Confronting the lie: 'God won't give you more than you can handle'

I know, I know, I'm not posting my own stuff. But I haven't written anything better/more pertinent than this, so you should follow this link.

Nate Pyle writes on 'Confronting the lie: God won't give you more than you can handle'.

In response to the Warren suicide, and an interview about celibacy

Once again, I'm only sharing things others have written. I seem to be experiencing extended writer's block currently - my apologies. However, these are really good things.

1. In response to the suicide of Rick Warren's son - An article from Premier's Mind and Soul site.

2. An interview with a young man training to be a Roman Catholic priest - discussing the choice of celibacy.

Anorexia and Jesus

A short video from Emma Scrivener about her past anorexia and Christian faith.
Beautifully honest.

"Does God really care what we eat?" From 4thought.tv.

Check out Emma's website 'A New Name' here. Both are definitely worth a few minutes of your time.

When You Relapse

This week is mental health awareness week  - and, with an almost ironic timing, I seem to have chosen now to go through a depression relapse. On the one hand, I now have an appropriate topic to write about. On the other hand, everything else.

Imagine for a moment that you are about 5, and at the seaside. You’ve just finished building what is, from your perspective, an enormous, indestructible sandcastle. You remember that the sea came in and swept away the last one you made, but you’re sure this time will be different. You’ve built bigger turrets, with shells on them, and a moat. You dig yourself into it, and watch the tide’s relentless, blind ascent up the beach, each wave threatening your vain attempt at safety and stability. And then, finally, the first specks of foam brush against the walls. There is no sudden tsunami this time, but instead the slow washing away of foundations, until you sit, pathetic and increasingly damp, in a little circle of crumbled sand.

That’s what relapsing is like. It is the destruction of a false illusion of strength. Suddenly, the resolute, spiteful voice in your head that tells you are crazy and irreversibly damaged is correct. More pills, more smiles. A kind of emotional lockdown takes place. Friends are confused – you were fine, and now you’re not. This is not how they know you. This is not who you want to be.

Thankfully, it is not who you are. I can’t feel this at the moment – I can’t understand it – but I know that this is not what I was made to be, even if it is too painful to pray. I cannot fix myself, but underneath my sandcastle is a rock on which I stand. All other ground is sinking sand. 

"For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" Romans 8:37-39

Happy Valentine's Day.

Hello. A thought about love on a day that is so often about romantic idealism and the Self:

"An act of love always tend towards two things; to the good that one wills, and to the person for whom one wills it: since to love a person is to wish that person good... thus he puts another, as it were, in the place of himself... love is a binding force, since it aggregates another to ourselves, and refers his good to our own. And then again the divine love is a binding force, inasmuch as God wills good to others"
Aquinas. 

Here is a great article on the BBC about romantic love and relationships - it makes the great observation that the loss of belief in God has led to a need to find that kind of perfect love in others - an impossible demand.
'Viewpoint: Down with romantic love'

Also -

Reading Gregory of Nazianzus - Theology is great.

A lot of the time I don't appreciate how fantastic studying Theology is. Often I even view my subjects as slightly tedious, particularly when the commentaries seem to stretch out before me, a whole tsunami of ink spilt over a few verses that I have to attempt to understand in 3 days. And then you come across passages that make you stop and read them repeatedly, in awe that such devotion and passion is at the very heart of these theologians and what they are longing to communicate.

Today I was reading Gregory of Nazianzus on the Son - a lot of which is a massively complicated discussion of the Trinity - but it builds up to this triumphant declaration of who Jesus is. This is what he has to say:

"He hungered, but he fed thousands; he is the bread of life...He thirsted, but he cried, 'If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.'...He was wearied, but he is the rest of them that are weary and heavy laden...He prays, but he hears prayer. He weeps, but he causes tears to cease...He is sold, but he redeems the world...As a sheep he is led to slaughter, but he is the shepherd of Israel...He dies, but he gives life, and by his death destroys death."

Theology - the study of God - should turn our eyes away from ourselves and towards Him. It should be devotional; in learning more of Him, we will love Him more. All Christians must then be theologians - how great is it that I get to do that as a degree?! Long may such feelings of appreciation last! 

Les Miserables Review - 'Stumbling upon a grace-fest'

Being a massive fan of the musical, I was planning to write about it when I had got round to seeing the film - but then I found this review on Threads, which is really excellent and gets to the point - this is all about grace, which is what Victor Hugo draws out in the original novel.
Click on the link to read - some great observations to chew over.

Hannah

The Testimony of a Failed Agnostic

Sorry I haven't posted in a long time. I've been very unwell, and haven't been up to writing anything.
However, lying in bed feeling sorry for oneself does focus the mind wonderfully. It gives you lots of time to think about things. And so I've thought a lot about the nature of faith - in particular my own. (Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, by the way)

Why do I believe? I believe because I do not have a choice. Even if I wanted to stop believing - and sometimes I do - I cannot escape the Truth of what has happened to me. That's the problem with meeting God. It is not just a vague philosophical idea that you can pick up and drop again when it goes out of fashion or convenience. It happens to you. I don't think Christians are particularly honest about this. 'The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light' - a light that smashes into your idea of  reality, works its way into the deepest, darkest recesses of your cracked, corrupt little heart until there is nowhere left to hide, and you cannot escape this Love that is more real than even your experience of yourself. Yes, you can rationalise it, yes, there is evidence for its truthfulness that runs off the pages of history in a glorious revelation of divine mercy and grace - but the astounding Truthfulness of it bursts out of the manger scene, triumphantly calls from the empty cross on the altar, and I am left overwhelmed in the knowledge that there Cannot Be Anything Else. The broken whisper of 'I believe, help my unbelief' is the only response, and I watch Him heal me as he has so many times before. Willingly, He calls me back - again and again. There is no clinical confession of faith, no Damascus Road, no 3 steps to being a good Christian. Instead, it is the first flowering of hope in a despairing soul that maybe there is actually a loving God. It is meeting Jesus, who I thought I had always known but had routinely ignored, seeing His life and death and knowing it is for me.

 Trust me - I have tried to escape it. I have done my reading and research like a dutiful doubter, mentally joined Sceptics Anonymous, chased empty arguments and angry epithets round and round my head, but it is like asking a man who has been given the gift of sight to start wearing a blindfold. Maybe there is something comforting in not having to see things as they really are, to hope that you can fix it for yourself, that you're ok, really - but it just isn't enough anymore. And so I turn back to this Thing - this Faith - this Person - who makes everything hard, but also makes everything bearable, even wonderful, even purposeful. And so here I am.

May you know that He has covered your days in grace this year.
Hannah

Weird Stuff Christians Say

Yes, this is what the Christian sub-culture sounds like to the outside world...

'Stuff Christians Say'
Stuff Christians Say from worshiphousemedia on GodTube.

Enjoy! 

The Murder of Innocents.

Today, don't turn your face or your mind to other things as you hear about the massacre of school children in Connecticut. Let the pain of it fill your heart, tear at your petty concerns and push you to your knees in sorrow before our heavenly father.

Let the thought that across the world hundreds of thousands of children are abused, sold and brutalised - and their stories go unheard - overwhelm you and stir up deep anger that you cannot shake.

Let today be A Day for Hatred. http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/12/14/a-day-for-hatred/

Lord, have mercy!