Don’t Just Thank God, but Praise Him Also

So I was looking through the Psalms trying to find something good to write about when I stumbled upon Psalm 117.  Psalm 117 is only two verses long, to which I googled it to confirm that it is the shortest psalm in the bible.  I thought this was quite humorous considering some psalms are pages long.  But sometimes long isn’t always best.

Psalm 117 reads: “Praise the Lord, all you nations; extol him, all you peoples.  For great is his love toward us, and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever.  Praise the Lord.”

It’s a pretty self explanatory psalm, but it doesn’t hurt to review.  I’m assuming David wrote this psalm as well, since he wrote most of the other ones.

But starting with the first verse, David is telling us that we must praise the Lord.  And why shouldn’t we?  Well that’s where verse two comes in.  David is telling us that we should praise God because He loves us, and He is always faithful to us.  Bam, there you have it.  Quite short and simple, which is what I like.

This psalm doesn’t really need anything more to it.  If you want more, I’m sure one of my other posts can help you out.  Thanksgiving is here, so of course we all are now reminded to be thankful for everything.  But I think that this psalm is extremely important because it tells us to praise God instead of just thanking Him.

Here on Thanksgiving we all thank God for everything that He has given us, but let’s not stop there.  Let’s praise God for everything that He has given us.  Let us sing and pray and rejoice.  But of course, we can’t just do this on one day, we should do it every single day.

I take a quick look now to 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18.  They read: “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Also short and simple, man I like this.  If I could add to the verses I would add about praising God as an extension to thanking Him.  When you thank and praise God, you should be happy.  God has given us so much, and that should make us happy.

The key word in these verses is continually.  If I could add anything to Psalm 117 I would put that word in there somewhere.  For we should always be thanking and praising God.  I know it’s terribly cliche for me to be telling you this on Thanksgiving, but it seems that God wants me to relay this information to you at this time.

I’m also getting some vibes that I should explain what I feel the difference between thanking and praising is.  When I thank someone, I acknowledge them and say thank you, and then move on.  When I praise someone, I acknowledge them, but put even more focus on them, and keep that focus on them longer.  I do something extra and out of the ordinary to let them know that I’m thankful for what they’ve done for me.

In any case though, we should be thanking AND praising God all the time.  God has a plan for every one of us, and though we may not like what He gives us at first, we must realize it’s all part of His plan.

God went through great measures to show us that He loves us and is faithful to us.  So thank God for all that He has done for you, but instead of stopping there, go ahead and praise Him.  Thanksgiving should be a joyous day.  In fact every day should be joyous.  God gives us each day, so each and every day we should be thankful for it, and praise Him who gave it to us.

God loves us and is faithful to us.  As everyone says on Thanksgiving, we should be thankful for this.  But in addition to what everyone else says, I’m telling you to also praise God for this.  Praising involves doing something extra; get down on your knees, raise up your arms to the heavens, shout to the Lord His holy name, worship through song and prayer.

Whatever it takes, don’t just thank God, but praise Him also.  🙂

Ascribe to the Voice of the Lord

So I was looking through the bible verse of the day websites, and I found a verse I liked in the Psalms, and then just started reading other psalms.  I came upon Psalm 29 and thought it was very interesting, and felt the need to share my thoughts on it.

The first verse is what caught my eye.  It says “Ascribe to the Lord, O mighty ones, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.”  Now I’ll admit, I didn’t know what ascribe meant, so I looked it up.  According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary app, ascribe means “to refer to a supposed cause, source, or author.”

What I get from that in accordance to the verse is that we are to give God all the glory and strength.  The verse mentions “mighty ones” in it, and I think what David means is anyone who has God in their hearts.  God makes us mighty people when we follow Him.  The verse also says “ascribe to the Lord” twice, to reinforce David’s point I think.

Verse 2 goes on to say “Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.”  I really like how David puts “due his name.”  God really deserves an enormous amount of respect.  You don’t really think too much about respecting God too much, cuz it’s almost a given.  But it’s something to think about though: are we giving God the respect He deserves?  Everything that we do is because of what He has done, so we should always refer to God for everything.  God is ever so holy, so we should worship Him above all things.  Actually to me, I feel that giving God the credit for something you’ve just done is a form of worship.  We should always be giving God the credit, and by doing so, we are worshiping Him in all His splendor.

Verses 1 and 2 go together, while I feel verse 3 kind of stands out by itself.  It reads, “The voice of the Lord is over the waters; the God of glory thunders, the Lord thunders over the mighty waters.”  It’s kind of a mysterious yet intriguing thing to think about the voice of God.  According to the verse, God’s voice is everywhere, in particular over the waters.  I like to think of the movie “The Perfect Storm” in this verse.  There were some ginormous waves and just ever so powerful and roaring waters just crashing over the boat.  And to think, the voice of God is even bigger and louder than that.  You’d never think to hear his voice in that noise, but if God spoke then, you would definitely be able to hear it.  Or even if it’s not volume loud, a thought in your head can drown out everything around you.  I just think that’s pretty interesting and awesome.

Verse 4 I think reinforces verse 3 while also adding to it.  It reads, “The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is majestic.”  In verse 3 we figured out that God’s voice is most definitely powerful, but now we read that it’s also majestic.  There are quite a few animals that could fit that description; powerful yet majestic.  Whales, big cats, horses, those are what I could come up with.  These animals are capable of destruction and power.  Yet when you look at them just swimming or running around, you just want to say wow how majestic.  Well maybe you don’t, but just imagine you do at least.  This is the same thing with God’s voice.  It’s extremely powerful, yet very majestic, and you’re just in awe of hearing it.

Verses 5 and 6 go together, and they are, “The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars; the Lord breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon.  He makes Lebanon skip like a calf, Sirion like a young wild ox.”  I’ll admit, I had to look some of this up, cuz I didn’t really understand it.  But from what I’ve read, cedars just refers to the trees.  And the cedars of Lebanon are a bunch of trees, but I guess this particular forest in Lebanon is especially abundant and full.  I feel that this big forest could apply to any big forest really.  Just think of a forest that you think to be really big and dense and not easily torn apart.  Well God’s voice has the ability to tear through it if need be.  God makes these places just shiver, almost like a giant earthquake is how I picture this.  Instead of plate tectonics making the earth move and crumble, it’s the voice of God.

