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The Church and most religious institutions are behind in marketing and branding campaigns. Spreading their message is critical to the fabric of their cause but the medium through which you share it, is critical for people to hear your message.
Kirk Cameron decided to market towards 50,000 (or 100,000 if they get the needed donations) universities. He has no relationship with them. He isn’t formally telling these universities about his “book dump” on Darwin’s 150 b-day. He’s just spamming them. Spam is an interrupted message you receive without prior approval. I doubt these universities will be happy about receiving these altered books and it’s probably going to cause a lot of controversy via the media.
Even if he nicely shared what he’s doing…does he have an ‘opt-out’ option? I doubt it. He thinks he’s being revolutionary with spamming universities with a new book. Content doesn’t matter when it’s medium is forceful. If no permission was given by the receiver, then the person doesn’t want to hear your good/bad message.
His book might have valid points. Science isn’t beyond reproach/question. It embraces questions and then disproves them with physical data. But, even if his book has valid points, I doubt anyone (maybe 1-2 brave souls) will even read it. Because of the flawed medium which he is about to do.
Kirk will have wasted all that money, time, trees, because his strategy is inherently flawed.
What if some evolution-believing people sent 50k-100k to churches? What would happen? There would be outrage. And I’m very confident that the church would bitch louder. Yea. I said bitch…
Good luck. But I already know the outcome Kirk. You’re going to do yourself (and your cause) a dis-service by doing this. Find a way to get people’s permission and people might hear you but this won’t change anything.
FYI, if you watch the spoof. I almost agree with everything she said. It explains a lot about the issues the church is facing with bringing people to their idea of faith.
I’m a casual fan of the UFC but this story is just simply inspirational. The moral of the story is pretty obvious because of my headline: persistence and determination pays off!
I heard a fantastic quote from someone:
If you don’t risk, you don’t get to drink champagne.
Some people take on too much risk which leads to utter failure but every once in a while foolish risk, IMHO (In My Humble Opinion), pays off.
I would never condone or encourage extreme risk like what this man took but his tremendous risk is what makes this story so great.
==Begin Story ==
If anyone needed a huge postfight bonus at UFC 104, it was Pat Barry. The heavyweight out of New Orleans, scored Knockout of the Night and Fight of the Night for his victory over Antoni Hardonk. That was good enough for $120,000. Good thing, Barry needed the infusion of cash in the worst way. He confirmed to MMAScrapsRadio that he was completely down on his luck before the fight, agreeing that he had little to eat in Los Angeles the week of the fight.
“I still had my apartment but if something would’ve happened and the fight had been canceled, I would’ve been evicted six days later.”
Barry, 30, said he didn’t even tell his trainer Duke Roufus for fear that he would think the fighter had the wrong motivation going into the fight. Barry said he didn’t ask anyone for money including his mother:
“I could ask someone but then at the same time, how hard are you going to work for something if everytime you get in trouble somebody catches you? I did something to put myself in this position I have to work my way out of it.”
Listen to Barry talk about his troubles before the fight:
Barry got his $120,000 bonus check last Tuesday. He couldn’t believe it. When he went to deposit the check, his truck wouldn’t start. Barry got a jump and hit the bank sporting a black eye and pink striped shorts.
“I go to the bank, I’m sweaty, I’ve got the black eye, I haven’t shaven in two
days, I’m strung out because I haven’t slept, I have green circles under my eyes
so I’m like ‘Can I have a deposit slip mam?’. She gives it to me, I fill it out
hand it to her. She looks at the deposit slip, then the check, then
looks at me and says ‘Excuse me I’ll be right back.’ Then a manager
comes out, a guy in a suit and says ‘What seems to be the problem?’ I was like
‘Well I have a black eye, that’s the only problem I know this looks
really ridiculous.’ So he asks me for my ID, I hand him my license an
he’s like ‘Your license says Pat Barry, but this check was written to
Patrick Barry.’ So I decided to be funny and tell him Pat Barry is in
my trunk right now. He didnt laugh. So I told him take your time man do whatever
you need to do because I have no where to go and my truck probably wont start
when I go outside so you can just do whatever you need to do. An hour later he
came back and everything was fine, the check was in my bank
account.”
My life is weird. God reveals things to me and then they happen. 9 times out of 10 it’s not the exact way I envisioned it, but it does happen. These premonitions happen from time to time. They happen so dramatically that I threw my life behind them. Then recently, 2 premonitions failed and were absolutely wrong. I banked on them happening one way, where in truth they happened another way.
