rent a car bulgariaMy daughter has been doing well at basketball. She is picking up the skills and having fun for the most part. The one thing she will need to acquire is aggressiveness. It’s not really in her personality, and I don’t think she needs to be hyper-aggressive, just enough to go after the ball when she should. But I am proud of her, because she’s doing so well when this is totally out of her comfort zone.
I’ve been helping coach, mostly by herding cats and trying to focus them on what they are supposed to do. I don’t try to instruct because I don’t feel like it’s my place and I don’t want to become one of those parents that’s trying to live vicariously through the kids. I do have a lot of fun running with them during the drills or pretending to be a defender while they are dribbling. I had so much fun yesterday that it was the first time in 5 years that I’ve missed playing. I have no illusions about trying to play again. My left knee can’t survive a half hour of fast walking, let alone running up and down the court. But it sure made me smile watching the kids be so happy after dribbling and coming to a jump-stop.
I was in Bible study yesterday where we are studying the Gospel of John and two asides came up. One was about good works and the other was about how much faith is saving faith?
As I wrote earlier, the good works we do are only viewed by God as such because of Christ’s death on the cross. The discussion in Bible study centered around a Jewish families’ kind acts toward some members of the Ku Klux Klan (I can’t recall the exact story). How could this not be a good work? It was a selfless act for someone with great hatred toward another. Surely God must view it as a good work. It’s probably more selfless than anything that I’ve ever done. And that’s where I think the problem lies. We want to think about our works as good and see others whose acts are greater and more selfless. I have to say what the other person did was a good work or my good deeds, which pale in comparison, couldn’t be a good work either. I wonder if I should just think of works like I do people. Both are conceived in sin and are fallen. Only Christ makes either of them good. Have to talk to pastor about that one.
On the topic of how much faith is saving faith, one of the elders asked if someone open to the possibility that Christ died for them was enough for salvation. Pastor said there is no scriptural evidence pointing to such a thing but pressed the elder on why he wanted to look for this “opening.” The elders response was something to the effect that he wanted to know that he had done his job in evangelizing the person. This point, once again, to our self-centeredness. We want to know that we’ve done our job, that we are making a difference. The fact is, we do know objectively if we have done are job in evangelizing by whether we have proclaimed the Gospel to someone. Whether there is some outward sign or evidence is immaterial.
Misunderstanding scripture and doctrine, like everything else, comes from our sinful nature. We want everything to be about “me” when the only proper use of the word is as the object of a preposition as in, “Christ for me.”
A simple little concentration game with Martin Luther looking on. Listen to some interesting sound bytes as you complete matches. You may even hear some words from Fr. Martin.
That’s what I used to think when I heard those pitches over the radio. I thought people were crazy to get no equity loans and 125% second mortgages. I figured they were putting themselves in financial jeopardy, but what did that have to do with me? As we all know, it turns out this did affect me, it affected all of us. Because of these mortgage products the fundamentals of the housing market were changed. Home prices were inflated because there were fewer homes on the market because there were more home owners who could “afford” houses.
It follows a classic case of unintended consequences. Government officials were upset because people with lower incomes, predominantly minorities, were being rejected for mortgages. This had to be because of discrimination and not income to debt ratios, so the government instructed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to make sure the banks weren’t discriminating against these higher risk borrowers. But how did they entice banks to make these risky loans. Well, they bought them from the banks. They lowered their standards for mortgages they would buy so the banks had a market for the higher risk loans. In the old days, banks made their money on mortgages by collecting the interest, now they were making money on the transaction. They no longer had to worry about people defaulting, that risk was shifted to Fannie and Freddie. So what would you do if you had a no risk way to make money? You’d see the dollar signs and milk it for all its worth and of course that’s what the banks did.
Then the economy slowed, interest rates went up, and people with Adjustable Rate Mortgages started getting adjusted out of being able to pay their mortgage. Then house prices started dropping because there were fewer buyers and more houses. This snowballed until we got where we are today. People who should never have bought the homes they did are now without them. People who still have their homes have seen there value drop. Banks folding. Government officials pointing the finger at everyone else and not the rules they setup that created the situation. All because someone thought they had a great solution to end discrimination in the housing market.
First, true good works, those that God considers good works, can only done by Christians. But wait, don’t unbelievers do good things like give to charity, lend a helping hand, etc., etc? Of course they do, but those are civil good works (good in the sight of man). Good works in God’s eyes are those works that are 100% out of love for Him. So, the unbeliever who is doing his civil good work because it will raise his standing in the community, or gain favor with someone, or even out of his own sense of compassion is not doing a good work.
Hey, don’t we have to do good works to please God? Whoa, that is the worst kind of “good work” because it imperils the soul. We don’t do anything to please God. Christ has done this for us by His perfect life, death, and resurrection. If we try to please God, we’re essential trying to buy our salvation, and that is not love, that is self-interest.
So how does anyone do good works? Even as a Christian, when I do things that look like good works like giving to charity or volunteering, if I am motivated in any way, and I am, by a tax deduction or perceived status, then I have not done this work out of 100% love of God. However, because I am a Christian, this sin is covered by Christ and God accepts it as a good work just like He accepts me, a sinner, because of Christ.
As usual, I feel pretty much out of step with many of those in the tech. industry. Google announced that they are against California Proposition No. 8. The proposition would prevent same-sex marriages. Google’s position is that this would infringe on people’s personal lives and eliminate the fundamental right of anyone to marry the person they love.
First off, marriage is not a private act. Even if you don’t believe that it was instituted by God, it is at least a governmental institution. I’m really at a loss to understand how something that requires a government issued license is a private act.
Next, nobody has the fundamental right to marry the person they love. What if the person you love doesn’t love you, is already married, is related to you, or a child? Do you still have a right to marry the person you love?
When you don’t understand what marriage is you sound silly, even if you are as smart as the people at Google.
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