"The Truth"

I have written many blogs over the last few years about what I call "The Fall of Christianity". It seems that more so now than ever people are utilizing the Bible to express their own bitterness and anger. The hate that is being spewed is being masked by phrases such as "THE TRUTH". Which is the premise of today's blog. What exactly is the truth when it comes to God's word?

As most of you know I love to read the Bible. I find great life wisdom as well as a nicely designed road map in which to try and live my life. I do not take the words of the Bible as literal truth and this is the reason why: for something to be considered 'the truth" it must be able to have factual basis. Let me go ahead in inject a disclaimer of my own. I am not saying the Bible is fiction, I am simply saying that describing the Bible as literal truth cannot be defended with facts. 

Over the last few weeks most of you have witnessed people spouting out scripture verses in an effort to elevate their own personal platforms. I find it quiet intriguing that those people only use verses that express hate instead of the one's that extend love. Once again let me disclaim here and now this, I am not saying that we should overlook portions of the Bible that make us uncomfortable, I am saying that we should learn to read and understand what the various writers of the books intended to say. 

Not to belabor this let me get straight to my point. Church attendance globally is in a decline the likes of which we have never seen. The ones that remain in the church will make every excuse under the sun as to why people are leaving. THE TRUTH is compelling if not down right simple. Thanks be to God we live in an age to where we can form our own thoughts and conscience with fact based research. The people that choose to follow Christianity are choosing to do so in record numbers with zero affiliation to organized religion. To further increase the decline the last few weeks people that were on the fence with their faith most likely have made the conscience decision to never belong to a church again. 

Instead of being unified in our love for neighbor we have seen people lash out in remarkable ways that I am confident Jesus would not be proud of. I wonder at what point the Christians will realize that they are driving people out of the church in droves by only expressing and exposing sin and hate. Trust me there will be people that say that "the truth is the truth", to that I say show me the facts behind the truth. Do not recite verses to me as the truth unless you have facts as to how they were formed. I love to study Bible history especially the early formation. If you are not aware of how the Bible came to be as we know it today please do not rely on faith or the teachings of your clergy. I urge you to do your own fact based research. This will not pour cold water on your faith it will actually enhance your faith and solidify what you have always believed deep down in your heart. The Bible is a book of love written by humans for humans. No question early on in Church history it was compiled to gain control over the masses. That method worked for years however people took advantage of that over the centuries until finally enough was enough. Now with factual information people can allow the Bible to come alive in their lives. 

There is a wonderful Latin term called "Lection Divina" which means divine lectionary. The teaching behind this is for each person to read the Bible and allow it come alive as a living breathing entity. Each life is different because God created it as such. Inside that creation is heart, mind, and soul that us uniquely ours. No two are alike yet they do have one resounding thing in common. We all have an inherent DNA of love that comes with us. That love if properly watered can flourish over a lifetime and leave behind it a trail of flowers so beautiful that others will want to experience it. On the other hand if that love is constantly being beat down with fire and damnation what is to follow is mere shell of humanity that leaves behind a baron wasteland of weeds. I believe that if you read the Bible and allow yourself to feel the love behind the words that you will begin to produce a flower garden your mind so powerful that it will push out the weeds. 

I believe with all my heart that God intended for us to love one another. I also believe that evil will NEVER prevail over good. If you look back at history you will see all the periods that evil attempted to eradicate the love of humans and every time it failed to do so. I believe that it will once again fail and that the new generation of Christians will bring back the true depth and love that Christ stood for. 

I must include this because it is important. Beings I do not have facts let me go ahead and say that his is my opinion. We are NOT in the end times, the so called second coming is NOT just around the corner. Remember this is not fact it is hypothesis, at least I have the courage to recognize the difference in fact and opinion. Continuing on, as soon as Jesus ascended into Heaven the talks of the second coming began. Remember if you take scripture literally the apostles were told by Jesus "Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom" They were convinced he was coming back soon. Over the years preachers, teachers, evangelist, etc have been shouting the end is near. This fear motivation worked the first hundred or so times it was used but finally people got tired of hearing it. No they did not let their guards down and increase the level of sins they were committing,  what happened is they learned to not trust the prophecies of mere man. Remember every prediction of end times over the last 2000 years has been WRONG 100% of the time. 

Let me conclude this in the same manner I have done the last few weeks. I believe we are about to experience a renaissance of Christian love the likes the world has never seen. We are not witnessing the moral decay of society. Remember the way you chose to see the world is not the way the world truly is, it is the way you are. I hope you can chose to look around and see the awesome beauty of humanity and the immense love that is shared inside our communities and families. That love does not need hate mongers spouting out Bible verses in an effort to cool the flame. What we all need is to set our lives on fire with love and surround ourselves with people that will fan those flames. Love will always prevail over evil. Always has and always will. I for one will work till my last breath to make sure that I treat everyone with love and respect. I do not have to agree with you however I will respect your right to an opinion as I hope you respect mine. Once we learn that building bridges will do more than building walls I think we can all board the love train and go places we never thought possible. 

I will conclude with this story. There was a man that was so bitter with the moral decay of the world (or so he thought), that one day he was so distraught that we went outside pounded his fist into the ground and looked up to the heavens shouting at God. Do you not see all the sin and destruction all around us, do you not see the people dying of hungry, the brutal murders, the ugly sinners, etc. Do you not see the world is falling apart, are you not going to do anything this man shouted. 

In a gentle voice God said to the man "I did do something, I sent you". 

I hope you see the morale of that story, God sent each of us to promote his love for us not to exploit and expose sin. Love will conquer even the deepest wounds of society. People may be leaving religion in record numbers and that is fine but I believe this with all my heart, if we choose to express our lives with love even the ones we disagree with we will be part of the new wave that is going to sweep our nation and globe. Love is in the air my friends, that I believe.

peace to you 

Dale