Whose is it?

Over the last few years, I have been learning the Russian language.  It is quite a difficult language.  For example, when you want to describe your trip to the store, you must say a different word depending on how you get there.  If you are walking to the store, you must use the appropriate form of the verb "ходить" (hoh-deet).  But if you are driving or riding to the store, you say "ездить" (yehz-deet).  And this is a rather simple rule when describing the Russian verbs of motion.  You also have to use different verbs depending on whether or not you regularly go to the store, whether you have "completed" going to the store, whether you will go to the store....  What a Pandora's box of motion!  One Russian guy told me that even Russians have trouble with these words.  Что это ужас! (Shto eh-tuh oo-zhuss!)  "What a horror!"

Walking, driving, and horrors aside, there are some interesting aspects of Russian.  For example, if I want to tell you how old I am, I must say "Мне 28 лет."  (Mn-yeh dvad-tzat vo-sim lyet).  Literally, this means "To me is 28 years."  So I suppose I could say "I have been given 28 years."

If you think about it, this lesson could apply to every area of our lives.  I have been given the gift of 28 years on this earth, despite the scrapes, illnesses, troubles, and difficulties along my way.  I could not have made it without the help of God, my parents, friends, etc.  But what about my other things - clothing, shelter, education, relationships?  Sure, I have worked hard to gain and earn these things, and I will not deny that.  I have certainly done my part, and I shall continue to do so.  But without help and God's providence, I would not have been able to enjoy them.  One of my favourite verses is 1 Timothy 6:17.  I have mentioned this verse before on this blog, but it is worth repeating:

"As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy." (English Standard Version)

Note how it is God who gives us everything to enjoy.  We should not only trust in Him to provide for all of our current and future needs, but we should also thank Him and give Him credit for doing so.

But in the end, whose is it?  Yes, we are able to and should enjoy the things God has given us.  But with that privilege comes responsibility.  Perhaps the best Biblical passage describing this principle is the Parable of the Talents, found in Matthew 25:14-30.  For the sake of brevity, I'll allow you to read it on your own. ;)  But basically, this story describes a master who gives his servants some money to invest.  While two wisely use this money to increase the master's profit, a third does not, and he is punished for his foolishness.  This idea applies to our spiritual lives.  God has given us so much, and He expects us to use what we have to help Him, glorify Him, and grow His Kingdom (the Church) on Earth.

Here are some other passages that are much shorter.  1 Corinithians 3:23 says to those who have accepted Jesus: "...you belong to Christ, and Christ belongs to God." (New Living Translation)   And 1 Corinthians 6:19b-20 says: "You are not your own: you were bought at a price." (New International Version)

So there you have it.  When we have become Christians, we have been given many gifts and treasures.  But we also have responsibilities to "give back to God" of what He has given us.  How can we do this?  Perhaps by giving at church on Sundays?  By spending time with and reaching out to our friends who do not yet know the Lord?  There are many ways we could do this, and this is where prayer comes in.  Let us all pray that God will give us the desire, skill, and wisdom to effectively use His gifts to us for His ultimate good.

- Christian Basar

Campus Bible Talk is Resuming

Hello everyone,

Hope that you have had a good, restful, peaceful Christmas holiday season and New Year.  As they say, a new year is a new beginning, and we hope that your 2016 will be great!

This is just a quick note to say that Campus Bible Talk is continuing, starting today, on January 4, 2016.  We will be meeting on Mondays at 6:00 PM on campus in Athabasca Hall, specifically in the Heritage Lounge room, on the 1st Floor.  We hope that you can join us for an informal Bible discussion and for hanging out and chatting afterwards.

Christian Basar

P.S.  Great apologies!  I had written that we meet in the Alumni Lounge, but we actually meet in the Heritage Lounge.  (CB: January 23, 2016)

Be Still and Know...

Psalms 46:10:

Be still, and know that I am God; 

I will be exalted among the nations,

I will be exalted in the earth!

1. What does it mean to “be still”?

To not move around. To be in deep silence.

The word still is a translation of the Hebrew word rapa, meaning “to slacken, let down, or cease.” In some instances, the word carries the idea of “to drop, be weak, or faint.” It connotes two people fighting until someone separates them and makes them drop their weapons.

