as a Christian, can’t even fathom it – because my finite mind can’t wrap my head, my heart, around that. What kind of a love that must be. I’ve only experienced His unconditional love for me, I’ll never know what it’s like to have an unconditional love for another person, not even my children. I do love them, I always will, and yes I’d die for them – of that there’s no question. But we, as humans, will never truly know what it feels to love someone unconditionally.

God will always be on the throne. When we sin, when we get upset about something, none of that matters in the long run concerning satan’s ‘rule’ because it doesn’t give him any thing. Sure it causes suffering and pain but God’s still on the throne, He’s always been and will always be, and it’s never changing. He’s already conquered sin and death. So even though people are rejecting God, it’s not going to change His power and His sovereignty, it just changes our eternities if we reject Him. That’s a hell of heartbreak. Literally.

“The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, “Let us break their chains and throw off their shackles.” The One enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord scoffs at them.” Psalm 2:2-4

We can’t bargain, barter, or buy when it comes to God. He owes us nothing and we deserve nothing. On the flip side: He has everything to give and we have nothing to give. God is self-sufficient; He doesn’t need anything from us. He never did. He never needed us, but He actually wanted us. Wow.

I’m an eternal debtor to an extravagant, infallible, and infinite God. He will never, nor is He capable of ever, owing me anything. He’s already gave all, sacrificed all, and before that He already had it all.

Today has been kind of one of those squirrel days where one thought takes me to another to another to another. Yeah, I do that sometimes, but once that seed is in there, it just sprouts all over the place. If you don’t have a whiplash from me bouncin’ back and forth from thought to thought, then I’d love for you to go read Acts 17 right now but I don’t think you’re going to remember, because I forget and procrastinate, too, so I’ve just included it all right here. You’re already here, so what’s one more minute? If you can, please read Acts 17:16-34 below! We all have an unknown god (agnostos theos) in our lives if we’re not worshiping a known God.

Grace & Peace

In AthenI

¹⁶ While Paul was waiting for them in Athens, he was greatly distressed to see that the city was full of idols. ¹⁷ So he reasoned in the synagogue with both Jews and God-fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there. ¹⁸ A group of Epicurean and Stoic philosophers began to debate with him. Some of them asked, “What is this babbler trying to say?” Others remarked, “He seems to be advocating foreign gods.” They said this because Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection. ¹⁹ Then they took him and brought him to a meeting of the Areopagus, where they said to him, “May we know what this new teaching is that you are presenting? ²⁰ You are bringing some strange ideas to our ears, and we would like to know what they mean.” ²¹ (All the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there spent their time doing nothing but talking about and listening to the latest ideas.)

²² Paul then stood up in the meeting of the Areopagus and said: “People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. ²³ For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: to an unknown god. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you.

²⁴ “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. ²⁵ And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. ²⁶ From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. ²⁷ God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us. ²⁸ ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’^[a] As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’^[b]

²⁹ “Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill. ³⁰ In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. ³¹ For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.”

³² When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, but others said, “We want to hear you again on this subject.” ³³ At that, Paul left the Council. ³⁴ Some of the people became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, also a woman named Damaris, and a number of others.

Acts 17:16-34