This verse I think ties in well with verses 7-9.  They read, “The voice of the Lord strikes with flashes of lightning.   The voice of the Lord shakes the desert; the Lord shakes the Desert of Kadesh.  The voice of the Lord twists the oaks and strips the forests bare.  And in his temple all cry, ‘Glory!'”

Verse 7 is just really short, only one sentence, but yet holds so much in it.  Lightning is always considered powerful and can be destructive, but also very marvelous to watch.  To think God’s voice is like lightning almost brings shivers, both from fear and excitement.  Going on to verses 8 and 9, I go back to verses 5 and 6.  It’s almost the same thing really, just giving another example I guess you could say.  God’s voice is like an earthquake that can just destroy everything.  I think also of an extreme wind that flow through a forest ripping leaves and bark from all the trees.  Just powerful stuff going on here really.

I really like the latter half of verse 9, with everyone in God’s temple shouting “Glory!”  To think that God has the power to destroy everything in His path with His voice is just stunning and also somewhat scary.  But while His voice is extremely powerful and destructive to everything, it’s also majestic.  It is elegant and beautiful to behold, therefore you just want to shout “Glory!”

The last two verses, verses 10 and 11 go together visually, but I feel they are separate.  Verse 10 reads, “The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; the Lord is enthroned as King forever.”

This is interesting, as David is comparing God’s voice to a flood.  When God speaks, it’s just a flood covering all the earth.  But the best part is when the whole earth is covered and nothing is to be scavenged, God sits on top of it all as ruler.  It doesn’t matter what He covered up, what matters is that God is on top of it all and is our one and only King.  We are to put all our focus on Him and not worry about anything else.

Verse 11 is the ending and I think almost puts a twist on the psalm.  It reads, “The Lord gives strength to his people; the Lord blesses his people with peace.”

Ok now this is my interpretation, but I feel that all this stuff happening about power and destruction isn’t actually happening.  I feel that it’s what feels like is happening.  God gives us strength, and to give us strength, he speaks to us.  It could be just a simple conversation with someone, or like an actual miracle that happened.

When we get this feeling that wow I feel God is speaking to me, and I am now filled with strength, this psalm applies.  Like for me, I feel that if I am in need of help, and I ask God for it, everything seems to stop.  At this moment in time that I am asking God for help, I am giving Him all of me.  God wants to help me and will stop everything in my life so that I get His message.  For all I care, the earth could be completely destroyed and underwater, but it doesn’t matter.  God has given me strength and peace.

I don’t know if this makes sense to anyone.  Like the way I see it, I’ve never actually heard God’s voice and been on this earth as it’s being destroyed as this psalm is expressing.  But I have received strength and peace from God, and I have gotten these things because God is all powerful and mighty.  It goes back to the first two verses.  We are to worship God by giving Him the glory and praise.  God is everywhere, and He speaks to us through all of His creation.  By giving God the credit for everything, and only focusing on Him, we are instilling a relationship with Him that is unbreakable.

God’s voice is everywhere, and is powerful enough to destroy the earth.  Another way to think of it is when you’re conversing with God, the world around you just fades away.  God is speaking to you, so nothing else matters.  He is the ruler over all, and our focus should only be on Him.  So when He speaks to us, His voice just destroys the earth around us so that we may not be distracted by it.  This might not be even close to what David originally meant, or it could be spot on.  This is just my interpretation of this passage.

I think this psalm is also directing us to fear God.  He is ever so powerful and can destroy the earth in less than a second.  But he destroys the earth for us all the time so that we may be more focused on Him and give Him all the credit.  His destroying the earth is a beautiful thing.  As we are focused on God, He gives us strength and peace.  So basically, we are to refer to God’s ever so powerful voice to lift us up and gain strength and peace.

In other words, Ascribe to the Voice of the Lord! 🙂

Submit Your Humbleness

Hey everyone, it’s been a while since I’ve written, but here I am again.  Looking through the daily bible verses online, I came upon a verse that I thought was really good.  I then looked at the whole passage around it and realized it had such a good message, so I wanted to share it with you.

The passage I found was James 4: 1-12.  The title of the passage is “Submit Yourselves to God.”  That in itself is just an awesome statement, so let’s look at this passage and see what it truly means to submit ourselves to God.

The first three verses go together and they are:

“What causes fights and quarrels among you?  Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you?  You want something but don’t get it.  You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want.  You quarrel and fight.  You do not have, because you do not ask God.  When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.”

These verses apply to our lives so well.  How often have we asked for some material item and didn’t get it?  I just have to have that new car or that new phone or new gaming system.  It seems silly, but I think we all at some point have prayed to God asking for that car or phone or whatever.  We’re asking God with the wrong intentions and motives though.  We’re asking Him for material items to fulfill our worldly pleasures.  I hate to break it to you, but none of our worldly possessions will matter in the end.

The most important thing here is, when you ask God for something, make sure it’s worthwhile and Christ-centered.  Before you ask God for something, ask yourself first, am I asking with the right motive and reason?

Verses 4-6 go together too, and they are:

“You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God?  Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.  Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely?  But he gives us more grace.  That is why Scripture says: ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.'”

Hatred is such a deadly word, and James uses it here to make his point.  We must not tie ourselves up in the world.  The people of the world are very proud and do not associate themselves with God at all.  They give themselves all the credit and envy each other.  This nature is not of God at all.  James is reminding us that if we live like this we will be separated from God.  It is most important for us to not boast in our deeds and to be humble.  God gives His loving grace only to those who are not boastful and are humble.  It’s extremely hard to be humble, but we as people of Faith need to show the world that pride is not everything.

The next section of verses go right along with the last.  Verses 7-10 read:

“Submit yourselves, then, to God.  Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.  come near to God and he will come near to you.  Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.  Grieve, mourn and wail.  Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom.  Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.”

The title of the passage comes from verse 7 and it’s such a powerful phrase.  James is saying we must fully commit ourselves to God.  God doesn’t force us to come to Him.  We must truly want Him in our hearts and go to Him first.  As part of the gospels say, “Knock and the door will be opened.”  On our own we must resist Satan and give our life to Christ.

I think it’s interesting that in verse 9 James uses the word “gloom.”  The word gloom means sadness or darkness, and I think why would I want to feel like that?  But I think what James means by this is to put ourselves in an intense state of humbleness.  For once we are truly humbled and truly put God as the all time number one, He will lift us up so that we may worship Him with all of our spirit.  At least this is the way I see it.