The phrase means to stop frantic activity, to let down, and to be still. For God’s people being “still” would involve looking to the Lord for help.

What happens when someone is still mentally and physically?

Exodus 14:13: And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever."

Isaiah 30:15: For thus says the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel:

“In returning and rest you shall be saved;
In quietness and confidence shall be your strength.”

When we are still, we can trust that God will take care of our situation.

What are some examples from our life today when we do not stay still?

Something happens in the church and we feel we need to rush in and save the day.

Something happens at work, family, school. When we are not still, we are rushed and make the wrong decisions, wrong choices, or do things that we may not be able to change later on, or at least it would be very hard to do so.

James 1:19: So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath.

In the Bible we have the example of Sarah rushing God’s promise to Abraham. This led to extremely bad consequences.

Genesis 16: 1-2: 1Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. And she had an Egyptian maidservant whose name was Hagar. 2 So Sarai said to Abram, “See now, the Lord has restrained me from bearing children. Please, go in to my maid; perhaps I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram heeded the voice of Sarai.

James 4:13-17: 13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will[a] go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; 14 whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. 15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” 16 But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.

17 Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.

Philippians 4:6-7: 6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; 7 and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

2. What does it mean to “know”?

To be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information.

Know – have the information that God is: omniscient (all-knowing), omnipresent (present everywhere), omnipotent (all-powerful), holy, sovereign, faithful, infinite, and good. Acknowledging God implies that we can trust Him and surrender to His plan because we understand who He is.

How do we know that He is God? By knowing what the Bible says about God.

How does knowing or acknowledging God impact our stillness?

Psalm 46:1: God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble.

Being still and knowing allows God to work in our lives. Did you know that we can stop God from working in our lives? How do we do that? By doing what we should not or not doing what we should. What are some examples?

Know how much God for us:

Romans 8:32: He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?

3. What does it mean to “be still and know”?

We can’t just “be still” or just “know.” The two need to work together. Why? What happens when we are just “still”? Or when we just “know”?

Mark 4:39: Then He arose and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace, be still!”And the wind ceased and there was a great calm.

Read the verses surrounding this one. What was going on in the disciples' and Jesus’ lives?

Romans 12:2 tells us to "renew our minds" so that we can be still.

Matthew 6:34: Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

Conclusions

Let us be still and know that God is our Lord. Let us know that He knows and will take care of all our problems, struggles and situations.

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Please note that we are not meeting for Campus Bible Talk over the Christmas Holidays. Our next meeting will be on Monday, January 4, 2016 at 6:00 PM in the Heritage Lounge of Athabasca Hall. May God bless you all over the holiday season!

Running the Races

Running is not my thing.  Oh, I can sprint if I need to, and I run up stairs often, perhaps to my peril.  But I much prefer going for a slow, relaxing walk or playing a soccer game than I do going for a long jog. 

Having said this, though, I admire marathon runners, joggers, and sprint racers.  The amount of hard work they put into these activities is amazing. But not only does a marathon require hard work, it also requires patience.  Whenever I run, many times I ask myself, "When will this end?  I cannot wait to get there so I can rest!"  Runs can take a long time to complete, and hard physical exertion only makes them seem longer.

This is a perfect metaphor for life.  Very rarely is a life goal achieved quickly.  "Get Rich Quick," "Get Your License Tomorrow," "Become Fluent in this Language in Two Weeks," etc. sound too good to be true, don't they?  Real life requires hard work, sweat, tears, and blood (figuratively).  As university students, this is all too familiar to us.  But in the midst of exam time, paper writing, and lab reports, we know in our hearts that our efforts will pay off in the end.  That degree and subsequent career are going to be ours, Lord willing.  We just have to trudge through, endure, and attain them.

The same is true in the Christian walk (or race).  Christianity demands a lot from us.  We need to change bad habits (repent), reevaluate our beliefs from time to time, overcome hurdles in our mindsets, and actively live out our faith.  This is difficult.  Sometimes our convictions will cause us pain.  But that is not the end of the story.  At the end of this hard Christian life is a far better afterlife. 

In more than one instance, the Bible compares the Christian lifestyle to a race.  The Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9:24-7 (NIV):

^"Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever.  Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."

And the writer of Hebrews says this in the 12th chapter, verses 1-3:

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.  Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart."