It’s kind of like winning the lottery 10,000 times in a row. Your track record is 10,000 for 10,000. You see no losing in sight. You let your pride get to you. You spent 10,000 dollars and you’ve won back $1,000,000 ($100 per winning). You feel so confident in your track record, that you decide to take all $1,000,000 and and enter 1,000,000 different lotteries on a bigger scale (every scratch off, state lotto’s, etc).
Time passes and you realize that you lost. You lost big. Bigger than you can imagine. You could’ve used that $1,000,000 and rejoiced and used it, instead you let that pride get to you. The aftermath is totally annihilation to you because you didn’t just bet the $1,000,000, you told all your friends and wagered your heart, life, and reputation on it. You said, “Hey, I’ve won 10,000 times in the past. I’ll win again, watch everyone!! Watch! Come and watch me win!!!” They all scoff at you because you have no documentation of your previous $1,000,000 of winnings. You won. You personally won! TEN THOUSAND TIMES. You never wrote those times down. You never discussed them with people. You kept them in your heart. They were 10,000 real events in your life.
But, naturally, your word is little. It’s nothing personal but everyone says stuff. Barack said he wouldn’t have any lobbyists on his team, but he’s hired at leasttwo. Things change, stuff happens, it’s life. We all know we’ve stretched the truth on things. Knowing this, many of us have problems with believing others.
We live in a fallen imperfect world.
It’s difficult to believe, when there is imperfection. There is a level of doubt, that is normal. No one can 100% proof that God exists, it ultimately lays in the hands of an act of trust (faith). You trust the idea. I would say it’s same for evolution because we weren’t there, therefore there are too many variables assumed to ‘prove’ it’s idea.
There are many assumptions in science and religion. And it’s those assumptions create an element of doubt. There is nothing wrong with assumptions but everyone should embrace that it’s how life is.
Some would argue that there are more assumptions in religion than science and to an extent I would agree but that doesn’t mean it’s any less valid. It just means there are more variables involved. If God exists, then where is hell? How did God get here? Does God exist inside of space/time? How? Why? What????
If there were provable absolute truths, we wouldn’t discuss things. We’d be like “2+2=4, case closed, next please”. We’d be like “God exists and His name is Jesus, case closed, next please”. We’d be like “God doesn’t exist, evolution is wrong, another idea is the truth, case closed, next please”. But there is reason to doubt.
Christianity teaches that we should explain ‘why we believe’ what we believe (1 Peter 3:15). If something is absolute, there is no object that can be raised. There is no ‘why’. For example, Why does 2+2=4? IT JUST DOES.
Although there are flaws in my philosophical talk, I think you understand my point. Absolutes = Absolutes. In some aspects you can say it’s circular reasoning but if it’s an absolute it is circular because it’s true. Absolute truth is non-conditional. Absolution truth has no error, it’s has no end. It’s eternal.
Faith is called faith for a reason. Faith means trust. Trust means there is reason to not trust. Faith means there is room for doubt.
So, back to my original rant. I can’t stop having premonitions. No matter how hard I try. There is no switch to turn it off. Also, I’m not sure that their is a switch to turn it on. If there is, I’m trying to find it.
These premonitions happen through prayer, thinking, meditation, randomly, out-of-the-blue, through others words that trigger something in my heart, and in short, THEY HAPPEN.
I wish I understood why. I wish I understood how to harness them. I wish I could make it do what I want it to. I wish I could save a life. I wish I could move nations. I wish I could call down fire from heaven. I wish I could prove it to you.
But I sit here, tearful. I CAN’T. I simply can’t. I can’t. It hurts that I can’t.
I can’t tell you where the mafia is at right now. I can’t tell you why Africa is treated so poorly. I can’t pray that your child comes back to life. I can’t do anything of myself. I have no power.
Honestly. I wish I did. I’d change this world in a minute. I’d let the debt of Africa go away, build wells, bring education. Kill people that are oppressing others (and/or convert them to a healthy heart).
Although I don’t have power to control this. Although I have no idea how to channel this. Although having this ability kills me inside. I’m going to try to embrace it and bring to light, it’s power.
Since I’ve realized recently that I hate criticism. That I despise it with a passion. I won’t be blogging it.
I might create a secret blog to write them all down. Probably not on this domain since I hate the hosting company and I’ve found a company that is 10 times better on my other domain. I’ll probably go to such an extent to protect the writings that I’m going to make it on a secure server (SSL) and password protected. I’m not sure if I’ll block it with robots.txt file because that would reveal it’s location on the server.
