The PASSION Blog

I am starting to look at the the Old Testament Book of Job for an assignment I have due. One interesting thing I have found already is about Job’s friends. Traditionally I have been a bit harsh towards them and judged them a bit. After all they came to Job and basically told him his suffering was due to some sort of sin he was committing and that he need to get right with God. However, when you look a bit deeper you see a few things that are good about them.

1. They stood by Job in his suffering - these days when people lose all their wealth and prestige many friends leave too. Especially when their might be some sort of sin involved.

2. They wanted to help - they were there to comfort and support him and offered advice which was aimed to help him overcome this problem. They wanted to see Job restored.

3. They listened - they let Job share his sufferings. The Bible tells us they spent seven days with him before they spoke. They really wanted to understand Job’s problem and then respond. Not the other way around.

Although the friends advice was not correct or really that helpful, at least they tried to be friends and stuck by Job in the midst of his suffering. They were there for him and offered support in the best way they could. They tried to make sense of his suffering from their limited understanding of the situation and their limited understanding of God.

My wife, kids and I went for a walk this morning around our local area. On the journey we saw this beautiful tall tree. It was about 60 feet high and had huge branches with lots of leaves on it. It was very straight and tall. I stopped for a bit and admired it and then walked on.

After we went around the park and started home my wife asked me to look at the tree again. This time we were closer to our home and looking from a completely different angle. This great tall straight tree suddenly looked very different. It was leaning on a huge angle and looked more like the Leaning Tower of Pisa. I was surprised that it was the same tree!

As I strolled the rest of the way home I couldn’t help but think this is a lot like some of the opinions we hold. We see it from a certain angle or from our perspective only. We might find it hard to see it from the other persons side. Sometime it might cause some strife between us. It might even end relationships or friendships. When all the time we are looking at the same “tree” from a different angle.

Maybe sometimes we might need to get up and walk around to where the other person is standing and see the view from their side. We might just see things in a whole new way.

What are you like at saying no? If someone asks you to take on a new role at church, at the sporting club or to be a part of a new ministry, do you find it hard to say no? Do you ever say yes, even when you know you shouldn’t do it or it is something God doesn’t want you to do?

I believe that there are times when we need to day yes and get involved, but there are also other times when we the answer should be a polite no. Saying no to certain things is part of setting good healthy boundaries for our lives. There are times when we are snowed under by work, by other family pressures or we need time to work through certain issues. It is in these times that we should say no and we should feel at peace with that decision.

Sometimes I wonder if we have lost the art of listening, really listening. In our fast paced world where we jam so many things into our days, I wonder if we really stop and take the time to really listen to those around us.

Sometimes I think we can fall into the trap of cutting people off because we think we know what they are going to say. This can especially happen if we have known someone for a long time. We might think we have the answer to their problem or we have some advice to give them, as well meaning as it might be, it might just not be the right thing to say. Sometimes it might just be time to listen and let the person articulate what they are trying to say.

I really believe that many of us have things inside us that we want to say or just get out. But when the people around us don’t really listen, we can feel that it is trapped inside us. If we really love and care for people we should stop and listen. We need to let them express what they are feeling or thinking. Sometimes they need some advice, some Bible verses, some encouragement, but sometimes they just need someone to listen, really listen.

I have added a new link to my links page today. It is to the Theopedia website. Theopedia is a lot like Wikipedia the online encyclopaedia, but it is an encyclopaedia of Biblical Christianity. I have found it useful when doing assignments or for general information about different topics.

Here’s the link to the Theopedia website. Enjoy!

In my last entry I mentioned we are a homeschooling family. A regular reader emailed me asked about our experience. As homeschooling is not the norm in Australia, I thought I would share a few things we have experienced. I have tried to answer most of the questions we have been asked.

If you would like to check out the article you can click here.

One of my favourite units I am doing at college this time around is “Creative Living”. It is a pre-requisite for all students at Tabor no matter what level you are studying at. The unit touches on who God is, who He says we are and how we live our lives in light of that.

