What must we do?

“On the one hand there is the enormous growth of the Church, and on the other its almost complete lack of influence.” This statement rang loudly true when I read it. The inability to persuade and even minutely control the populace is largely evident.
As Christians we are commanded to work and toil for Christ, and as Noll says that modern Christian pursuit of knowledge has become an “anti-intellectual desire to play the fool for Christ”.
Translating all of this and filling in the holes with modern activities and you get this scenario: A missionary comes to a church and the members become “On fire for Christ” and send out three missionaries. The entire rest of the church does nothing other than attend church and pay tithes. Sure, they attempt to be lights in their mediocre lives but they do not suffer for Christ, they make no change, they wield no true influence. Let us say a member of the church attends a college and hopes to be a physicist, those who find out would say something like,

“Ah! So you want to fight for Creationism!”
“Well, no. Not exactly. I want to study sub-atomic particles.”
“But what are you going to use that for as a Christian?”
“I am going to study and better understand God’s creation.”
“But we are supposed to give everything for Christ! Do exactly as He commands.”
“And God has gifted me in an understanding of the sub-atomic universe. You have told me on countless occasions that you feel God has gifted you in working with children, why don’t you start a youth group or something?”
“Because, our church already has a youth group and besides I pay tithes and talk about Christ at work.”
“Well at the least I am using God’s gift to me.”

Highly intellectual ideas have come under heavy attack by Christian society. This has caused a noticeable fall of the effect that Christians have on society. Thus highly intellectuals consider most Christians foolish. Most if not all highly renowned physicists are anti-Christian. The reason for this? In fact, a certain writer has said about Albert Einstein, “He … looked at what the preachers said about God and felt theat they were blaspheming. He had seen much more majesty than they had ever imagined, and they were just not talking about the real thing.”

No Christian would disagree that Christians must spread the gospel. But, few will sacrifice their own security for His sake. This is evident in the lack of Christians excelling in things other than Theology. If they truly were giving all that they have into their gifts for the sake of Christ, Christians would be at the top of every level of intellectual learning.
That or there truly are no smart Christians.

Do Christians need to give everything for Christ?
Is it possible to make a change in the world for Christ without an amount of influence?
Is a little enough?

"No I want to be Ehud!!"

Something that is intrinsically good is something that is good in its own right. It does not have a definition as to why it was good, it is simply good.

Silence

Fellowship

Worship

Love

Creating something completely new

Darkness

Motion

Art

Persuasion of individuals

The mind

Combat

Justice specifically the process of executing it justice

Playing especially socio-dramatic (Your challenge is accepted….)

Laughing

Imagining entire worlds

Prayer

Discovery

Reading

Heroes with fatal traits, that are hated by some and loved by others

Adaption

This summer at New Life Ranch, I told the story of Ehud to my campers as a bed time story. It’s one of my favorite Bible stories, so I know a lot about it that isn’t in the Bible. Such as culture, the significance of left hand, inflections, and so on. So I got pretty eccentric and excited with it, and I was rather disappointed when they didn’t seem to notice or talk about it in the final moments of the night. I had no idea, however, that they whispered to each other till after midnight about it. The next day they loudly and excitedly announced to me that they loved this story and wanted to hear more or play an “Ehud game”. They didn’t understand socio-dramatic playing—playing pretend, roleplaying, make-believe—so during free time we got our group together, bundled a bunch of sword-sized-shaped sticks together, and went to the trail. I found a rock and gave the speech Ehud gave to the people of Israel, and then I raised my sword towards the trees and bushes and yelled charge…
We fought the Philistine army—foliage—for hours.

Think of something that is intrinsically good,but that you don’t usually do, or that you have not done in a while. Why haven’t you done it? If it is intrinsically good, shouldn’t it be compulsory to do it?
Can something that is intrinsically good, be an unacceptable activity?
If so, how could this come to be?

(Finally a post...)

