Speak Up...

The Australian Human Rights Commission are inviting you to submit a response to issues of Freedom of Religion and Belief in the 21st Century in Australia. In particular they are interested in your responses to any or all of the questions in the discussion paper, as well as any other issues of concern. These questions are intended as a guide only, so respondents should not feel limited by these.

Go onto their website: http://www.humanrights.gov.au/frb download the form and write a submission!

What on earth am I thinking...

Do you ever question that the life you are living is real... that maybe you and the small amount of Christians in the world got it wrong?

It's a sad wrestle that we 'all' go through? I know I did for many years. And it is sad to see it in your friends who were once pumped for life of loving Jesus...

I think Tom Steller sums up the emotion well in this parallel from the Wizard of Oz:

Toto wanders behind the curtain, pulls the curtain open, and reveals the truth behind the great Wizard of Oz. The Wizard of Oz was a hoax. He was a kindly but pathetic old man without any special powers. He merely projected his face on to a giant screen and amplified his voice. What Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Lion, and the Tin Man, and I had hoped in turned out not to be real.

As a result of this movie I can specifically remember wondering for the first time in my life if God was a hoax. Maybe my priest, Father Winzerling, was a fraud, or perhaps he too was deceived. Maybe there was some mastermind who thought up religion and who created the Bible to fool naïve, desperate people. Maybe God wasn't real. Maybe there really wasn't a God at all, except the ones we could dream up in our imagination. What a frightening thought for a religious boy like me to have. Have you ever had those thoughts? Do you even wonder now sometimes if God exists—I mean really exists? Is God real, or is he a concoction of our wishful thinking. Are we just playing games here Sunday after Sunday? Sometimes, even since I have become a Christian, those thoughts enter my mind.

Steller also describes the perfect solution:

JESUS

"And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know shim who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life." 1 John 5:20

We need more Fujimura's...

Praise Jesus for Faith Visuals for producing this clip!

Makoto Fujimura

He is an artist.
He is intelligent.
He paints.
He writes.

He proclaims Christ.

Mako is a Christian of the reformed persuasion.
Mako and Tim Keller are mates.
Mako is the Creative Director & Founder Artist of IAM
Keller is on the Advisory Board of IAM.

IAM gathers artists and creative catalysts to wrestle with the deep questions of art, faith and humanity in order to inspire the creative community to engage the culture that is and create the world that ought to be.

I am sad that I haven't been introduced to Makoto earlier... but very thankful that I now have.

"I am a Christian. I am also an artist and creative, and what I do is driven by my faith experience."
— Makoto Fujimura said in a 2007 article by Associated Press reporter Eric Gorsk

He and the artists that he as gathered around him have created a new realm where the arts and religion meet. He and IAM are doing great things for Christianity and the Arts. He is bringing faith to the cultural discussion table and putting the gospel on the agenda. I praise Jesus for the way he and the many artists are using their gifts to express the truths of the God who gave them.

As critic Robert Kushner has written, "The idea of forging a new kind of art, about hope, healing, redemption, refuge, while maintaining visual sophistication and intellectual integrity is a growing movement, one which finds Fujimura's work at the vanguard."

I've just bought his book, became a member of IAM (not that I will get much benefit beng here in Aust, but think its a gospel initiative that I want to support) and iwll use Makoto for the God and Art Course I am running at my church in the coming month.

We need more people like Makoto!

Sex and the City Reconsidered

Christianity Today did a review of SATC movie... Some Christians have reacted in outrage by the 3 stars the movie received, where as Prince Caspian received 2.5 stars.

These articles have made me think - am I guilty?

This movie I think is really telling of our culture. I think it is an accurate picture (within creative licence) of the confused state of our world. But does this film promote the confusion and contridiction of society or does it show it up?

hmmm....
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Christianity Today Review
http://www.christianitytoday.com/movies/reviews/2008/sexandthecity.html

Christianity Today Review - Review!
http://www.christianitytoday.com/movies/commentaries/youreviewedwhat.html

The Shepherd's Scrapbook Blog
http://spurgeon.wordpress.com/2008/06/11/sex-and-the-city-christian/

Boundless Blog
http://www.boundlessline.org/2008/06/christianity-to.html

I've been tagged to confess...

• I am sorry for being an impetuous friend: for the times I have hung out with you waiting for the 'gospel opportunity', being disappointed when there wasn't one and so resenting my time spent with you.
  
  INSTEAD: "So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us."
  
  
• I am sorry for the times I make a mockery of my God and don't display His worth and value to you by treasuring other things more highly than He.
  
  INSTEAD: But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.
  
  
• I am sorry I look down on your life's pursuits and laughed at your attitude of "if you dig it, do it".
  
  INSTEAD: "When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd."

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Christians are viewed by the world often as judgmental, arrogant, do-good party-poopers... and sometimes we deserve rightly this criticism. Christian brothers and sisters... Christ didn't save us to a religion of moral correctness and boredom but to serve the living God with joy and true lasting fulfillment. We are a community of dirty, fallen, broken, transforming YET perfectly forgiven people! Thank you Jesus!


This blog entry is in response to being tagged by a friend, as part of a thing called...

CHRISTIANS CONFESS: Where Christians are encouraged to apologize for three things that Christians have often got wrong.

Your apologies should be directed towards those who don’t view themselves as part of the Christian community. Alternatively, apologize for things you personally have done wrong towards those outside of the church.