The False Conjured Affections

I think one of the biggest misconceptions for the atheist, agnostic, and believer alike is the idea that God demands worship from all people regardless of proclivity or passion. Somehow the wrong idea that we should serve and be obedient to God out of pure obligation and fear has penetrated Christian culture. But all this creates is joyless, miserable, grumbling, fruitless, lawfully obligatory God slaves that would just as soon repulse a potential believer rather than help draw them to the immensely joyful salvation of Christ.

This idea of conjured affection is a bit skewed and misshapen, I think. For no one desires false expressions of love from a spouse that secretly, or openly for that matter, hates them. If the expression does not match the passion it is vain and of no value, if not utterly abhorrent. Real affection is derived from real intimacy birthed from genuine unconditional love.

So why do we suppose God wants us to DO things for Him, that if Hell were no longer part of the equation, we would just as soon drop our pursuit of holiness and let our faith fade and become a distant memory?

Let us consider the reality of the situation. Contrary to popular belief, Heaven does not belong to those who fear Hell, but instead to those who love God. No one goes to Outback Steakhouse because they fear hunger. They go to Outback because they love the food. Anyone who marries because they’re afraid of being alone is simply trading one suffering for another due to the fact that marriage doesn’t solve intimacy problems it intensifies them.

Likewise, a profession of faith, baptism, church attendance, tithing, and ministry (though all good things) are rendered nothing but garbage if not bathed in a love for God. Doing things simply out of contractual obligation for God with no love for Him is just plain offensive and hypocritical. By doing this you’ve bypassed the greatest commandment to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. If we can’t get this one right we shall utterly fail the rest.

God doesn’t want worship, praise, or good works that do not naturally flow from the heart of a person that has beheld the magnificent glory of God and has tasted from the living fountain of life in Christ Jesus and seen that it is good. All else is cheap imitation that God could care less for. In fact He says...

Isaiah 29:13-15

Then the Lord said,
         “Because this people draw near with their words
         And honor Me with their lip service,
         But they remove their hearts far from Me,
         And their reverence for Me consists of tradition learned by rote,

Therefore behold, I will once again deal marvelously with this people, wondrously marvelous;
         And the wisdom of their wise men will perish,
         And the discernment of their discerning men will be concealed.”

Woe to those who deeply hide their plans from the LORD,
         And whose deeds are done in a dark place,
         And they say, “Who sees us?” or “Who knows us?”

Amos 2:21-24

I hate, I despise your feasts,
and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies.
Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings,
I will not accept them;
and the peace offerings of your fattened animals,
I will not look upon them.
Take away from me the noise of your songs;
to the melody of your harps I will not listen.
But let justice roll down like waters,
and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

By this you can see that God desires the affectionate manifestations of good works, praise, and adoration from the overflow and abundance of the heart. The only other option is hypocrisy; people trying to adhere to a moral code of conduct without a reason, except for self-righteousness and personal gain.

I think the main point here is to just be real. If you don’t really love God, don’t pretend to. If you really want to love Him then really begin to seek Him for real this time. God’s love is real and He really wants you to get to know Him, and this is really good news.

Hit with Grief

Today, just as any other day, I woke and I started toasting some waffles. As I waited for them to finish I decided to take a chance and watch the morning news. Sure enough, there were the bright shining faces on the TV wishing me a happy morning with updates on the weather and current events with the occasional joke on the side. Had I known what was to shortly ensue in this program I most likely would have turned the telly off. Alas, a report began where a young boy had been burned on 60% of his body. Normally, this wouldn't catch my attention except for the fact that the circumstances of which this event occurred made my stomach turn.

Apparently the boy was being bullied by some former friends from school. Michael Brewer is his name. As the report goes, Michael owed a kid named Bent some money for a video game, about $40. Since Michael didn't pay up, Bent tried to take Michael's bike but was thwarted by Michael's parents and arrested and sent to juvie, for a day.

Needless to say, Bent had his heart set on revenge. Days later, Bent and his 4 friends brought alcohol and poured it over Michael and set him on fire. He was found by a pool screaming. A lady called 911 for help.

