Theology Evolved?

Elijah at Mount Carmel. (1 Kings 18)

It would be yet later in the days, when Israel was well into its kingships, that there would come a time for God to reveal himself before his people again. It was a time when the king of Israel, Ahab, had gone off to follow Jezebel and the prophets of Baal, taking Israel with him as a confused and very sheep like nation. This Jezebel had destroyed all but one hundred and one prophets. One of which lived off the land, and the other hundred lived in caves being taken care of by a man who had great fear of the Lord. The one was named Elijah. God had taken him aside and let him know that there would be a serious famine in the lands, and had led him to a brook where he would continually be able to drink, and God commanded the ravens to bring him food. Ahab was very well aware of Elijah, and had a feeling that Elijah was connected with the famine, So when it did come time for Elijah to go meet Ahab and speak to him about his evil transgressions that Ahab was not in the best of moods.
However, a prophet, a soldier of the most high God, is still not someone to be trifled with, and when Elijah lays out a contest for Ahab, the cocky king cannot turn it down. So all the people of Israel are brought to Mount Carmel, as well as the 450 prophets of Baal, for a showdown of godly proportions. And Elijah more or less just says he will allow the prophets of Baal to receive the kick off. He allows them to build their altar of wood, and take the choice ox, and then allows them to call upon Baal to light their altar and ox on fire. And of course being the amazing god that Baal is, he creates a giant pillar of flame consuming everything and Elijah as well… nope, nothing, not even after hours of calling. So Elijah feels free to encourage them reminding them that their God needs time to sleep, or even relieve himself so perhaps they should shout out to him. And they do so, mutilating themselves too because he delights in that, and this time the fire comes… again no.
So Elijah takes it upon himself to then rebuild the old altar of the Lord. Not only that but he also gathers 12 stones, one for each tribe of Israel. Then he cuts up the ox and lays it upon the altar. Following that he digs a sizeable trench around the altar. The he commands the people of Israel to pour out four pitchers of water upon the altar. And then to rinse and repeat. And then one more time till everything is totally soaked, and the trench is filled with water.
Finally Elijah prepares to call upon God time and time again. Only one real difference here though. He only needs to call once. Asking God to remember His people, and to help turn their hearts back to Him. And he does so. The fire falls, and it falls in power. The fire consumes, the ox, the soaking wet wood, it devours the wet stones, and not even steam is left where the trench of water was. EVERYTHING WAS CONSUMED.
And so when Israel realized their stupidity, they went back to their God, the almighty God, and worshiped him. And with this, Elijah commanded all the people to gather up all the prophets of Baal, and Elijah slew all the prophets of Baal.

One man, One God, One Faith, One Outcome

The Lesson? God+Faith=Victory

The Capture of the Ark of the Covenant (1 Samuel 4-7)
It would be much later on when Israel has established itself as a people looking to God for direction through his priests and prophets that the next triumphant act of God would happen. It will however have been one to show that God has no room for foolish pride and arrogance when it comes to his leaders.
You see God had appointed a judge, Eli, to preside over Israel, and Eli had two songs… Hophni and Phineas. Both of these young men preferred little gods, and did not care to know the lord, but were both priests of him. And when those brothers brought a curse upon themselves, and Eli did not do anything to rebuke them God decided it was time for that lineage to end. And this is how it unfolded.
After a devastating defeat of Israel by the Philistines the elders decided it would be best if the brothers, Hophni and Phineas brought the Ark of the Covenant to the next battle site and proclaim shouts of praise in order to strike fear in the hearts of the Philistines and that God would give victory to Israel, because obviously God would not allow his throne to fall into the hands of the Philistines. However, the Philistines girded themselves and went forth to fight despite their fear of the God (or as they saw it, gods) who struck down Egypt. And… they had a victory… a GREAT victory… they slew 30,000 Israelite foot soldiers, two high priests (Hophni and Phineas), and ultimately in a three-two-one victory captured the ark of the enemies gods. When news was brought to Eli who was sitting on a stool, old and blind, he fell over and his own weight caused him to break his neck.
Now one would assume that God did achieve his goal but at a great cost, His throne was in the hands of the pagan enemies. However, this was to be a multi-faceted lesson that God was teaching. For the Philistines needed to learn that indeed the God of Israel was bigger then their own gods.
The first place the ark of the covenant was brought to was the house of Dagon, a god of the philistines. They placed the ark before the stature of Dagon in his temple that night. The next morning, the priests found the statue laying face down in front of the ark, so they righted it. The next morning the same statue was face down in front of the ark, except, on the altar its head and hands had been cut off so only the torso remained, and the priests knew they were in trouble. This was culminated when God afflicted them with a couple of plagues to remind them of how he regards being treated like a lesser god. The people were afflicted with tumors, and mice were sent to ravage the land. And what did the Philistines do? They send it to a different city of their own… And what happens…? The Rinse and Repeat cycle through another 3 cities until the Philistines finally relent and send the ark back to Israel with a guilt offering.

