A few days ago an atheist by the login name of croixian1 left a comment telling me that God was a “magical faerie” and asking me to visit his site.

Anyone who knows me at all would realize that I then had to visit. No one is ever allowed to question my faith and have me not respond in some way. Really. Croixian1’s site offered very little that I found compelling, aside from a post which called the recent overturning of the gay marriage ban in California a “bad day for bigots”. Well, Thank God I’m not a bigot! It was a good day for me.

In the side bar he linked to a bunch of other sites that are supposed to also help me realize why God is Imaginary. Most of them talked about thinks like there being no quantitative proof that prayer works, or talking about the inherent hypocrisy in Christianity and how Christians don’t actually behave as if Christ were real.

Guess what? I agree wholeheartedly with many of their assertions, but I still believe that God is real. My favorite of the sites, simply enough called God is Imaginary had a list of several things to contemplate as “proof” of God’s unreality. I take issue with several of their points. I won’t go through them one by one all in one fell swoop because who has the time… but I will address a few here. Like their “look at your church” point, in which they describe a church that is moving onto 33 acres and building soccer fields and a new building with a “huge” sanctuary and library as “your typical church.” I don’t know what America those guys live in, but in my small town the “typical” church seats about two to three hundred, barely has sufficient parking and doesn’t pay their pastor much. In small towns the country over that is the case. Why a few hundred “mega” churches are accepted as the norm and the standard by which all churches should be judged baffles me. It’s simply not logical.

They also offer the fact that “You ignore Jesus“. I hope they didn’t mean me. They show several verses in which Jesus talked about the fact that we should sell our possessions to feed the poor, not acquire wealth, and serve God not money. All great verses. All teachings that I follow. We live in the first floor of a rental house and live sort of communally with our upstairs neighbors, sharing the work and sharing our things. We drive two vehicles, one a van we bought from my parents very used and the other another used car. We paid cash for both. We don’t have credit cards. We don’t have many possessions at all. We live a lifestyle of sharing and giving and work with our church to take care of our neighborhood homeless. My husband and I follow those teachings. So, people who made God is Imaginary, you lose on that point as well. Are there many Christians who don’t follow those teachings? Yes. Are there many who don’t know Christ? Yes. But this little Christian does.

There also seems to be a focus on the fact that many Christians don’t believe in evolution and thus Christians are irrational. Guess what? I don’t believe in the “Young Earth” teachings. I believe that evolution isn’t necessarily at odds with faith. If to God a second is a thousand years and a thousand years is a minute, then how do we know how long those seven days took? The Bible was written by humans and thus is open to human flaw, as human understanding simply cannot encapsulate the Godly mind. We don’t know how our Earth was created- but believing that it was created is still entirely possible.

I looked at the entry titled “Think about a Christian Housewife” because I am one, and I wondered if they might have anything interesting to say about me. They posed a situation in which a housewife prays for God to help her clean a mustard stain off of her favorite blouse and that prayer was “answered” and then they ask why the same housewife couldn’t just, you know, pray for poverty to be eased or the hungry to be fed.

Kiss my Christian Housewife Ass.

I never, ever, pray over such trivial things as a stain on a blouse. If I did, I’d spend my entire life in prayer as I’ve got two very young, very messy children. And I DO pray for the poor and the hungry. I DO pray for world peace. I pray for a lot of things which the people who penned that site have absolutely no concept of. Do I believe my prayers will be answered? That’s an insanely complex question to address and would take an entire post in itself, if not a series of them.

But one thing I am sure of:

If Christian Hypocrisy is the Atheist’s strongest argument against God, Christianity needs to change.

1 John 4:7-21

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.  This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.  This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.  And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.  If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God.  And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.  In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him.  There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

We love because he first loved us.  If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.  And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.

I often say, “I have yet to meet a single person whom God does not passionately love”- and occasionally I’m asked precisely what I mean by that.  Does this mean that God loves murderers and thieves (or *gasp* the gays?).  Why do I clarify the phrase with the word “passionately” when perhaps it’s more precise to simply say “love”.  God certainly doesn’t lie awake at night fantasizing about how badly he wants to be with us, imagining a world in which there would be no barriers between his love and our hearts.

Or does he?

I imagine that he does.  I imagine that every harsh word, every sin, every fading glance pains God.  It is his desire to be reunited with us.  After all, he sent his son so that we could be Christ’s bride.