The kid is ok now, as much as he can be anyway. With skin grafts and operations he pulled through. But he will continue to be in pain and deal with post-traumatic stress for the rest of his life unless God works a miracle in his life. You know, usually this kind of thing is only experienced in times of war and conflict. Not to a child.

Needless to say, I turned away from the TV in disgust. Not of Michael's wounds, but of humanity. As I reached for the remote to turn the channel, God told me, "No Caasi, you're going to watch. You need to sample just a microscopic inkling of the pain I see, hear, and feel every moment of everyday. Just as I heard the blood of Able cry out from the grave to me for justice, so do I hear the millions of humanity that cry, groan, grieve, and suffer. Evil does not pass my notice, nor should it yours. So weep and know."

I tell you now, I have not cried like that in a long time, nor so suddenly. It was more than I could bear. In the words of Isaiah I said, "Woe is me, I am undone. For I am a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips..."

Immediately I wanted to get up and do something. Anything. But I felt so helpless. I thought maybe I should start an organization, or a ministry that reached out to kids being bullied. But then God spoke to me again and He said, "They need to know Me. All of them; the children, adults, victims, bullies... they all need Me. There are many organizations and institutions that deal with aftermath and prevention. But until they know I AM, all will fall short and you will not but care for one victim until another comes along. Reach the lost where you are, then we'll talk about reaching people groups and nations."

This is the best interpretation I can give for what God put upon my heart. All I know, is that we should not turn away and desensitize ourselves to the pain around us. The more we hear the cries of pain, agony,suffering, and loneliness; just maybe we'll develop a heart of the lost and dying. If Hell is a real place, then why aren't we doing anything to save anyone?

Giving is a good thing. Praying and reading the Bible is awesome. But if we never lead one person to Jesus, then are we really following Christ? Is God really dwelling in us? Or are we just spectating to watch the outcome of this life? We should always strive to help the poor, hurt, broken, hungry, and naked. But if we never share with them the hope of Christ, we are just patching wounds and sending people back in to the same hopelessness they just came from. There has to be a change, there must be a difference.

Tough questions that can't go unanswered...

A Defense Agaisnt Relativism

(This letter was written in defense of a friend who was writing about morality and ethics. It has been slightly adjusted to help the comprehensive fluidity for the current reader, being you.)


It's all a farce. All these arguments are nothing more than word play and semantic delusion. Relative humanism and nihilistic philosophy rears its ugly head once again. Men pride themselves in their attempt to refute God and His truth. "Only the fool says in his heart, there is no God." Without concluding the issue of the existence of God, it is only expected that these deny transcendent truth and ethics from a moral law giver, i.e. God. Men and women blind themselves to the truth while they posit a stance of relativism or nihilism, proclaiming the truth of no truth and the purpose of purposelessness.

The fact is that no society, nor even a person, can properly maintain a basic functionality without meaning. In this case a person may attempt to create proximate meaning for basic functionality, though to what end and for what reason I am not sure. At this point it all basically becomes an illusion to cope with and maintain some form of normalcy for day to day non-purposeful purpose to continue living a purposeless existence. It seems death is no different than life, other than that it appears we are aware we are alive and not aware that we've died. I consider it all pseudo-intellectual banter only used to satisfy an empty heart longing for something more.

Some have stated that morals are subjective. Well that's obvious, for morals are nothing but mere mores observed from a certain sample people group in which the most common actions or popular opinion become the standard for normal cultural expectation. So for the Nazis, holocaust was the general expectation of that people group that dictated the given morals of that society. However, it was circumstance and deception that unified a nation against another. The killing of the Jews was derived from false accusations from Hitler and his corrupt ideals birthed from Godlessness and hate.

If one were wrongfully accused of a crime and punished for it, or even murdered for it, they could not reasonably justify to me that an act of evil that transcends personal emotion and opinion has not occurred. Unless, that is, they believe that there is no God, in which there is no moral lawgiver who gives a standard of good and evil. In this case all simply is and decisions are not by choice, but simply the predestined unfolding of a staged play that has been written by our genetic code. Thus, chance becomes our creator. And in the words of Steve Turner, 

“If chance be

the Father of all flesh,

disaster is his rainbow in the sky

and when you hear

State of Emergency!

