Jimmy Page is thought of by many people to be a devil. After all, he studied the "dark arts" with Aleister Crowley, who was a "master dark magician". That just seems a little hard for me to believe. After all, what's to really fear? No one, not even Satan, is more powerful than God. Right? RIGHT?
I've been thinking about this because there is a lot of stuff, like Led Zeppelin, that I think is high quality but a lot of Christians think is trash or they think it's scary or has something to do with Satan. We can't both be right and I am convinced that I have every right to listen to a nice round of Led Zeppelin whenever I feel an urge. After all, didn't Psalm 100:1 tell us to "Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands"? And heaven knows I make a joyful noise when it is a beautiful sunshiney day and I blast my Zeppelin, singing "Tangerine" at the top of my lungs. Therefore I see absolutely nothing wrong with such music. Obviously the musicians were gifted with talent from the Lord.
Everybody kept talking about the "deceiver" on Saunday. We walked in late to Sunday school. We were trying to be on to time to church and wound up being about ten minutes early, which is really about twenty minutes too early at a church as small as the one I sometimes go to. First Born has about twenty-five worshippers on a good Sunday. But it feels like family because I was flower girl in the pastor's daughters' double wedding when I was five or six. I can't remember which one, but I was young. At any rate, we walked in late to Sunday school and all I heard was something about a story in the Bible where a man lies to everyone (and he tricks them too) and he tricks everyone to get all the way past St. Peter at the pearly gates and then he sits down at the marriage table supper and Jesus call him out. Basically goes, "Hey you, what you doing here?" because he notices the man is not wearing the marriage garment. And the was the jest of what I got from the story. I finally found the parable in Matthew 22 (and BTW learned that Jesus is to take a bride in Revelation 19:9, spoiler alerts would have been nice!) and I feel a little better now that I know that this marraige table was a parable. I was a little concerned.
The whole point of both Sunday School and the service that day went back to the scripture in Ephesians 6:11, about putting on the full armor of Christ. Ephesians is quickly becoming one of my favorite books of the Bible. It has a look of good quotes in it. Ephesians 5:18 is a great one. So over all, i was really enjoying my Sunday morning worship experience (because we got to sing 'O Happy Day', which my favorite) until the guy who was preaching (sometimes our preacher switches it out with the members of his family, after all, it's basically just a two family church) said something about baby Christians.
I hope you all know what i mean by baby Christians. I am a baby Christian. I don't mean little kids, I mean someone who is newly born in Christ. Someone exactly like me. That's what I mean. I do not take offense to this term. On the contrary, I am proud of it because this means that I do know Jesus Christ. Praise God! 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” Thank you Lord for that! I don't know what I would do without that chance. Brother Mike then went on to say that the only thing that baby Christians need to say is "God is good".
Continuing on with my Sunday, I was deep in contemplation of that thought when we wondered home from church yesterday after noon. Am I wrong to think that being born again should be a shared experience? That others might find the transfer from cocoon to butterfly as fascinating and delightful as I do? I don't think that the only thing a baby Christian should say is "God is good", but I do think it is the thing that all Christians should proclaim the loudest. I think we need to talk about everything that we are experiencing, other wise how will we learn? I was thinking about this when I came across an online sermon from Granger Community Church in Indiana, and I finally found my soulmate church. They opened will Kings of Leon, threw in some Chris Tomlin, played some Coldplay, had a Lego demenstration of King David's reign (complete with South Park-ish voice), and had tabloid headlines everywhere. It was completely too flashy. It was obvious that they were way too cool. It was everything that I would ever ask for in a church. Basically it was a rock concert with a sermon thrown in. But what a sermon! I learned more about King David yesterday than I have ever known in my life! And if God can forgive David for everything that he did and still say that David was a King after His own heart (Acts 13:22), then there is nothing but hope for me! God is good! And I strive more to be like him every day!
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Each church is completely different and you can find ones that preach the love of Jesus and are much more contemporary in nature that the more traditional ones.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that "baby Christians" shouldn't just say "God is good". I think that they need to continue to learn, but I also believe that new Christians can be wonderful witnesses of who God is. Too often, longtime Christians get passive about our Lord. They forget the fact that he says that he can come at any time. They think to themselves, "Oh, that person will never become a Christian" and therefore, don't try.
I think ALL believers should proclaim who Christ is.
I do think, however, that if a new Christian, or someone who has been a Christian since they were a lot younger, does not know the answer to a question from someone, they should just admit it, research (Bible or asking another believer for help in finding the answer in the Bible) and return to the person.
New Christian or not, we don't all have the entire Bible memorized and know it all all of the time. I say, "Share the Gospel, sister. Share it with anyone and everyone. Do not be ashamed and know that God is with you!"