The last few verses kind of wrap up this passage nicely.  Verses 11-12 read:

“Brothers, do not slander one another.  Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it.  When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgement on it.  There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy.  But you-who are you to judge your neighbor?”

When I see this last part of the last verse, I think of the one BarlowGirl song “Mirror.”  If you get a chance, definitely listen to this.  The chorus goes as follows:

Who are you to tell me
That I’m less than what I should be?
Who are you? Who are you?
I don’t need to listen
To the list of things I should do
I won’t try, I won’t try

They’ve got it right here, because nobody has the right to judge you.  God is the only being that can and will judge you in the end.  So don’t waste your time judging everyone around you, for you are basically not keeping God’s laws.  In judging, you are showing pride for yourself and not for God.  You needn’t worry about judging others because God will do it in the end!

So what does it mean to submit yourself to God?  According to these verses, the main idea is all about being humble.  We must realize that God is the almighty creator of this world.  God gave us our talents and abilities so that we may glorify Him with them.

At school and at work we submit papers and reports.  We put all our hard work and effort into these and put everything we are into them.  This is like submitting ourselves to God.  We must make an effort to give Him everything we are.

Being humble isn’t easy, but it’s the source for God’s grace.  All you have to do is just ask for His help to be humble.  With the right motive, God will give you what you ask for.

By submitting ourselves to God, we must be humble and give everything we are to Him. 🙂

Live With Your Heart

So it’s been a while since I’ve written, but I’ve been having some writer’s block.  I was looking at the bible verses of the day again, and one of them caught my eye especially.  The verse I found was Jeremiah 17:10 which reads: “‘I the LORD search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve.'”

I think one thing that’s interesting to point out is that this verse is in quotes, meaning that God is actually saying this.  This I think makes this verse more personal because it’s God actually talking.

I think this verse is pretty self-explanatory at first glance, but I would like to go a little deeper discussing it and surrounding verses.  Verse 9 reads: “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.  Who can understand it?”

This verse makes sense, cuz really, the heart is very hard to interpret sometimes.  Deceitful sounds too harsh of a word to me, so we’ll go with a synonym such as misleading instead.  People can be very misleading a lot.  Sometimes people act one way for show, but their hearts are on a total different path.  The fact of the matter is, we will never be able to truly interpret each others hearts completely.  But in the end, we don’t need to.  God is the final judge.

Right after verse 9 asks “who can understand it?” God chimes in in verse 10 giving us reassurance.  God searches our hearts and minds and knows everything about us.  He knows when we sin and when we do good.  And He rewards us for the good that we do.

I think it’s interesting on what He rewards us on though.  Naturally we’re rewarded on conduct.  If we behave good, we get rewarded and if we behave bad, we get punished.  It’s just like grade school pretty much.  But God doesn’t stop there.  Sure we can be good people, but that’s not going to get us anywhere.

The most important thing is the very end of the verse, “according to what his deeds deserve.”  This phrase is kind of hard to think about, so I looked up other versions of it.  The King James version says this line “according to the fruit of his doings.”  The NASB says “according to the results of his deeds.”  The NLT says “according to what their actions deserve.”

I think I like the NLT version the best.  Deeds seems too fancy of a word.  I like actions in this case, cuz I think it makes it better to understand the verse.  People shouldn’t just do what you say, they should do what you do.  It’s like that saying, “Actions speak louder than words.”  Sure we can talk the talk, but can we walk the walk?  I’m sure you’ve heard that saying before too.  As Christians, people see how we act.

If we live our faith instead of just speaking it, people will notice.  If we have accepted Jesus into our hearts, we should be living with our hearts, instead of just speaking with them.  As Luke 6:45 says, “The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart.  For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.”  So by living with our hearts, we can then tell others about the love of Christ and all that He has to offer.  That’s at least what I get from that.

Jesus says in John 15:8 “This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”  Jesus is saying that we must show the world who He is.  And to do this, we must show the world by our actions.  As Christians we are called to witness to the world.  This again is where the “according to what his deeds deserve” comes in.  As Christians we can’t be silent about our faith.  God wants us to share it with everyone!  And by sharing it and living with our faith we will be rewarded.

In Flatfoot 56’s song “Black Thorn” they sing “Walk the walk and speak what you mean to say. Face the facts. Keep walking day by day. Let the past die with the troubles of the morn. Say farewell to fields of thorns. Briars of blackthorns.”

I think this is a great wrap-up of what I was trying to say.  Every single day we must show others the awesome love our God has for us.  It’s like show and tell.  You can tell the class about an item that you have, but to have a greater effect you need to show them that item.  In this case, we are to tell people about the love of Christ, but also show them by our actions.  If we do this, we can be sure that we will go to Heaven and not Hell.

So as Christians, we must live with our hearts.  And when we live with our hearts, we can then tell the world of God’s amazing love for us.  As part of Matthew 15:18 says, “But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart…”  So when our hearts are right, then our words can be right.  Again, as Flatfoot 56 sings, “Walk the walk and speak what you mean to say.”

Maybe some of us need to check our hearts.  Are we acting as one of God’s followers?  Are we showing others through our deeds God’s love?  I for one know that I can do better.  I can talk all I want, but it won’t mean anything unless I act upon it first.

This is a really good verse to help remind us that God is very involved in our lives.  For if we live with our hearts, God will reward us.  And what more could we want? 🙂

 

 

Extol Your Tastes in Righteousness

Well it has certainly been quite a while since I’ve written anything, so sorry to anyone who reads my stuff.  I’ve just been really busy with finals, and then I’ve been working quite a lot.  But I felt the urge tonight to write something.

As I was looking around for something to write about I stumbled upon a verse that I liked, and I went to it and found that it was part of a psalm.  Psalm 34 to be exact.  Reading through the psalm I found I really like it and I want to share my thoughts on it.  The first three verses go together, and they say:

“I will extol the Lord at all times; his praise will always be on my lips.  My soul will boast in the Lord; let the afflicted hear and rejoice.  Glorify the Lord with me; let us exalt his name together.”

Extol is the name of a Christian screamo band, except I don’t think they’re still around anymore.  I’m not a huge fan of their style, although ‘The Blueprint Dives’ was a pretty good album.  Quick little story, I remember looking up Christian alternatives for secular bands, and as alternatives for Metallica, Mortification and Extol were recommended.  Let me just say that Extol is a terrible recommendation as an alternative to Metallica.  Mortification works, but it’s a stretch.  Anyways, back to the verses.