The reason it will be on the Internet is because I don’t want it on my desktop. The reason being because it’s like something that you’d put in a safety deposit box. Also because I have a journal but I have horrible writing, it’s difficult to read and the ink deteriorates over time and sometimes I forget I’m writing in pencil. Plus I can write faster through typing and I have the satisfaction that I ‘posted’ something. There is a sense of achievement in blogging. If I were just writing something and saving it on my hard drive, it just sits there doing nothing. There is no sense of achievement.
Another reason it’s going online is because it’s portable, I can easily show someone everything in it.
If the premonitions continue (I assume they will because I’ve tried to have them stop), over time, it will be public, but that’s after I have the strength to handle the criticism. Maybe after a few thousand of ’small’ premonitions, I’ll have a case to some people. Then maybe over time, I’ll have a few people invited to ‘test’ these (maybe friends or family or someone objectively) and provide their feedback.
Honestly, I can only think of two people to share these with right now. But even now, I hurt inside by opening myself up. To be naked, hurts. It hurts because of speculation. It hurts because of ‘thinking what they might be thinking’.
So, I guess in some ways you can say, “Today, I’m publicly going private”. I hope to learn a lot in the future. Maybe find some people with the same gifting’ to share their experiences and wisdom. I don’t care if they are Christian or not, if they believe in creation or evolution. If they have the gifting’ they have the gifting’. And you should be easy for me to spot because you either have it or you don’t. It’s very difficult to fake it.
Throughout my life, I grew up without my father. He was never present nor did I have a father-figure in my life either. Briefly for 2 years, my uncle took me under my wing and spent time with me but even that was rare and nothing solid.
God changed my life when I was 16 and for the past 5 years I’ve been learning how things should be done (I’m 21). I’ve seen many men (trying to learn from them, even in the minor situations) and too many times I’ve seen men do nothing.
For me, I watched how men would act to learn how they acted and glean the good stuff. For example, I would see someone yell at his wife and he’d do nothing. Then I watched how the wife would call the husband a ‘jerk’ or give him a mean glare. Obviously he did wrong, but he didn’t accept/realize it.
Other times, family issues would happen, yet the ‘father’ of the family would say nothing and let the issues remain. Over time, they have become destructive and spawned evil. I mean EVIL, I don’t mean wickedness, I’m talking about someone with the intention to harm is spawned from passivity.
I haven’t seen even one situation where being passive has been beneficial to someone. Not one. Most of the time, it involves a man doing nothing. Not speaking up. Not getting pissed off. Not punching someone in the face. Not being diplomatic. Not exercising his authority.
Now, there have been other times, it’s a women in leadership not acting but their issue has been fear. Fear of what others would think of her. (from my experience). But this isn’t time for doubt. It’s time to act and stand up for love.
I’m not talking about someone stares at you and you pound their face in. I’m talking about how someone demeans, demoralizes, degrades, or speaks down to anyone you love in any way. I’m sure there are other issues men have been passive about but this one recurs, quiet often.
So, although I don’t encourage killing someone or beating someone’s face in. I do encourage defending others. Defending your friends, family, and loved ones. If you have to beat the shit out of someone, to protect them, by all means, do so. But, try the gentle way at first. Give the person grace. Warn them. But, when it’s passed a certain point (after you gave them grace…and warned them…) feel free to deliver what you’ve promised.
It’s called justice and love. It’s justice because they are afflicting another and deserve to be punished, in the same manner. It’s love because your not doing it out of hate, your doing it out of love. You love your friends and family. Your not doing it to protect your ego, your protecting others. For someone to be so passive where they won’t act upon injustice, I think is showing that your not a protector and that you DONT love those who are being persecuted. Yes, vengeance is God’s but maybe your the vessel of protecting. Are you?
Many times people ask tough questions “Why did God allow this to happen to me?” This answer isn’t looking for a logic response (at least 90% of the time). Logic doesn’t satisfy our souls. If we are asking a deep question we need a deep response. Something more simply “I don’t know, It’s God’s will”. In many situations, the answer, from you, should be silence.
Silence is powerful, it gives time to be introspective and meditate (think about something deeply…) about the situation. If someone else is involved, your presence can be more powerful than any words uttered. Shutting up and letting them talk can be more powerful than 1,000 lectures about their situation, no matter what you say, truth or error, presence is simply more powerful in difficult situations.
