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What to blog next... Hmmm

Just finished 1, 2 and 3 John and I'm wondering what to blog about next. Happy to do another Bible book but could do something different. Maybe people would like to ask questions and I'll have a go at answering them, maybe something else. Let me know what you'd like to see and I'll give it a go! At the moment, I'm wondering about looking at some Psalms but I'm happy to do something else if people want. Let me know!

Dealing with Family (3 John)

I don't know how you feel about your family but I love mine. Although we don't always agree, we manage to have some great times. The other day I sent my bro this picture just for a laugh and today I got a one word reply - "Fool" - Brilliant! I love it when family know just what you're like and you can say anything to them and you know they'll accept you because you're family and they love you, even if you're as silly as me! John knows that this is what the family of God ought to be like and he's writing to some brothers and sisters about it...


As Christians (if we're Christians), we have been welcomed into a huge spiritual family - God's family and we are brothers and sisters with Jesus! Sometimes we're great at remembering this and other times we're not!

John's buzzing about some of his family that have visited recently from another part of the church. They brought him great joy because they were full of stories about how other parts of the family are doing and how they're growing. We could learn from this! Do we get excited about this kind of stuff? John says he has no greater joy than to hear about other Christians living in the truth (v4).

John writes also to remind his readers to be encouraging to other Christians who are doing things for Jesus and not to neglect them (v5-8). He talks about showing hospitality to others who are working for Jesus. We should show love and practical help to other Christians because even though they might be strangers to us - they're part of our family because they belong to Jesus and are living for him.

Sometimes Christians are rubbish at being family. John mentions this guy Diotrephes, who's doing the exact opposite of supporting his family - he's slandering them and spreading lies and gossip about them just to make himself look good (v10-11). It happens! Have you ever experienced other Christians putting themselves first and deliberately being deceptive and even preventing other brothers and sisters from doing work for Jesus? I have! Like any family, we have our breakdowns at times and relationships aren't what they should be. We shouldn't paper over the cracks and pretend that everything's fine in the church. Sometimes there's rot and rubbish in the church and we need to sort it out! This could mean being ready to challenge sin in each other when we see it happening unchecked and being ready for others to lovingly challenge our mistakes and attitudes too!

The great thing is that when Christians do live as family together and encourage each other as John suggests, others notice that something special is going on. Christians should be the kind of loving community that causes others to realise that something is different about us. The difference is that God is living in his people! This kind of thing ought to be noticeable in the way we hang out as Christians!

A challenge...
What are you most excited about really? Ask God to make you increasingly excited about seeing others get to know him and live for him more and more and ask him to help you to do the same too! Maybe you could encourage one of your brothers or sisters with a letter about all the things God is doing in your life and those around you - exciting stories! Or maybe just send them a silly photo of yourself like I did!

A Reminder (2 John)

John's second letter is nice and brief and to be honest, although there's a lot we don't know about who he's writing to or the situation they were in, the main message of the letter is pretty straight forward. It's a reminder to another Christian and her local church family to keep loving God by living for him wholeheartedly and to avoid all the rubbish that would distract them from doing so...


We don't really know who the lady is that John is writing too but we can tell a few things from what John writes:
  • She appears to be a Christian leader with God-given reponsibility for others (v1)
  • She is someone who teaches and shows others how to follow Jesus (v4)
  • She has worked hard at it (v8)
  • She could benefit from a reminder to keep loving others (v5-6)
  • She could also benefit from a warning about false teachers that are around (v8-11)
  • She's a good friend of John's and well worth visiting in person (v12)
  • She is well-loved by other Christians where John is too (v13)
I think there is a lot we can learn from this letter but the one thing that jumps out at me is the fact that even Christian leaders that have been chosen and are hard-working and gifted, need reminders to keep loving others and warning not to fall into wrong teaching. We need to remember that none of us has all the answers and so it's quite possible for us to be swayed into wrong thinking or wrong actions that don't show love. Loving others doesn't mean going along with whatever they believe. Truth is still truth and it is the truth about Jesus that unites Christians because God is living in them by his Holy Spirit. If we're Christians, let's make sure that we're not too cocky that we think we can't go wrong!

A challenge
  • If you're a Christian, ask God to show you someone who you can remind and encourage to continue in God's love and who possibly needs a stabilising hand to hold them strong through a wobbly time where they could potentially give up on the truth. Maybe you could write to them like John did or go see them!
  • If you're not, consider the Christians you know and their attitude towards you. How much do they care about you and do they ever explain how their beliefs differ from yours? Maybe you could challenge them to show more love to others or to explain themselves more clearly (or do both at the same time)!
More blogs and that

    Everything is Different with Jesus (1 John 5:13-21)

    Everything is different when you're a Christian. I don't mean that life is necessarily easier or that all Christians sail through life with a smile on their face, impervious to struggles and pain. That's clearly not true! What I mean is that sin (the root problem behind all that is wrong with our world and our lives) is defeated in the life of the Christian and this changes everything...