Please note something here.  Note how the Christian race is to be focused on Christ, the "pioneer and perfecter of faith."  Yes, we do need to make godly decisions in our Christian life.  We do need to "put our time in," or as Paul says, to "go into strict training."

But we cannot do it alone.  Our race depends on Jesus, through Whom salvation comes in the first place.  When Paul talked about the Old Testament vs. the New, he said in Romans 9:16: " It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God’s mercy."  I believe the same can be applied to Christian life.  That is why calling upon God in prayer is so important as we live our faith.

And at the end of the Christian race, remember that a grand prize awaits.  Keep these words in mind as you run with God in your race:

"I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing." (2 Timothy 4:7-8)

Christian Basar

Moral Relativism and Its Implications

If you don’t know already, CBT has recently implemented what is being called “Monday Night Discussions,” which take place on the last Monday of each month. A topic is submitted at least one week before the last Monday of any given month and the group takes it from there. It is a fantastic way to bring topics to life, share ideas, learn new things, and stand for the truth. The topic suggested by one of the students this last time was the difference between moral relativism and moral objectivism (or moral realism). If you didn’t get the chance to sit in on the discussion, you missed a real treat. But never fear, for what follows is an explanation of moral relativism and its opposite: moral objectivism/realism. Included below is a rough following of the major points that were covered on this a particular “Discussion Monday” night. 

Before we even begin to answer the question of what moral relativism is, we must first come to a basic understanding of what relativism implies. Stated most basically, relativism affirms that the truth of any given question (in our case, the truth of moral questions) resides in the person answering the question. This is to say, the thing that makes an answer either right or wrong is the person’s opinion on that particular question; the truth of the matter is found in the subject. 

For instance, suppose you were having a conversation with your friend about ice-cream. Over the course of conversation, it comes up that your favorite flavor of that frozen goodness is chocolate. To your surprise, your friend disagrees with you! Rather than affirming the supremacy of the chocolate flavor of ice-cream, he chooses to give credence to the vastly inferior flavor of strawberry. Now both you, the reader, and I, the author, can clearly see that your hypothetical friend is in great need of immediate correction. After all, strawberry is most certainly NOT the supreme flavor of all ice-cream flavors. That spot is reserved for chocolate. And so you proceed to try and change your friend’s mind by showing him the error of his ways. Shortly thereafter, you find yourself hotly debating who is right and who is wrong; is chocolate or strawberry the right flavor to like best? 

Hopefully you already know the answer. Both you and your hypothetical friend are correct: chocolate is the best flavor for you and strawberry is the best flavor for him. You both have different answers, contradictory answers nonetheless, that are both simultaneously correct. But how can this be? The answer is that the truth to the question “which flavor is best” relies on the opinion of the person (in this case, you and your friend) answering the question. There is nothing inherent about the flavor of chocolate that makes it superior to all other flavors. The only reason that chocolate is better than strawberry is because you think that chocolate is better than strawberry! And the same holds true for every other person on the planet. But here is the twist: What if you woke up one morning and found that strawberry was actually your new favorite flavor? Well, then strawberry would then be the best flavor for you. You see, based on nothing else than personal preference, people can have conflicting answers to the question “which flavor is best” and all be 100% right all at the same time. How can this be? It is only possible because ice-cream flavor is an issue that is relative to each person.

But what about the opposite and opposing view: objectivism? Consider a counter example to the ice-cream illustration used just above. Suppose I had a book. Suppose further that I placed this book on top of the Empire State Building in New York City. Lastly, suppose you and I went throughout Edmonton and asked people if my book was on top of the ESB. When we gather our results, we find that 30% of our survey said the book was there and 70% said it was not. Who is right? The 30% got the question right. Now what about this: I want you to imagine that every single person capable of rational thought took our survey and that 100% of the answers (that is approximately 7.4 billion people) said that the book was NOT on top of the Empire State Building. Question: is the book on top of the building? Yes! It does not matter one bit what people think about the book, the truth of the question is determined by the object, not by the people answering the question (hence, “objectivism”). Therefore, even if no one thought that the book was there, it would not change the fact that the book still stood on top of the building.

