Celberity Hypocrisy!

I saw something the other day that was rather disturbing.  A band that I listen to, Escape the Fate, just released a new album entitled “Ungrateful”, earlier this year.  I finally had a chance to listen to it just the other day.  Because I like to, I went to go to the back of the lyrics pamphlet and look at the “thank-you’s” that the members of the band give.  3 out of the 5 guys mentioned something about God.  Two of those guys mentioned God, or Jesus being a good role-model.  The other one said that Christ was his Lord and Savior.  Sounds great!

What’s the problem? My problem was with their lyrics.  8 of the 11 songs had the f-bomb dropped at least once in the song.  That is my problem.

Alright guys, if you are going to call yourself a Christian, you better act like one.  Some people may have a problem with their music, “How could a Christian listen or play that?” Some may have a problem with their style or appearance.  My problem is with their hypocrisy and yes I am calling them out on that!!!  Are they Christians?  Well judging by their actions, I would say… “NO!!!!”

“Jakob, you have no right to judge that!” Why not? Have you read Scripture? Paul calls his readers out.  If they are going to claim the name, they’d better live it!  I believe that yes we can judge another person by their actions, not their idle belief.  And when the person claims Christ, their lives are to be conformed to Christ.  Paul writes in Ephesians 4:17-32 of the Christian walk and what it is to look like.  The public display of Escape the Fate and their behavior does not resemble that of a Christian, based off this passage.

Let me be clear, I do listen to the band.  In fact I would suggest some of their material, because they make quality music and have some great lyrics.  If you don’t like them, that is fine.  Really all this is about is what they claim, “Christ”, and how they live, “not of Christ”.  They contradict it by their actions.  Unfortunately that is something that is all too often heard about in our culture, both from Believers and non-believers.

How do we change it? Match your theology with your life.  Your doctrine is meant to be lived out.  If you call yourself a Christian, than you better find what Christ says and you had better live it out!

Gender Hypocrisy!!!

Please allow me to rant a little bit, but do read on.  I have a problem with hypocrisy in an example that I will provide:

A friend of mine traveled to a local ball field to watch a softball game.  He went with his wife and his little baby girl.  They arrive at the field and the husband gets out of the car, he grabs two lawn chairs and places them where they will sit together, he then proceeds to sit down.  He leaves his wife to get the child from the car seat, grab to stroller from the trunk, set up the stroller, put their child in it, and then bring the stroller to where her husband is already seated.

To all you women out there thinking “Who would marry him?” Yeah he made a bad decision.  He made some dumb mistakes, especially when confronted.  Another friend of mine confronted him and asked, “Hey are you going to go help your wife?” To which he responded that, “She is fine.” Again a very bad mistake.  I could write numerous negative comments on his character and mistakes that he made, that go completely go against what Christ and the Apostles taught a husband should be and do towards his wife.  But that will be for another time.

So I talked to the individual, a female by the way, the neglecting husband.  She replied, “If my husband did that to me.  I would smack him.”  I quoted her verbatim.  Albeit she was sarcastic, but I confronted her on that.  I told her she shouldn’t hit her husband.  She replied that she wouldn’t and she couldn’t hurt a fly, then said she would verbally abuse her husband.  Again she was sarcastic.  I replied to her that two wrongs don’t make a right.  She says that she has a “right” to be upset, too which I immediately responded “NO!!!”  We don’t have a right to be upset.  It is not her right to respond in a negative, sinful way to his neglecting manner.  Let God judge him and confront him.  Too that, she scoffed and walked away.

Alright, my example is finished, let’s get to the point.  Scripture is Ephesians 4:26 says, “Be angry and do not sin.”  Does this passage give us a right to be “upset” when wronged by another sinner? No, I don’t think so!  When we are angry, the likelihood of us not sinning is slim to none.  We are sinners, no getting around that (Rom. 3:9-18, 23).  No, I think that this passage in Eph. 4 does not give is a right to be angry.  I think it’s a statement of when you do get angry, because you will, don’t sin! Can you get angry? Yes! Will you get angry? Yes! Should you get angry? No! I don’t think we have a right to anger or to being upset because anger leads to hate, but love covers a multitude of sins.

