I thought this one was too cute not to publish. That's our Eli bunny. Man, is he going to me for this some day.  

Can anyone make sense of this?

Matthew 27:51-53: ...The earth shook and the rocks split. 52 The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs, and after Jesus' resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

Why? I'd like your thoughts on this one.

many hats for many heads

Luke 6:1-6

The first church-split is avoided, and the church becomes much stronger, because of the wisdom of the Apostles.

There's lot of things they didn't do (i.e. point fingers, dismiss the compalints as silly, try harder to pass out food more fairly). What they did do is look to the rest of the church for the solution. In doing this they passed on authority and power to seven more leaders. They gave up the food-distributor hat to focus on the prayer and word (teaching?) hat. Wearing many hats requires a big head, somehting they could not afford to have. Dispensing jobs (and with them authority and control) to the rest of the body of Christ requires humility. And it breeds health.

Are you trying to do too much? Perhaps it's time to empower some helpers. Surrender the hats.

Worth Reading

I wanted to encourage you to look at two sites that have been exceptional as of late.

The first is: Ranticles

He is a very good writer and always has lots of interesting images to go along with his writing. But his posts for Lent have been his best. Instead of writing his own stuff he has just posted Scripture (and a few other quotes) with very telling photos. He has linked some Scriptures together in a very insightful way. See "6teen" and "8teen" especially.

I'm also excited about followtherabbi.com

It's filled with interesting Bible background stuff.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

After being flogged and further threatened...

Acts 5:41 The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name. (NIV)

Their excitement comes from being able to walk the path of Jesus. Being a disciple of Jesus means becoming like him. But it's not a buffet-style commitment. "I'll take the purity but leave the sorts of people he hung out with. I'll take the boldness to take on the money-changers and leave the boldness to stand with the woman caught in adultery. I'll take the eternal glory and leave the cross." You cannot do that. There is only one Jesus and we must accept (i.e. try to emulate) him fully.

I think it is really cool. Not only is he the shepherd of his sheep. But he himself exemplified what kind of sheep we are to be (1 Corinthians 5:6-8)

Something worth listening to

There is a Preacher out in Grand Rapids, MI named Rob Bell. His teaching has been very inspiring to me recently. He gives a lot of background information that makes the Scripture come alive. He has caused me to rethink the way I view discipleship. Here is a link to his churches website:
http://www.mhbcmi.org/listen/index.php

You can dowload his sermons for free in MP3 and other formats. I would especially recommend his sermons of the "salvation of my stuff". If you have a fast enough connection, you can watch a video of his sermon of discipleship at this link:
http://www.willowcreek.com/servicebuilder/servicepages/service.asp?servid=156

I hope you are as encouraged as I am.

The credibility of the church

Acts 5:26 At that, the captain went with his officers and brought the apostles. They did not use force, because they feared that the people would stone them.

You would think that being the captain of the Temple Guard would buy you some credibility. You would think that the Jews would fall in line with the High Priest and the Sanhedrin. Yet the Temple guard did not assume such things.

There was apparently quite a bit of support on the side of the apostles even among the non-believers. They had earned the credibility. They had done this by a) not doing anything immoral or foolish to embarrass the church b) speaking boldly about what they had witnessed c) performing acts of kindness (see verses 15 and 16) and d) producing real results that could not be done without God (see verses 15 and 16 again).

How is your church's credibility in the community? Would those who are not even associated with your church take up for your church because of the obvious good that is being done? Could those four things above be said about you and your church?

Mmmm.... Colonnade

I was just looking at Acts 5:12-16 and 1 thing became really clear to me. The way Luke uses the term "believers" is a lot different than the way we usually use the term believers.

Modern definition of believers- those who have mentally (and probably verbally) acknowledged that Jesus died on the cross so that we could be declared innocent by God and go to heaven.

Luke's definition of believers- people who are willing to make huge risks that non-believers never would. People who are so sold-out to the fellowship of the kingdom that they would risk their lives to be a part of it.

So, some questions: Would someone who did not believe ever live the same lifestyle that you do? Why or why not?

Can you say you believe something if you "never put your money where you mouth is"?