So, if your friend is going through a rough time, shut up and listen. If you have that ‘erie silence’ ENJOY IT! because it’s healing to the person! It might be uncomfortable but it’s the right thing to do in many situations. A few times I’ve had friends beg me to answer “why….this” (and I’ve asked on many occasions) and the best response, many of the times, was to let them vent, let them express themselves and just watch listen and acknowledge their frustration. Don’t just be 100% silent, acknowledge their pain. Grunt, say yes, just do something to acknowledge their pain when they make heart-felt points.
Outside of friend situations (or even strangers), what about you? What about your personal life? Have you ever tried to be quiet?
I’ve learned over the years that I’m an introvert. So when I’m in a crowd I’m quiet but with friends I disclose myself to them and share a lot. Sometimes I steam-roll the conversation and just take it all by storm. Sharing everything, with numerous details. I’m trying to shut up and allow time for others but sometimes I get caught up in the moment of my life and take too much control over a conversation. I talk more than ask questions.
There needs to be balance. Talk but be silent. In every area of life. I have no words to say……..weird…like I wrote a lot…then lots words to say. Eh. Tis life.
Being in online marketing and learning what’s effective and why made me rethink a lot about the way that church is done and why it’s dying fast. Being passionate and emotional about something helps (it’s mainly why the pentecostals are growing rapidly…main natural reason) but much of the church is declining rapidly throughout America.
Is the Gospel no longer relevant? Is Science replacing God? Is Atheism too powerful to argue against? No. No. and No. Point blank, the people are identifying the message anymore. Typically you could talk in a authoritarian voice and people would follow you but no so in the church anymore. People have become glazed by the message, be it good or bad.
Why are they glazed about pulpit messages? They have lost respect, honor, and admiration for the clergy, therefore the church. Not only that, many pastors speak in Greek and Hebrew but they can’t break it down to common-day American English. Pastors speak messages that people can’t identify with. The bible is clear “to a Jew, I am a Jew”, so when we are among different cultures we should shape HOW we communicate the message, not the message itself.
Some reformed christians will be like “No, the issue is the message has changed”. Eh, it’s partly an issue but not as big as you think, liberal churches that deny Christ=God is few and far between.
Declining churches and mini-history of the dialogue
So, we have an issue, obviously, of declining church members/converts. I think the issue is the METHOD in how the church communicates the gospel. We are preaching AT people and not TO people. We are being authoritarian and not speaking as a humble servant.
For America specifically, I think churches should change their cultures/services to include a dialogue. I say this because it’s extremely biblical and because it’s effective (as seen by the internet). The bible states all believers are priests. This new status is a high privilege, that once only a selected group of a few people, literally you had to be a VERY VERY rare person to become a priest. Chosen by God, meeting numerous specifics, and you got to hear God, while others couldn’t, you had a direct line to God. Now we all do, as new believers.
In addition to this, priests, before Christ and even now, had discussions to discuss doctrine and beliefs. The power to “bind and lose” that Peter was given (by Christ), was actually the power to pick doctrine. He was saying, when the church agrees “x means this…..”, that is what it is. So, this means that the CHURCH (everyone…since we are all priests) has the power to discuss and debate doctrine. Not an elite hierarchy.
Again, NOT AN ELITE HIERARCHY. Meaning, the web designer, the tax collector, the mailman, and the priest have EQUAL authority to talk and make doctrine. This idea is somewhat new (from my understanding), the only group of people, other than the early church, is Quakers but they even have somewhat strayed away from this. I’m not a Quaker but I like some solid methodologies they promote.
So, within OT times, priests would get together to discuss doctrine and say “yes on this, no on this, etc”. Now today and for the past 2,000 years, Christians have had this GOD-given authority but have been suppressed from it for about 1,700 years.
How can we walk this out today?
Encourage dialogue within church services. Have vocal feedback at the end of the message and allow questions and any random comments.
Let others speak. Yes…even the former stripper and high school teacher.
Have discussions with people as your “lecture”. Basically have a debate while everyone watches.
Let atheists, anti-Christians, and any other non-Christian groups to speak.
Think about other ways to involve people.
Conclusion
I could support all this with Scripture but I don’t have time to find them all. I’m sure I could within 30 minutes but any pastor or christian wanting to learn more just look up contextualization and dialogue. I forgot the hebrew words for Jewish dialogue but I’m sure you can find it or maybe ask a Christian professor. I doubt this will ever come about but it would be awesome to see the church shine as the way Christ intended.
