The past year.

I haven't posted in ages but here is a quick reflection on the past year

As the semester winds down and comes to a close I am just amazed at the way the Lord has provided for us all along the way. One year ago we were in Florida knowing that God was calling us elsewhere and it just so happened that Louisville, KY and Southern Seminary is where he had for us. I am still amazed today that I am where I am. Just a couple of years ago I would have never seen myself where I am today. This was as far from what I was planning as I could imagine. What do I think of it all? I am so glad that I am here and I think that Amanda is too. We have known what it means to have plenty (at least plenty for us) and this year for the first time in our marriage we have known at times what it is like to have significant needs and God was there through it all (Thanks to those of you God used to help us). He provided our excess in past years and he provides for us now.

I can truly say that I am as grateful to him for our scaled down lifestyle as I was for what now seems excessive lifestyle. I can also say that though I am a little more stressed out at time, and certainly MUCH busier (husband, father, full time Seminary student, full time employee supervising a dozen people, church member, occasional runner) that I love my God and my life more than I have at any point in my life. I am TRULY blessed.

This is part of a paper I wrote for my Philosophy class this semester I will post the rest in the next couple of days.

The drastic change in the social and ethnic landscape of Western Europe in the last 50 years can be tied to the corresponding change in their philosophy of religion. Western Europe has all but lost their grounding in Christianity and a serious shift is currently taking place; in the next 50 years Islam will be the dominant religion in the European Union. In this paper I hope to show how the adoption of atheistic and secular philosophy has led to this point.

Many Europeans have adopted an epicurean lifestyle and are living carefree, materialist, and pleasure-filled lives without regard for God, an afterlife, or in some respects the serious things of life. People today have taken Epicurus teaching to an extreme level, following far beyond what even he taught and other philosophers’ teachings whom held his similar views. This problem is not one that can only be observed in Europeans but with an entire generation of young high school and college students who have even less regard for others than that of previous generations of young people. There is a complete disregard for all things related to a holy God and especially one who would be a lord over their lives. This pattern of thought, Christ as Savior but not as Lord, is even bleeding over into many denominations including those most popular in Europe.

In the last few decades with the growth of retailers like Wal-Mart and Target there has been an explosion in the amount of “stuff” available in the marketplace. This growth has lead to an expanding materialism and a desire for more, which is typically Epicurean. If there is nothing after this life as Epicurus taught, then we should not deprive ourselves of any pleasure or thing in this life because it is all we have. Epicurus taught that pleasure is a sign that things are good and pain is bad. This thought pattern is prevalent today and many do all they can to avoid pain and suffering including the extremes of euthanasia and suicide--a concept completely foreign to anything taught in a Christian philosophy which once dominated Europe.

Epicurus suggests:

“Accustom yourself to believe that death is nothing to us, for good and evil imply awareness, and death is the privation of all awareness; therefore a right understanding that death is nothing to us makes the morality of life enjoyable, not by adding to life an unlimited time, but by taking away the yearning after immorality.”[1]

When a person believes this, the only loss that occurs with death is the opportunity for more enjoyment. Also, a person lives their life without fear of death but also without fear of eternal punishment either. The idea of “living life to the max” in many ways comes from this concept. The biblical concept from Matthew, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heave, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; where your treasure is there your heart will be also.”[2] is not an option for a true Epicurean so worldly materialism is the result. The atheist’s heart must be in this world because they do not believe in God. It then makes sense why they would see material possessions of great value.

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[1] Linda Zagzebski and Timothy D. Miller, Readings in Philosophy of Religion: Ancient to Contemporary (Wiley-Blackwell, 2009), 406.

[2] John MacArthur, NASB MacArthur Study Bible (Thomas Nelson, 2006), 1731.

Classes so far.

Two weeks are finished and I have some initial reflections on what classes and life as a 1st semester seminary student are like.

1. There is a lot of reading and that reading can be painstakingly slow at times. Immanuel Kant's Critique of the Ontological Argument for example took me forever to read and I still don't really know what he said.

2. The readings and books that I have read so far have been great for the most part. There is immeasurable wisdom to be gleaned from most of the books. I look forward to getting into the other books to see that riches they contain. (Hopefully just not all at the same time.)

3. My professors are world class. I am still amazed that I get to study under these men and learn from their scholarship and life experiences.

4. Chapel is convicting, inspiring, and motivating. We have had chapel 3 times so far and all three have been outstanding. To hear the Word of God preached and expounded in such a powerful way is awe-inspiring and motivating.

5. At church and Sunday school I hear more teaching by Dr. Moore who is the Dean of the School of Theology and it is such a blessing to sit under his teaching.

6. Lastly, Greek is intense and requires a lot of work but I can see how it will be beneficial once I learn it. In two weeks I have had to memorize 75 vocab words. In addition to that most of the words have different ending which provide additional information based on the ending so you have to memorize those too. I am beginning to master the 24 versions of the article "the". The amazing thing is I can now understand quite a few of the words in my Greek New Testament.

All in all it has been a good start to the semester. I am looking forward to seeing what God has in store for me over the next few years. Check back soon, I plan to document things here and you can keep up to date on the journey.

Moving Costs

Well, today I received what seems like the 25th moving estimate. This is the final one I am going to get because our move is only 16 days away, and I need to get something booked.