Can you imagine a father saying, “we want you in our family so badly that one of us will die to win your heart?”

But… yet…  This is love, not that we have loved God but that God loves us.  Our knowledge of, understanding of, and ability to love are all birthed from God.  It is through love that we come to know God, through the work of our hands and the cries of our hearts for each other.  It is through demonstrating love that we show the world who God and who Christ is.

We must learn to feel the passion, the burning in the bones, the explicit agony of hope, the dream of bringing the world before God as a spotless bride.

We must love.

And remember- anyone who says they love God but hates their brother is a liar.

I have planted a garden in my backyard.  The seeds went into the ground almost two weeks ago, and the little green heads of the plants are just starting to break ground.  What exactly have they been doing all of this time, I ask myself?  Waiting for the right weather?  Canoodling each other?

They’ve been putting down roots.

The roots have to be well established before the stalk is formed, and the stalk has to be well established before the leaves unfurl, and the leaves have to unfurl before fruit can be born.  There is a natural order to these things, and that order must be observed for the plant to survive.

People are the same way.  You can’t judge them by their fruit before you see where their roots are.  You can’t expect them to be spreading out in faith to receive before their stalks have formed.  You’ve got to let them do things in the right order.  Allow me to explain.  Come with me.

A young girl enters your church, and by rumor you learn that she’s “living in sin”.  Now is not the time to approach her about her sin, though, is it?  She’s only been known to you for a few hours.  So you introduce yourself, you treat her warmly.  You and the other members of your church are now preparing the soil for her to take root in.  You need to foster an environment where she can grow, give her the “water” of the spirit and the “light” of the Son.  Perhaps now she chooses to plant herself in your congregation.

Do you now approach her?

No.

You give her time for her roots to harden off, and for her to put that stalk up from the soil and for those leaves to spread.  You expose her to the proper teachings, put her into a mentoring relationship with a trusted elder, you give her a chance to form friendships and become well and truly established in your garden.

Do you now approach her?

Test the waters, see what is there.  Has she been allowing herself to be discipled?  Showing signs of sincerity and change?  If so, a confrontation becomes uneccessary because God himself is tending to her.  Allow the process to complete.  Has she been questioning the precepts of faith?  Showing doubt or discomfort?  If so, a confrontation could nip her faith in the bud.  Allow time for her to warm and soften, and see where the process goes.

Is she professing to have faith and to be committed, but is in all ways the same as the day you met her?  If so, a confrontation is warranted, as if she is planted in good soil and in all ways showing that she should be fruitful, you should be able to find the fruit to judge.

But even then, the conversation should not progress like this;

PASTOR:  You are living in sin.

GIRL:  Excuse me?

PASTOR:  If you want to be a member of this church body you need to stop sinning.

The conversation should go more like;

PASTOR:  I’m wondering if you’re feeling like you’re getting what you need.

GIRL:  What do you mean?

PASTOR:  By this point most people would be showing signs of having grown into our community and becoming secure in their faith, but you don’t seem to have taken root.

GIRL:  That may be true.

PASTOR:  Why do you think that is?

And then listen- because she will most likely tell you exactly what the impediment is between her and faith.  And then you can help her remove it.

And she will take root.

In a recent comment on another post, someone who is Christian and questioning their sexuality asked the million dollar question:

“Can someone be Homosexual and Religious?”

Oh, that hurts me.  Right in my gut, I feel it.  If someone can be addicted to Porn and religious, a gossip and religious, be cheating on their spouse Saturday night and still preach with conviction Sunday morning- how is homosexuality different?  “But wait, Lindsey”, I can just hear someone say.  “Those people are clearly not all that religious, or they wouldn’t be guilty of such obvious sin.”

Oh, Really?

As long as there has been faith, there have been flawed people of faith.  As long as there has been sin, there has been sinners.  And as long as there has been Jesus, there has been God’s love poured out on a weak and undeserving people.  Who was it that said that thing about healthy people needing no doctor?  Who was it that said, “he who has not sinned…”  When we start to put prerequisites on faith we abolish the need for it entirely.  Broken and hopelessly flawed people have to be able to live out religion, it’s they that need it!

