Learn to crucify yourself!

Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Galatians 5:24


No one knows or can better explain the struggles we have in our flesh as the apostle Paul can*, **. He says the carnal mind is enmity against God*. While the world whispers in our ears to enjoy ourselves any way we can, Paul warns us not to be conformed to the world's way of thinking but to be transformed by being renewed in our minds*. He says, "if you belong to Christ then you ought to crucify your flesh with its evil desires". Picture this for a while; you are both the one being crucified and the one doing the crucifying. You are the one with the hammer and the nail and you are the one with the open palms ready to receive the pounding. Where as this conjures up a picture of some medieval monk flogging and torturing himself in order to attain salvation, this is not what the apostle means when he says crucify yourselves. He means discipline* and not abuse which has no value in making any progress but only gives one a false sense of pride and achievement*.

How are we to crucify our flesh?

Paul tells us to remind ourselves of how when we practiced sin that it was both fruitless and made us ashamed*! In today's world temptations and attacks can come at us from all angles and in various modes. Whenever lust or some other temptation crops up in our life we should go into a prayer/fasting mode*. This will weaken our flesh while setting us up for sweet communion with the spirit, His outpouring and revelation. At this time we should also open up God's word and start reading to remind ourself of God's promises. This will gird our mind for good actions and rekindle the fire in our heart. We should then find the particular scriptures pertaining to the area of struggle we are facing and meditate on it. This will help us understand how to position ourself against this particular attack.

Your flesh will resist and try to run from any and all kinds of spiritual endeavours and activities. It will resist waking up on Sunday to go to church and listen to God's word or you will find yourself dozing off just when prayer time comes around. But learn to muzzle it so that your soul can progress to that higher place that God desires for you! This does not mean we should not have time for other work or recreational activities. However, we should guard against our prayer time being stolen or squandered through watching flaky TV shows or other types of useless entertainment. We should be jealous of our time! Otherwise, like the disciples who slept at the most crucial time in our Lord's ministry(His passion), He might say to us, "Can you not pray with me an hour"


God's standard of Holiness

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. 12 It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.

Titus 2: 11
Further reading-------->What is Biblical holiness?

Why is it worth the fight?

The Social consequences:

So what? Why does all this matter? What is worth the fight?

The ruthless assassin Vincent played by Tom Cruise in the disturbing movie 'Collateral', says as he goes about his killing, "..Improvise, adapt to the environment, Darwin, ---- happens..whatever, roll with it". He says again, "Millions of galaxies of hundreds of millions of stars..each a speck on one in a blink..thats us lost in space" . This is part of his rationalization for the terrible things he is doing! Its not an accident that both evolution and the idea of a godless universe are used by the writers when they created this amoral fictional character. He believes he is alone in the universe and has no moral qualms about killing people to get what he wants. The question then, that should be asked is, How do these 'celebrated' scientific theories filter down into our psyche and affect the moral choices we make everyday?

Man, a law unto himself, Secularism

Evolutionary theory along with the big bang theory have set aside or altogether replaced the creator God making man seemingly unanswerable to Him, His moral laws or judgments! This has been and still is a huge split with monotheistic religions whose tenets include that there is a day of reckoning, a day of Judgment and accountability serving as a strong moral deterrent (when conscience goes awry*)! These scientific theories, at times overly presumptuous in their claims of having cornered the truth have garnered a faithful following. Together with anti-religion and atheistic philosophies, these theories form a wedge between genuine faith and honest science that seeks to ascertain the truth. Religious faith is being usurped its effectiveness as a moral & spiritual agent in a needy world. Some such philosophies have gone as far as to state religion to be a sinister plot by certain men to keep certain other groups of men under subjugation, making a "prison for their minds"!** This is seriously doubtful since the progenitors of these faiths were themselves poor or belonged to lower economic and social strata and getting ahead was never their motivation in preaching and establishing their message, "The Lord Your God is one"!

The Anti God age

Under the sway of the 'Evo-bang' theories and philosophies that permeate our world, man is left to make his own moral boundaries and decisions, making them up and changing them as he wills to fit his own selfish motives. Traditional social norms have been eroded and replaced by irreverent cultural mores leading to what one might call an amoral/immoral society and a type of a biblical Sodom that would unashamedly say, "Bring out the men so we can know them".

