For a long time here @ LayGuy, I’ve discussed how religion sucks. Pure and simple. Religion is anything man does to try to earn the favour of God. As a Christian, I see this all the time. Religion rules most of the modern church and it’s adherents are miserable.
You see, religious people all feel, if you scratch hard enough under the surface, like failures – cause deep down they know they suck just as much as you and me. And yet, while filled with this inner turmoil and doing something about it, they turn around and point their fingers at others and announce that “you are not as good as me cause I’m religious and you’re just a sinner.”
So they end up sucking on two fronts! Someone should invent a two sided lollipop – it’ll be a hit with religious people!
Jesus, on the other hand, was radically different. In fact, if you read the Gospel closely enough, you would realise that the major scandal in His life was that he hated what religious people stood for and instead embraced and befriended those “pathetic sinners” so despised by the world.
See Jesus turned religion on its head and exposed its ugly and hypocritical nature. And a great example of this is found in Mark chapter 2 in the story of the calling of Levi (Matthew)..
“He went out again beside the sea, and all the crowd was coming to him, and he was teaching them. And as he passed by, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, “Follow me.” And he rose and followed him.
And as he reclined at table in his house, many tax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him. And the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” Mark 2:13-17
Dig a little deeper with me for a second. Here you have Jesus walking past Levi the tax collector. Tax collectors were so despised by the people as they literally committed treason against the Jewish people by selling their souls to Rome for the pursuit of money. As outcasts of society, they weren’t even allowed to vote!
As Jesus walked past Levi, He knew that this man was ripe for Kingdom of God to invade his life, Maybe He just simply sensed the complete anguish, isolation, guilt and helplessness in Levi. Others saw him as a tax collector – a mere sinner.
Trust me, Jesus had some stern words for tax collectors. But Levi was different and Jesus, in His omniscience, would have known that this man was desperate for the Kingdom of God to invade his life and simply ordered, “follow me”. And Levi got up immediately, left his business and followed Jesus.
In fact, that night Levi threw huge party for Jesus at his place where his fellow outcasts of society joined him – the bible says “many tax collectors and sinners were reclining with Jesus”. So you have Jesus, 6 disciples at the time, Levi – so far 8 – and then add many others. What we have here is a full on feast fest at Levi’s house.
Enter the religious freaks – the scribes of the Pharisee’s. Picture these guys as the thinkers, the policy makers, the high and lofty intellectuals of the notorious Pharisee’s – a cut above your traditional Pharisee – in other words uber religious!
And all they could say is, “Why does He eat with tax collectors and sinners”. In other words, “what kind of so called messiah would want anything to do with this low life bunch of scumbags who don’t amount to anything”.
Religion – in all it’s glory! And if you think this doesn’t happen in your church today, you’re a fool. In fact, if you don’t think this happens in your life, you’re a fool. I know that I am a fool.
Jesus simply answered their hypocritical rebellious slander with the words…
“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”
I pray that my heart is so broken by the sin in my life that I may never conclude that I am righteous on my own merits. Because if I ever do, Jesus didn’t come for me. Jesus is the most anti religious person that ever walked the face of this earth. Richard Dawkins – eat your heart out!
To top it off, I think this is all captured rather succinctly in the following video…
Mars Hill Church is known to talk about Jesus and Jesus only. Last weekend, being Good Friday and Easter Sunday, they had approx 20,000 people walk through their doors – with about just as many watching online. In total, they had 376 baptisms.
I loved watching the movie Avatar. To say it was one of the most graphically stunning movies I have ever seen would be to understate the situation. The storyline was pretty average however this is quickly forgotten – especially when you watch it on 3D!
I remember walking out from the cinema’s and having a chat with my wife as to “how boring the real world seemed” compared to the reality portrayed in Avatar.
I even read how many people had committed suicide after watching Avatar as they couldn’t stand to live in the “evil real world”.
And to top it off, it has become the most watched movie at the Cinema’s ever. Period.
Quite an achievement!
However, while I watched, I was also really uncomfortable at the overt Pagan and New Age themes running rampant throughout the story line. What was uncomfortable was that it really, REALLY appealed to my fallen sinful nature.
It painted a picture of utopia – and my flesh loved it. And I knew it was wrong – for so many reasons.
And tonight I come across Mark Driscoll’s take on Avatar. And in typical Driscoll style, he slams the movie for what it is – and advert, albeit an expensive one, for paganism…
Sin – a simple three letter word which has devastated mankind from the beginning. It’s a topic no-one wants to talk about. And yet all have been touched by it and have felt the effects of it.
Mankind has excelled in so many ways. But along every step of progress, sin has walked side by side. And as mankind has increased its abilities, so to has the power and effect of sin.
Thousands of years ago, the Apostle Paul discussed the cunningness of sin in the following way…
For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Rom 7:15
So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Rom 7:17-24
It’s inside you. It’s inside me. It’s inside every human on this planet that has ever lived. It’s cunning and relentless. It desires nothing else but to satisfy it’s own desires. And the scary thing is that it’s me – and it’s you.
Iran’s President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is a first class scumbag. Apart from being accused of human rights violations in Iran, rigging Iran’s elections to give him a second term, sending his country into economic sanctions by blatantly ignoring international efforts to curb Iran’s nuclear program, arming terrorist organisations in the Mid-East, calling for the destruction of Israel…..
I’ll stop there as the list can simply go on and on. This guy is a first class loser. He actively promotes himself as an apocalyptic figure destined to bring on the end of the world via the destruction of Israel.
Given the fact that Iran is nearing its capacity to make a nuclear bomb, announcing new plants for it’s rocket production and even sent a rocket into orbit with animals and worms on board, people better start to take notice at how a whacko like Ahmadinejad – and the means and technology he has access to – can make a significant impact in their lives and the lives of millions in the Mid East – especially Israel.
You see Ahmadinejad has a huge gripe towards the nation of Israel and is hell bent on it’s destruction. One of Ahmadinejad’s biggest controversies is that he is a Holocaust denier – he hates the fact that Israel, as a nation, was born after the atrocities of World War 2. And yet, in the same breath, utters the words…”we will create the next holocaust” – this just shows how depraved this man is.
Below is a video which conveys just how sensitive the Holocaust still is in the minds of Israelis – every year, a siren goes off and everyone stops, dead in their tracks, to honour the 6 million Jews murdered in World War 2. In light of this footage and the graphic images of World War 2 of murdered Jews, just imagine how despised Ahmadinejad in Israel and amongst those who know their history.
As Dwight Eisenhower accurately stated after World War 2…
Get it all on the record now – get the films – get the witnesses – because somewhere down the road of history, some bastard will get up and say that this never happened”
For a long time here @ LayGuy, I’ve discussed how religion sucks. Pure and simple. Religion is anything man does to try to earn the favour of God. As a Christian, I see this all the time. Religion rules most of the modern church and it’s adherents are miserable.