I think David really wanted to stress that he wants to glorify God.  He said it three times, just using different words.  He stresses it because it’s important.  I don’t think we glorify God as much as we should.  I think too often we just witness His creation, like it, and then that’s it.  What we should be doing is praising God for all the wonderful things He has created.  Think of all the people in your life, all the nature around you, and thank God right now for giving them to you.  For we are blessed people and we should extol, boast, and glorify God to the fullest extent!

Verses 4-7 go together as well.  They read: “I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears.  Those who look to him are radiant; their faces are never covered with shame.  This poor man called, and the Lord heard him; he saved him out of all his troubles.  The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them.”

If we seek God and put all our trust in Him, He will deliver us.  God is ever loving and will help you go through anything.  I love verse 5, which is the radiant one.  Like the sun that shines so bright in the sky, if we focus our eyes on God, our faces will shine with His love.  There is no shame in trusting God.  How could there be?  For we are saved if we put our faith in Him.  There is no shame in being saved.  Actually the shame lies with the unsaved, for they should be ashamed for not wanting God’s amazing compassion.  As long as we put our trust in Him, he will save us from our fears.

Verse 8 also goes with the others, but this one really sticks out to me.  This is the one I first saw which made me read the whole psalm.  “Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.”

I’m supposed to stick out my tongue and expect to taste God?  Well maybe, that’s what I first thought.  But looking at it more, I think what David is trying to say is that we should use all our senses to look for God.  God gave us our senses for a reason.  We can taste things because God wanted us to taste things.  When we taste good things, that makes us happy.  God wants us to be happy.  He also wants us to realize that we should be thankful for our ability to taste.  Now it may seem sort of silly, but next time you eat your favorite food, thank God for it.  It was He who gave you a liking to that food.  God is very powerful, and controls many things, even your taste buds!

Verses 9 and 10 go together also.  They say: “Fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him lack nothing.  The lions may grow weak and hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.”

Again, if we put our trust in God, there is no shame, and we will experience good things.  Actually I think good should be changed to great, cuz anything involving God is great!  God provides for us, and when we put our trust in Him, everything that we need will be given to us.

Verses 11-14 go together as well.  They read: “Come, my children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord.  Whoever of you loves life and desires to see many good days, keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies.  Turn from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.”

There should be no reason for us to hate life.  A lot of times we say it, but we should actually hate the situation, not life itself.  These verses are pretty self- explanatory; if you want goodness in your life, turn away from evil.  Now I know we all sin, and there’s no getting around that.  But we can at least minimize our sin by saying nice things and telling the truth.  Also we can try to find ways to fit peace into situations where there could be confliction.

All of the verses here are grouped if you didn’t notice.  And verses 15-20 are grouped together as well.

“The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their cry; the face of the Lord is against those who do evil, to cut off the memory of them from the earth.  The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles.  The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.  A righteous man may have many troubles, but the Lord delivers him from them all; he protects all his bones, not one of them will be broken.”

It’s a lot, but it all makes sense and is awesome.  This is where the fear of God kicks in I think.  And no I’m not talking about Showbread’s album.  Although it is a fantastic album.  But God wants to wipe out the unrighteous, the evil people, out of this world.  If they refuse God’s love, He will destroy them in the end.  It’s a scary thought kind of, and makes you afraid that He will just destroy everyone.  But he won’t destroy everyone.  God will save the righteous, for the righteous are those that put their trust in God and can taste his power, and are thankful for it.

I think verse 18 is kind of the odd verse out in this section, but yet it is still comforting.  “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”  There are many of us that have a lot of things go wrong in our lives.  It’s just one after another, different blows coming out depleting our spirit.  Well for those of you who have low spirits, God is with you.  There is no need to give up, even though giving up seems like the best thing to do.  God will never leave you, and don’t forget it!  As Go Fish sang:

I will never leave you or forsake you/You are mine and you’re My child/You can lay your head upon My shoulder/Let your tears fall down on Me/I love you more than you could ever know/It’s true/And that’s the way it will always be/So don’t you worry anymore.  Good stuff that song is, called ‘Lullaby Interlude).

Now when you read that “he protects all his bones, not one of them will be broken” do not go and jump off a building and expect none of your bones to break; I think David means this figuratively.  God will protect us through all our trials, and even though Satan will try to break our bones by making things go wrong, our bones will never break, for we have God on our side.  Satan will tempt us, but God will protect us from evil, if we are righteous in His name.

The last two verses, 21 and 22, go together too.  “Evil will slay the wicked; the foes of the righteous will be condemned.  The Lord redeems his servants; no one will be condemned who takes refuge in him.”

Condemned in this case is eternal punishment in hell I think.  It makes perfect sense though, if we become a servant to Christ we won’t have to go to hell.  Everything always comes down to heaven and hell.  I know it’s usually an annoying billboard to most people, but where will you spend eternity?  It’s such an extremely important question.  If we do not become righteous in the name of the Lord, we will not experience eternal bliss in heaven.  I know I mention it a lot in my posts, but I can’t really stress enough how great heaven is and how we should strive to go there.

I really like this psalm cuz it lists some very important points that we as Christians need to remember.  We need to remember to thank God and praise Him for everything that He has done for us.  Our faces will radiate with light if we put our trust in God.  Family Force 5’s song ‘radiator’ is a sweet back up to that verse.  But overall, the most important thing is to give our lives to Christ, and become righteous in His name.  For by giving our lives to Christ can we be saved and go to heaven.

Seriously though, next time you eat your favorite food, or something that tastes good, or actually something that just has a taste, praise God for it.  It’s a step towards righteousness, for we can’t be righteous unless we extol the Lord. 🙂

Pity Me, for Having Hope?

So I was in the math lab the other day, and saw this one guy working on a paper on a computer in front of me.  I glanced at what he was working on, and saw that “1 Corinthians 15:19” was on the screen.  Curious, I looked up the verse and this is what it says: “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.”

Now when I first read this I was a little confused.  Why should I be pitied for having hope in Christ?  Isn’t Jesus the way, the truth, and the life?  Where does pity come in here?  Well once again, context clues rule the day as I try to figure this out.

The beginning of this section is verse 12, which reads: “But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?”