Therefore, "Thou shall not lie, steal, commit murder or covet your neighbors property" and other divine laws and tenets that were given to be honored and have served societies well in the past have been weakened or have a convenience clause added to them or are denied altogether! (Think of the divorce rate and the crime rate in western societies). Science has also been wrongly used to furnish some of the justifications(By painting a godless universe and by sometimes blurring the lines between right and wrong) for which certain moral and spiritual principles are to be abrogated for 'better' ethics and man made laws plunging us straight into an Anti God age (Anti-Christian if you will, to invoke Nietzsche) where we find ourselves today and where we have been for a while now! This might spell our demise! Unknowingly, we are cutting away at the pillars and limbs that support the very fiber of our society, its laws, education, its government and most of all the family structure! As it is said of the Anti-Christ, "He will change times and laws" . May God help us if we cast away and forget these eternal words and principles by which we were created that have upheld us up to now. Perhaps indeed the end is near!


Argument from design:
http://www.iep.utm.edu/d/design.htm

Is the Genesis story myth or fact?

Psalms 139:14 I am fearfully and wonderfully made

Q. What does the Genesis account have going for it that is superior to evolution and fitting to the observable phenomenon of life around us?

1. It mentions that our human species was created male and female. Where as in a random happenstance kind of origins theory, it is not clear why all or most species in the animal kingdom ended up with just the two sexes instead of 0,1, 3, 4, 5 etc.

2. It mentions that the female of our species came from the male. Men have x & y chromosomes while females only have two x chromosomes so the chromosomes to make a female were readily available in the male, making the Adam's rib story plausible. For one to go in the reverse direction(male from female) would have required creating a y chromosome from the female x chromosome. Granted both scenarios would not be impossible to the original creator one appears to be simpler! (we are not being chauvinistic!)

Symbolically, G(x,y) --> x,x would be a lot easier than G(x,x) --> x,y

3. It mentions the seed as a way of propagation in plants which is true in both animals and plants!

Psalms 139:14 "I am fearfully and wonderfully made!"

4. The genesis account mentions that the creator God fashioned man implying a deliberate shaping or formation similar to how a sculptor would create a magnificent piece of sculpture. A random happenstance type of theory does not explain why our face and in fact our whole body is symmetrical and seems to have esthetic qualities of beauty and structure which in turn are appreciable by the organ of vision which is our eye. Why isn’t our nose (which is necessary for one's survival as an opening for assimilating air molecules) malformed on the left side of our face, if survival was the driving motivation of nature as suggested by evolutionary theory? But all of creation seems to exhibit esthetic qualities beyond what would be needed for survival implying it was fashioned by someone well aware of beauty and meaning to imprint it all around us!People are known to have fallen in love because of how someone’s nose, chin, face etc looked. This double purpose in creation i.e. That of esthetic beauty beyond biological necessity implies a deliberate fashioning by someone rather than a random evolutionary occurrence over time.

5. It establishes that a certain compatibility was intended between certain living beings. For example: a. Between man and woman, answering the question why men are attracted to women biologically and emotionally b. Between man and his natural food source i.e. "fruit trees that are good for eating" which appear to have been made for no other reason than that very purpose(excepting for a sliding fall caused by a banana peel)! It is not so easily clear in an evolutionary model why living beings that supposedly evolved separately would be very compatible except that they were intentionally made to be so as the creation model signifies. Simply put, it answers the questions as to why men are naturally attracted to women and why we derive pleasureout of eating our fruit. Its inconceivable how an evolutionary theory can come up with a non convoluted explanation as to why these things are so(apart from claiming them to be coincidental in which case you can estimate the probabilities of that happening to be next to zero) except to get into minute biological details of how and why they seem to work in a way that is reminiscent of an 8th grade Biology class.

6. It mentions the elements within the planet earth to be the raw materials from which both man and animal were made. a. Having been made so they dissipate naturally into the ground after being deceased.

In conclusion, For a story that is supposed to be a 'myth' and 'outdated' the model of origins described in Genesis fits almost too well some of the observable phenomenon of life around us and therefore should not be dismissed so easily. In fact, one would be hard pressed to find a scientific fact that negates what it says, if one were to leave aside its moral and spiritual elements for a separate study. Therefor, it should be considered as a possible explanation to the question of how life started here on earth and should be given an equal opportunity to be developed in our schools and other places where such discussions arise. This is merited even if for no other reason than for the sake of freedom of speech and expression of ideas! So ask yourself, what are the evolutionists afraid of in such an endeavor? Could it be precisely because they are afraid it might supplant what they believe to be the right theory concerning origins?

Its also merited for reasons of morality. What we in general and our youth in particular believe about origins will determine the moral choices they will make in the future(Read following blog). Hence, we should not be hasty to eliminate the claims of these ancient texts as simply archaic and without use for our modern world. If we allow ourselves to be open we might indeed gain a lot knowledge and wisdom from them because that was the very intent with which they were written. I.E. "..To make the simple wise!"

http://www.iep.utm.edu/d/design.htm