This is my first point.  (Really this whole post is in response to the conflict I had with my friend, this is not entirely concerning the neglecting husband).  There is no right to be upset.

Secondly, I want to move onto the sarcastic replies, “I’ll smack my husband”, “verbally abuse my husband”.  Okay sarcasm, I get it, I really do.  I’m trying to have a serious conversation, but she is trying to be funny.  But saying is the first step towards doing it and she is a sinner so it’s very likely she would do it too!

“But Jakob, she was sarcastic!” No I get it, I really do! But I really want to think about it.  If you are in Christ, He never tells you to repay evil for evil.  No, He tells you to repay evil with love.  Romans 12:9, Love must be without hypocrisy.”

By getting angry, or upset, at your spouse due to their negligence, it won’t help the situation at all.  It will probably, more than likely make it worse.  There are much better ways to address the problem, ones that involve love and don’t involve repaying sin with sin.

One final thing I’d like to address is gender roles.  The big bad word: Feminism.  My friend, though she will deny it vigorously, she has a very similar mindset to what would be dubbed an ‘evangelical feminist”.  Basically what that means is a woman claims to be of Christ, but she disregards the Biblical basis of the gender roles.

Why do I bring that up? Because if I ever said anything like, “I would smack my wife” or “verbally abuse my wife”, the things that would and could be done to me are so numerous because of the society we live in of “women’s rights”.  Even if I did so sarcastically like my friend did, it wouldn’t matter.  As males, as a gentleman, we just don’t say stuff like that.  Is it too much to ask the same of the females?

“Dude you are totally over-reacting!!!”  We complain about how much the church is conforming to society’s ways and conforming to their standards.  Let’s take a step in the right direction and follow after God’s way.  Let’s listen to what Scripture has to say about gender roles and here I am trying to take a stand.

Ladies, if you don’t like being treated or joked about being treated negatively, than please do not do it to us men.  Men the very same applies to you and treat a woman right!

Treat others as yourself!

That is all!!!

Devotions!!!

Matthew 16:17

*All passages taken from the NET Bible

I was reading my Bible the other day in the Gospel of Matthew and I came across a well-known passage.  Matthew 16, Jesus is asking the disciples who people say He is and the disciples who they think He is.  The disciples say that the people say He is, “John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, a prophet” (vs. 13-14).  Jesus asks the disciples who they think He is.  Though Scripture isn’t entirely clear who all spoke, it does record that Peter spoke up.  “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God” (vs. 16).  Jesus replies, “You are blessed, Simon son of Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father in heaven” (vs. 17).  Quite frankly there is a lot in these two verses (vs. 16-17).

First: Peter’s answer is covering Christ’s Deity.  Peter acknowledges that Jesus is in fact God.  I think of I John 4:15, “If anyone confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God resides in him and he in God.”  I don’t think Peter was saved because he said this.  I think Peter was already saved as were all the disciples, apart from Judas the one who would betray Christ, at their calling.  Of course they struggled and they were learning but they were following Christ and completely surrendered to Him.  Of course there were a few misconceptions that they had, which were later cleared up by Christ’s resurrection and the Holy Spirit’s indwelling.

But when the Gospel is presented and people claim to be of Christ, we will know a “Christian” by their acknowledgement of Christ’s Deity.  Christ is God, Christ is Lord!

Second: Look at Christ’s reply in verse 17.  He says flesh and blood did not reveal to Peter that Christ is the Son of God.  Look back again at Christ’s initial question (vs. 13).  He Himself alludes to His Deity by calling Himself the “Son of Man” yet only Peter replies.

My point is this, flesh and blood cannot reveal that Christ is God.  I truly believe that and I think it is proven everyday in our world.  The evidence for Christianity substantial and overwhelming, yet people continue to ignore Christianity.  Yeah, a lot of things were to blame, but number one is their sin and their state of sin, which is dead (Rom. 3:9-18, 23; Eph. 2:1).

Third: Who did reveal to Peter that Christ is God’s Son? God did!!! What a stunning truth! It is by God and God alone who allows us to acknowledge Christ’s Deity.

