Faith and Action

I’m REALLY trying to blog more. I love writing and I love writing about God.

But I’m a serious procrastinator.

Okay, the dear Abby section of this blog is over. What better way to break my procrastination streak than to talk about faith and action?

Almost, every week in my Sunday school class I push our Men’s Bible Study. But on the weeks that we are doing a service project I like to say “because our faith compels us to action we’re going to . . .” I love the idea that the Christian faith compels us to action!

Jesus talked a good game to be sure but he never shied away from action. My favorite verse to illustrate this is in John 2 when Jesus goes in and busts up the temple. But before Jesus the prophets were getting into the game standing up to the followers of Baal, the Philistines, etc.

True men of faith are men of action.

This doesn’t mean that men of faith unthinkingly take action but they always to take action because when you believe in something you act. For example, your friend calls you up and says “the new Doritos Taco is AMAZING! You need to try it!” So you go out and try the taco.

You trust your friend and you believe that what he says is true. Can you say the same about Jesus? When Jesus tells you to help the poor, protect the weak, and stand up for justice do you trust him?

So get off your butt and be a man of action!

Am I wrong am I right? Let me know what you think in the comments section.

Book Review: Christian Are Hate-Filled Hypocrites . . . and Other Lies You’ve Been Told by Bradley R.E. Wright 

I’ll be the first to admit that reading a book about statistics was would not be my first choice. But I chose this book alone on the strength of its title which is, in case you didn’t notice, AWESOME! This book is the 10th or so book that I’ve read with a group of friends we call the Broadly Thinking Christian’s Men Club. I have to admit that this book is perfect edition to this group. Wright not only challenges some of the most commonly held misconceptions about Christians and Christianity but does so in an extremely approachable and entertaining way.

Wright takes up the seemingly insurmountable take of trying to convince us that many of our “favorite” statistics about Christianity are often not as accurate as they might appear. Wright tackles these questions with wit, charm, and thoroughness. Each chapter addresses a specific subset of stereotypes and conceptions about Christianity. Do Christian’s behave morally? Is Christianity going to die out in the next decade? Are Christians racist? While we are all familiar with the standard answers to these questions the ones the Wright provides are insightful, convincing, and more than a little surprising.

No book review is complete without noting flaws and while this book was excellent it wasn’t perfect. I have only one major gripe with this book. The call to action is almost nonexistent. Throughout the book the thought in the back of mind was, “Interesting, now what do I do?” Should these stats make us content or worried? Should we tell people about these great stats or do we rest on our haunches? I dare say that Wright even dodges the issue entirely in the final chapter of the book. He simply tells us that now we can think more critically. But even that chapter is written with such finesse and humor that it’s hard to be upset.

How is it important to the Christian Man?

I would say that Christians Are is a great book for anyone to read. But since this is a blog for Christian men I suppose I should play to my constituency. 1 Peter 3:15 calls us to always be ready to give a defense of the faith. This book helps to accomplish that end. In addition to taking a closer look at statistics about Christianity he challenges us to think more critically. Wright points out that stats somehow bypass the critical thinking part of our brain and go right to the “that makes sense” part of our brain. But why should this be? The answer is it shouldn’t.

Recommendation

I strongly recommend this book for anyone who has ever heard a stat, anyone who is a Christian, anyone who wants to think more critically, and anyone who enjoys humor.

I’m starting up my blog again with. I know what you’re thinking,

“Here’s the return of the blog that nobody asked for.” 

True as that may be, I’m back. Deal with it.

I’m even starting up a new feature! Man-Up Monday. Wherein on Mondays I’ll share with you man knowledge. Some of it will come from my own brain, some of it will come from elsewhere, and some will come from guest contributors (any takers?) For that minority that wasn’t thinking the above statement allow me to introduce my first topic for Man-Up Monday . . .
Making a budget

Few things are more boring than making a budget. Not that that’s out of the way let me continue by saying few things are more rewarding than making a budget. Let’s take a quick look at the pros and cons of making a budget.

Pros

• You’ll always know how much money you have
• You’ll always know where you money is being spent
• You can adjust your spending habits to save more or less money
• You never have to feel guilty about spending as long as you stay in the budget.

Cons

• You’ll have more money than you know what to do with. 

As you can tell from the above list I really like using a budget. So let’s get started. 

Getting Started

Without a doubt the best way to make and keep to a budget is using Microsoft Excel or a comparable program. You can do a budget without a computer (who are you and how are you reading this blog?) but it is much easier with one. Excel is by far and away the best program. But there is freeware from Open Office that will do just fine. Before we make the sheet there are a couple of questions you need to figure out. Here are a few,

How much do I make in a month? (I do my budget by month but you can do yours by week.)

What do I want to save for?

What are things I have to pay? (Things like rent, food, and car insurance)

How much do I pay for the things I have to pay for?

Have you figured out the answers? No? Too bad we’re moving on any ways. 

Design

Sorry about the quality :(

Here’s a shot of how I set up my budget.

You’ll see that I’ve itemized every expense (blue arrow).