Now, to continue on to some of Renegade’s other questions, we will go on a journey together.  It starts with conception and birth.  God is weaving together all of the fine strands that make the potential for who a person is.  He weaves A with B even though A and B mean “gay”.  Do you think he meant to?  I think he probably did.  Now we can argue about whether or not this is “unnatural” or whether God meant it as permission or a test all day long.  Some people contest that Homosexuality is not found in nature- they are wrong.  I’ve seen very nice, cuddly, obviously gay dogs that prefer to sniff the underparts of other boy dogs more than girls.  (Whether or not that is a fair comparison to human sexuality is another post entirely.)

Is the act of homosexual sex inherently sinful?  I’m not a scholar, so I will refer you to a wonderful page on SisterFriends-Together.org, which discusses in depth the meaning and intent of passages used to describe homosexuality as sinful.  This page, “The Bible and Homosexuality“, makes a far better argument than I would expect to on my own.  I will repeat the words of that site’s founder and simply say, “Christian and Gay?  It’s not a contradiction, and neither are you.”

I realize that not everyone agrees.  Some Christians will say that homosexual feelings are not sinful, but acting them out is.  Or they would say that the feelings are sinful.  They would say that we must “unbend” our sinful nature and return to the straight and narrow that God intended.  Perhaps this is what you, oh commenter, feel.  Perhaps it is not.

This is what I would suggest:

Find a quiet place.  Sit down, and center yourself with God.  Pray.  Ask these questions:

1. God, do you see me struggling with this?
2. What was your intent in giving me this burden?
3. Who do you want me to be?
4. Should I be gay, straight?  Stranded in between?
5. Am I sinning?

You may not hear an audible answer right away.  You may spend days, weeks, months, even years continuing to ask these questions of God over and over.  But trust in the fact that when we ask in sincerity God always answers.  It may not be the answer you expect, I expect, anyone expects, and it may not come in a form that is easily recognized.  But the answer is out there.

In the meantime, rest in Christ’s love for you.  Rest in the people who love you.  Rest in the knowledge that you will be cared for, and your needs will be met.

You will find love.

God is love.

You will be held by God.

These are the rules:

Anyone can comment, Christian or not.

No attacking anyone or your comment will be deleted.  (Acceptable:  “I don’t understand your comment”, “can you please explain the logic behind X”, “Are there Bible verses to support that?”  Unacceptable:  “You obviously know nothing about the Bible”, “that’s the stupidest logic I’ve ever heard”, “curl up and die.”)

Note:  I did let a bit of a battle fight itself out on my previous Open Forum, but both parties seemed willing to take off the gloves and they were big kids and could resolve their own sandbox wars.  People who are known to me and I trust to use their brains will receive more leniency than strangers.  I apologize to any that may confuse or offend- but such is life.  We tolerate from friends far more than we would from strangers, because we know the hearts of our friends.

So- today’s open forum.  How should we share the Gospel?

If you are a Christian, answer the following two Questions:

1. What do you believe the ideal way is in which to share the hope you have in Christ?
2. When was the last time you did?  Would you like to tell us about it?

If you aren’t a Christian (or are, and feel adventurous) answer the following:

1. Do Christians ever evangelize you?  If so- how do they do it?
2. Does it leave you with a positive or negative impression of Christianity?
3. Does that impression carry over to Christ?

Thank you in advance to everyone who plays!

I may be many, many things…  but evangelical is not one of them.  Do I believe in the benefit of spreading the Gospel?  Absolutely.  But I believe we spread it in the same way Christ and the Disciples did- not by handing out tracts (or as Mike Frost once heard them called “Jesus Brochures”) or putting on plays or dancing in the streets or inviting over every single person you meet for a dinner that’s actually just a way to trap them so they have to listen to you…  instead- we go out on the streets.  We hold these people.  We live side by side with them.  We don’t bring them into our homes, we go into theirs.  We take part in their lives.  We minister to them.  We meet practical needs.  We clothe the naked, feed the hungry, give homes to the homeless, comfort the grieving, care for the sick, hold the hand of the dying.

Imagine if tomorrow morning we woke up to a world where Christians once again (as they did in times of plague and disease past) had the reputation for being where there was need, giving selflessly, treating their own lives as if they had no value because they knew their value came from God.  Imagine that everywhere need was felt, God’s hands were present because ours were.  Imagine if we sold our possessions to take care of the needy, if all of the military widows who are grieving right now were taken in and cared for, if the homeless were given the skills and attention they need to be valuable to society once more, if the starving in Africa were fed, if the street children of Guatemala were given parents, if the hospitals around the globe where people perish in stink and agony were filled with hands to hold.