I am at lecture 11 of 16 and so far I have really enjoyed it. I feel a lot freer in myself and I have a deeper understanding of who I am in Christ. As a result of this I have found that I am striving less and just “being” more. It is really amazing when you take an in depth look at Ephesians chapters one and two and how much you can really get out of it!

The funny thing is last time I did Bible College back in the 90s my favourite unit was “Understanding God and Ourselves”. It was very similar in content and required a lot of reflection. I guess I am just a glutton for punishment…the good kind that leads to growth that is!

Sometimes we can fall into the trap of thinking that we need to get our lives perfectly right before God will accept us. We think we need to repent to a certain level, straighten out all we have done wrong before we can have even have an “audience” with Him. The reality is that God accepts us first wherever we are at, no matter what we have done.

In Luke chapter 19 we read about Zacheus the tax collector. Zacheus was despised by the locals because he worked for the Romans collecting the high taxes they placed on the people. Tax collectors in those days would quite often take over the amount required and keep it for themselves. They lived very well at the expense of the people they lived amongst.

In the Luke 19 passage we see that when Jesus was passing by He called out to Zacheus and invited Himself to lunch at his home. This was unheard of as a Rabbi (as some people called Jesus) would never eat at a tax collectors house. They were social outcastes and considered unclean. Yet we see that Jesus wanted to be His friend! As we read on we see that the result of this lunch was that Zacheus repented of all the things he had done, gave half his money to the poor and promised to repay four times over all the people he had cheated. Jesus then said, “That salvation has come to this house today”.

The key message of this passage is that we see that Jesus accepted Zacheus before he had even repented or promised to make amends. Jesus even approached Zacheus right where he was at. He didn’t have a list of things that he had to do first, Jesus just accepted Zacheus when not many other people did.

If you feel like you would never be accepted by God because of some of the things you have done, I would encourage you to come to Him today. He loves you and accepts you exactly where you are and He just wants to be in relationship with you. If you would like to experience the love and acceptance of God I would encourage you to visit my Peace with God page right now.

It has been 10 months since we moved from Perth to Merredin. It is hard to believe it is that long already. In many ways the time has flown by. In other ways it has felt like we have been here forever.

One of the things I love about the country is the feeling that we have jumped off the treadmill. Life is certainly a lot slower and more relaxed up here. When we lived in Perth it always seemed we were busy working to pay the mortgage, the endless bills, the loans and rushing from one thing to another. Up here we feel we have stopped and can smell the roses. I have actually noticed that roses do smell…and they smell nice!

If you feel like you are on a treadmill and you are just running from one thing to another, you might like to prayerfully consider the country move. For us as a family it is by far one of the best things we have ever done!

One of the things I feel I have been drawn to over the last 12-18 months is the idea of a house church. House churches are small congregations of people who meet each week in a house rather than a church building. Many of the same things that happen in a traditional church happen in a house church, but it is just in a smaller space with less people. Typically you might find it is about 5-20 people that meet and share lives of faith together.

So why am I drawn to the idea of house churches? I guess I like the idea of being a part of a small group of people who share lives of faith together. I like the idea of being part of a large church with its resources, but I find the closeness and intimacy of relationship happens better in a small group. For me personally I have always enjoyed the small home group meeting during the week more than the hustle and bustle of Sunday mornings. I have found most of my breakthroughs have come during this smaller group.

The other thing is that a house church seems like a natural progression for us as a family. We are a home school family and we spend lots of time together in our small “clan”. We are not naturally drawn to big meetings with lots of people. Getting together with a couple of other families (or singles) each week and spending some time in fellowship, prayer, worship and learning together from the Bible sounds appealing.

If you are interested in finding out more about house churches, two of the resources that have really helped me learn about house churches are “Starting a House Church” by Kreider and McClung (link is to their website about the book) and “The church in the house - a return to simplicity” by Robert Fitts (links to the book itself in html).