Tony Wheeler dot Net

In case you missed it.

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1. The people who make up Christianity are determined to be ‘in the world, but not of the world’ so much that they are overwhelmingly compelled to form sub-cultures to suit their separateness. I’m a fan of Christian books and a few musical selections, but do we really need absolutely everything to have an ixthus on it?
2. Even though Jesus tells us that we are to love God and love people, we spend our time “loving God” and judging people.
3. Boycotting any institution, business, people group or soft drink has never solved any of the world’s problems, but yet Christians insist on continually boycotting stuff. If you really want organizations of any kind to change, why don’t you get involved? Get on the City Council, sit on the Board of Directors, start a business…Just stop boycotting. It makes those of us who actually love God and love people look really bad.
4. Why are we insistent upon having alternatives to ‘pagan’ holidays? We take the one day a year where the entire neighborhood comes to your house, knocks on your door, and asks you for a treat and hold a ‘harvest festival’ at our churches. This is one of the dumbest things I can think of. Halloween is probably the second most important Christian holiday. Oh, by the way, don’t hand out some stupid tract with the candy. Be creative. Tracts are dumb. I’ve never heard of anyone accepting Christ because of a tract. If you really want to reach out, have a haunted house in your basement or garage. Do something cool not just for the kids but for the parents.
5. For the most part, we have no idea who our neighbors are. My neighbors are difficult to get to know, but I’m working on it. Do you know yours?
6. It is trendy in Churches to be ‘relevant’. Relevance is relative. Are you relevant to your culture or someone else’s? That is where the rubber meets the road…What is relevant in Rochester, MN is not relevant in San Diego, CA.
7. Finally, I hate that I cannot even call myself a Christian without negative connotations. I love Jesus. I follow his leading in my life. I learn from the way that he did life and ministry. I don’t follow the people who follow him because many of them suck. I suck sometimes too, but the difference is that I realize it, learn from it and don’t do it again.

The Christian Post reports that Southland Christian Church in Lexington, KY is sending love letters to Brit. They are joining together to reach out to someone who professes a faith of sorts at a time when she needs love the most. Pretty interesting, actually. I’m not sure why they chose Britney over all the people out there, but I’m glad they are. I really do hope they follow through on their message of love and not condemnation. I’ve spent some time praying for the lady myself. She apparently grew up knowing God in some way and has evidently strayed from. Part of the liberties that The United States of America offer is the right of personal privacy. Sure, Britney and throngs of others have chosen lives that are very much public, but that doesn’t deny them the right to privacy. There are countless celebs that successfully separate their public lives from their private lives, so what makes Brit and some others different? Let us call it rubbernecking. Ever wonder why cars back up for miles and miles when there is a car accident? People like to see the damage and are by nature curious to see what is going on. Train wrecks naturally cause a scene.

What Britney and others like her need is for some people to just drive by and not look at the wreck that their lives have become. What they need is people like the folks at Southland to say that Jesus loves you and so do we.

Britney, Jesus does love you and your kids. He even loves FedEx. Oh yeah, God is a he.

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Thanks to Rich Wagner for posting this up.

Barak Obama is on a “40 Days of Faith and Family” tour in an effort to show voters how his faith and family have impacted his leadership (and I assume his politics). One of the things that he is doing is throwing gospel concerts with ‘star studded’ ensembles. One of the performers is Donnie McClurkin, who, according to this article, has struggled with homosexuality for much of his life after being molested by his uncle. Obama has taken some heat, especially from the LGBT crowd, for having McClurkin in the lineup. So he added a gay minister. This will now, somehow, smooth everything over because not only is this guy gay, but he is also a minister. Fits right in with Obama’s ‘Faith and Family’ theme.

Couple of thoughts:

1. Why are we now starting to campaign for public office immediately after the incumbent takes office? (not really related, but it is something that bugs the heck out of me)
2. Barak is probably going to have to learn from the old adage that says, “You can please some of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people, all of the time.”
3. Why is sexual orientation a platform on which to gain political influence? The day may come when we have to convince politicians to add straight, white artists to their lineup.
4. Is the whole sexual orientation dilemma the direct outcome of the condemnation of homosexuals by the Church?

At the end of the day, I don’t care if you are gay or straight. I don’t care if you are black, white, yellow, brown or purple. I do care that you are respected, valued, and appreciated for who you are, not who you sleep with. I do care that you know that Jesus does love you and didn’t come to this Earth to condemn you but to save you. That is the whole reason for this ‘faith’ that Obama is campaigning for.

“But be very careful to keep the commandments and the law that Moses the servant of the LORD gave you: To love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to obey his commands, to hold fast to him and to serve him with all your heart and all your soul.” –Joshua 22:5

I was doing some cleaning in my garage today and came across a bunch of old stuff that has traveled the country with me. Some of the stuff is memoirs of past relationships. Some of the stuff is old 3.5″ floppy disks (remember those? I don’t even have a place to put them on this computer). Some of the stuff is just stuff, junk that meant something at one point in my life but is now just junk. Most of this stuff ended up in the trash bin, some of it wasn’t junk, and some of it caused me some deep reflection.

The above scripture verse was one of the things that I kept. It is written on a note card that was intended for me to carry around and memorize. I can’t help but be humbled and repentant when I meditate on this verse. Above all else, I am to be a person that loves God, obeys his commands, and serve him with everything I’ve got. If I’m honest with myself and with you, I must say that I have failed time and again at most of this. I don’t have it all together, I don’t always do what God tells me to do, nor do I always serve him with everything I’ve got. I’ve disobeyed, I’ve done enough ‘just to get by’, and I’ve rejected God on numerous occasions. I can tell you, however, that I’ve never been more resolved to hold fast to God, to serve him with everything I’ve got and everything I’m not, and most importantly to love God more than anything else.