How long do you think it would take for people to start saying, “Who is this Jesus guy?  I want to know him!”

?  How long?

Think about it.

Apparently a great deal of my readers are avidly pro-life, which comes as no surprise to me.

So on my last post I received a lot of comments reading, simply put: Abortion is murder.

Let’s imagine that tomorrow Abortion becomes illegal. What, then, would be the penalty to the doctor who performs the abortion and the mother who requests one? Shall they be given a life sentence? A manslaughter charge of ten years? Negligent homicide (which hardly seems appropriate, as it’s not negligence), a misdemeanor charge? If it is truly murder, a mere fine seems insufficient.

What do you think?

I am stranded somewhere between being pro-choice and pro-life. This is a tenuous position to be in, but there I am.

I had two unplanned pregnancies that ended in the light of my life and the breath in my prayers being born. The first pregnancy showed my husband being laid off from his job a little bit in, us having to scramble to find somewhere to live and some way to support ourselves. I won’t go into extreme detail as this is not a personal blog, but suffice it to say that we were strapped for cash, living hand to mouth, and bad off. Very bad off. The second pregnancy we were still in a transitory position when it came to housing. The husband was again without consistent work. Things were still hand to mouth (and still are). So when I see a statistic that says that over 90% of women who had abortions ascribed failure to provide for a child/pay for a pregnancy as their primary reason to abort, I sympathize.

It is terrifying to bring a child into this world, even more so when one asks “where is my next meal coming from” and “how much are diapers again?” Now add into that the physical and emotional rigors of childbearing, instability in intimate relationships- and what do you have? A cocktail for disaster. Any time I am asked I will be frank about the physical symptoms of pregnancy, the strain it puts on the father of the child as well as the mother, the fact that labor and delivery while not the end of the world are not easy. There is an insurmountable psychological impact to pregnancy and childbirth that MUST be observed.

That is why any time I hear someone say, “why can’t the woman just put the baby up for adoption” I cringe. Not to mention that women who are not Caucasian will have a harder time getting parents for their child, and women who have done drugs or drank alcohol before they were aware they were pregnant will also have a harder time finding a family for their child. Ask a poor black woman with no intimate family to afford her who innocently drank alcohol a few times before realizing she was pregnant to just “have the baby and give it up.” Have it? With whom footing the bills? And to whom shall she give it? The overburdened foster system? What if the baby has permanent defects from the alcohol? She’s got no way to know.

When I found out I was pregnant with my son my first thought was, “dear God just undo this.” I was in no emotional or economic shape to give birth to and take care of a child. I had no way to know if we’d have insurance to pay for my care, and we were still in the process of paying off our uninsured delivery of our first child. Have another baby? In my state? With the state of jobs in our area? With no home to live in? With no money to buy healthy food to eat?

There was no way that I would abort. I knew from the second I suspected a pregnancy that I loved this child- but part of the reason I DIDN’T want my child was my love for him. I didn’t want him brought into the kind of life we were struggling through.

And that is why I am pro-choice. Because unless YOU, YOU YOURSELF are willing to take a woman’s child into your own home and raise it yourself, you’ve no right to make that decision for her. Is the unborn child a real life, imbued with soul and breath? That is another thing to be argued about. But consider embryos that implant into a woman’s fallopian tubes. Those are aborted without a second thought, because there is no hope of them being viable. If the woman carries them past the first trimester she will die of internal bleeding. What about the amount of miscarriages that happen? Were all of those sacred life? And if so, why would God allow a God-fearing couple who desperately wants that child to endure such pain?

These are questions we MUST ask ourselves if we enter into the abortion debate. But the greatest question of all we must ask is whom shall we love? The unborn, or the struggling mother? Whom must we embrace? The unreachable, or she who stands outside our door? Whom must we pray for in whispers and moans? Those who are with Father God, or those who must remain on this planet, within our reach?

Ask yourself that. And ask yourself if you were with her, at her side, holding her hand, wiping her tears, and she simply could not bear the thought of bringing her child into this world of pain and distress- would you still judge?

Or would you land with me, somewhere in the gray land between choice and life, choosing to embrace the life that we can see and touch and bear with.

