Pilgrim's Ponderings

Today the preacher made a statement - "Remember you do not leave God in church when you leave Church.... in fact the reality is when you leave Church you take God with you to your work place and elsewhere. He is always with you and follows wherever you go." I have heard this encouraging statement many times before and am sure you have too. It's an encouraging fact to know that wherever you go God will be there... the psalmist says that too over and over again. I was thanking God for being so caring in my life... and as I thought and meditated on this truth the Spirit of God convicted me of something I needed to address. Our churches today are preaching this message... and while it is true it is only one side of the coin. We rest i God's omnipresence that His eye is watching us wherever we may go... but does God really follow me. Unfortunately i fear that we have allowed this mentality to creep into our lives and ministries. We decide on a course of action and then...

Worship is a key theme throughout the bible. Whether you read the historical books of the old testament of the epistles of the new testament; whether you read the psalms in the OT or even the Revelation of the NT you cannot escape the theme of worship. Gid is God and I have learned two valuable lessons on worship recently (I should have known them before). 1) We dont worship God because of what He does for us. That's only a tiny bit of the whole phenomena, for even if God were not do a thing for us, and even should he seem far away God is still God and deserves worship. God is not God because of hat He does, He is inherently God and thus worthy of all our worship. Thats a humbling truth and negates my feeling like worshiping or not. A correct realisation of who God who is will automatically demand worship n any and every circumstance. 2) God has set ways in which we are to worship Him. If we look at creation, we will learn an awesome truth. God is a God of order. He has order in al...

James 2 talk about faith without deeds. Recently my small group studied and we got into a debate on the role of deeds or works in christian life. The whole problem is that James says that Faith without works is dead... but if your faith is dead then how can it save you? But Paul would say that we are saved by faith and not by works so that no man can boast. Is the bible contradicting itself? Do Paul and James have different theologies on salvation? By no means... so what then is the answer? I think the key is in defining what we mean by works. If I had to read that verse I would equate works with obedience. We do what we do (works) out of obedience to God. This also answers an important ethical question - Does command us to do good or is what God commands good because He commanded it? I would hold to the latter and say in life we are faced with many decisions of differing roads to take... most often the road holds no inherent good or bad, right or wrong value in and of itself. Wha...

Deadlines, papers, assignments, research, competition, unhappy bosses, not so easy to get along with colleagues, blue Mondays.... the list goes on... and you could be forgiven if you thought i was writing about the corporate sector work field. No.... this is an excerpt from the life of a bible college student. One year in bible college has taught me a lot about working hard. It has also taught me a lot about how easy it is to be busy in Godly things and yet not be with God. That's true... in the middle of commentaries on the Psalms, Ex-positional readings on the Old Testament and Homiletical guidelines to preaching the new testament... where is my time to just pick up the bible and say "Here I am God... speak" Sure i have learned many a practical application from classes and chewed on many a scholars ideas of theology and christian living... but if I had to pick the most important lesson i learned here in college... i would have to say its one i always knew... "...