Sniper Kills Ten!

Troops on Rampage!

Whites go Looting!

Bomb Blasts School!

It is but the sound of man

worshipping his maker.”

Though, I'm sure that those who do not believe in God will surely disagree. It is expected. In fact, the current issue at hand is but a domino issue down the chain of causality that one arrives from the truly most important question that has either rewarded or plagued men throughout history; is there a God?

Some of the previous posts of these relativists have included the words “good” and “love.” You have no reference point or justification to use these words. They are borrowed words that you have deconstructed and rebuilt in your own image. We Christians believe that our words are not our own creations, but translations of translations that originate from the creator. If I wanted to be technical and cruel I could say that you argue in vain and in an unknown tongue of which I cannot understand or comprehend. Your argument is of no value because it has a purpose of purposelessness which contradicts itself.

Someone previously posted that gold and copper have inherent value. “Both naturally have the value of conducting electrons easily. Silicon has a natural value as a resistor. Diamonds have a natural value for cutting rocks.” This is false. These have functional purposes to which we attribute value. If we did not need conductors or rock cutters we would not need gold, copper, and diamonds in the previously given context, thus not attributing or finding any value relative to us. To assert that materials have inherent value and mankind does not is simply ridiculous. If someone had a gun to your head and asked you if you wanted to live you would surely say yes, this attributing value to your own life for whatever reason. Then you must ask the question, of what makes your life valuable and others not? But if you said no, you relativists would not bother in promoting this argument you have so graciously presented before us. Realize that we do not live in a vacuum. Though it may seem logical on paper, life is not lived on paper nor solely on logic.

‎"The heart has its reasons of which reason
knows nothing. It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason.
That is what faith is: God perceived by the heart, not by the reason." -Blaise Pascal-

But I know I cannot convince you to faith. We speak in two totally different languages. I care not to debate for simple intellectual satisfaction or personal pleasure to the affirmation of my own worldview. Truth is truth whether we recognize and affirm it or not. My plea is that you simply search out the face of God and know Him as I have. To be able to see the wonder, joy, peace, and love of a savior in which we all “live, move, and exist. Acts 17:28.” Some have said, that they could be wrong. I encourage you to search that out. I’ve never heard a missionary say “I wish I had just lived for myself in this meaningless world.” But I have heard atheists wish for something more and die in their regret.

P.S. Please don’t assume that we Christians are all illogical or unreasonable. It’s just rude, you know.

A Defense to the Accusations of an Atheist

(I wrote this letter in defense of a friend who tried to apologize to the gay and lesbian community for the lack of love the general majority of Christians have shown them. It has been slightly adjusted to help the comprehensive fluidity for the current reader, being you.)

The Defense:

It is very unfortunate and disconcerting that so many uneducated blogs and internet rants have been published these days. While open and honest dialog is always encouraged, blind and emotionally opinionated retaliation is very rarely desired or fruitful. In the grand scheme of life, why say anything if it is not the truth? If the truth is unknown, even so, produce theories wrought with fact and evidence, if not at least some form of quantifiable proof or creditability. With approximately 6,855,861,382 people in the world today, opinions seem less than reliable and should not be used as any measure of truth. As the saying goes, “Opinions are like butts. Everybody has one and more often than not they enjoy showing it.”

Many of the critiques, disagreements, complaints, and sheer hatred provided in most of these writings shed very little light on the underlying rudimentary issues at hand. We are talking on issues of “wrong and right” with people who have very different worldviews, and because of this we will never come to an agreement or fundamental harmony on the basic foundational truths which guide our values, ethics, morals, and behavior. Just as any other religion or philosophical lifestyle, we as Christians are, or at least should be, guided by our faith, principles, and knowledge based on what we believe to be true. This is an inevitable causality that even the most faithless atheist cannot deny; that our response to reality is a product of what we really believe we believe to be true, i.e., you choose to live in a particular fashion based on the truth claims, information, and experience known to you in your own circle of spatial proximity and informative avenues available to you.