So with no help by Israel, God demonstrated his power to foreign powers and foreign gods.

The Lesson? God -You = Victory

The Exodus (Exodus 1-14)
The first time that comes to mind when I think of God’s power being enacted in the face of overwhelming odds is when the not quite yet nation of Israel is a multitude of slaves in Egypt. They are a people have been told be meek, passive, and to humble themselves for the Egyptians and their host of gods.
And there is one slave who by the wisdom of his mother is orphaned for an hour to rise suddenly into power as a prince of Egypt. He is a young man who lives an alien life. At a crucial point he realizes who he is and tries ineffectively to show his people their true nature, and ultimately must run-away into the desert.
As this young man ends up living amidst an unchained nomadic tribe oh his people he gets to encounter his might God and learn his place in life, a Soldier of the most high God. And God sends him on a mission back to Egypt. Here one nomadic prophet, one former prince, goes before the most powerful mortal ruler who has a host of gods behind him, and this prophet has but one.
So what does he do? He tells this self-fancied incarnation of a god to release an entire people of slaves numbering in the hundreds of thousands. He does this because his King, God, commanded it. And being the all-wise, most powerful mortal ruler, self-fancied incarnation of a god, Pharaoh says… “No.”
What comes to follow is a battle of Godly proportions as the prophet proclaims supernatural plagues upon the nation of Egypt and 12 times more the Pharaoh refuses to surrender. Granted the pharaoh tried with the help of al his priests to disprove or duplicate the plagues as to diminish God’s power, but utterly failed miserably. It takes the death of his first-born son to finally release the slaves, capitulating out of grief to the prophet and his God.
But in his grief, there is also anger, and the ruler attempts to deceive the almighty God and his prophet. When the slaves are almost free, they are at a sea they must cross, the armies of the Pharaoh appear on the horizon to slay these weakened slaves while their backs are against a wall of water. But the prophet, at the bequest of his God stands before the water, and commands it to make way for the people of the God who created the water. And as the people rush through the canyon lined with water their enemies follow only to find out the terrifying truth of God’s wrath, as the water allows the slaves to pass but closes behind and crushes the armies.
The Lesson? God+You=Victory.

So this is the introduction to what I have been working on. Will post the actual first portion of the subject matter itself tomorrow. Enjoy

I am not the most eloquent speaker, I struggled through my classes, I spent more time pondering the mysteries of God then being able to actually answer or even properly attempt to address them in my classes. I have no masters, or even a doctorate. I am just one guy trying to share my thoughts with others. But ultimately I am also one thing, a Soldier of the Most High God. And in this I move forward in faith knowing that hopefully one day, this book will affect one more person, to stand tall as a Soldier of the Most High God.

God is powerful despite your immaturity, your incompetence, and in your faithfulness… aka… all the time.

Too often a Christian hears they should be meek, humble, timid, passive. They do not hear “You are strong!” or “You should be Proud” or even “You are POWERFUL!” So Christians duck their heads low, trying to move through life avoiding and chance of potentially offending someone Christian or no. The truth is, Christians, we are powerful. We have the omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient God at our backs, and as scripture says, “If God is at our backs who can stand before us?”

Paraphrased: “We got God, who the heck you got?”

This thought, idea, concept, has been established time and time again. The Old Testament proves it in a variety of ways both direct and indirect. God has shown his divine power when his prophet was unsure of himself, and even when his appointed elders were too sure of themselves. But best of all is when God has acted upon the faithfulness of his prophet.

So as you read please know ultimate truth I am trying to portray.




God does not fail…ever.

Yeah, I am asking that question. I am a born again Christian. Yes that means I follow Christ, I live for the Lord, I have seen the light. I understand there is a standard I follow in calling myself that. But of those standards I cannot stand that religion has any right to tell people they cannot produce alcoholic beverages or control what kind are sold.

I am referring to this article written in the LA Times on March 10, 2008 later republished on March 28, 2008 in the Record Searchlight.

The barebone details are that in Alabama it is illegal to brew your own beer or sell beer with an alcohol content over 3.9% following decade old laws based on the prohibition. And as groups try to fight this the SBC is throwing their weight into saying that it is immoral acts, quoting "Be not drunk with wine but filled with the Spirit". This is ridiculous because it does not say anything about brewing, or drinking beer, just the abuse thereof.

I am a Christian, I also consume a beer on occasion. I do not get drunk, I actually enjoy the taste of a well crafted beer. There is a complexity in beer that wine at times even has a hard time competing against. There is something delicious about it that just sits well.

I do not promote getting drunk, it is just plain stupid, you might as well hand your decision making abilities over to a 3 year old at that point and then blame them later for you downfall. But a drink is fine. Legislating the decision to enjoy a drink just seems like it is going too far in my opinion.

Please, read the article and tell me what you think.