Thou Shalt Not “___?____” A Bible of Mad-libs

I was talking with some of my brothers in Delta Sigma Pi last week and we got to talking about some of the differences in religious beliefs that are in the business school and the difficulties and conflicts that come with them. It was then that I jokingly suggested we just post a fill in the blank “religious poster” so it wouldn’t offend anyone. To this one of my brothers responded, “Like a Mad-Lib Bible?!”

That got me thinking….. how often is that the unfortunate truth on how we treat the scripture when things get “uncomfortable”? Our society has become so tolerant of everything that in our quest to be more “open-minded” and “loving” we have effectively reduced the importance of scriptural authority. I’m not saying that we should be hateful to others, but we should hate sin with every part of our being. In hating sin we truly do show our love for the sinner.

Christ called things as He saw them, how He saw them is the standard we live by, the standard we live by is contained in the Bible, and the Bible is the final authority. No questions asked. Sin is sin to Christ. He doesn’t leave any room for us to “fill in the blank” on issues.

In a world of “political correctness” and “tolerance” is this what we have done to God’s Word?

1 Timothy 1:9-10 “as knowing this, that law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and unruly, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for fornicators, for abusers of themselves with men, for menstealers, for liars, for false swearers, and if there be any other thing contrary to the sound doctrine;”

Or do we see it for what it really is?

1 Timothy 1:8 “But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully,”

Sin is sin. Don’t try to make blanks where they don’t exist or soften the message to make things comfortable. Preach the word of God in love. Plain and simple.

Just a thought, I’d love to hear yours!!

Note: The thoughts in this post are very similar to those I shared during my class at Sonshine Youth Rally 2011. You can find the audio here and check out the Prezi I made for the class. Both can also be found under the Files Page of this blog.

Even The Dreariest Days

Beautiful Day. What does that bring to your mind? To some its sunny days and warm weather, to others it might be the leaves changing color in the fall, to me there isn’t anything more beautiful than a heavy snowfall. Yes, all of those are beautiful. But do we pick and choose what forms of Gods creation cause us to be in awe of Him?

One of the things I have been trying to do lately is find beauty in everything, and if not beauty, find wonder. Every part of creation is from God from the green grass to something as terrifying and fearful as a tornado. And while some aspects of weather and creation can be devastating, that doesn’t take away from the fact that they still show how incredible God is!

Try and be thankful for everything God has created. Even the dreariest of days is a gift from Him! Rain or shine, there is a good God in heaven and He cares about us. Our thankfulness and love for God shouldn’t be unpredictable like the weather outside, it should be as constant as the love He shows for us.

Do we see the rainy days as beautiful, or do we only look for beauty when the sun comes out? When the SON is shining beauty and comfort is easy to find.

Genesis 1:31 “And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.”

Just a thought, I’d love to hear yours!

Tools of The Trade: Notability (App Review)

I have started to use technology in ministry more frequently and I figured that it might be beneficial, every so often, to share some of the tools I use. My iPad has become a HUGE help to me not only in my ministry, but in school and everyday life. When I preach somewhere, I like to record my sermons audio so I can share it with others, I like to take notes and be able to see those notes while I preach, and I like to be able to share my notes with others. One of the apps I have found TREMENDOUSLY useful for all the above is called Notability.

Here are some of the key features, you can:

• write on lined paper with use of a stylus
• type notes in an outlined format with the use of a Bluetooth keyboard
• record audio while you take notes and run it in the background
• link the app with a cloud based program like Dropbox or Evernote
• export your notes ALONG WITH your audio to the cloud
• export notes in either RTF or PDF format

It isn’t a free app, but it is worth the price! I have used it both for preparing sermon outlines as well as recording sermon audio. One of the neatest ways I have used it is preparing my sermon outline first, then recording the audio for the sermon, and exporting both files with the PDF of the outline to a Dropbox shared folder to make it available for download.

Since I am still in college this has also been a great tool for taking notes during lectures both with a stylus and with the keyboard.

I hope these posts are useful to you! Let me know if you try them out and what you think! Have a great day!