Now that we have a basic understanding of relativism and objectivism, we are prepared to deal with the topic of moral relativism. Given what you now know about relativistic thinking, what would moral relativism imply? It would imply that questions of morality (i.e. abortion, theft, lying, etc.) were relative to each person. For instance, have you ever heard the expression “Abortion may be wrong for you, but it’s not wrong for me.” Or “If you don’t like abortion, don’t have one!” These claims reduce the moral question of abortion to mere claims of personal preference. You might as well be talking about ice-cream: “Don’t like chocolate? Don’t have any!” But Christians affirm that morality is much more than mere preference. Christianity affirms that morals are objective; that they are real and exists independently of what any person on earth things about them. 

Take for example, the Salem Witch-hunts. Overly superstitious people would put women (primarily) on trial for being a witch and practicing sorcery. In order to test whether the accused was a witch or not, they would tie them to a chair, throw them in a lake and see if they floated. Or, they would place a plank of wood across their chest, having great amounts of weight on either side of the plank. If their chest was crushed, they were not a witch. You can see where this is going. If they died, they were innocent. If they lived, they were executed. A lose-lose situation if ever there was one. We can all agree that this behaviour is immoral regardless of what people think of it. The people who conducted the “trials” most likely thought they were doing the right thing. But they were wrong. Their actions were immoral regardless of what they, or anyone else though. 

What about a more pronounced example? Take the Nazi Holocaust. People were killed in torturous ways simply because of their race. Others were killed because they were seen as “unfit” to reproduce, or because they had mental disabilities or different sexual orientation. Children were killed along with the elderly. Surely this was one of the darkest moments in human history. But what if Hitler had won the war, killed everyone who thought the Holocaust was wrong and brainwashed everyone else into thinking it was right? Question: would the Holocaust still have been wrong? This author is compelled to think that it would be. But if certain things (such as boiling babies in wax for entertainment) are wrong even if everyone thinks they are right, moral objectivism is true.

Atheism, the system of thought which affirms the proposition that God does not exist, cannot account for moral objectivism. In atheism, there once was nothing. After an indeterminate amount of time (please excuse the sloppy description, but this is only a rough sketch of supposed billions of years) nothing exploded and created everything. Everything flew in all directions and then came together to form planets and stars. One of these planets, now called “Earth” was a big rock in space. This rock produced chemicals and the chemicals made bacteria. Today, we call the more advanced species of bacteria “humans”. Every now and then, one of these more complex biochemical machines will destroy another complex biochemical machine. We call this “murder”. But how in the world would the atheist ever be able to affirm that this thing we call murder is objectively wrong? It simply cannot be any more wrong for one human to kill another human than it is for one lion to kill a gazelle. Atheism cannot account for the moral features of reality that we answer to on a daily basis. So then, we can agree that, if God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist. But as we have seen very briefly, objective moral values and duties do exist. The conclusion follows logically and inescapably, therefore, that God exists.

There is one other very significant implication of this fact: we are all obligated to conduct ourselves morally. In other words, God has set the standard and we are morally obligated to meet that standard. However, when someone takes the time to do serious self-reflection, they will realize that something deep inside their innermost person is broken. Something inside each of us is dark and twisted. It’s something we are ashamed of - embarrassed about. We all have a profound feeling of raw guilt inside. We all know that there are certain moral standards to live by. But we also know that we have all failed to meet that standard. Just like we tried to hide the fact that we stole a cookie from the jar before supper, we try to hide our moral shortcomings. And, just like we deserved to be punished for taking the cookie, we deserve to be punished for our moral crimes. Dear reader, there is only one known cure for guilt. It’s not acceptance, anger, sadness, or confession. It’s not anything we can do. The only cure that guilt has, the only cure for the human condition, is forgiveness. Jesus Christ, who walked the earth and lived among us, came to give you that very thing: forgiveness. Christianity correctly identifies mankind’s most fundamental problem: guilt. But Christianity is the only religion that offers the only solution: forgiveness.

It was a long read this week, but that’s only because it was such a great discussion. If you like what you see here, won’t you stop by Athabasca Hall at 6:00pm on Monday? We would love to see you! And if you don’t like what you see, submit a topic for a Monday Night Discussion (and if you want, come prepared!). We always welcome the opportunity to discuss important issues in a safe environment.

Aaron Johnson