However, it is exceedingly difficult for the modern day conservative Christian to worship and believe freely. The world shouts freedom, yet we live in a society where most people believe in freedom of belief as long is it doesn't conflict or contend with the majority of the world's popular view. If you do have the courage to disagree your contention will be met with hostility with proceeding degradation such as “bigot, ignorant, close-minded, hate monger, etc. As you can see, the naturalists' idea of humanism and freedom can be quite hypocritical. The greatest tragedy and danger of popular opinion becoming the standard of moral law is that the principal of transcendent ethics dies and now “might makes right.” And when might makes right you will find a great many of the minority crushed and oppressed by the might of the majority.

We live in a society today where only 9% of church going self-proclaimed Christians have a biblical worldview as stated from a study conducted by the Barna Group. This is a very dismal percentage for the Christian community that speaks louder than our opposition. The reality is that the liberal multitudes have taken the majority and cast their worldviews as the popular opinion and standard of moral behavior, and are quite aggressive about enforcing the adherence of all peoples. How, might you ask? Through existentialism and the mass media that drives it, coupled with the deterioration of the family and many other causes is this accomplished. Though, it is the lack of responsibility of the Christian community itself that is mostly to blame.

With that said, I'll digress to the main issue at hand.

It has previously been stated by many that it is time for Christianity to “catch up” with the rest of the world; that we are bigots who are void of any reason, logic, and understanding. Some say we live in the past and continually cause problems for the world's future. I ask the very simple questions... What does the rest of the world have that I want to catch up to? To what standard would you like me to adhere to and to what end should I assimilate for?

Nothing, I tell you. Not one thing do I admire about the reality of the society of which I live. The most honest naturalist or existentialist would admit that while people may create their own proximate meaning, that proximate meaning is most definitely unjustifiable and inevitably an attempt of futility and vanity in which only an intellectual satisfaction could possibly be sated in its blind deception. And because of this, the masses have decided by opinion and pleasure what is right and what is wrong and we have become slaves of their social convention with no thought to the future ramifications of there decisions. If there is no good or evil, then you must assume there is no moral law. If there is no moral law, then you must assume there is no moral law giver, therefore no God. In this case, all things become relative and there ceases to be any intrinsic given value to human life. And if your life has no value, then why should I respect it? We become products of primordial ooze and star stuff and we are now but dancing to our DNA, for there is no freewill or choice. Whom do you have to blame now? At least the atheist Friedrich Nietzsche was honest when he explained in his poem "The Parable of the Madman":

Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the market place, and cried incessantly: "I seek God! I seek God!"---As many of those who did not believe in God were standing around just then, he provoked much laughter. Has he got lost? asked one. Did he lose his way like a child? asked another. Or is he hiding? Is he afraid of us? Has he gone on a voyage? emigrated?---Thus they yelled and laughed

The madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes. "Whither is God?" he cried; "I will tell you. We have killed him---you and I. All of us are his murderers. But how did we do this? How could we drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? What were we doing when we unchained this earth from its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving? Away from all suns? Are we not plunging continually? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there still any up or down? Are we not straying, as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is not night continually closing in on us? Do we not need to light lanterns in the morning? Do we hear nothing as yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition? Gods, too, decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him.

"How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it? There has never been a greater deed; and whoever is born after us---for the sake of this deed he will belong to a higher history than all history hitherto."

Here the madman fell silent and looked again at his listeners; and they, too, were silent and stared at him in astonishment. At last he threw his lantern on the ground, and it broke into pieces and went out. "I have come too early," he said then; "my time is not yet. This tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering; it has not yet reached the ears of men. Lightning and thunder require time; the light of the stars requires time; deeds, though done, still require time to be seen and heard. This deed is still more distant from them than most distant stars---and yet they have done it themselves.

It has been related further that on the same day the madman forced his way into several churches and there struck up his requiem aeternam deo. Led out and called to account, he is said always to have replied nothing but: "What after all are these churches now if they are not the tombs and sepulchers of God?"