After this verse up to verse 20, there’s a whole chain of things that would happen if there was no resurrection of the dead.  I think this is an appropriate topic to discuss since Easter just happened.  I think it’s worth reading verses 13-19 to see how much the resurrection of the dead actually means to us, so I’m going to list them here.

“If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised.  And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.  More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead.  But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised.  For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either.  And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.  Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.  If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.”

I think it’s worth noting that it mentions twice the fact that had the dead not been raised, Christ would not have been raised either.  And it also mentions twice the fact that if Christ were not raised, then our faith is useless.  We have faith because we believe that God will carry through with his promises.  There are places in the old testament where it is prophesied that Jesus will come and die on the cross for our sins.  If that didn’t happen, then what would be the point in faith?  If God didn’t do what he promised to do, then Christianity itself would be destroyed.

I think an interesting verse is verse 18 which says “Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.”  Our goal as Christians is to be alive in Christ, not fall asleep in Him.  One of my favorite verses is Romans 6:11 which says, “…count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”  If you’re asleep you’re not physically doing anything, but when you’re alive you can witness and do all sorts of things.  God calls for us to be alive in Him, not asleep.

Going back to verse 19 to answer my original question, we are only to be pitied if Christ were never raised from the dead.  Like it was mentioned, if the dead were never raised, our whole Christian faith would dwindle.  The people who never believed in our faith in the first place would pity us more than even the starving and the sick.  For having hope in Christ is the greatest thing we can do in this world.  If this hope is destroyed, our lives our destroyed, and we deserve to be pitied to the fullest extent.

But wait a second!  Verse 20 revives our hope.  It says “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.”  Firstfruits meaning to me the hope rekindled, or the meaning for praise and offerings.

The previous verses dealt with what would happen if the dead had never been resurrected.  The rest of the verses in this section deal with what will happen because of the resurrection of Christ.  Verses 21 and 22 go together, verse 22 defining 21.  They say “For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man.  For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.”

This alive isn’t the alive as I mentioned earlier.  This alive is referring to our eternal lives in Heaven.  Our physical bodies die here on earth, but by accepting Jesus as our savior, our spirits will remain alive and go up to Heaven.  Verse 23 is starting to prophecy the end of the world by saying when we go to Heaven.  “But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him.”  This verse is saying that Jesus will come again.  I think most of us are somewhat familiar with the tribulation, and verses 24-25 back up our thoughts.

“Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power.  For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.”  I really like verse 26 which reads “The last enemy to be destroyed is death.”  Satan loses in the end, and therefore God is the victor!  Heaven is devoid of death.  Once you’re in Heaven, you never have to experience the pain of death anymore.  Verses 27 and 28 just back up the fact that God is the ultimate ruler, and that he “may be all in all.”

Verse 29 goes back to the question of what if there is no resurrection?  “Now if there is no resurrection, what will those do who are baptized for the dead?  If the dead are not raised at all, why are people baptized for them?”  I believe we are baptized to help signify our relationship with Christ.  It’s sort of a way to repent our sins, and wash them away with the water we’re baptized with.  If Christ was never resurrected, then what’s the point of being baptized?  When people are baptized in water, they are pushed down in the water, then brought back up.  I like to think of Christ rising from death with this movement.  If Christ didn’t get raised from the dead, then this movement has no meaning.

But of course we know that Jesus was in fact resurrected from the dead, so that’s where we get all this meaning from.  Baptism certainly has a point today, and we can thank the resurrection for that!

In verses 30-32, Paul questions our lives without the resurrection.  “And as for us, why do we endanger ourselves every hour?  I die every day-I mean that, brothers-just as surely as I glory over you in Christ Jesus our Lord.  If I fought wild beasts in Ephesus for merely human reasons, what have I gained?  If the dead are not raised, ‘Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.'”

Without the resurrection, we would be engaging in more sinful activities than usual.  We are killed by the sin we commit every day; there’s no way to get around that, but because Jesus died for our sins we can be forgiven of our sins and try to lessen our sinful activities.  There is no reward from doing anything for human reasons.  Maybe we won’t necessarily be fighting wild beasts, but we have our own beastly temptations.  If we fight for only ourselves and for other humans, there is no reward for that.  If there was no resurrection, we would have this mindset of doing everything for human reasons and not worry about where we’re going when we die.  But because the resurrection actually occurred, we won’t just eat and drink waiting to die.  We will engage in prayer and praise for the fact that we’re going to Heaven.  Food and drink are extremely worthless when we’re on our deathbed.

Verses 33 and 34 is a conclusion of this particular section.  Paul says “Do not be misled: ‘Bad company corrupts good character.’ Come back to your senses as you ought, and stop sinning; for there are some who are ignorant of God-I say this to your shame.”

I think Paul is saying that he wants us as Christians to communicate with fellow Christians.  If we spend all our time in the presence of non-believers, our good character will diminish.  While I believe we should spend time with non-believers to help them become believers, I agree with Paul in that we can’t spend all our time with them.  In order to become stronger in our own faith, we should spend time with other believers.  These verses are like a wrap-up to help us to get back on track.  Easter is over, and most people forget about the resurrection, but I think Paul is reminding us to keep it in mind, because of the extreme importance of it.

As I talked about earlier, Paul gave a chain of events of what would happen if the dead were never resurrected.  These events are supposed to remind us that Jesus died on the cross and was resurrected.  This resurrection provides proof that God goes through with His promises.  This resurrection provides us with a promising faith in our Lord. Without this resurrection we have nothing.  But with it, we have an everlasting hope that there will be a place for us in Heaven.

Going back to the original verse I saw, verse 19, we can see that we are not to be pitied for having hope.  Rather, we should be pitied for not having hope.  For Christ’s resurrection strengthens all hope.  “And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.” (Romans 5:2)

So even though Easter is over, do not forget the resurrection, for it is the basis of our faith and hope in going to Heaven! 🙂

Living in Love

So once again I was looking through the daily bible verses websites, and I found a verse that I thought was pretty cool (Surprise!).  Haha anyway the verse is 1 John 4:12 which reads “No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”

Now this verse I think is self-explanatory, but it doesn’t hurt to look at the verses around it to help strengthen my take on it.  When I looked at the section that this verse is in, it’s all about love.  The words love, loves, and loved appear 27 times in 14 verses.  That’s a lot of love, almost an average of two forms of love per verse.  I think this is like this because the concept of love is extremely important and must be stressed for us to understand it.  Because this is such an important topic, I want to go through all of these lovely verses in this section.

