GO CELTICS

Ocean Views Aren't That Great

We are at a frightening time in our country, as we face severe economic troubles that are of great concern to everyone; but the greater concern comes from those who find security in their wallets, not their hearts. I was listening to a song “American Dream” by Casting Crowns (great band by the way), but any way it got me thinking. Has anyone built a sandcastle? (If you haven’t you’re missing out on some fun). Sand castles, although fun to build are also tedious to create; once you build the base and the towers and a wall, and a moat, it will often fall apart and crumble to the ground, or the next day you find your creation, your magnificent kingdom gone! Swept away by the sea and wind, all those hours wasted. When we find security in our wealth it can be like that. Life is all fine when you’re building your castle, and when you’re king, but when the storm comes, the wind knocks you down, and when the sea eats you up, you come back the next day devastated to see that your kingdom is gone, and that is when life turns around on us. That is when we see that the walls of a bank are not made of solid concrete but made of sand. Jesus dealt with this when He said “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy…” (Matthew 6: 19) and “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you” (Matthew 6: 33). If we put our security in something that will rust, something that can be lost or stolen we’re left with nothing when a storm comes by, but if we can put our security, our faith, store up our treasure in Heaven then we are truly secure. Money will be either spent or lost, stocks will go up and down, but God’s love and His gift to us will never change, and He will always be there for us.

You Can't Live In Church

I don’t know about you, but I’ve heard the people tell me to stay “constantly in prayer” and “always worship God.”These concepts sounded foreign, like something only monks up on high mountains have time to do. I never knew how live my life solely for God, how to eat for Him, god to school for Him, study for Him, play baseball for Him, how? Well it goes back to the question “what is worship?” To anyone who thinks worship is getting up at 7:00 on a Sunday, driving to a church, singing some songs, and listening to a sermon for an hour I just have to say THAT’S BORING! And it’s not worship. Too often we see worship as watching the Red Sox game. We get in and are hyped up and we sit and watch and leave. NO! Worship should be like playing in the game, being involved, and to do that you can’t sit in a church all day. Church is the body of believers, the body of Christ and worship is what we do as the body of believers. I’ll encourage you to look into your church ministries, mission trips, youth ministries, Bible studies, small groups, praise bands, cooking, even something like handing out bulletins every Sunday. And why stop at Church? Look into your own community: soup kitchens, visiting shut-ins, and that’s not all (who feels this is sounding like one of those infomercials?) any small act, anything that you can do to shine the light of Christ in your community, any act that glorifies God is worship. So I encourage you to be active, to wake up and say “How can I represent Christ today?” to look at everyone as a creation of God and to share the good news with others, that is true worship, and that is how you can “always worship God”.

See Ya In April

Well the Rays finally did it. They finally won; I guess they deserved to win. The Red Sox have fought their way through this season, near half the team was out with injuries: Lugo, Papi, Lowell, Ellsbury, Beckett, Shilling, Wakefield, Drew, Colon, and Ardsma got hurt and were out for at least a part of the season. Maybe if the whole team was healthy (except Lugo) they would have been a first place team and the Rays may have lost to the Angels, I don’t know. All I know (and all Red Sox fans will agree) is that I am happy the Yankees got bumped down to third place in the AL East and out of the playoffs. And I’m also pretty happy that the Dodgers were bumped out because I didn’t want Manny to win anything. Oh well there’s always next year.

GO RED SOX!

I really don’t want to ruin everything for the Red Sox but I will say that that was probably the best rally I’ve ever seen. I mean Big Papi with that three run homer. I was starting to say he didn’t have it anymore, and was more like Big Papa. And then Drew coming through with a two run homer. That was an amazing game. I just hope they can win it on Saturday; Beckett really needs to work on location. He may not have speed but if he can use what he’s got he can hopefully get a win.

Never Alone

I wrote a post in August titled “why does it have to hurt?” and now I’d like to add to it. I came to the conclusion that I don’t know why suffering is in the world, I know as a result of sin and the devil entering the world suffering came a long too, but I didn’t have an answer to the “tough” questions and I still don’t. I will only add this, not as a way to make anyone feel better about themselves, but as a message of hope to those who don’t have any. God understands what we’re going through when we suffer because He too suffered. Jesus went through the agony of having one person literally sell him out and eleven others running away, one of them, the most faithful, denying Him. He then was put on a mock trial, beaten beyond understanding, had His beard plucked out, and was forced to carry His cross to be humiliated in front of the entire city of Jerusalem. He then was crucified on the cross and watched His clothes be gambled away, only to be mocked more by the roman guards. I do not mean to “gross you out” if I did I am sorry, what I am trying to do is show you that when we suffer God understands us because He went through it too. Jesus was killed and abandoned, God watched sitting on His hands as His son was crucified. He understands our pain. When we suffer we aren’t alone, we’re never alone. Through the light and darkness God is never too far away. I don’t know why we suffer, and if anyone who reads this is suffering I’m sorry but there is no “cure all” solution, only an answer, and that is Jesus. I can only say one thing, God loves you, and He knows what you’re going through. One more thing to remember, it is not always the fact that we may suffer, but how we react to it that matters.

He Broke Our Chains

In my writing class we’ve been talking a lot about abstract subjects, one of my favorite topics was morality, and then what a good person is. I’m going to focus on the question of what a good person is. I wrote an essay on this, and because it was over two pages I won’t rewrite it here because you as a reader probably don’t really want to read my essay, and I wouldn’t either but that’s not the point, the point is what is a good person? In my essay I concluded that because morality is God’s law it is good, and if someone were to follow the law he must be good. From that we can conclude that we aren’t good from the beginning and become good (more on this later). But here’s the problem, honestly who has obeyed every aspect of the law? Who here is perfect? Simple answer, no one. That’s Jesus’ point when He talks to the rich man and points out he still lacks something- to think we can be perfect and follow the law at all times is legalism, and definitely not what God wants from us. But then an amazing thing happened, God sent His son down to earth for us. He was put on a fixed trial, and then beaten beyond belief and then died on the cross. We were dead by the law, and then had life through Christ. That is the beauty of what God did to us. Imagine that, if you had to be perfect to get into Heaven, and God graciously lent us a hand and picked us out of the pit. It’s not what a good person is, but what a redeemed person is.