    1 John 5:13-21

    John is writing so that his readers might become Christians and know that they are safe. If we're not sure what it really means to be a Christian (or if we've forgotten!), we can fin it in verse 13. John says it's about believing in the name of the Son of God or in other words, believing Jesus was and is who he says he is.

    If we're Christians, John says we can know for sure that we have been given life forever and also we can ask in prayer with greater confidence because we're asking our Father who's forgiven and accepted us. People who aren't yet Christians can pray too and God will hear them (he hears everything) but it's not the same if you haven't asked for forgiveness and there's sin separating you from God. Prayer changes when you become a Christian.

    Sin changes when you become a Christian too. All sin leads to death but God offers free forgiveness and life (Romans 6:23). Christians still make mistakes and do the old sins they used to but it's totally different because when a Christian (forgiven) is sinning - it's not killing them! God has taken the sting of sin away through Jesus' death on the cross and his resurrection. This is how John can talk about sin that doesn't lead to death. ALL sin leads to death but what he's talking about is forgiven sin. Forgiven sin doesn't lead to death. Making mistakes and doing wrong is also totally different when you're a Christian. Still wrong (and we still need to grow out of it) but it's forgiven! We can still have life to the full and life forever!

    John finishes this letter by ramming his point home. In short - 'Jesus is the truth so don't bother with fakes!' Why is he being so clear about it? Why is he being so exclusive? So arrogant? Because John knows that believing in the name of Jesus changes everything and it's the difference between life and death.

    Have you asked Jesus for forgiveness and for change? You're allowed to! And you're allowed to keep asking too! And if you've done this, remember that as you grow to become more like Jesus, your sinful mistakes aren't killing you any more when you fall back! Jesus is life!

    A Simple Choice (1 John 5:6-12)

    Just the other day I decided to try and cycle from Exeter to Bournemouth via Lyme Regis and Weymouth (about 90 miles) and after 3 hours hard slog, I just about got to Lyme Regis and I had a choice to make. Do I keep going and try and make the whole distance or do I give up here and eat some fudge instead? You can probably guess which one I chose and I don't regret it one little bit. Fudge is yummy!

    Our choices can be really important, especially when it comes to what we choose to do with Jesus...


    First of all, what's all this blood and water stuff in the first bit? I had some idea that it might be about the natural earthly life and death of Jesus (considering how important it is) and then I checked to see what the Message version of the Bible had to say...

    Jesus—the Divine Christ! He experienced a life-giving birth and a death-killing death. Not only birth from the womb, but baptismal birth of his ministry and sacrificial death. And all the while the Spirit is confirming the truth, the reality of God's presence at Jesus' baptism and crucifixion, bringing those occasions alive for us. A triple testimony: the Spirit, the Baptism, the Crucifixion. And the three in perfect agreement.

    I wasn't surprised about what the Message version said and I found it a really helpful explanation of the things John is talking about. God is basically giving us repeated opportunities to look and realise that Jesus is who he says he is and we all have a choice to make about whether or not we believe him.

    If we believe God (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) when he tells us about Jesus, John tells us what we get - LIFE and if we don't, John is equally clear that we get death instead. There's no middle ground about saying Jesus was just a really nice guy but that's it. People who think that are totally ignoring most of the wild and miraculous things Jesus said and did.

    CS Lewis in his book, 'Mere Christianity', explains it really well I think...

    I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him, "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

    Do you ever doubt that Jesus is the Son of God and all that he says? I know I have my doubts sometimes and then I get to thinking about the evidence again... The historical reliability of the gospel accounts in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, the birth, the baptism, the death, burial and resurrection. And it doesn't stop there. I have to think about the things I know God has done in my own life too. The peace, the rescue through all sorts of trials and trouble, the comfort in pain and the resources to know what to do just at the right time. I have to remember because the reality of God's presence and power at work in my life and in the lives of those around me has been abundantly clear. It's not been because I'm such an amazing person (I'm not!). It's been God. Some would say I'm kidding myself about it being God but when I look at the evidence I have to say that I'd be kidding myself to ignore all that God has blatantly done. He just been so busy showing us himself that we'd be stubborn and closed-minded to conclude he's not there or that Jesus was just some bloke who was really nice.

    A prayer...

    Lord - Thank you for Jesus and thank you for not being a totally invisible or silent God but for constantly interrupting our world's history with significant demonstrations of your love for us. Thank you for the biggest interruption of all when Jesus came and lived, died and rose again for us so we can have a relationship with you. Help us to keep trusting you until this world ends and sin, pain, hurt, death, sadness, tears, and everything else that's horrible and crap is over and done with - gone forever. Amen!

