Saturday, August 14, 2010

Selfishness and Self-Sufficiency

Self-Sufficiency:

  • Jeremiah 2:12-13 "Be appalled at this, O heavens, and shudder with great horror," declares the LORD. "My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me,the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water."
  • Psalm 146:3-4 Do not put your trust in princes, in mortal men, who cannot save. When their spirit departs, they return to the ground; on that very day their plans come to nothing.
  • Ecclesiastes 1:14 I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
  • Isaiah 44:9-17 All who make idols are nothing, and the things they treasure are worthless. Those who would speak up for them are blind; they are ignorant, to their own shame. Who shapes a god and casts an idol, which can profit him nothing? He and his kind will be put to shame; craftsmen are nothing but men. Let them all come together and take their stand; they will be brought down to terror and infamy. The blacksmith takes a tool and works with it in the coals; he shapes an idol with hammers, he forges it with the might of his arm. He gets hungry and loses his strength; he drinks no water and grows faint. The carpenter measures with a line and makes an outline with a marker; he roughs it out with chisels and marks it with compasses. He shapes it in the form of man, of man in all his glory, that it may dwell in a shrine. He cut down cedars, or perhaps took a cypress or oak. He let it grow among the trees of the forest, or planted a pine, and the rain made it grow. It is man's fuel for burning; some of it he takes and warms himself, he kindles a fire and bakes bread. But he also fashions a god and worships it; he makes an idol and bows down to it. Half of the wood he burns in the fire; over it he prepares his meal, he roasts his meat and eats his fill. He also warms himself and says, "Ah! I am warm; I see the fire." From the rest he makes a god, his idol; he bows down to it and worships. He prays to it and says, "Save me; you are my god."
Selfishness:
  • Zechariah 7:4-6 Then the word of the LORD Almighty came to me: "Ask all the people of the land and the priests, 'When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted? And when you were eating and drinking, were you not just feasting for yourselves?"
  • Esther 6:6 When Haman entered, the king asked him, "What should be done for the man the king delights to honor?" Now Haman thought to himself, "Who is there that the king would rather honor than me?"
  • 1 Samuel 25:3-11 His name was Nabal and his wife's name was Abigail. She was an intelligent and beautiful woman, but her husband, a Calebite, was surly and mean in his dealings. While David was in the desert, he heard that Nabal was shearing sheep. So he sent ten young men and said to them, "Go up to Nabal at Carmel and greet him in my name. Say to him: 'Long life to you! Good health to you and your household! And good health to all that is yours! Now I hear that it is sheep-shearing time. When your shepherds were with us, we did not mistreat them, and the whole time they were at Carmel nothing of theirs was missing. Ask your own servants and they will tell you. Therefore be favorable toward my young men, since we come at a festive time. Please give your servants and your son David whatever you can find for them.' " When David's men arrived, they gave Nabal this message in David's name. Then they waited. Nabal answered David's servants, "Who is this David? Who is this son of Jesse? Many servants are breaking away from their masters these days. Why should I take my bread and water, and the meat I have slaughtered for my shearers, and give it to men coming from who knows where?"
  • Proverbs 28:27 He who gives to the poor will lack nothing, but he who closes his eyes to them receives many curses.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Boldness

This is my command—be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. Joshua 1:9 (New Living Translation)

*****
Be strong and courageous. It is so easy to be discouraged and fearful, and this is coming from probably one of the most daring people I know, ME! Phew.

Quebec Rabbis Sign Document to Accept Gays

By CBC News

Three Montreal Orthodox rabbis are joining an international call for acceptance of homosexual Jews into synagogues.

The rabbis have signed a statement calling for the acceptance of gays, even though the Torah (the Jewish Bible) explicitly condemns homosexuality.

The document is called Statement of Principles on the Place of Jews with a Homosexual Orientation in Our Community.

More than 150 rabbis from around the world have signed the statement, which was drafted after extensive debate among Orthodox rabbis, educators and mental health professionals.

"We have wonderful members of our community in our congregation who are gay, and come to us anticipating and expecting to be welcomed into our community," said Adam Scheier, rabbi of the Shaar Hashomayim Congregation in Westmount and president of the Montreal Board of Rabbis.