Verses 7 and 8 read “Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.  Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.  Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

So the entire concept of love comes from God Himself.  God and love are practically synonyms, since God IS love.  If you have ever loved a person, than you have experienced the love of God.  I think of the phrase from Les Mis when I hear this, “To love another person is to see the face of God.”  The scripture doesn’t say this word for word, but it’s pretty much what it means, as far as I see it.  Going back to verse 12, no one has ever seen the actual face of God, but by loving each other, we can see His face through one another.

Easter is approaching fast, and I think verses 9 and 10 help remind us of what it’s all about.  They read “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him.  This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.”

I think it’s interesting to see that love isn’t just our loving and praising God.  While that is very important, the most important action of love that has ever happened to humans is that God sent Jesus to die on the cross as our sacrifice for our sins.  I think too often we just go along with the Easter story, and then forget about it once it’s over.  But Easter isn’t something we should celebrate once a year, it’s something we should celebrate every single day.

Jesus gave his life so that we may simply ask for forgiveness anytime.  The fact that God did this for us is an unfathomable amount of love.  God has such an enormous affection for his children, that he wants everyone to come live with Him in Heaven.  He made it easy for us by sending his son to die for us, so that all we have to do is believe in Him and ask Him to come into our hearts.

But there’s already a piece of God in us.  Skipping to verse 13, it says “We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his spirit.”  I believe that this piece is in loving one another, for we can’t love without God.  And God gives us the gift of love, which has bits of Him mixed in with it.  Going back to part of verse 12, it says “if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”  By loving each other, we can become closer to God because God is love.

Verse 15 and 16 say “If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he is in God.  And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.  God is love.  Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.”  How do we know?  Well we saw it in verse 13, “because he has given us of his Spirit.”  And in verse 14 it states “And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.”

We know about the love God gave us, because we can love one another.  The reason we can love one another comes from verse 19, which says “We love because he first loved us.  Because of God’s love, we are able to love each other.   And we rely on the love of God, because that is what will get us in to Heaven.  Remember the love of God is that He sent Jesus to die on the cross for our sins.  And we’ve seen that by loving each other, we experience God’s love, and so live in Him, and Him in us.

Verse 17 says “In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him.”  This whole concept of love is absolutely amazing, because if we love, then we are experiencing the works of God, and therefore can understand God’s love for us, so then we can accept Jesus and go to Heaven.  So by living in love; loving your neighbor, loving God, we can experience the greatest prize ever, that being Heaven.

I know I’m pretty much repeating myself here, but that’s what the scriptures do, they repeat things so that we can get different aspects and understand better.  The more we know about love, the more we can understand it.  The better we understand love, the more confidence we can get in knowing that we will go to Heaven.  In having confidence, we can get rid of any fear we have of not going to Heaven.

Verse 18 says “There is no fear in love.  But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.  The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”  If you’re afraid that you won’t go to Heaven, than you aren’t loving enough.  If we love one another and understand God’s love for us, why should we be afraid?  There is nothing to be afraid of at all if your life is based on God’s gift of love.

But how do we know if we’re truly loving or not?  Well verses 20-21 tell us.  “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar.  For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.  And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.”

Love is the complete opposite of hate.  There’s no love/hate relationship here.  You have to love both everyone around you and God.  You can’t just love one, cuz it doesn’t work like that.  If we hate someone, then we can’t love God and don’t fully know God.  If you knew God, than you would know that there’s no way that you could ever hate anyone.  Now I know it’s extremely hard to love everyone.  There are some people that I despise a lot, but now that I’ve looked at these verses, I think to myself ways of how I can love these people.  If I want to fully experience God’s love, I have to do my part in loving everyone around me.

God sending his son to die on the cross for my sins is just too amazing.  By seeing that He did this for us, we know that God has an unmeasurable amount of love for us.  We’ve just seen it in these verses.  In order to live in God, we must also live in love, for they go hand in hand.  By living in love, God Himself lives in us.  When God lives in us, we can show the world how awesomely amazing He is.  By living in love we can achieve the ultimate goal of spending eternity in Heaven.

At the moment I’m listening to the song “Redeemer” by the band Kutless.  I highly recommend you listen to it.  In the song, they are thanking God for giving us His son.  I think the best way to thank God is for us to love one another.  God loved us so that we may also love, why not go ahead and love?

As we celebrate Easter this Sunday, we are celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. Ultimately though, we are thanking God for giving us His son.  So don’t just end the celebration Sunday night, thank God every single day by living in love.  Cuz “if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”  And there’s nothing greater than that! 🙂

Perverse Gossip

So yet again, I was looking at the daily bible verses online, and I came upon one that caught my eye.  The verse was Proverbs 16:28, which reads: “A perverse man stirs up dissension, and a gossip separates close friends.”

At first glance I was like what the heck does this even mean?  I don’t use the words perverse and dissension every day, so I looked them up in the dictionary just to make sure they meant what I thought they meant.

Webster’s dictionary defines perverse as being corrupt.  It also defines dissension as discord.  Again, I don’t use discord every day, so to make it even simpler I looked up that, and discord is defined as lack of harmony.  Now I know what harmony means, but since I was already looking stuff up I figured I would see what the dictionary defines harmony as, and the one I like best is internal calm.  The next one I like is lack of conflict.

So now that I got the definitions, I can look back at the verse.  I guess it can be split up into two parts, the first part being “A perverse man stirs up dissension.”

Putting it into other words, you could say “A corrupt man stirs up conflict.”  Well this makes complete sense.  Evil people stir up trouble.  Maybe evil is too big a word.  I like to think of the part in Ricky Bobby where they’re at Applebee’s and the dad can’t stand things being perfect so he makes a scene.  This scene I think reflects this first part of the verse perfectly.  Some people just have to make a commotion and get all worked up about stuff, and mess up the harmony.

Another perfect example is Satan disputing God.  In the beginning there was a certain perfect harmony between God and the angels, and everything was just fine, until Satan comes around and has to mess up the harmony and disobey God.

Looking at these examples, I definitely understand the first part.  The second part of the verse I would say is “And a gossip separates close friends.”

Gossip can be a very dangerous thing.  Sometimes it’s meaningless and is discarded soon after hearing it.  Most of the time though, gossip can be very hurtful.