“Yeah but this is a special case, there is no way that this is the only way to acknowledge that Christ is God?” I’m sorry but I believe that Christ is the only way.  I believe that God is the only One who can reveal Christ to someone.  I believe that this account is a crystal clear picture of salvation.  God’s initiation leads to our acknowledgement, period!

Let’s look at a few verses, some of the more popular and prominent ones used to present the Gospel.

Ephesians 2:8-9: “For by grace you are saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift from God; it is not from works, so that no one can boast.”

A very popular passage that is always used to present the Gospel.  I love to use it, always using it within context and so I add verse 10, which says, “For we are His workmanship, having been created in Christ Jesus for good works that God prepared beforehand so we may do them.”

Let’s take a look at this passage.  We are saved by grace through faith.  We are saved by God’s grace, through our faith in Christ.  But look at the phrase “it is a gift from God.”  What is a “gift from God”?  It is our faith! Even our faith comes from God.  Our faith in our Savior has its source from God alone…

Oh and don’t forget verse 10!!!

John 1:12: “But to all who have received Him – those who believed in His Name – He has given the right to become God’s children.”

Seems straight forward right?  Wrong!!! As my Greek professor says, “Context is King!!!”  Look at verse 13, “Children not born of human parents or by human desire or a husbands decision, but by God.”

Hmm… sounds very similar to Jesus’ reply to Simon Peter in Matthew 16:17.  It’s not flesh and blood, it’s solely on God and on His Will!  Clearly John is referring to Salvation, as is Christ.

These are but two passages that have crossed my mind.  Yes, this is what goes on n my devotions.

Just something to think about…

What Mission Field?!?!

At Calvary, the school holds a missions conference every year in which a good 20 or so missionaries or differing mission agencies are represented all over the world. I really enjoy being able to talk to the missionaries, hearing stories and what God is doing wherever they are at.  I enjoy the conference except for one major detail.  To them at least, it seems like a huge time for recruiting for more missionaries.  It seems to be a recruiting week for most of them there, not all of the, though.  Instead of being invested in the student, they seem to be invested in themselves or their mission agency.  That is wrong!

I want to go into ministry, be a pastor.  They will ask me what I want to do and I’ll tell them, that I believe the Lord is leading me to that ministry.  And they’ll reply with a congrats on that and then the conversation will shut down, and they will move on to the next “victim” to try to recruit them.  At my church, we hold a missions conference, the same idea as Calvary, but at home the missionaries are sharing what the Lord is doing in their field.  Their focus is not recruiting, it is the glorification of God.  If there were missionaries that I would want to be following in their footsteps, it would be the ones at home because they are not looking to recruit me.  The big difference is the focus between Calvary and my home church.  The missionaries that will come to Calvary seem to emphasize recruiting whereas at home the focus is God!  I like my home churches missions conference because I am not being pressured to “follow God’s call into the mission field” because I know that is NOT my call, at least not right now!

I promise that this won’t turn into a rant against mission’s or missionaries, but there is a point to all this.  I would like to address the issue of unity within the Body of Christ! I have a huge burden for proper theological training and teaching within the Body of Christ.   That is where my heart is set.  We need that proper theology so the people can go overseas and spread the Gospel correctly.  We need these people in our church so they can train others who will go to the mission field.

I’ve struggled with Christians who place so much emphasis on overseas missions, that they forget about their church, which is what Christ built.  Why aren’t they sharing the Gospel with their neighbors here and what makes them think that they will share the Gospel overseas when they won’t do it with their next door neighbor?

The unity of the Body of Christ (Eph. 4; I Cor. 12).  Yes, the context of the passage in I Cor. 12 is on Spiritual gifts, but verse 12 through the end of the chapter is key on Unity.  Paul places emphasis on different parts of the Body of Christ and their unique abilities and function to make the body work.  We aren’t all called to be missionaries.  I believe God is calling me to the church here stateside.  You believe that God is calling to you Nowhereville, Africa, GREAT!!!  Good for you!!! I couldn’t be more excited for you because you are seeking God’s will for your life.  I am too, so don’t go to try to change God’s calling for me and I won’t do it to you!  I’ll gladly support you, asking only of you to do the same for me!

We are not all called to be missionaries, we are not all called to be pastors.  Find God’s calling for you and do it, supporting others to do the same within the Body of Christ!!!