Simply put, according to science, there are no facts, there are no absolutes. The closest thing science gets to a ‘fact’ is called a LAW. For example, you know the reason why we don’t float away from earth? It’s called gravity, or more technically, the LAW of Gravity. It’s not called the fact of gravity, not the truth of gravity, nothing more than the LAW of Gravity.
What is a LAW? A law is the closest thing to ‘fact’ and ‘absolute’. It’s 99.9% true, in 99.9% situations. When is it not true? Well, none. But remember science is understanding through a completely NATURAL, PHYSICAL, and TANGIBLE REALM. You can’t know the future in a natural, physical, and tangible way. There are no ‘assumptions’ in science. So, when is the LAW not true? None, but science doesn’t assume that it will be true in the future, so therefore, science takes a humble and natural route of the uncertainty of tomorrow. Tomorrow something might happen and cause gravity to just not work. Something, somehow, someway. In that case, gravity will no longer be a LAW.
But Evolution is a fact
So, when I hear people, from any background say Evolution is fact. I just stop talking to them about the subject because they obviously aren’t someone wanting to discuss something based on the principles of science. It’s very wise to let this argument go because in their mind it is ‘fact’ and they feel entitled to their ‘new found truth’ and won’t let it go even if you tell them plainly “Gravity isn’t a fact sir…how can evolution?” They will rant and rant. It’s very annoying.
But then, on the other hand, Christians saying Creation in 6 days is fact are very foolish. This is an impossible task because according to the 1st LAW of Thermodynamics, you can’t produce something from nothing. (From what I’ve heard from others, this is true…I’m no scientist…but I’m going on the information I’ve received; So, If I’m totally wrong about this, please comment intelligently) So, within the 1st LAW of Thermodynamics even the Big Bang Theory doesn’t hold weight.
But the Big Bang Theory isn’t LAW. Evolution isn’t LAW. Creation isn’t LAW. None of it is. Big Bang and Creation will probably never ever become a LAW, according to science, since the theory is going against existing LAW’s of science. Evolution holds more possibility to become LAW but it’s still nothing but a hypothesis. I’m not sure if you could even call it a theory because some friends (that have PH.D’s in Science junk) say that Theory means it’s about 33% ‘true’. Hypothesis are just a rough idea with no proof.
Another example: If for some strange reason, I thought the world was implanted by Alien’s and somehow the Alien’s did it all. I’d have to have proof backing every inch, every thought, answering every rebuttal, if I ever wanted my theory to become LAW in science. Science doesn’t make assumptions and science Alien’s are material and natural, it is a possibility it’s proven true and declared a LAW, according to science.
Within science, no idea is shunned. I don’t shun evolution. I just ask, Where is the proof? Science doesn’t answer a question, with another question. To science 1 + 1 = X The answer isn’t “Well, what about dinosaurs?” Although science must seek an answer for every question, it’s all one step at a time. No hypothesis becomes a LAW overnight, thousands, millions of scientists research and criticize every aspect of the idea.
If Evolution is true (as Darwin even wrote in his book) it would have million/billions of missing links from the water pond to the human. Today, we haven’t created a cell…..we have not even one link between an ape to a human. So, my question is how can something be ‘fact’ when it’s not a legitimate theory (33% true).
What Evolution is and The Only Aspect I BELIEVE is true
The idea of evolution is from one cell….it adapted and made everything you see. Therefore every mammal is a by-product of this one cell. Just because this happens over millions of years, it doesn’t negate the aspect of science. It must be proven, in every case. Everything that surrounds evolution is hypothesis un-top of hypothesis un-top of hypothesis. There is nothing wrong with this. This is how science figures out LAW versus hypothesis. There is nothing wrong with a hypothesis with other hypothesis surrounding it. But to call it FACT, much less a LAW, is a 100% black-hearted lie. It’s saying this theory is true, until proven other-wise. Actually, science works the opposite way, false until proven true. But for some reason people want to have this hypothesis true, so they spread propaganda to see that the people believe it’s true.
One aspect of evolution is true, that is adaptation, at least I believe it could be considered a strong theory or even a LAW. We adapt to our environment. Our bodies modify. The animals modify. For example, I’m on the computer a lot and I read a lot therefore I’m becoming near-sighted. Why? Because my eyes are adapting to the situations I put them through.
