Are Christians supposed to please people? Christians often confuse “becoming all things to all people” as a command to try to please everyone so that everyone will give approval of that person. Jesus warned, “Woe to you, when all people speak well of you, for so their fathers did to the false prophets” (Luke 6:26 ESV). Pleasing others for their approval was not what Christ and the apostolic writers taught. In 1 Corinthians 9, the apostle Paul revealed that he made himself a servant to all to win them and he became “all things to all people, that by all means I might save some” (1 Cor 9:22). However, Paul also professed, “For though I am free from all, I made myself a servant to all” (1 Cor 9:19 ESV). How does a Christian reconcile Paul’s words with “I try to please everyone in everything I do” (1 Cor 10:33).
Pleasing God over People
Paul’s words did not mean that Christians are bound as people-pleasers, but that Christian seek only to please people to save and edify others. Paul also declared, “For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Gal 1:10). The approval of God over man is the key qualifier of any Christian’s effort to please others. Continue reading
Why did Jesus cry, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me” quoting Psalm 22:1 (Matt 27:46)? Some have thought that Jesus’s words for God forsaking him implied that Jesus went to Hell. However, Jesus told the thief on the cross that he would be with him in paradise that day (Luke 23:43). The idea of Jesus going to Hell is from an old misleading translation of Acts 2:27. However, the Greek word is Hades, which is the place of the dead. Furthermore, the Greek for “forsaken” in Matthew 27:46 is also in Acts 2:27 for God leaving Jesus’s soul in Hades — not Hell. That is a separate event than God forsaking by having left Jesus to experience death on the cross.
Why God Forsook Jesus on the Cross
Why do churches meet on Sunday? The churches in the New Testament met on the first day of the week. Luke reported this is the common practice of churches of Christ (Acts 20:7). However, is this passage all the Bible speaks about meeting on the first day of the week?
The Lord’s Day
The apostle John revealed, “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day” (Rev 1:10). This Lord’s Day is not the Day of the Lord’s coming evidently or the Book of Revelation would have been too late and it would not have been written because John was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day. On this “Lord’s Day,” John heard a loud voice behind him like a trumpet, and it was the voice of Continue reading
Occasionally, a sports commentator will reflect upon the relationships developed among athletes and coaches. They appear to look for something deeper than physicals feats and to a deeper meaning in human relationships. However, beyond human existence, sports have no lasting meaning. The same is true for how many approach life. Many just play life as a game.
Does the universe lack ultimate meaning in the same way? Unless acted upon by a force beyond the universe, the stars will eventually die out and the galaxies will drift into cold dark nothingness forever. Many cannot explain the origin of the universe or appease a meaningless end of life. For the secularist, there is no ultimate meaning of life.
What is the ultimate purpose of life? This question is not about what meaning that someone personally attributes to life, but what is the ultimate purpose of life.
Humanity Hopes
What will make someone happy Continue reading
Most Americans live their days with little thought of God. Their television and movies mostly ignore God. For the most part, the media ignores God. People have not allowed God in the workplace or school to avoid controversy and pursue peace. This is secularism.
The U.S. government ignores God. Political correctness has chosen secularism, which is the exclusion of thinking of God. Americans have bought the lie that secularism is neutral.
Politicians have little mind to think theologically about policies. Why should they? They must “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech” (1st Amd). In the process of ignoring religion, they think little about preserving this right of religion, because their thinking disregards God having a place in the state.
The Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God
The ninety Founding Fathers who formed the First Amendment were concerned that some would deceive the people to Continue reading
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