    Believing is Being (1 John 5:1-5)

    I was at a huge Christian conference once and sitting in a seminar about the 10 Commandments. The guy leading it asked us a question: 'Why did God give the Israelites the 10 Commandments?' I remember one of my youth leaders at the time sticking his hand up and answering, 'For their enjoyment!' I thought it was a great answer because God only asks us to do what is best for us but the guy leading the seminar obviously didn't see it that way and didn't know what to make of it. I think he thought it was a joke or something. Oh well.


    John says the commands of God are not burdensome.

    There's something really natural about being in a relationship with God that naturally affects everything else, even when there's sin trying to catch us at every turn. People struggle and strive to impress God and live for him but John makes it sound so natural - like breathing in and out. Loving God, loving Jesus, loving others and obeying God's commands should all be as natural as breathing in and out.

    If only it were that easy! But it's worth remembering that it should be this easy! The thing that makes it difficult to do these things is our own sinful nature (which we won't completely shake off until Jesus takes us to heaven) but if we're Christians, we have God the Holy Spirit living in us and this means that we have a new nature. This means that we're not battling to live for God against our nature but that we're living naturally for God and when we sin - we're battling our new nature. Do you see the difference? We're being less ourselves, less our true nature, less like our Father God when we sin.

    So how can we live more naturally and do the things John describes? Well, it all starts with believing. Not doing - BELIEVING. What we believe affects what we are. John says those who believe Jesus is the Messiah (chosen one from God, saviour, rescuer) are the children of God.

    So, do you believe this? If so, ask God to help you live according to your new godly nature. If not, why not and have you considered Jesus thoroughly for yourself or written him off?

    Have fun!

    Email from an atheist...

    I haven't been blogging lately because I've been on holiday but I just thought I'd share something with you. A while ago, I was chatting with people on the Richard Dawkins forum and I had a fantastically honest and thoughtful email from an atheist guy on there about why he didn't believe in God or religion. His honesty challenged me and I thought I would share it with you and also my reply. I wonder what you would have written back...

    Email from an Atheist...

    My mother brought my siblings and me to a Presbyterian church off and on for a couple of years when I was very young. Other than that I was never raised to be religious. Throughout my childhood and teen years I believed in God but it was a rather vague belief and it didn't do anything to shape my life. I believed in God only in the sense that I would give a positive response if asked. I didn’t subscribe to any religion because I thought (and still think) organised religion is subversive and caused a lot of evil. I wanted to believe in God but on my own terms. I really closed my eyes to the idea that God may not exist. It was a silly thought to me. I told myself “Since everyone believes in some sort of god there must be one and they’re all praying to it in their own different traditions and through their own understanding". I latched on to this idea for a long time (but now know the logic is fallacious and is an appeal to popular belief).

    After high school I joined the army and in 1998 I was deployed to Bosnia. There I saw enormous cemeteries, too many to count and in some cases too large to stand and view their borders, filled with the victims of the war. I saw the remains of what once were houses but since were marked with a spray painted x to signify that they were inhabited by Muslims and then riddled with bullets by Serbs. Other houses in the same neighborhoods were leveled to their foundations from rocket or mortar attacks. I saw old grey women in the streets forced to beg for money because they lost their legs to landmines hastily left in their backyards during the war. I saw other women standing in market places holding up pictures of their sons or husbands, men who died in the war, asking us soldiers if we knew where they could go for financial aid. A part of my job was to give mine awareness classes to elementary school to high school aged children in their classrooms. We had deactivated landmines to show the children so they know what to avoid. In one class, filled with twelve or thirteen year old children, one of my teammates held up a small antipersonnel mine and asked if any of them had ever seen one. One child held up his hand which was missing three fingers. He had to give no description of his account as his proof was his deformity. On multiple occasions my team and I were approached by Muslim extremists, members of the Mujahideen, who yelled at and spit in our faces and wished for our deaths, none deterred by the loaded M-16 rifles on our shoulders. It was in Bosnia that I asked myself if I was absolutely sure I believed in God.

    I didn’t think there was any way to prove or disprove God’s existence so the question lingered but I didn’t feel compelled to try to answer it. When I got back from Bosnia I started noticing things that didn’t accord with my view on God and admitted to myself I was agnostic and remained so for many years. On my first date with my current girlfriend I told her I didn’t believe in God although I didn’t call myself an atheist. She asked me why I didn’t believe in God and I wanted to give her a good answer. I then started a search for answers. I asked myself what still made me believe in God. The argument from design struck me as valid but then I studied evolution and learned natural selection is a mindless process that has no goal in mind and we and every other species are products of it. The cosmological argument seemed valid but then I studied cosmology and found an explanation of how stars form from clouds of hydrogen and create the heavier elements that make up planets and everything on them…including every atom in my body! The more I learned the less reasons I had to believe. The only issue that remained is if God doesn’t exist there would have to be a reason why the universe does. Then I learned about the Hawking-Hartle Wave Function Theory that states the probability of our universe coming into existence uncaused is 100%. Dr. Stephen Hawking started work on this theory about 15 years ago and it's been verified by observational data.

