Reading from Friday, July 16

Over the past two days I have been to two sacred events in the Christian faith - a Wedding and a Christening, both were Catholic ceremonies. Now there are things about Catholocism that I don't agree with, but overall it's the same message and certainly the same God. Both ceremonies, oddly brought up the character of God himself.

During the wedding, the priest opened his sermon with this line:

"The supernatural stuff of which God is made, the glue which holds the Holy Trinity together, is love. In the same way, the two of you [the couple getting married], will become one - united through love."

That got me thinking. If God is the perfect image of love, not to mention he's actually made of love, maybe my understanding of love is wrong. God loved Israel. Therefore he protected them and coddled them through an extremely rough period of terrible twos. He fought off anyone that tried to harm them, then when he realized that there was no way for these people to ever redeem themselves, he came to Earth, as a human and allowed himself to be murdered by them. Because he loved them. But not did he love them alone anymore - his love was extended to the whole world on the day he was killed.

There was a very similar message of God's love at the Christening today and it just felt like one of those times where God was speaking to me. Where you get a message just beat into your head until you go, "hey! That's just what I was thinking about! What a coincidence!" Also, congrats to Lucas, Caprice and Charlie Deux on the Christening today.

Reading for July 16  <-- You can click this to read what I'm reading
1 Chronicles 22:1-23:32
This section retells a conversation between King David and his son Solomon. He tasks Sol with building the Temple for God and, after time had passed, appointed Solomon as king. What struck me was David's retelling of the conversation he had with God about the building of the temple:

⁸ But this word of the LORD came to me: 'You have shed much blood and have fought many wars. You are not to build a house for my Name, because you have shed much blood on the earth in my sight. ⁹ But you will have a son who will be a man of peace and rest, and I will give him rest from all his enemies on every side. His name will be Solomon, ^[a] and I will grant Israel peace and quiet during his reign. ¹⁰ He is the one who will build a house for my Name. He will be my son, and I will be his father. And I will establish the throne of his kingdom over Israel forever.

What sticks out there to you? To me it's the fact that God didn't want David to build the temple because he had committed so many violent acts. Now many - if not all - of these violent acts were ordered or condoned by God. Does this mean that God dislikes violence, but he's just got a really good poker face about the whole thing? And as many people know, you:

Can't read God's, can't read God's, no you can't read-a God's po-ker face...

It certainly creates another potential side to the story. Could God actually be that loving big teddy bear that I want him to be?

Romans 3:9-31
My hardcover Bible cited Romans 3 as a chapter that so deftly sums up the entire Christian faith. There is a metric ton of stuff here, let me see what I can get to...

Paul is extremely focused (at least so far) on the idea that everyone is sinful, no man is holier or closer to God's love than another, and all of us "fall short of the glory of God." He cites Old Testament scripture that reemphasizes that fact - a verse from Psalm states that "There is no one who does good, not even one" as well as a few other little bits and boops. Check out the rest of it if you get a chance, it's really cool.

Next is a definitive answer to one of my running questions, which is "What stuff can be dismissed as cultural norms of the time?" It is answered in a short paragraph where Paul talks about the relationship between faith and the law.

²⁷Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. ²⁸For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law. ²⁹Is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of Gentiles too, ³⁰since there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. ³¹Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law.

So through this new faith we are upholding the law. Now, critical thinking hat on, there are definitely some things that are indeed different. Gentile's inclusion in God's love and the removal of the cleanliness and sacrificial laws of the Old Testament. However, what I believe Paul means here is that this faith in Jesus Christ is how the law should have been written in the first place, in an ideal world. Think about it: the laws which I mentioned that are now moot, all had to do with keeping one self as clean and pure as possible before God so as not to entice his wrath. Now that layer between man and God has been taken away, and so too have the laws that required such formality between the parties. And I think that God's ideal lawbook from the beginning was a lawbook without those formalities included, and since Christ's death and resurrection, that is indeed the case. So believing in and following Jesus, we are living out the true, ideal law of the Old Testament.

Psalm 12:1-8
There are a lot of groups that like to talk about how "This generation is damned!" or "I've never seen such wickedness or disrespect! Back in my day people were decent."

I think every generation says this to the younger generation. Look, even David was saying it 3500 years ago:

 ⁷ O LORD, you will keep us safe
       and protect us from such people forever.
 ⁸ The wicked freely strut about
       when what is vile is honored among men.

Remember: people are terrible creatures. There are going to be bad examples of us in every generation.

Proverbs 19:13-14
 ¹³ A foolish son is his father's ruin,
       and a quarrelsome wife is like a constant dripping.
 ¹⁴ Houses and wealth are inherited from parents,
       but a prudent wife is from the LORD.

Family.

Alright, I'm feelin good about this stuff. And we're going to church tomorrow for the first time in a while. Very excited.