The way it has always been

So I read Deuteronomy 6 today.  I found it very interesting in the response they are to give their children when they ask what do the statuets mean.  

 20"^(X)When your son asks you in time to come, saying, 'What do the testimonies and the statutes and the judgments mean which the LORD our God commanded you?' 21then you shall say to your son, 'We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and the LORD brought us from Egypt with a mighty hand. 22'Moreover, the LORD showed great and distressing signs and wonders before our eyes against Egypt, Pharaoh and all his household; 23He brought us out from there in order to bring us in, to give us the land which He had sworn to our fathers.' 24"So the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes,^(Y)to fear the LORD our God for our good always and ^(Z)for our survival, as it is today. 25"^(AA)It will be righteousness for us if we are careful to observe all this commandment before the LORD our God, just as He commanded us."[BibleGateway.com]

They are to present them the history.  The commands are "for our good always"

Bike Log

This morning was nice weather.  Started out just over 50 degrees, and warmed.  It was pretty dark.  Probably should replace the batteries in the back light because I really don't want them going dim.  

Wore 

insulated windbreaker pants

cotton undershirt and yellow fleece

insulated gloves.

Took a new route through the neighborhood.  Stopped before coming out on garnett and switched gloves out for bike cutoff gloves, and took off the fleece.  May have been too cold with just the undershirt, but too hot with the fleece.  Pants worked well.  Pushed too hard at 61st and Garnett, need to remember to not go so fast.

Also think of doing a different blog to track this info or something.  Put it somewhere else maybe.

Bike Log

Thought I was needing to start logging my bike conditions.  As it gets colder I want to know what works and what doesn't.  For those who don't know I've started biking to work a few times a week.  Well, now it is cold.  Temp this morning was about 46 degrees starting out.

This morning I wore 

nike long sleeve coolmax shirt and yellow fleece

snow gloves

North Face hat

kahki work ants and insulated windbreaker pants

cotton socks and New balance shoes.

My feet were cold, but everything else went pretty well.  I may need to try a face mask, because going at 20mph makes the air very cold against the face.  Probably should also tuck my shirt in, at the begining it was pretty cold.  Also I should probably wear some socks other than cotton.

Faith and Works

James chapter 2 of course.  

As I though over this chapter of scripture it started to make since.  Works is the natural outflow of faith.  So we shouldn't have to truly strive for good works, it should be a natural outpouring of our faith.  

Faith without works is dead.  What is the point?  To bring glory to God.  Does faith without works bring glory to God?  I would say no.  Possibly even worse than that.  Faith without works may be considered a disgrace to God.  Jesus Christ transforms lives.  If you don't have works then you are not letting God work in Your life.  

So how do you increase Your good works?  Maybe by increasing Your faith.  First you need to be involved and not isolated.  You need to have opportunities, and take them.  Short term missions are wonderful.  Raising kids in the love of Christ is incredible.  But if you have faith in Christ, and understand that He is in control then wouldn't you naturally want to serve Him and do things for the God of the universe?  He is God!  What is more important than serving Him?

A Worthy Sacrifice

This morning I read the first chapter of Malachi. It was really eye opening. The actual animal sacrifices no longer apply to use today, but the principle is very relevant. The passage speaks of the people of Israel not honoring God with the sacrifices by offering blind, lame, or sick animals. God has asked for an unblemished sacrifice and this is what His people bring Him. It isn't the act of sacrificing that is the point, God said he rejects their sacrifice. The sacrifice needs to be a proper sacrifice, not just a poor effort.

But wait, I'm supposed to be a sacrifice. I'm supposed to be a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to the Lord. How many times have I grumbled but still did something thinking I was doing what is right by sacrificing my time or something. Well, I'm pretty sure in light of this scripture from Malachi that God won't accept that. It needs to be honoring Him. Is a sacrifice with grumbling showing any respect to God? I don't think so.

Body Building

Saw a shirt the other day for bodybuilding.com But it didn't make me think of fitness, but rather building up of the body of Christ. So I thought about it some more and it is an amazing example.

For example, you want to grow. But putting on weight is only part of the picture. You want it to be useful muscle, not just fat. Same is true in the church, yes we want new members, but they need to be productive and not just sit around. They need to contribute to the body.

Another good corollary is what you feed the body. For fitness purposes this is your diet. But it relates very well with your spiritual food. If you want to properly nourish the body it needs to be on the word of God.

Activity is also a big point. For fitness you need to excercise, and for the body of Christ you need to be involved and contributing. Mission trips is a big one that I can think of. But in the scriptures we are commanded to "go" several times. We are given imperitives that involve action, not just going to church and sitting, but having an effect on those around us all the time.

Journal update

So you get to be graced with a double post.  I thought of making it just one post, but they really don't relate at all.  Of course I'm beginning to think that I do this just for me and people don't really read, which is fine.  I really am doing this for myself.  I wanted to do a journal and have been failing.

Katie has been growing really well.  I am surprised to see how much bigger she already is.  I still am amazed sometimes by having two children.  I'm really not sure how Julie gets through the day.  

David still isn't talking.  This is disappointing, because with Katie here it takes longer to figure out what he wants than it should.  I just need to do my part and work with him on it.  

I've started really biking to work now.  It isn't much, but it is fun and I like to think it is helping.  But since my trip is only 5mi it isn't that much in savings, but at least I get some exercise finally.  I've been needing to excercise, and now with Ben going back to body building I feel I should try to get some strength training in sometime.  For strength training I try to just use David.  He likes being tossed around and I like spending time with him where he isn't an "interference" to what I'm trying to do.  

Life is getting busy.  Impact (Bible study) classes started at the church.  Julie and I are taking the advanced doctrine class on Bible interpretation.  It is a very interesting class, but a little disturbing how the Bible has been translated in the past.  The alagorical method and neo orthoxy method are incredibly strange.  But I'm amazed at most of the methods how they look over what the text is actually saying to try and explain away things they don't understand.  

With life being so busy, part of that is still due to Katie's newness.  Family and friends have been visiting, we have a baby shower this weekend.  But it looks to be calming down some.  It will be nice to have a weekend again.  

On another note, I have been too busy to mow the lawn and then Julie surprised me by mowing it herself on Tuesday.  Now she is a little sore, but I am very grateful to her.  

That is it for me, time to get some breakfast.

Sound Doctrine

I would encourage everyone to read Titus chapter 2.  Then count how many times it speaks of doctrine.   I count three (NASB).  For a short little chapter it seems to be a popular word.

This is one of those chapters I find difficult because I see how much improvement needs to be made in my life.  I'm currently working on improving my knowledge and understanding of doctrine/theology/The Word of God.  Man has really made up some big words(Justification, dispensationalism) to capture some of the points.  

This chapter is nice, I think I like it because it is so short and to the point.  I could just see it as a nice power point presentation.  It is hard to imagine what it was like 1000 years ago when people just listened to someone else's interpretation of the bible and didn't actually read it themselves.  Then I have to ask myself how some of these people could handle the truth in God's word with such disgrace by warping and twisting the meaning to control people.