Study for the Sake of Study

Last week my small group got on the topic of envy and jealousy. I actually can’t remember how; I think it had to do with one of the verses we were discussing. And someone asked what the difference between the two was. Do you know that not one of us really had an answer to that question? It’s not like they are deep theological concepts or Hebrew words! They are plain and simple English words but we couldn’t tell you the difference between them. We all admitted that we use them mostly interchangeably. So one person suggested that it might be a good idea to do a word study on envy and jealousy.

AHA! And that’s when I got excited! If you don’t know me, there’s nothing I like better than studying God’s Word and discussing it (calmly) with others! So I went home last week and did a word study. If you don’t know what that is, it basically just involves looking up each verse that has the word (or a related word) in it and reading it in context to get an idea of the meaning. It involves research and a lot of cross-referencing and I love it. By the time I was done I had four pages of notes on envy and jealousy.

You can bet I was READY for Sunday night. I was real close to bringing a couple books I have that talked about envy and jealousy but decided to make notes from the sections and just take my notebook. Better not OVERDO it. 🙂 But I know something about myself: I have this bad habit where I’m super excited to discuss something and no one else cares….so since this wasn’t actually our main study, I decided I was not going to bring it up. I would let someone else bring it up and if no one did, that just means our focus was on our book study. But since I figured everyone must be eager to discuss it too, it would probably come up, right?

Nope. We went the whole night and not one word on envy or jealousy. We had a great discussion on our book, but everyone seemed to have forgotten about the previous week.

When I got home that night, I suddenly remembered a quote that I recently heard from J.I. Packer in his book Knowing God:

“The fact we have to face is this: that if we pursue theological knowledge for its own sake, it is bound to go bad on us. It will make us proud and conceited. The very greatness of the subject-matter will intoxicate us, and we shall come to think of ourselves as a cut above other Christians because of our interest in it and grasp of it; and we shall look down on those whose theological ideas seem to us crude and inadequate, and dismiss them as very poor specimens. For, as Paul told the conceited Corinthians, ‘knowledge puffeth up… if any man thinketh that he knoweth anything, he knoweth not yet as he ought to know’ (1Cor. 8:1 f. RV). To be preoccupied with getting theological knowledge as an end in itself, to approach Bible study with no higher a motive than a desire to know all the answers, is the direct route to a state of self-satisfied self-deception. We need to guard our hearts against such an attitude, and pray to be kept from it. As we saw earlier, there can be no spiritual health without doctrinal knowledge; but it is equally true that there can be no spiritual health with it, if it is sought for the wrong purpose and valued by the wrong standard. In this way, doctrinal study really can become a danger to spiritual life, and we today, no less than the Corinthians of old, need to be on our guard here.“

To say I was convicted would be the understatement of the century. I should probably print that out and stick it on every wall of my house. I think a lot of my life has been pursuing theological knowledge just for the sake of it. Although I would never tell you that at the time. I always feel like my motives are in the right place but most often they are rooted in pride, instead of a love for my Savior, a desire to know him more, and to live practically for him.

Was that word study worth the time and effort? You better believe it. Because NOW I can see areas of envy and jealousy in my own life that I need to work on. Instead of it just being about the knowledge, it’s actually about the application of God’s Word; to God himself, to the world around me, and to my own life.

“If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if anyone loves God, he is known by God.”
1 Corinthians 8:2-3

 

A Stupid Show

Wow. I blinked my eyes and weeks went by with no blog posts. It wasn’t really intentional; I have a lot of reasons. But you know what? Ya’ll don’t really need to know them because this is my little corner of the internet (for real- I paid my domain fees this week) and I can choose when to post and when not to, huh? So I guess that’s that. 😊

There’s a show that I watch. I’m not proud of it. Most of the shows I watch I really love like Andy Griffith, I Love Lucy, or the Great British Baking Show. A friend told me I should watch this one and against my *ahem* better judgment, I did. It’s one of those shows that you can watch while doing something else because it’s so shallow you don’t really need to pay attention. Have I mentioned I’m not proud I watch this show, nor do I recommend it? Okay, great. 😊 It’s The Good Place.

The Good Place is about four humans who die (*this post is going to contain spoilers lol) and go to “The Good Place” but through a series of events they end up back on earth. And it was in an episode on earth where I had to stop the dusting I was doing because my heart jumped at something I heard:

Eleanor (main character): “It made me realize that we’re the only truly free beings in the universe because we actually know what’s up with the afterlife. And I think that means we need to be bold.”

Whoa. For a terrible show with a repetitive plot line, it deals with philosophy and ethics more than any other show I’ve watched. Which is probably why I keep watching it.

That statement is so true for believers! We ARE the only people in the world who know the truth about what comes after death and because of that, we should live boldly through Christ! It reminds me of this passage:

“Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” 2 Corinthians 4:1-6

I think these days there is a lot of tampering with God’s Word to make it more appealing or more relevant. But this passage says we will REFUSE to do that because what we have is the absolute truth and the ONLY way of salvation. Which, by the way, is always relevant. Why would we change it? We are truly free to live boldly and openly for Christ because we KNOW the truth! Turns out, I gained a little perspective from the dumb show.

