Reasonable Rationality

The problem with Christianity is not in the audacious claims made by it.  Everything about Christianity is really quite reasonable and logical.  Its difficulty lies in the simplicity it presents.  Who can't imagine a God making the universe?  It really isn't that stunning a conclusion!  And what is so odd about that God loving His created beings with unquenchable affection?  Is that hard to consider?  And can we be so shallow in our thinking that we can deny the possibility that there is universal right and wrong; that some things always are good and fair and others have for all time been wicked and bad?   What can we say about a God who is willing to take the extreme measure of dying Himself to make a way for His beloved people to become wholly good and thoroughly flawless?  Is that too strange a consideration?  What marks the Christian is not the illogic of her assumptions; it is the complete reasonableness of her thinking!  No Christian should apologize for believing that God is love and eternal and holy.  That is the logical conclusion.  What is irrational is the determination that evil is somehow desirable and life is temporary and behind all of this we see and smell and touch is the random unthinking of empty space.  Just consider for a moment the love you feel for a baby griping your thumb for all he is worth or the joy you experience making a new friend who really does want to be with you!  Is that the stuff of nonsense and balderdash?  The beginning of wisdom is that love is really Love and good is really Good and life is Life and darkness is too small to contain the Light.  Perhaps just a moment or two is enough to resettle your senses and grasp the simplicity of your faith, that God loves you and really does love you and is working out every detail of that life of yours for good that is eternally good and intelligently loving and in your favor.  You are not alone.  You are in the lap of Love and that Love does not give up on you even when you want to give up on Him.

 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"—which means, "God with us."     Matthew 1:23 NIV

Something More

It is presumption to make it out that we can convince anyone of the reasonableness of Christianity .  We can point out that Christianity is reasonable to the believer but that is as far as we can go.  The facts are the facts.  The universe is before us to explore and examine and any atheist or pagan is just as free to look at it closely as the most holy of Christians.  Our task is not to talk people into following Christ.  Jesus never went out of His way to convince anyone of anything.  He showed the disciples his hands and side, gave the congregation on the hillside food to eat but he didn't talk a single unbeliever into going after Him.  Herod and Pilate were classic examples of the bait Satan puts out there.  Neither of the splendid trophies of "churchianity" were offered a solitary nibble of rational evidence.  Christ left both crawling in the dust of their unbelief because each remained in rebellion against the clear facts of his sinfulness.  We must do two things if we want to be evangelists.  We must present the Gospel clearly and simply and we must let Christ rule over us as we walk about.  We are not to "do something" to get the world to believe; we are to be witnesses.  Yet our overriding call as a witness is not to be witnesses of the rationale behind our faith, we are to be witnesses of the faith itself.  You sow the seed of the Gospel at a point where humanity is alerted and it may very well lie there dormant for an unbearable length of time.  At once however, in a blink, that seed may come alive and sprout but we cannot initiate the work of it.  God Himself does it.  He brings a crisis, a despair, a spotlight upon the ugliness of sins and when He does, like lightning, the Gospel will awaken where it was buried and that one soul will choose to give the Cross a go in him and come alive or walk away from it and wither.  What makes baptism such an amazing event is that we witness the power of the Cross worked out in the physicality of faith.  Nothing should so vivify our joy as the sight of one soul socked up in sin released from her bonds and free to be completely given over to Christ.  Let the Lord live through you and when He gives you the word, say the Gospel clearly and without reticence.  God did not fill you up with the fullness of Christ so that you might be a useless bump on a log.  He has given you the opportunity to be a fisher of men.  Get after it!

"Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men."   Matthew  4:19-20 NIV

Burning

It is sheer lunacy to think you are not inhibited by the spirit of this age.  You are stopped short at nearly every turn by some good or respectable option...a way that seems reasonable and even right.  But it is not what God has told you to do just then and so you drift off imperceptibly from the straight and narrow way.  And when you do, you lose the quiet voice...or at least you lose track of it.  God will not beat you back in place, He will let you drift until it becomes nearly unbearable, this loss of His still, sweet nearness.  It is not some dramatic falling off the wagon that will hurt you most, it is the terrible indifference to the burning flame of the consuming Holy Spirit.  The soul that is not being scorched and seared by God is slowly growing cold and weary.  Only the determined return to the last word from God will catch your heart aflame again in the passionate fires of your loving Lord.  Again, take hold of God in His Word and you will find yourself flowing once more with the Joy of your Salvation. "The fire and wood are here," Isaac said, "but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" Genesis 22:7 NIV

Sensible

The sensible Christian is a bit of an oxymoron in the Kingdom of God.  You will not be of much use to Jesus Christ by taking things sensibly.  There is nothing sensible about being crucified with Christ, nothing sensible about leaving one's fishing boats and tax booths and following after a King who has no place to lay His head.  The sensible Christian cannot forgive his neighbor and will not give his last dime to God.  The sensible Christian has no time for the bleeding woman who touched the hem of Christ's garment or the quitter John Mark.  Jesus Christ did not accept the beams of Pontius Pilate because it was sensible; He did so because the Father wanted it done.  There is nothing so absurd as the Christian who says he won't while staring into the face of a Scripture that says he must.  Caution is fine if you never want to walk on water or dismantle Jericho.  No one who is sensible goes the extra mile or gives his cloak when only a friendly handshake will do.  The Kingdom of God is not made of sensible people but rather of those who are so feverishly loyal to Christ that they will stop at nothing to please Him.  ...but even if I am being poured out like a drink offering...I am glad... Philippians 2:17