The first example that comes to mind is from something I actually watched today, that being Spongebob.  It was an episode that I’ve never seen before where to get more money, Mr. Krabs sets up a printing press at the Krusty Krab and has Spongebob write juicy stories for his new tabloid newspaper.  Now I never pay attention to the tabloids, I could care less really about the little things celebrities do most of the time.  But in Bikini Bottom in this episode, everyone reads these tabloids and discerns it all to be true, and therefore judge based on what they read.  Some of the juicy stories that Spongebob and Mr. Krabs come up with are really starting to hurt the reputations of some of the residents.

One example was where there was a photo taken of Mrs. Puff sitting in traffic with a cop behind her.  In reality, they were just sitting in traffic, but the headline of the tabloid said something like “Boating Instructor Caught in High-Speed Chase!”  When the fish read this, they believed it, and then nobody showed up for class, because they thought that she was a bad driver, and didn’t want her to teach them.  And Mrs. Puff was kind of depressed because of the lie that was published.

Maybe this example isn’t totally gossip, but I think it’s a lot like gossip.  Most of the time gossip isn’t true, as was the case in the episode, but sometimes it is true, but it’s very personal.  Actually the definition of gossip is revealing personal information.  In the verse it mentions close friends.  Close friends tell each other personal things about themselves that only they want each other to know.  And being close friends, they trust each other with this personal information.  But if one of the friends were to tell other people information about the other friend, it could prove ill.

I would think that close friends could trust each other, but every now and then sometimes some friends tell other people things about the other friend.  Sometimes it’s harmless information, but sometimes it’s really personal and probably shouldn’t be shared with other people.  By doing this, these friends that were really close at first could then separate and not be friends anymore, just because of gossip.

The two parts to the verse seem kind of different at first, but then if you think about it, if one friend gossips to others about the other friend, then you could call them corrupt.  They’re stirring up trouble, and potentially destroying a friendship.

Proverbs 11:13 says “A gossip betrays a confidence, but a trustworthy man keeps a secret.”  This verse backs up what I was just talking about.  I think we all know that gossip is bad, but yet we keep doing it.  Another really good verse about gossip is Proverbs 18:8 which says “The words of gossip are like choice morsels; they go down to a man’s most inmost parts.”

Gossip can really hurt, and can practically ruin a person’s life.  Of course we’ve all heard the saying “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but names will never hurt me.”  Names in this case is pretty much gossip.  Sure we shouldn’t let names and gossip get to us, but if people just keep gossiping about you and spreading lies, you’re going to feel some emotional hurt.

Nobody likes to feel hurt; we all want to be accepted and loved.  We all just want to live in a perfect harmony, but gossip is a corruption that destroys this harmony.

Gossiping about someone isn’t going to get you anywhere.  In fact it will break you apart from getting to actually know someone.  The golden rule can be applied here, cuz I highly doubt any of us want to be gossiped about, so why gossip about others?  I’m sure they don’t want to be gossiped about either.

Maybe I’m being a little rash here, but if the Bible says that gossip is perverse, then I think we should heed to it.  Never trust a corrupt person, because they will betray you.  It’s what makes a person corrupt, they just have to cause a commotion, and destroy the harmony.

In my opinion, I love harmony and would love to stay in it.  I know it’s extremely hard not to gossip about other people, but I encourage you that next time you feel the urge to gossip, refrain from it.  Think of the damage that you could be causing.  We shouldn’t be separating ourselves from each other, we should be bringing each other closer to ourselves.  If that makes sense.

I think these two parts were meant to be put together in the same verse.  I also think most of the time we think gossip isn’t good, but not extremely bad.  But I believe the Bible is telling us that it actually is really bad and that we shouldn’t do it.  Nobody is perfect, I mean we’re all going to slip something out every now and then, but I think if we really try and stop ourselves from gossiping so much, we could all experience some harmony together.  And that seems like a cool thing to me. 🙂

In God I Trust

So again I was looking at the bible verses of the day websites, and I found a verse that I thought was pretty cool.  Actually two verses, Psalm 56: 3-4.  But before I list those verses I actually want to start at the beginning of the psalm and then work my way through it, cuz it’s not that long and it’s a pretty cool psalm.

The first two verses go together I think.  They read: “Be merciful to me, O God, for men hotly pursue me; all day long they press their attack.  My slanderers pursue me all day long; many are attacking me in their pride.”

This psalm is written by David and he wrote it when the Philistines had seized him in Gath, so it makes sense for his asking of mercy from attacks.  But this can apply to our every day lives when we’re not being held captive by the Philistines.  People all around us attack us with sin each and every day.  Even though it’s not always a physical attack, emotionally and spiritually we’re fighting battles all the time.  Asking God for mercy is not a bad thing to do when you’re struggling.  In fact it’s probably the best thing to do I think, cuz who else to help you in your time of need than God?

Now coming to verses 3 and 4, they read: “When I am afraid, I will trust in you.  In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I will not be afraid.  What can mortal man do to me?”

God oversees everything and will help you in everything.  All we have to do is trust Him, and He will get the job done.  Verse four reminds me of our currency here in America where they say “In God we trust” on them.  What it says on the coin or bill is supposed to speak for everyone here, but in this particular verse, it speaks only to us as individuals.  “In God I trust.”  At the moment that you are afraid and need help, you’re not thinking about everyone else in this country, you’re only thinking of yourself and how you alone trust in God.  Once we put our trust in Him, there’s nothing in this world that we should be afraid of, cuz God is in control.

Verses 5 and 6 go together, and they read: “All day long they twist my words; they are always plotting to harm me. They conspire, they lurk, they watch my steps, eager to take my life.

These verses are almost a repeat of the first two verses.  People attack us by twisting our words around, and making us sin.  Satan is always trying to harm and hurt us and to trip us so that we fall into darkness.  But for the grace and mercy of God, can we defeat Satan.

Verse 7 reads of a punishment for our attackers: “On no account let them escape; in your anger, O God, bring down the nations.”

God is slow to anger, but I believe that this verse actually is a sort of prophesy for the revelation.  God will not let sinners escape from his wrath.  His wrath will be ever terrible and will “bring down the nations,” so to speak.  In the end only those who put their trust and faith in the Lord will survive.

