Thinking about God, Jesus and The Big Questions

When I was a schoolgirl, a friend of mine remarked "God only knows what would have happened if Adam and Eve had not eaten from the forbidden tree."  I still think this is very true.  Before reading the Bible, I used to get mad at Adam and Eve for snatching away a paradise from us.  Now I realize that attitude is a bit ridiculous, because it implies that I could do better.  When I really asked myself, could I do any better than Adam and Eve? - the asnwer was simple: I don't think so.  To do better than them, I would have to be perfect and resist any and all temptation.  That is not me.  I am an imperfect human being, a sinner.  Furthermore, to do better than Adam and Eve, I would need to resist eating from the forbidden tree for my whole life.  The temptation wouldn't just be a one-time test.  After thinking about it, I realized I almost certainly wouldn't be any better than Adam and Eve at resisting temptation.  To tak...

The church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum of saints All too frequently, organized religion (i.e. a church) can seem pointless and boring.  I certainly found it this way before I started reading the Bible.  Often, the lack of interest in church may be caused by one of two main things: 1. The person has had a bad experience previously in organized religion 2. The person feels uncomfortable about realizing that they are a sinner In the case of the first problem, it is quite possible that differences in Christian denominations has confused the person.  It is confusing!  It is important to go to a church whose teachings are in line with the Bible.  Identifying such a church oneself does require a) attending a church and b) reading the Bible. In the case of the second problem, that isn't actually a problem at all for attending church.  All of us are sinners.  It is as simple as that. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of G...

When I was younger, I thought that Christians were too heavy-handed about telling people about Jesus.  In fact, I thought they gave a bad name to the rest of the Christians! I puzzled as to why Christians couldn't just leave people alone about this. I only figured this out in the past year.  To Christians, the news that Jesus has come to save us is simply good news! In an era of bad news, from violence to war to tsunamis, the Christians see the news of Jesus as good news.  They would tell friends, family and even strangers about other good news, so why not about Jesus?  Therefore a Christian who is enthusiastic about telling others about Jesus is about as unremarkable as a mailman who likes to be sure the mail gets delivered. I have to admit that it took reading the Bible for me to be able to 'see' this though. If you found this post interesting, you might also like these related posts on this blog: My Christmas experiment - freedom of religi...

This is the long-promised post on this topic.  One of the things I noticed is that after reading the Bible without pre-conceived ideas, it became much clearer to me why bad things still happen when God exists and is good.  It all comes down to free will.  God created everything, all the angels, including Satan.  God also created us.  He wanted his creations to have free will and not be automatons.  This means he wants us to follow him, but he will not force us to do so.  Therefore, if everyone has free will then they can take actions which might be harmful to others.  So for instance, someone could steal from someone else.  Obviously, this is not what God wants us to do.  He could stop it from happening every time, but if he did, he would be taking away our free will.  So God gave us free willl, but some people will use it to do bad things.  So this is why bad things happen. As a little girl, I sometimes wished that Go...

Apparently, the Mayan calendar only goes up to December 21, 2012. So a few people believe that this will mark the end of the world. When we think about it, this is a ridiculous conclusion. After all, a calendar has to have a finite endpoint. Sure, the end of the world is one possible interpretation, but so is the notion of some ancient Mayans saying "OK, let's stop at 2012, that should give us plenty of time before we need to lengthen the calendar". Furthermore, imagine an alien civilization examining Earth's technology just prior to the turn of the millenium: "Wow, these Earthlings didn't really bother considering dates past Dec 1999 in their computers. Clearly they believed their world would end at the year 2000!" We don't know the details behind why the Mayans stopped their calendar for 2012, but this does not mean the end of the world will occur then. (Read here for a balanced article from USA Today ). Let's look at what the Bible says abo...

One of the things I find the hardest is to put in practice God and Jesus's teachings in the busy 'real world'. In fact one of the biggest struggles I have is listening to a religious leader (whose full-time job is in ministry) exhort us to do various ministry works, when the rest of us are so busy already with demands of a secular job and/or caring for children or other dependents. It is easy to feel that the religious leader is simply 'out of touch' with the demands on our time, yet I know that they are simply conveying the message that is there in the Bible. So, as a (currently) stay-at-home mother, why did I feel a drive within me to find some volunteer work I could do? After all, wasn't I already justifiably busy with the unpredictable and full-time demands of a baby? (To clarify ahead of time, I certainly didn't feel I was guilted into volunteering by religious leaders). So why did I feel to need to help minister to others? (For those who are curious ...

I've noticed a disturbing trend lately where there has been a rejection of the Bible/Christianity for the reason that it does not mesh with what that person heard in Sunday School many years ago. The Sunday School version is not incorrect, but we need to be aware that it is a simplified version of the 'real God' for a younger audience. If someone then reads the Bible later on, they (like me) will find that there is a lot more to the Bible than what one learns in Sunday School. The God of the Bible may even seem 'different' compared with what one learns in Sunday School. This is because we are more mature and are learning more of the Bible, not because religion is incorrect or inconsistent. The God that we learn of in the Bible, is, in turn, only a shadow of what we will see when we meet Him face-to-face. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see bu...