Here are just a couple of the estimates based on the spreadsheet I created:
PODS - $2615 and we load and unload the POD.
Budget rental truck - $2460 after flights, hotels, and gas. We would have to load and unload twice.
Graebel Moving- $4895 we store and move in but they load the truck.
All My Sons- $2732 they store, wrap belongings, and do everything except pack the boxes.

Well then what did I decide to do......I think we will be going with All My Sons. It will involve no loading or unloading and will be much less stressful when we get to Louisville since I'll be starting classes and finding a job.

Amanda's glad that no one else will be coming over to give us estimates.

Words

I am rereading James 1 as I work on breaking in a new Bible. As I was going through and making notes by some of my favorite passages, I came across a good verse. James 1:26 really hit home today as I heard many unrighteous words at work this morning. It says, "If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man's religion is worthless." This verse tells us that our heart is often revealed by what we say. Controlled and proper speech reveal purity of heart while uncontrolled and crude language defilement. If this is true (and I believe it is) then what are the hearts of many who claim to be Christian really like?

A couple of other thoughts
We see in many other parts of Scripture that words really matter. Words can bring both death and life, cursing and blessing, and can edify or tear down believers. In Matthew 12:36 Jesus tells us that we will have to give an account for EVERY careless word we speak. For those who speak a lot that is a lot of words for which you'll have to give an account.

We should never take words that are spoken or written lightly. They can have a devastating effect both in this world and for eternity. God is just in judging all of us because we all fail in our use of words (Romans 3:4). Everyone fails with words on probably a daily basis. Every careless word could bring judgment--not just curse words or blasphemous words, but any careless word that brings shame to Christ or his people.

We need to be careful with our words and remember that we will someday have to give an account for them. James 3 tells us that the evil we speak will not only effect us but others we come into contact with. Let us, as those who have been purified by the blood of Christ, use our words to bless, build up, and edify others rather than tear them down.

Stewardship in ministry

Long time no blog I will try to be more consistent. This is something I am working on to possibly teach on at some point in the future.

Stewardship

An administration or management

We are entrusted as stewards in a number of roles by God.

We have been given a stewardship in many areas of life. Some of them include money, possessions, and our ministry. We are called to manage and fulfill our role as a steward in all these areas so that God can be most glorified through us.

Ministry

God has sovereignly called and commissioned us with knowledge and opportunity to serve Him in a variety of roles. Just as everyone has different gifts we all have been given different responsibilities. Our role is to be a good steward of where we are in the body of Christ.

In the Bible we see many examples of God’s people faithfully and unfaithfully handling the stewardship given them by God. In the Old Testament we see an incredible example in Noah, who was faithful in all that God had called him to. He spent years building a massive ark in the middle of the desert though it had never rained on the earth. Imagine the persecution and ridicule from those who knew Noah.

How have our persecutors/enemies deterred us from our task?

What do we need to do to get back on track?

What would it take for us to remain faithful to a task like Noah’s for years?

The worst example of poor stewardship has to be that of our father Adam--because of his disobedience, all humanity is destined for hell. He was given stewardship over the garden and was promised that it would provide for him and Eve all that they needed. He was disobedient to God and followed Eve’s lead and ate of the tree of life, bringing damnation on all of humanity.

In what ways do resemble Adam and Noah in our stewardship?

What can we learn from the example of these two men?

In the New Testament Paul was very much aware of the stewardship he had been given by the Lord. We see it throughout his writings here are just a couple examples:

· Colossians 2:25: “…of this church I was made a minister according to the stewardship from God bestowed on me for your benefit, so that I might fully carry out the word of God.” We see in this verse that Paul was a steward of the church at Colossae. His responsibility was to make the Word of God fully known through preaching and teaching.

· Ephesians 3:2: “…assuming that you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace that was given to me for you.” When we read this verse in the context of Ephesians 3 we see that what Paul is referring to is his responsibility to share the grace of God to the Gentiles. We can all be thankful that Paul was a faithful steward of what God had called him to.

What does it mean practically for us to be stewards of the ministry God has given to us?

What ministry stewardships has God given us that we need to be faithful too?

Ohio/ Kentucky Trip

Yesterday I booked our flight to Ohio we will be visiting Southern Seminary in Kentucky as well as Camp Presmont in Ohio hopefully(if I get the position). I got a GREAT deal only $194 per person with tax from Ft. Myers. I found even cheaper tickets ($156) from Ft. Lauderdale but decided on Ft. Myers from a convience standpoint. We will be arriving in Pittsburgh on Wed. 4/1. I will spend 2 days at the camp on Thurs. and Fri. looking at facilities as well as hopefully meeting a few people while I am there. Amanda will hopefully be visiting camp with me on Friday to get the lay of the land as well as visit the neighboring towns as we will hopefully be living there for a few months this summer.
We will then leave Saturday early morning (like 4 or 5 AM) to drive to Louisville arriving around 9AM (I hope). We will spend Sat. through Mon. afternoon in Louisville and then head back to OH then fly out of Pitt. on Tues. morning. I am really excited for the trip and I am really looking forward to visiting Southern Seminary over the weekend. We plan on visiting Highview Baptist Church on Sunday morning for worship. This is the church in which Eric Yeldell leads worship (Eric is the son-in-law of our pastor in Naples) and Russell Moore preaches. We will not have much time to see friends but there will hopefully be time for that when we move there in about 6 weeks. Yikes!