Jelly Bean Theology

Ok, so last week I headded to the library and picked up the classic "Eating When You're Expecting" book, ready for 9 months of totally healthy eating, exercising and feelin' great. Then Saturday I headded to the grocery store and loaded my cart with strawberries, kiwis, spinach, broccoli, squash, chicken, fish, whole-wheat bread, cottage cheese...you name it. If it's healthy I got it.

So today I open the fridge and all I really want is a bagel and some jelly beans. All other food sounds completely repulsive and just the thought of spinach makes me nautious.

In a way, sometimes I think I have Spiritual "morning sickness." My shelves are stocked with comentaries, Bible dictionaries, study guides, books on sin and holiness and the Gospel. I'm gung-ho ready to do some "healthy studying." Then one day I look at the shelf and think, oh I could just go for something...fluffy. I don't want a brain challenge right now. No Jonathan Edwards tonight, I think I'll just read a story. Then once I've "indulged" in my fluff, I feel just like after I indulge in those jelly beans - like something's missing. Where's the meat? Where's all the good stuff? Oh, I don't get the good stuff when I'm indulging my flesh.

So well I can compromise in my eating habits and feel the effects physically, I compromise in my study habits and come up short Spiritually. So hey, it's off to both sets of shelves for some healthier fare.

Happy Resurrection Day!

Ok, has anyone noticed that there is no big debate about "Easter" like there is over "Christmas"? There's no one saying "Oh, we can't say Easter, we can only say "Happy Spring."

Well, of course there's no debate because Easter is the celebration of the fertility goddess Ishtar. Have you never wondered what bunnies and eggs have to do with the resurrection of Christ? Why don't the same Christians who get all riled up about Christmas get riled up about the change of what should be called "Resurrection Day" to the name of a pagan goddess? We're not celebrating Spring, or fertility or rabbits, we're celebrating the reason for our faith!
After all, Paul said that "If Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless you are still in your sins...If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, we are of all men most to be pitied." (I Cor 16:17,19)

So this weekend as you go about your festivities, whatever they may be, muster up the courage to tell people to have a wonderful "Resurrection Day" and may it be a chance to share our faith or at least to remember the reason why we have such hope!

Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, "Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your victory? O Death, where is your sting?" The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore my beloved bretheren, be steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord.
I Corinthians 15:51-58

Oh Baby!

Got the official word...

There's a little one on the way...

Due in December...

Praise the Lord...he has given us the desire of our hearts and another challenge to live what we believe.

Rumpspringe

Some Amish groups have what they call "rumshpringe" (sp?) It's when a child turns 16 they get to "run around" in the world for a year or more and decide whether they would rather join the world or join the church. It's done in secret. Some choose to stay within the bounds of their church's rules, court and get married after a year. Others get pregnant, buy cars, and do all kinds of "worldly things" and then choose the church. Others just choose the world and never return.

What an awful practice! Yet I'd like to put a comparison to the "rumshpringe" and the college years. Do we in the church not have a similar practice of sending 17-22 year olds off to get the "college experience?" "They need to experience life away from mom and dad." or "They need to experience the 'real world'". Is what I've heard so often. So we send them away to live in a dorm, do whatever they wish all unbeknownst to parents until after the worst has happened. And even in the most conservative of colleges, the worst still happens.

Yet the same 3 situations come about. Some know what they believe, obey it and enjoy college without rebellion. They meet a fine man/woman, marry and continue life as always. Others rebel to their heart's content. So "free" for the first time in their lives from mom and dad. Then when those years are over they "settle down" and turn to God. Some of those repent and regreat horribly the things they have done, while others only turn halfheartedly, if that's possible. Others rebel and never "return" to their parents' faith.

I'm not saying Christians should never go to college. I'm not saying if you send your kids to college, you're sending them into rebellion. But I do wonder - how many "church" kids are grounded in what they believe long before they leave the confines of mom & dad's four walls? How many moms & dads just say "oh well, they need to experience the world if they're ever going to appreciate Christ." And turn a blind eye to their child's rebellion? How many think that at college they will get a sound understanding of their faith? And how many think their children are being obeidient, yet once out of sight, they are anything but?

I'm not perfect, and right now my daughter is not even 2 years old. I pray that she will grow to love the Lord and her heart's desire will be to obey Him. But I need to be a dilligent teacher. I can't let her college professors one day teach her theology - My husband and I need to instruct her now and all through her growing up years. We need to hold her accountable for her choices and not write them off as simply "teenage rebellion."

Are we being faithful to "teach [the scriptures] diligently to your children...talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise...?" (Deuteronomy 6:6) My prayer is that the church will wake up and realise that our children need solid, Biblical Truth now, not just "when they're older." And we as parents need to be an example in "speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity." (I Timothy 4"12b)