 

The Phlegmy Religion

Do you have words that you just don’t like? I’m not talking about swear words here; I mean ordinary words that you simply don’t like to use and you may not even know why? For instance, I despise the word phlegm. I do an inner shudder when I hear it, I don’t say the word, and I would probably never use it in a blog title. I also don’t like the word waft. My best friend hates the word moist. Think about it: you probably have some.

But I’ve been doing some research on a particular religion and for some reason the only word I could conjure up to describe it is that nasty word up top. (Plus whenever I hear it, I always think it sounds like someone sneezing.) Gnosticism. Don’t let the big word scare you away- until about two weeks ago, I didn’t really have a clear idea on what Gnosticism was. I knew it wasn’t a good thing but that’s about it. I went through some training a few weeks ago and I was a little shocked at how prevalent this viewpoint really is. I’ll be honest and say that most of what you are going to hear from this point on will be from that training and my research after it.

In short, clear terms, Gnosticism is a belief system that centers around man. It believes in an inner light or divine spark in every person. It places a huge value on feelings and experience and believes that a person can experience God outside of the Bible. Gnostics aren’t big on authority or institutions such as the church because they have a more subjective view of morals and revelation. Gnostics tend to be very spiritual and sometimes almost mystic.

So if none of that makes any sense to you, let me give you ways that this plays out in real life:

-Personal, special revelation has replaced God’s Word
-Morals are subjective- I get to decide what’s right for me, you can decide for you
-Experience trumps Scripture- what you feel is true and right, doesn’t matter what anyone else says
-No absolute truth- you assign meaning to things (such as gender)
-God wants me to be happy- pull the verses you like out of Scripture
-Follow your heart, you have a light that is special and unique to only you

Does ANY of this sound familiar to you?? Because it certainly does to me. And the scary thing is that some of it sounds familiar because I’ve heard it from believers. People, that scares me. This stuff is wrong and it has infiltrated God’s church! It can be tricky to catch because a Gnostic can know all the right terms and use the same phrases as biblical believers but what I just wrote above is NOT the gospel. You cannot have the gospel apart from God’s Word (his WHOLE Word) and you cannot decide that you get to call the shots. That’s not how it works.

A verse from Hebrews 2 is popping into my head right now. (May I just add that all of Hebrews 1 talks about Christ being preeminent to all? We aren’t little gods running around. Just wanted to clear that up.) Hebrews 2:1 says:

“Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it.”

That’s highly applicable. How close are you, am I, paying attention to the Scriptures? Do we know it well enough so that when nuances are brought in from the outside we can quickly identify them as the false teachings that they are? I think we need to start paying “much closer attention.”

Otherwise you might get caught up in a gross, phlegmy, false religion.

 

Sinner or Saint?

If you’ve known me very long or ever been in any sort of Bible study with me, you probably know that I can be kind of mischievous when I so choose. For instance, if someone is trying to skim over a difficult topic or passage, I’m going to be THAT person who points it out and forces the group to discuss it. My best friend can tell when it’s coming and sometimes I get a warning glance from her (which is usually ignored) and then she just sighs. 🙂

Sometimes though, if I want to really get a group going, I’ll make one of my favorite statements:

“Well, I actually don’t think we should say we are sinners. We are saints.”

And then I just sit back with a smile and listen to all the protests go on around me. People whip out their Bibles like they are ready to excommunicate me. Arguments start. It’s great.

After the dust settles and everyone is ready to listen, I bring forth my evidence. Let me start by saying that all of this only applies to those who are saved. If God has NOT redeemed your soul, then you are a sinner and that word is highly applicable. And it was for every. single. person. BEFORE we were saved as well. In fact, we are such sinners that Ephesians 2:1 says that we were DEAD in our trespasses and sins. That’s how fitting the word is.

But if you read just a little further down in Ephesians you come to these verses:

“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” Eph. 2:4-7

Something changes when we become saved. Actually, everything changes. But one thing in particular that I would like to talk about is our standing before the Lord. Once we are saved, when God looks at us, ALL HE SEES IS CHRIST’S RIGHTEOUSNESS! I mean, how incredible is that??! He doesn’t see our sin, but he sees what Christ did to redeem us! (Disclaimer: Not an excuse for sin. Read yourself some Romans.)

Furthermore, did you know that out of the 9 letters that Paul wrote to churches, in 6 of them, he starts out using the word “saints?” He either says “called to be saints” or outright calls the believers “saints.” He also uses it liberally throughout his letters as he refers to his brothers and sisters in Christ. Paul definitely thought that word was fitting for believers. (Galatians….not so much…)

Webster’s 1828 Dictionary is my favorite one and so of course I was curious to see what it had to say on the word sinner. One thing it said was, “It is used in contradistinction to saint, to denote an unregenerate person; one who has not received the pardon of his sins.” Believer, that is not you!

So, here’s the part in my conversation where someone usually goes, “but, but” and stumbles around for some words. Let me help you out. I understand, friend! Of course we still sin and need to ask God’s forgiveness constantly. That’s not what I’m saying at all! I think the problem comes in because some churches have distorted the word saint to mean a perfect person and they worship man instead of God alone but that’s NOT how the Bible uses it. The Bible refers to us as saints not because WE are perfect but because our REDEEMER is! Totally different. But it does refer to believers numerous times as saints.

Because, in God’s eyes, we are no longer sinners. That train has left, that slave isn’t here (another one is lol.)

We aren’t sinners; we are saints that sin.