No, I’m not talking about fantasy in a sci-fi/fantasy sense- I’m talking sex.

Is it wrong to fantasize?  Many women will admit to fantasies of being held, talked to, emotionally stimulated in some way.  They will admit that sometimes they dream about people they’ve met in passing.  Not necessarily always in a strictly sexual sense, sometimes it’s just about companionship.

But if we are Christian a question remains: is it sin?

Psychologically speaking fantasy is a “safe” way in which to engage in behaviors deemed “unsafe” in reality.  One knows one would pay a price for arguing with one’s mother, so one fantasizes.  One knows one isn’t ever going to date Edward Norton, so one fantasizes.  Fantasy can also be an exercise for certain things one is unsure of- and in this sense women have much more active fantasy lives then men.  Women tend to fantasize about the course of the day, how to interact with a boss, what to make for dinner.  Women tend to think about these things to a much greater extent than men.  It’s not a wonder we’re often seen as a “mystery” seeing as we spend such a large amount of time in our heads.  (And yes- I realize this is a gross generalization.  Some men operate this way and some women simply don’t.)

Yet, the question remains:  when it comes to sex, is it a sin?

Ask yourself a few questions:

1. Do you ever replace real interaction, necessary interaction, with fantasy? Are there times where you know you need to discuss something, and yet you don’t?  Where the anger/disatisfaction/desire you are feeling causes a rift in your relationship, and yet you continue to exorcise it with fantasy instead of interaction?
2. Do you find yourself unattracted to your mate and only stimulated by fantasy?  This is a major problem- and in this way fantasy can be as dangerous as pornography.
3. Does your fantasy life take you out of your daily life to the point that it’s an obstruction? You know the kids staring out of the window instead of listening in class?  Is this you in your job?  Your marriage?

Do you throw yourself into romance novels?  Soap operas?  Do you find yourself hurting and longing for something that you only achieve in fantasy?  While in small doses an argument can be made for the safeness and even health of fantasy, there’s a time when you need to embrace and appreciate reality.

Not to mention communication, communication, communication- perhaps if you tell your spouse that you fantasize about being spoken to in a certain way, held in a certain way, approached in a certain way, you’ll find that his eager to behave this way himself and fulfill you.

But- is it sin?  In Matthew 5:28 Jesus says, “But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”  Where is your heart?  Is it with your spouse, your life?  Or have you given it to something unattainable, something that is only in your head?

Luke 10: 38-42

As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him.  She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said.  But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”

“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

This passage is usually related in a single context.  That is, a call to stop being distracted by the things of house and home (or work) and take time to sit at Jesus’ feet.  It can be a confusing teaching, because Jesus isn’t really here with us and his feet aren’t right there- so what should be do?  Well, we are told, pay attention to teachings, read your Bible, fellowship with the believers instead of worrying about what to have for dinner.

As a woman I’ve always been irritated by this- especially when I was living in Mexico and the men would regularly nag their wives for being “Marthas” when they were trying to get the food out.  It felt to me like disrespect, because the women have their own way of fellowshipping and serving God and they did it by serving their men.

The truth is, Marthas- in one sense- are necessary.  We need people who think about things like what we’ll eat and if the table will be clean.  So what, exactly, was Martha’s problem?

Let’s take a closer look at what Jesus said.  “You worry about many things, but one thing is needed.”

Doesn’t it seem like he really is trying to help her?  He’s acknowledging the frustration and pain she’s feeling, he’s inviting her to join in the fellowship.  He’s not coarsely reprimanding her and saying that Mary is better, he’s simply saying that Mary chose something better by allowing herself to be ministered to.  Martha’s problem is the hardness of her heart.

Think about it more.  Martha invited Jesus and the disciples into her home.  She took upon herself the burden of meeting their needs.  She did not have to make that choice.  Why did she do it?  Did she want to hear the teachings, or did she want the status that (in that society) came from being a hostess?  Was she seeking some sort of fulfilment?  And if so, did she feel that her sister was somehow harming her by not helping her to put on the kind of show she wanted?

Perhaps Martha’s problem was selfishness, and that is why Jesus responded that Mary’s good choice would not be taken from her.  He wouldn’t allow Martha selfishness.

In any case, I don’t think that Martha’s problem was wanting everyone to have food.  No, Martha’s problem was somewhere in her heart.