Verse 8 reads: “Record my lament; list my tears on your scroll-are they not in your record?”  To this I believe that David is getting very emotional about this.  And who could blame him?  Either he’s in much pain, or he’s just crying because God is so wonderful.  Whatever the case, this psalm to him carries much emotion, as it should hit us in some way.

Verse 9 gives us hope, and it reads “Then my enemies will turn back when I call for help.  By this I will know that God is for me.”

All we have to do is ask, and God will be there for us.  When our enemies see that God is with us and that they will be defeated, they will turn back and run away.  And by them turning back, we can know that God is on our side, cuz there’s nothing else that would make them turn back then the power of God.

Verses 10 and 11 go together reading “In God, whose word I praise, in the LORD, whose word I praise-in God I trust; I will not be afraid.  What can man do to me?”

I think David here really wants to stress that God is THE only one to praise.  No other being on earth should be getting all the praise but Him.  It seems like you want to say, well no duh, but I think too often we forget that God deserves all the credit, not any of us earthly beings.  Again though we see the phrase “In God I trust.”  While David is being held captive or whatever from the Philistines, he never loses his trust in God.  He is putting all his faith in God and letting God do what He wants.  Again, with God on our side, we need not be afraid of anything, and no one can harm us, for they will have run away!

Verses 12 and 13 are the last verses, and they go together saying “I am under vows to you, O God; I will present my thank offerings to you.  For you have delivered me from death and my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before God in the light of life.”

Although we live in a time now where we don’t need to sacrifice an animal to give to God, we can still give our time and thanks to God.  These verses kind of wrap everything up in giving some proof as to why we should thank God.  As mentioned earlier, God will be on our side and rid us of our enemies, but God also helps us so that we may go up to Heaven and be with Him.  I know I’ve mentioned Heaven a couple times before, but I love doing it because Heaven will be the most awesome and most amazing place ever.

David was not killed by the Philistines, because God made it so.  God has a specific purpose for each and every one of us; God saved David from death, and as he should be doing, David is thanking God for this.

Whether it be something little or something big that we go through, we should be thanking God for delivering us from evil, helping make sure that we can go to Heaven and praise His wondrous name.

Reading through this psalm I think is very comforting, for it helps to revive our faith in God, because we know that He is always with us.

Next time you pay for something, or even just any time, say to yourself, “In God I trust” so that you may think of Psalm 56, and know that God is with you and will always be there for you.  O and make sure you thank Him for being there too. 🙂

God: Foolish and Weak?

So I was looking at the verse of the day websites again, and the first site I visited had a very interesting verse; that verse being 1 Corinthians 1:25 which reads: “For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.”

Now at first glance I thought wait, what?  God is foolish and weak?  Even though He’s still wiser and stronger than man, it still says He is foolish and weak.  Immediately I got my bible to read the context to see if I could find anything to help me understand this verse better.

Nothing is better learned in school than that of reading for context clues.

Anyways, looking at the verses around this verse, to answer my question, God Himself is not foolish and weak but he uses the foolish and the weak to help more people know Him.  To help explain this verse, you really have to look at the entire section from verses 18-31.

Verse 18 says “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”  This makes sense, for to the people who choose to not ask Jesus as their savior, the message of the cross doesn’t make sense and seems to them something stupid.  But for those who choose to accept Jesus as their savior, the cross and what it means is one of the key fundamentals of Christianity.  God is so great and powerful, that to send his son to die on the cross for our sins is just the most awesomest thing.  For God to do this for us, is just the epitome of His complete power.

Moving to verse 21, it says “For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.”  I think this is kind of hinting towards the “foolishness of God” part.  God isn’t foolish, but it’s through foolish things that he uses His wisdom to get people to know Him.

Verse 22 through 24 sum up the elements of wisdom and foolishness.  They read, “Jews demanded miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”

To the Jews and Greeks, to know God they would have to have wisdom and a bunch of miracles.  The crucifixion of Christ seemed foolish to these people.  They’re just like what?  Jesus died on the cross for me, so that my sins are forgiven?  This didn’t come out as a miraculous sign to them.  The cross was such a terrible torturous death, and to actually get to know God from that just seemed like a foolish idea to them.  They expected that to be saved, God would have some fireworks show and angels descending from heaven and a huge spectacular show.  What they got was Jesus dying on the cross.  They then realized that wow this was actually a big deal and really important.  This foolish thing that was preached to them was actually extremely powerful.

The wisdom of God to use this method of foolishness to preach to the world is unfathomable.  No wise person would ever think to do something like that.  So, it makes sense to say that “the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom.”

Verses 26 through 28 back up the fact that God has immeasurable wisdom and strength in power.  They read, “…Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth.  But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.  He chose the lowly things of the world and the despised things-and the things that are not-to nullify the things that are.”

To me, these verses say that God uses the untalented to open the eyes of the talented.  And I don’t mean untalented in everything, cuz everyone has a talent of some sort.  I did a previous post on that.  But not everyone is talented at everything.  Like take someone who is really strong and someone who is extremely weak.  I guess being strong could be a debatable talent, but hey, it could be.  But the strong person could be like hey I’m so strong and powerful, and not giving God the glory for it.  They see this weak person who thanks God for something, and they think wow, here I’m so strong, but yet I have not the strength to give God the credit.

God uses people in the most peculiar ways.  It’s always that person who is weak, poor, lowly, etc. that helps the strong, rich, powerful, etc. person to make them realize that they need to give God the credit.  Skipping to verse 31, it says “Therefore, as it is written: ‘Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.'”  For those who have a talent, let them use that talent for the glory of God.  I guess in other words to summarize what I was saying above, using your talent for God tells other people that they need to be using their talents for God.

Verse 30 says “It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God-that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.”  By using foolishness and weakness God has given us Jesus, who is our way into heaven.  By knowing Jesus we can become righteous, holy, and forgiven.

So all in all, this whole section helps to explain verse 25.  Verse 25 can be a misleading verse if not understood properly.  Again these are my interpretations, others can interpret it different from me.  But what I write is just what I get out of God’s word.

Now that I understand the context, I begin to understand the single verse even more.  It makes a lot of sense to me now.  “For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.”

We expect signs of strength and wisdom to come from God, and by expecting this we get nothing.  It is in what we see as foolish and weak that God uses His wisdom and strength for us to see Him.  I think that’s such an awesome thing, that God shows up where we least expect Him. 🙂