Don't Play With Fire!

Are we insane? If we scoop fire into our laps, we will be burned. Let us reject sinful behavior. It will surely lead to anger, violence, greed, alienation, depression, compromise, slavery or other degradation. We should not rebel against God. Let us examine our lives. Can we play with fire and not be burned?

A Prayer begins . . .

Heavenly Father, we honor your name in all our thoughts, words and deeds. May we stay away from evil traps and not be burned.

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Two selected book quotations begin . . .

Why Isn't There More Written About Jesus?

Lee Strobel, The Case for Christ, Zondervan Publishing House, 1998, pp. 30, 31. SoAmazing.com

Category: Christian Living
ISBN: 0310209307
Keywords: bookstore, biography, gospels, Jesus, Blomberg, Craig L. Blomberg, Denver Seminary, literary, theological, Greek, Hebrew, exemplary, illustrative, meaning, Christians, Jesus, Christ, forgiveness, sins, atonement, death, resurrection, crucifixion, ancient literature, Zondervan Publishing House, Strobel, Lee Strobel

" 'When I go to the bookstore and look in the biography section, I don't see the same kind of writing that I see in the gospels.' I said. 'When somebody writes a biography these days, they thoroughly delve into the person's life. But look at Mark--he doesn't talk about the birth of Jesus or really anything through Jesus' early adult years. Instead he focuses on a three-year period and spends half his gospel on the events leading up to and culminating in Jesus' last week. How do you explain that?'

Blomberg [Craig L. Blomberg, Ph.D., Professor of New Testament at Denver Seminary] held up a couple of fingers. 'There are two reasons,' he replied. 'One is literary and the other is theological.

'The literary reason is that basically, this is how people wrote biographies in the ancient world. They did not have the sense, as we do today, that it was important to give equal proportion to all periods of an individual's life or that it was necessary to tell the story in strictly chronological order or even to quote people verbatim, as long as the essence of what they said was preserved. Ancient Greek and Hebrew didn't even have a symbol for quotation marks.

'The only purpose for which they thought history was worth recording was because there were some lessons to be learned from the characters described. Therefore the biographer wanted to dwell at length on those portions of the person's life that were exemplary, that were illustrative, that could help other people, that gave meaning to a period of history.'

'And what's the theological reason?' I asked.

'It flows out of the point I just made. Christians believe that as wonderful as Jesus' life and teachings and miracles were, they were meaningless if it were not historically factual that Christ died and was raised from the dead and that this provided atonement, or forgiveness, of the sins of humanity.

'So Mark in particular, as the writer of probably the earliest gospel, devotes roughly half his narrative to the events leading up to and including one week's period of time and culminating in Christ's death and resurrection.

'Given the significance of the crucifixion,' he concluded, 'this makes perfect sense in ancient literature.' "

SoAmazing Review: In The Case for Christ Lee Strobel asks tough questions about Christianity to leading intellectuals. The answers he gets may surprise you.

Buy The Case for Christ Now!   Amazon.com, Barnes&Noble, Christianbook.

Grace Is So Amazing!

Charles R. Swindoll, The Grace Awakening,, Word Publishers, 1990, 1996, p. 4.
SoAmazing.com

Category: Christian Living,
ISBN: 0849913233
Keywords: grace, awakened, released, enjoyed, freely given, dead grace, salvation, freedom, live it, claim it, amazing, Word Publishers, Swindoll, Charles R. Swindoll

"Grace was meant to be received and lived out to the fullest, not dissected and analyzed by those who would rather argue than eat. Enough of this! It's time for grace to be awakened and released, not denied . . . to be enjoyed and freely given, not debated.

Grace received but unexpressed is dead grace. To spend one's time debating how grace is received or how much commitment is necessary for salvation, without getting into what it means to live by grace and enjoy the magnificent freedom it provides, quickly leads to a counter-productive argument. It becomes little more than another tedious trivial pursuit where the majority of God's people spend days looking back and asking, 'How did we receive it?' instead of looking ahead and announcing, 'Grace is ours . . . let's live it!' Deny it or debate it and we kill it. My plea is that we claim it and allow it to set us free. When we do, grace will become what it was meant to be--really amazing! When that happens, our whole countenance changes.

SoAmazing Review: Charles R. Swindoll in The Grace Awakening, wants grace center stage. Grace is not to be denied or debated. Rather let grace be awakened within you, the church and all people, everywhere.

Buy The Grace Awakening Now!   Amazon.com, Barnes&Noble, Christianbook.

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