In the words of Homer Simpson..."Doh!"

I was hanging out with Jacob the other night, and after a grueling match of racquetball we began to talk about our church and how we think home-groups were intended to be. I'm not sure how this conversation lead to the subject of election...but it did. We began to search the scriptures to prove certain sides of the debate. I landed on a more Armenian view while he leaned closer to a Calvinist view.

My biggest concern was the fact that most of the Bible God was either pleading with the people of the bible to do life right, or disciplining them when they did it wrong. There is a ton of "if" statements generously sprinkled throughout the New Testament in regards to those are saved and those who aren't. "If" sounds an awful lot like a choice to me.

Then we found out an interesting fact. We proved through scripture that God was outside of time. Only a being not confined by time can enter it, leave, and watch it all at the same instant. Which proves that He is Omnipresent.

That fact set me up for the most important discovery of the evening. The word According used in the New Testament in regards to salvation, (John and Romans) in the Greek translates to **to cause**. Which in the texts of the Sacred Scripture, it is seemingly clear that those did not have a choice. The "If" statements were not "If you choose..." They were simply, "If you have the Spirit...or If you don't have the Spirit..."

WOW! How did I miss this?

Pride: The Dust That Fills My Soul

A little over a year ago I began to deal with my pride on a deeper level than I ever have before. There were dark places in me that had not yet been revealed and may not have been revealed if it weren't for a dark time in my life.

It is disheartening sometimes when you don't want to be a certain way, but you find yourself struggling with it anyway. When the moment reveals those deep struggles it kicks up dust in your soul. It makes you sneeze and cough violently in a desperate attempt to kick it out of your system. It hurts and sometimes creates rage, but when the dust settles and your heart rate begins to slow down; all of a sudden, you find yourself in rest. I found a part of my soul in that rest after struggling with some outward pride issues.

I see some more dust getting kicked up as inward pride issues are being brought to the surface. I see dust getting kicked up over subtle lust issues that I didn't know I had.
I see dust getting kicked up over fear of failure.

I need prayer as the dust fills my nostrils and dips into my lungs. I want to kick this out of my system. But right now I don't know exactly how, nor do I know how much this will hurt. But I look forward to the day when the dust settles and I can rest in the fact that God has taken care of it.