It’s a baby; not a blob!

From the Stand to Reason blog:

GE, which developed the 4D ultrasound imaging technology, has a website of images that follow the timeline of the unborn’s development from six weeks to birth.  It’s a fantastic window into the womb to see the human being, bring to life the formerly unseen, at stake in abortion.  These pictures are worth 1000 words, but use the words as well to explain the value of these children.

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Celebrate redemption!

Have you thought about the fact that human beings are the only creatures in all of God’s creation on earth that celebrate?  Angels celebrate in heaven, but on this earth you will never see a dog, a tree, or anything else consciously design a celebration.

We celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, raises, championships, the first steps of a child, a new job–among other things.  But as Christians we should celebrate much more–including our redemption in Christ!  There is great joy in the presence of angels when a lost soul comes to Christ!  They celebrate this even though they have never experienced it.

And we should celebrate all that comes with our redemption, including forgiveness from sin!  After David had openly and fully confesses his sin to God and had forsaken it he prayed,  “O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.” (Psalm 51:15, ESV).

Christians should be the most celebratory community on earth!  We should be celebrating who we are in Christ, what we are becoming in Christ, and where we are going from here! As Paul Tripp writes in Whiter Than Snow of celebrating our redemption ,

It should be in our minds, it should flood our hearts, it should be constantly on our lips; we have been redeemed! Chosen out of the mass of humanity, forgiven by the sacrifice of Jesus, accepted into God’s family, the Holy Spirit now living inside of us, God working to empower us against and to deliver us from sin, the great paradigmatic truths of the biblical narrative now open to us, the mutual-ministry fellowship of the body of Christ our regular experience, and a guaranteed future in God’s presence and free from sin and struggle. We’ve been redeemed! The scope and breadth of it boggles the mind. It’s almost too much for our hearts to take in. Given what we couldn’t deserve, love in the middle of our rebellion, and given acceptance we could never earn. We’ve been redeemed! We’ve been redeemed! We’ve been redeemed!

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Feeling like grumbling

Titus2woman struggles with a universal problem–finding it hard not to default to grumbling and craving in her life. Most of us can relate at times with her so I post some of her comments.  She writes,

I was reading Numbers 11 recently as part of working through the excellent Gentle Rain on Tender Grass by Sharon James. In this chapter, the Israelites are grumbling against God about the manna he has provided for them and harking back to their captivity in Egypt (where they had all the cucumbers they could eat, apparently!). As a result of their complaining and ingratitude they were judged severely. This also tied in with a John Piper sermon I just listened to on John 13:31-35. Part way through he talked about how we must lay aside our feelings of “entitlement” in order to love like Christ.

All of this has reminded me again how easily it is to slip into an “entitlement syndrome” where I feel things should happen in a certain way, to a certain timetable of my choosing. When things don’t go that way, often my first response is to grumble to God, just like the Israelites did.

When things don’t seem to be working out to plan, or when the headlines are yet again full of financial disasters, what are we to do?   As Sharon James says,

“If our hearts crave after things that the Lord has not yet provided, there is only one thing to do: pray.”

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Should Christians gamble or play the lottery?

Considering buying your lottery tickets, betting on-line, or going down to the casino this week?  Read this and this for short answers. Still unconvinced, read this and this for a longer answer.

What think you?

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