David Brody, a gay member of Scheier's Orthodox congregation, said the statement is progressive.

"I never thought I'd live to see this," he said.

However, Brody said he does have some issues with the statement, such as the fact that it was only drafted after consultation with mental health therapists.

"They [make] reference to mental health specialists, which makes us sound as though we're all crazy people," said Brody.

Brody would also have liked the statement to allow gay marriage in the Orthodox community.

"It says that we are also created in the image of God, yet we are not allowed to love like heterosexuals," said Brody.

"I do believe that there is a place within Orthodox Judaism for affirmation ceremonies." Brody added.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Gay Priest May Become Church of England Bishop

Robert Barr The Associated Press

LONDON—The Church of England may be on the verge of promoting a gay priest to bishop, a step that would widen the split over sexuality in the global Anglican Communion.

If that happens, it would appear to be a significant turnaround for Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, spiritual leader of the Church of England and the world's Anglicans, who recently imposed sanctions on the U.S. Episcopal Church for electing a lesbian bishop.

According to newspaper reports, Williams is prepared to back the elevation of the Very Rev. Jeffrey John, who withdrew seven years ago from an appointment as a suffragan (assistant) bishop in the face of a heated controversy about his homosexuality. Williams' office will not comment.

"I think the strength of the opposition is much weaker this time," Rev. Canon Giles Goddard, the chairman of Inclusive Church, said Tuesday. His group was founded by people disappointed by John's failure to become a bishop in 2003.

John, who is now dean of St. Albans Cathedral, might be seen as a more acceptable candidate than the U.S. bishop because he has declared he is celibate — and therefore not in violation of church teaching.

A Crown Nominations Commission, composed of 14 Church of England representatives, including Williams, met in secret Monday and Tuesday to choose two nominees to become bishop of Southwark diocese, the half of London that lies south of the River Thames.

Prime Minister David Cameron, who has spoken strongly in favour of equal rights for gays, will have the final decision about whom to recommend to Queen Elizabeth II, who will make the formal appointment. Southwark diocese says a decision may not be announced before October.

Williams has said nothing publicly about the issue.

After the Episcopal Church elected Mary Douglas Glasspool as an assistant bishop in Los Angeles, Williams moved to bar Episcopalians from representing the Anglican Communion on international ecumenical bodies. "This is simply to confirm what the Communion as a whole has come to regard as the acceptable limits of diversity in its practice," Williams said in a letter to the global church.

John, who is 57, has claimed celibacy despite being in a civil partnership. Neither Glasspool nor V. Gene Robinson, the Episcopal bishop of New Hampshire, has claimed to be celibate.

Rev. Paul Dawson, media officer for Reform, an evangelical grouping, objects that John has defended sexual gay relationships that are "Permanent, Faithful, Stable," as the title of one of John's books puts it.

"If you have a bishop who is effectively teaching what is against the Bible's clear teaching and what the Church of England says is its doctrinal position, if you have someone at the highest level saying this is a 'blessing,' this is a 'gift,' that raises all sorts of questions for the average churchgoer," Dawson said.

Appointments to bishoprics are the battleground in the Anglican debate about the role of women and homosexuals in the church.

The Church of England's governing General Synod will resume its debate about permitting female bishops this weekend as it continues trying to mollify conservatives who fought against making women priests and now resist what appears to be general support for women as bishops.

Anglican agonizing over sexuality has dogged Williams since 2002 when he became spiritual leader of the Church of England and of the Anglican Communion.

When John was nominated become bishop of Reading, Williams is believed to have yielded to conservative opposition.

"He cracked after two months of pressure and asked John to withdraw his name, establishing his reputation as a man who could be bullied," religion commentator Andrew Brown wrote in The Guardian newspaper.

"If he is beaten again, he is finished. If he wins, he will have shot the rapids and the Church of England will finally emerge from the turbulence of the last 30 years with a fairly clear and fairly coherent doctrine about sex."

The prime minister, in an interview with the gay magazine Attitude early this year, said his Conservative Party supported equal rights "whether you are male, female, black, white, urban, rural, straight or gay." The church, Cameron said, "has to do some of the things that the Conservative Party has been through — sorting this issue out and recognizing that full equality is a bottom line full essential."

God's Truth

But the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! Romans 1:19 (The Message)