Itemize? That mean’s I’ve specifically noted every expense and subtracted it from what I make every month. By the way, you don’t need to know how poor I really am so I made up the numbers. But I assure you I don’t clear 60K per year.

Also, you’ll notice that I have tabs on the bottom (Pictured above, black arrow). These tabs further itemize all my expenses. Let’s take a closer look at the “food” tab.

I'll try for better pics on the next post. But you get the idea.

You see that on the left I’ve included the date (blue arrow), the place I spent the money (black arrow), and how much I spend (yellow arrow). You’ll also notice that the number on the right keeps going down. The reason it’s going down is because Excel is automatically subtracting based on a formula I put in.

Pretty cool, right?

At this point you’re asking, “how can I make an awesome budget like this?” I’m not gonna tell you this week.

Come back next week and I’ll get into the nitty gritty of making your own budget.

It’s good to be back . . .

Did you like this post? Did you hate this post? Just let me know your weren’t completely indifferent! Email your comments here.

*** We're getting a lot of traffic because of a post on TGC. I'm working on new material after a brief hiatus. Subscribe to my twitter feed for updates on our new blog posts. In the meantime enjoy this "classic."

Pornography. It is now ubiquitous in our internet society. No matter where you turn on the internet it won’t be long before you see scantily clad women and men. A few clicks from there an you’ll have access to hours of videos depicting strangers having rough sex with each other. But porn is bad, right? If you grew up, or are in, a Christian church no doubt you’ve heard this message. Even secular psychologists agree that as men and women become more interested in virtual partners they become less interested in their actual partners. So there, it’s settled. Porn is bad, both sides agree on that.

But not so fast, if that is the case why does porn remain a multi-billion dollar industry? The reason is because there is something we like about porn even though we know it’s wrong.

So how do we stop? This is the question that much of secular psychology lets us down on. The love or our partners and the compelling evidence about porn’s harmful nature are supposed to be enough. But it isn’t.

In the Christian culture we are told the God doesn’t like us to look at porn. Which is true enough (Matt. 5:27-28).Thus, we are taught to fear God’s anger. But the fear of God often isn’t enough to pry us away from the tempting glow of the computer screen.

Today I’m here to offer different reason you should turn away from porn. Here’s the reason, because Jesus loves you.

Why love?
When someone truly loves us it serves as a powerful deterrent against any activity that would hurt the one who loves you. Remember the first time your Dad gave you that “I’m not mad just disappointed” look? Mine came when I just didn’t show up to a job because I was too busy playing video games. I know for me that look hurt way worse than any beating he could have given me. When we love someone we try to avoid doing the things that hurt them.

God Loves Us
We see God’s great love in the book of Exodus. The book of Exodus tells us that God wants us to have “no other god” before him (Exodus 20:3). God said this because he loved the Israelites. He didn’t want to share his love with other, lesser gods. He had proved his love to the Israelites by delivering them out of Egypt. (Exodus 20:2). In the same way when a man loves his wife he doesn’t want her to have other boyfriends. We later see God’s love when Jesus died upon a cross (Phil. 2:8). So sad was God when he thought of his creation being condemned by sin that he sent his only son to die.

But Why Would Porn Upset Jesus?
Simply put when we start on a path to porn addiction we find something that we love more than God. Matthew 5:27-28 tells us that lust is tantamount to adultery. Now in terms of human relationships it is worse to cheat on your spouse than it is to watch porn. To God, however, your love of porn is replacing, or at lease weakening, your love of Jesus. Jesus died that we might be holy and sanctified (1 Cor. 6:11). When you give into the flesh God is sad and disappointed. Disappointed, because he has loved and sacrificed so much only to see you turn down a path to self destructive sin. He is sad because He created you for so much more than self gratification in front of a computer screen.

Great, now instead of fear I feel guilt!
The above is not meant to push us toward putting off sin because we “feel” a certain way. Rather, it is to get us to think about Jesus not as an abstract concept but as a real person with whom we have a relationship. Let me put it another way, Jesus is a real person who loves us. This is the real reason why porn is bad (I bet you were wondering when I was going to get to that). Do you believe that Jesus is a real person with real feelings that get hurt when you sin? If we believe this then sin will be an abomination to us. We’ll want to avoid it so we don’t upset Jesus.

Sin upsets Jesus but how does sin hurt us?
Susanna Wesley summed up sin pretty well when she defined it as “whatever weakens your reason, impairs the tenderness of your conscience, obscures your sense of God, or takes off your relish of spiritual things; in short, whatever increases the strength and authority of your body over your mind, that thing is sin to you, however innocent it may be in itself."

Porn hurts your marriage, your sex life, and your view of the opposite sex. More important than any of that porn provides a love that is something other than Jesus. Jesus loves you and wants what’s best for you. Loving porn more than Jesus hurts Him and those around us. Would a real man hurt his wife or mother? Would a real man hurt anyone he loves?

