July 28 2009

Number 30

VIEWPOINT

Does it make any difference what you believe?

A few years back Gallup polls reported that 20 percent of “born-again” Christians believe in reincarnation and 26 percent in astrology.  In another study, George Barna found that forty-five percent of those who claim to be “born again” believe that “if people are good enough they can earn a place in heaven.”

According to Spiritual Marketplace by W. C. Roof, “about half of nominally Christian baby boomers believe all religions are ‘equally good and true,’ and one quarter believe in communicating with the dead.”  Like the Israelites of the kingdom age, many who call themselves God’s people are syncretists:  they combine and merge any number of religious beliefs. 

How can we explain this?  Today’s culture tends to substitute feelings for objective reality.  We seek self-centered spirituality over the structured demands of organized religion.  With self-fulfillment the goal, people pick and choose religion, as if at a salad bar.  They seek spirituality from any belief system that provides comfort or meaning. 

The problem is that “salad-bar Christianity” often goes unchallenged.  The spirit of our age shuns absolutes, and this has made many who should be spiritual leaders reluctant to raise such challenges.  One minister summed up the problem bluntly: “The church has lost the capacity to judge between good and evil, truth and falsehood.”

Much of what passes for Christianity may suit the spirit of the  age,   but  it   isn't   authentic

Christianity.  It really does matter what you believe!  The Scripture says, “We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true” (1 John 5:20). 

I think you’ll agree we want something better and more genuine for our Cedar Grove family.

I look forward to seeing you Sunday with a Bible, a smile and a positive word!                                                                                                    RA  

Blessed Are the Peacemakers

BLESSED are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. (Matthew 5:9)

THE FOLLOWERS of Jesus have been called to peace. When he called them they found their peace, for he is their peace.  But now they are told that they must not only have peace but make it.  And to that end they renounce all violence and tumult. (Dietrich Bonheoffer, The Cost of Discipleship)

NOW PEACEMAKING is a divine work.  For peace means reconciliation, and God is the author of peace and of reconciliation. . . .  It is hardly surprising, therefore, that the particular blessing which attaches to peacemakers is that “they shall be called sons of God.” For they are seeking to do what their Father has done, loving people with his love.  (John R. W. Stott, The Message of the Sermon on the Mount)

BEING a peacemaker is part of being surrendered to God, for God brings peace.  We abandon the effort to get our needs met through the destruction of enemies.  God comes to us in Christ to make peace with us; and we participate in God's grace as we go to our enemies to make peace. (Glen H. Stassen and David P. Gushee, Kingdom Ethics)

NO ONE has ever been converted by violence. (Jim Forest, The Ladder of the Beatitudes)

MAKING PEACE makes us God's children — and kin to each other. (Michael H. Crosby, Spirituality of the Beatitudes)

THE PEACE intended is not merely that of political and economic stability, as in the Greco-Roman world, but peace in the Old Testament inclusive sense of wholeness, all that constitutes well-being. . . .  The “peacemakers,” therefore, are not simply those who bring peace between two conflicting parties, but those actively at work making peace, bringing about wholeness and well-being among the alienated. (Robert A. Guelich, Sermon on the Mount: A Foundation for Understanding)                                                                – Compiled by Richard A. Kauffman