    That is how I became and why I still am an atheist. Can I ask why you believe in God?

    My reply...

    Thanks for your honesty and thanks too for asking me why I do believe in God. Here's a few reasons why...

    1. I believe because he loves me.
    Ok, ok, I know this is completely unscientific but it’s the biggest and most fundamental reason that I keep believing God is real. It’s like trying to prove that my mum and dad love me. There’s no way I could ever conclusively prove their love for me, least of all scientifically. However, this can’t take away the fact that I know they do love me. I know it because I know it. I’ve experienced it and I feel it. I’m reminded of it all the time but can I prove it? No. Is it real love? Yes! I believe God is real and loves me because I can’t deny that I’ve felt his love and seen his love at work in my life and the lives of others. Love in the midst of tragedy and suffering. Love that brings healing and hope. Scientific? Absolutely not. Real and true? I can’t deny it.

    2. I believe because historical evidence is overwhelmingly compelling.
    Most people who don’t believe the Bible haven’t taken much or any time to explore its claims. I’m thinking especially about the gospels and the account of the resurrection of Jesus. The historical reliability of the gospel accounts we have is incredible. We have eye-witness accounts written down for us to examine and test and they were written within living memory of Jesus. The evidence demands a verdict. We owe it to ourselves to thoroughly explore these claims before we dismiss them out-of-hand. Science is about building theories to explain the evidence we see around us. When a new piece of evidence comes up, we must test it to see if it’s false or if our theory needs to change in the light of this new piece of evidence. In this case, the scientific theory is: ‘Dead people don’t rise’ but the Bible says that Jesus came back to life. It would be unscientific for us to ignore the evidence completely and stick to our theory about death. Science surely should compel us to examine this evidence to see if our theory needs to change. The evidence is there but few people can be bothered to look at it. I could say more about specifics if you wanted. The evidence for the resurrection of Jesus is overwhelming and it stands up to examination.

    3. I believe because it’s logical.
    I go back to your comment about ‘Hawking-Hartle Wave Function Theory’, which I must confess I have never heard of before. I'm assuming it must explain scientifically how we got something from nothing. I'm skeptical straight away because principally it sounds like science is trying to explain the origin of the universe and that issue is simply beyond the realms of science. How can science build theories to explain non-existence? This question has to be philosophical at least if not theological. The only logical explanation for getting something from nothing (especially something so incredibly complex and precise and amazing) is an amazing designer God. People ask, ‘But who created God?’ This is a common question but surely it also should apply to whatever it is that anyone says pre-existed our universe. What do you think came first, right at the beginning of our universe? Gasses? Space? Something else? Whatever it is, we could ask the same question: 'Who made it then?' Sooner or later, we have to acknowledge that something or someone was there at the beginning of our universe and that something or someone has always existed. There is no other logical explanation for how we got 'something' from 'nothing' and I don't think we should be attributing eternal characteristics to simple matter or gas or molecules or whatever. It is surely more likely and more logical that God, above and beyond our understanding is the only one who has this 'uncreated quality'. Something has to have had it and anything less than God seems far-fetched to me. The logical conclusion must be that something above and beyond ourselves is responsible for all that we can see, hear, smell, taste and touch. That something or someone must be amazing and well worth getting to know, if they would give us the chance.

    4. I believe because of conscience and morals.
    Who decides right from wrong? Why do we even care? The fact is that from a very early age, humans instinctively react with an acute sense of injustice when they are wronged. A child will throw a tantrum when he or she feels that something is not fair. As we get older, we develop a more reasoned approach to ethics but still we don’t lose our sense of right and wrong. We may differ about specific issues like abortion or euthanasia or the death penalty but we all have ethics wired into our frame somehow. Why? Where does it come from? Why do we feel pangs of guilt when we get it wrong? I believe this points us all to God who gave us our conscience and our strong feelings for justice come from him. Everyone seems to have this sense of a moral obligation but to who? I believe it’s God.

    5. I believe because he’s my only real hope. My believing doesn’t make him real but because I know he’s real, I’ve found that he’s the only place I can find what I (or anyone else) really needs: forgiveness, peace, hope, love. I can get bits of these from other people but ultimately the only person who can give me these completely is God himself. I don’t deserve it. I’m no more important than anyone else and I’ve done plenty that I’m ashamed of but that’s exactly why I need him so much. Without him I’m lost and without any hope of real forgiveness, peace and life to the full.

    I hope this helps. I really appreciate your honesty, even though we currently have different views. I hope we can continue discussing and that we would be led into the absolute truth and reality of this issue. I think it could change our lives.

    Thank you!