How does this help us become “fully man?”
It may seem a little touchy feely to talk about doing things because we love somebody. “That’s girly” you may say, but consider this. Every year men dress up in funny out fits and brave sub zero temperatures. I’m talking about football fans. To show their team, and everyone else, their great love they paint up their bodies and faces. Consider this less “girly” example. A man who loves his country might join the army to defend what it stands for. As men we do plenty of things out of love. We can, in a manly and decisive way, show our love for Jesus and others by turning away from porn.

So don’t try to cut out porn through power of will or great arguments. Because it just won’t work. Rather, remind yourself that porn is not a victimless crime and that somebody up there loves you.

Further Reading:

Your Brain on Porn

How Porn can Ruin your Sex Life – and your Marriage

The Song Jesus Christ Is Singing to You

Lust: Not for Men Only

Did you like this article? Is there something I missed? Do you have opinions? I would love to hear them? So, put them in the comments section

Theological Imperialism and the Black Community

Great Stuff from our friends at the Gospel Coalition.

Theological Imperialism and the Black Community from The Gospel Coalition on Vimeo.

"Guest" blog

Trading Up – from Cosmetics to Christ – Men, Expect More! | Faith Church Blog

This is great stuff. I encourage all the men to read this.

Today we continue our three part series about the God’s personality “flaws.” At Fully Man we believe that God is perfect. God doesn't really have personality flaws. What we are going to talk about are the most unpopular of God’s characteristics. They are unpopular, I think because they are misunderstood. In the coming weeks we’ll discuss God’s Wrath, God’s Judgment, and God’s Holiness. As we work our way through these attributes we’ll see that they are different but related.

The idea that God is sitting on His throne and he gets to decide whether we spend an eternity in Hell or Heaven can be kind of scary. It is a major contributor to the rise of the universal salvation heresy. It might be comforting to think that God will send everyone to Heaven. But can a God who doesn’t punish anyone really be just? The position that God doesn’t punish is not only un-Biblical but, the truth is, that it is a good thing that God judges humanity.

The Just Judge 

God is a perfectly just judge who is thirsty for justice (Ps. 7:11). We must start with this position or else we cannot make a case for the judgment of God being good. God always gives out the punishments that people deserve, no more and no less. What that means is that while it may seem there is no justice in the world God is working tirelessly to but the world to right and judge the wicked for their misdeeds. Isaiah tells us that “I, the LORD, love justice” (Ish. 61:8). The wicked will be judged at the end of their lives for the evil that they perpetrated in their life time and just will be rewarded (Ish. 61:8).

Knowing that God is a just judge we can rest assured that the wicked will be rightly punished and the righteous will be rightly rewarded.

The Two Justices 

There are two kinds of justice and therefore two kinds of judgment that God exhibits. There is distributive justice and retributive justice. Briefly, distributive justice means that everyone is treated equally (Example Ish.47:17) Retributive justice means that God gives people their “just deserts.” (Example Deut. 1:17).

God will judge (or bring justice to) the world and wicked. On one hand, God will eventually “put the world to right.” On the other hand, God will eventually punish the wicked and reward the righteous.

The best example of the two aspects of God’s justice working together is to imagine you are caught in huge riot. You are in the middle of the riot with your wife and all around you the world is falling apart. Looting, fire, violence, rape, and murder are all occurring. At every moment your life is in jeopardy. The only thing you pray for is that the police would come to restore order and punish those committing crimes. The type of prayer is prayer of God’s judgement.

When we pray for God’s judgment we are asking him to restore order to the world and judge those who are making the world bad. We live in a fallen world. All around us sin is growing more rampant and widespread every day. But we can rest assured knowing that one day God will come back and make the world perfect again.

Judgment is a Good thing 

If you are a Christian God’s judgment compels us to action since His judgment stems from His desire for justice. If God cares about the poor and defenseless why don’t we? God’s always seeking justice. Like I mentioned earlier, God’s wrath burns against those who would oppress the weak or exploit the poor. So, men, what are you doing about it? Do you have a heart for the poor? Do you get angry when the weak are oppressed? If you not you need to more carefully consider God’s justice.

However, the Bible is clear that if we aren’t saved were heading for Hell. Paul tells that “no one is righteous, no not one.” (Rom. 3:10) If we are not saved in the sense that the Bible talks about God judgment is VERY scary. As it should be, God’s judgment is supposed to deter the wicked. This should be a perfectly comforting thought for the Christian. Jesus Christ took our deserved judgment when he died on the cross for our sins. Paul tells us that “there is no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Rom. 8:1-2)

So here’s the question, do you believe that your sin puts you under God’s judgment? If you do you need to repent of your sin and accept Christ as Savior. It’s as simple as that.

The wicked will get punished and the good will get rewarded. That is a good thing. This is what human society has strived for through the centuries. But due to the inherently sinful nature of humanity a totally just society has been unattainable. But God will ultimately judge the living and the dead. We can rest easy knowing that we have a perfectly just judge in heaven that offers us a way out of condemnation for our sins.



Part 2 down only 1 to go! This one was tough to write if you have any questions or comment I’d REALLY appreciate them.
If you have questions or comments leave them below. Or send them here.