Grace Credit Card

No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him. Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. He who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in him; he cannot go on sinning, because he has been born of God.
- 1 John 3:6-9

Recently we had a staff devotional about sin. It was a real thinking experience. The topic was, if we love Jesus why do we continue to sin. This among other verses was brought up in the conversation. After much thought, and contemplation, I believe all to often, we as Christian use the excuse, "no-one is perfect" to excuse our sin. If Jesus is really in our hearts, and he really is the Lord of our lives, wouldn't we be a little differant. Should we use that excuse? Do we really "HAVE" to sin after coming to know Jesus because of our nature? Do we really "HAVE" to sin, is it really beyond our control, or are we just dumping blame elsewhere like we do in every other area of our culture...or worse, are we claiming the grace of God and putting our sins on the "Jesus Paid It All" credit card. Jesus did die for our sins, but we don't have to attempt to make his sacrifice more valuable by sinning more. How will anyone else every know him?....thinking about about...

Twitter the worlds leading Killer

So a few weeks ago, our Worship Pastor at Marathon Greenville, introduced me to Twitter, an online website used to keep up with what your friends are doing. I thought it was really neat, and so i began to use it. Then, in all its newness and my glee, i began to receive updates to my phone and really be able to follow people. Text messages would pour in moment after moment according to what friends were doing. Then i stopped. And realized. Something very important. While there is nothing wrong with this website, other than it is consuming my time, cultural websites for keeping in touch with people are probably damaging relationships. Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter, may be great to keep up with old friends, or talking with people you don't really know well, but while it may bring those people seemingly closer, it pushes other away. Those close to you, you then talk to mainly on facebook, or twitter, and never actually visit or make a phone call to see what their doing. It puts all people at a distance. The distance of the Internet, however close or far you consider that. Its interesting the direction our culture is traveling with more intimacy in bed being encouraged for singles, and less real life conversation for real people being required in the "in" crowd.