The Synesthesic Miss Memorable

Dear Miss Memorable, I just thought I would let you know how things are going here. Everyone remembers you well; they all consider you a very successful person. In fact many of those that knows you dream of being as an accomplished student as you are. The memories you have left here have made a very large impact, from leading that youth group, to deciding to leave our church because your dad was a pastor and you wanted a dad for a dad not a pastor for a dad. Though the decision that has made the biggest impact was your decision to go to England to study art. We miss you! I keep remembering those good ol’ days when we worked together to teach those kids. The kids ask to play some of the games you mad up every single week, and they still sing those ridiculous songs you taught us! Your creativity was obviously excellent; I guess that’s a good thing since you want to be an art professor someday.
I think maybe the reason you have such a legacy back here in Lincoln Arkansas is just how many people you got to know and be friends with, but even those that barely know you remember something. It could be how crazy and quirky you are, or it might simply be that you’re love of God is blazingly obvious. Things at New Life Ranch are going well, lots of new kids this year. When one of the  older kids found out I knew you she later brought five of her friends to me because they all wanted to write you letters.
Apparently they remembered you teaching their cabin about King Saul when God told him to kill everything in a land that they were about to conquer. But Saul decided to keep some of the animals to make sacrifices to God later. Even though he knew Gods will, he thought he could do God a favor. It was touching to see how much it had affected their lives in the past few years. They really understand that working for God is nothing compared to being in a relationship for God, even if you have good intentions. “God isn’t impressed by great works done in even the slightest disobedience.” They quoted you.
Well, I’ll tell everyone that you said Hi, because everyone here says Hi to you!
From Joshua.

If we are supposed to do what God wants which is always to do good, then how are we supposed to know what good is from God and what “good works for God” should we disregard?

To follow up the previous question, what if we don’t hear Gods voice in our lives?

Life's Rough Draft

According to Miller, ambition is your drive to continue your story. It makes us desire to find something or to win something. Our story cannot be a good one without it. Our ambitions define us, or perhaps we define our ambitions. No matter which of these is true, it is undeniable that we all desire to have a better story, especially after a taste of a good story in our lives.
Like most teenagers, I wanted a cool job. Maybe I would be a soldier, a professional hunter, or even a martial artist, something that would be exciting and fun. I eventually aspired to be a writer and a teacher of writing. Now I get to create the martial artist, the expert hunter, and the valiant soldier; I am still driven to search intently for new worlds and personalities.
My search for story could be quite literal. My story is made up hundreds of other pre-made stories. I could never forget the feelings of revelation in me when I read the few final chapters of Thr3e by Ted Dekker, or when my sister and I discovered we could go into the nearby woods to play.  My story will always be changed by the mind blowing effects of The Matrix, as well as the mind blowing effect of learning we were going to be moving.
The changes that have happened in me are permanent, but they too might be changing in their own way. My story so far has been a rough draft, always changing and leading up to now. I still love the kind of hero who is unstoppable, but now I prefer him to be unstoppable only with his great allies. I still crave noble adventures played out by noble men, but I want the hero to be flawed. I want action and precise deadly skills, but they don’t have to be deadly specifically to bad guys.
My story is changing, and I personally am changing.

Imagination Wars

My age at the time was approx. 8 years old.

James, Joseph, and I were in a great battle, we fought as valiantly as we could conceive. Naturally one of us had to be “The guy who gets hurt and is dragged away by his heroic comrades”. This time, that was me. I remember grabbing the pistol of a dead soldier laying nearby and shooting at the evil spider shaped machines that were chasing us, as we were the only human survivors remaining on the battlefield. I vividly remember being pulled by the back of my shirt by James when suddenly a metal spider jumped on me pinning my arm back, then hearing and seeing the droid be kicked off of me and shot into pieces by Joseph. My left leg and entire lower left torso had been severely damaged earlier and were unusable, thus the dragging. I remember James saying something about me needing to get a robotic leg. “Cool…” was my only response.

All of these things are very clear in my memory, but the one thing that stands out the most for me is the fact that if asked there is no way I could tell you where we really were during this incredible imaginary battle, I have no idea what me true surroundings looked like. All I remember are enemies, craters, dead soldiers, and the like. But that’s just how we played. We never played sports like football, soccer, or basketball. No way, we played War, Space Pirates, Dino Hunters… etc.
This memory and ones similar to it are very near to me, and certainly symbolize my childhood mind and my mind as of now.

The unique innocent events of a child’s mind are much different than that of an adult. Why is this? Is it a sign of simple physical and mental maturity? Or perhaps of experiences throughout the child’s life? Maybe even as a result of trying to imitate the grownups they love?

Without using the word fun, can you explain why a child wants to play? Why do some choose this game while others choose that? Does it have anything to do with his peers? Or his parents? Maybe Ideas of good and evil?