If I believe like you, your life and person mean nothing to me. You see, all of this hinges on the issue of truth. What is truth? Truth is "that which affirms propositionally the nature of reality as it is." -Ravi Zacharias-. Ultimately, all truth must come from a transcendent God or else it is nothing but an ambiguous relative idea that is totally unverifiable. Biological determinism then becomes our god, and we all are chained to the weight of fatalism as we are thrown into the sea of time and wait... for nothing. Morality becomes nothing but a survey of the norm, constantly decreasing in standard where we are moving from order to chaos. We are then throwing darts of behavior at a dart board of ethics that do not exist.

However, as conservative Christians we believe God very much does exist and that His son Jesus died and rose again so that we might be free from ALL our sins and judgment of eternal death. That God created us in His image that we might share a special relationship with the creator. A relationship even the angels admire. God created all reality and so God is the decider of all truth, for God is truth. As well as God is love, is justice, is mercy, is wrath, is peace, and is good. These are not merely pretentious conventions or idealistic forms God has created to taunt us in our imperfection, but these are the very characteristics, though more precisely, very nature of God which He has extended to His creation to recognize and emulate. You see, we Christians have based our whole ideology and philosophy on our faith which was given to us by the Word of God on page and confirmed in spirit. I cannot expect the nonbeliever to understand this just as you cannot expect to understand what its like to swim if you've never been in water. But have you not come to your own conclusions on why you live or choose the way you do, if not by your own personalized belief system?

So when asked why it is we as conservative Christians do not affirm the gay and lesbian lifestyle, my question to you is why should we? Why should I change my beliefs and ethics? Why should I give up the moral law and transcendent teachings of Christ? To please you? Really? You are asking me as a human to give up all that defines me as a person so that you may feel better about your choices. I ask you friend, is that not the very attitude you allegedly accuse and despise us for? You would deprive me of my freedom to follow the law of God of which I have come to love and live in joy and peace? Unless you can give me an adequate answer based on truth and quantifiable evidence, I have no reason to change my beliefs. You may rant and rave at us all you like, but the truth doesn't change because you want it to.

It is because of God's law that I do not kill. It is because of God's commandments that I do not steal. It is only by Christ that I love those of you who hate me. It is because of God's love that I have gay friends whom I also love and respect, even though I do not affirm their life choice. And it is because of God that I cannot change these moral laws because it transcends me and has been since God spoke them into existence. If I am wrong we all lose nothing, if I am right the consequences for those who do not believe are eternal and unpleasant at very least.

The Apology:

Do we as Christians mess up? Sure we do, and sometimes really bad. The church is comprised of the imperfect, for why else would we need Christ? However, no matter how bad the presentation of Christianity is given by a third party, you cannot dismiss Christ by association of the unfaithful, because Christ's teachings are truth and inerrant. But I cannot make you believe that. You must weigh the evidence yourself. Are there going to be extreme variations of experiences and circumstances? Of course. Though the truth is not relative, experiences definitely are. We come from different places around the world with different cultural, demographic and socioeconomic backgrounds. But none the less, as a global church as a whole we have certainly failed in this area of unconditional love and respect. So I too apologize for the lack of love and concern for all of you out there who are gay, lesbian, trans-gender or whichever road you have chosen. Though I do not agree with your worldview, I do love you. Though you may not believe me and may never give me or others the opportunity to make up for our mistakes, I at very least say to you now, I'm sorry and Christ really does love you.

One last thought, I urge you to really think through your worldview and start asking yourself the hard questions. You will start to realize that your presuppositions of life and existence have a profound and immeasurable affect on your choices and beliefs. The existence or nonexistence of God hold the implications that will ultimately dictate your response to reality, for the consequences of either side are too immense to ignore or trivialize. May God be with you all.

Newbie

As far as blogging on this website, I am a newbie. So, I just want to say hey to everyone and let ya know that I am going to graduate from a Emmanuel College with a degree in Corporate Communications this semester. It has been a great 5 years but I am glad it is all coming to an end. I attribute a great deal of who I've become to Emmanuel. Being Chaplain for the EC Singers, Worship Leader for the college, Senior Class President, and Admissions Counselor has been fun and I will always treasure every moment. By the way, to all those who have come and gone before, all those who shared the good old days, I really miss ya'll and things have never been the same since you left. Later.