Conclusion
Basically, Science doesn’t have the answer to ‘where did we come from’, it’s still figuring out different theories and testing them out. Science cannot prove ’supernatural’ ideas. But evolution, without big bang, (which is Darwin’s original idea) is a solid idea to answer this question naturally, through science. One day, science might arise with an answer, but as of today Jan. 5th 2008, it doesn’t have an answer.
I watched the movie Religulous and Bill Maher says “I don’t preach certainty, my Gospel is that of doubt, I just don’t know”. In some ways, after watching the movie, I think it’s very hypocritical of him. Throughout the movie he isn’t playing devil’s advocate, he is a devil’s advocate. What I mean is. He believes the opposite of the Christian/any religious dogma. That is where his certainty lies, in anti-religious beliefs. If he were preaching doubt as gospel, then he’d doubt even his own thoughts. Doubting evolution, doubting creationism (he does), doubting as all aspects of beliefs, even atheism/naturalism.
I say this because Bill Maher isn’t trying to bring doubt to all, just to the religious communities. Which is fine, I have no qualms with this because any honest religious person (of any faith) will admit to doubt in their belief system. But I think if I were preaching a ‘gospel of doubt’, I’d doubt everyone and everything, not just one sect of belief systems (the religious crowd).
Why not doubt everyone who speaks and has an opinion. If someone says “Krishna did this”, why not doubt the sources and bring criticism to them. Why not doubt the law of gravity? Doubt doesn’t disprove something but it causes you to think (at least me…) critically about a topic and look at more than one side (your current side).
Doubt is healthy and Godly
Over the past 6-10 months, I’ve come to embrace this. I’ve come from accepting the reformed doctrines (Protestant and Pentecostal churches) where certainty is creed, yet it’s not Scripture. Where you can “know” your after-life destination. Yet Scripture isn’t as plain. Scripture is a combination of many books, from many authors. To say something is ‘plainly laid out’ is a difficult opinion to defend since it’s 66 different books with 66+ different intentions (by the author) and different cultures than today. I’m not saying Christians can’t be certain, I’m saying certainty isn’t reality, nor idealism. Love is. Love is perfect, yet knowledge is partial (1 Cor. 13:8-13). To say you have the ‘more perfect’ doctrine or 100% certainty in a topic is arrogant and prideful. Because ‘we look through a mirror dimly’ (vs. 12).
We can’t fully know anything but we can try our very best to figuring out things. But knowing that things are imperfect (our mind, our information, everything….is IN PART) is a humbling feeling. I can say “I believe in Christ…” with conviction but that is based off of partial information/knowledge.
Certainty isn’t ideal plainly because it’s not Scripture and I think Scripture is a good model to live by (only when the concepts of Scripture are looked at within context of everything it was birthed from; Scripture takes a little time to understand, looking at things at face value is almost impossible to correctly interpret).
Certainty isn’t reality because through Church History doubt is seen through ‘Saints’ and Christians throughout the existence of the Christian religion. Mother Teresa had her doubts God was even there, hearing her. Today most would say (religious or not) something special was surrounding her life, be it God, strange fame, or whatever but something above the norm happened to her life. To me, I say, although she doubted God was absolutely with her throughout her life, since the fruit of her work was so impacting for good.
No where in Scripture does it say one needs to be 100% certain of Christ to go to heaven. Faith as a mustard seed… is Scripture. Only believe is Scripture. Trust is faith. If you can trust a little, you’ll fall safely into His arms. A little, the size of the mustard seed. If your following someone…that is a lot of trust, even if your complaining along the way. You might say “I though we needed to turn right at the last intersection” but the truth is His way is perfect. We may not understand everything, we will have our doubts (since we don’t understand His intentions), but we are following… and that is important and counts for everything.
Avoid the extremes
Obviously, the more trust, the better but blind faith isn’t always smart. Because we look through the mirror dimly. If you can’t think for yourself, then you are in the path of danger. Christ has given you a brain. If you “hear the voice of God” say kill someone. Don’t take this in blind faith, use your brain. Obviously it’s difficult to follow something ’spiritual’ like God but everything is spiritual because you are a spiritual person, so use your mind, heart, and wisdom to consider all options and know why you made your decision. Have a reason for your ‘belief’ but be open to correction and be open to being 100% wrong in your beliefs because YOU DON’T HAVE A PERFECT MIND and you might’ve missed something. I’m guilty of all of this and it’s why I’m posting it.
Have faith! Doubt healthy! And think about things wisely!
If anyone needed a huge postfight bonus at UFC 104, it was Pat Barry. The heavyweight out of New Orleans, scored Knockout of the Night and Fight of the Night for 