The Myth of those who ‘believe’ and those who ‘don’t’

There is a myth that 'believers' are only the ‘religious types’! We are of course all 'believers', it’s just that we may believe contrastingly from one another. Every one of us has a worldview, a grid through which we view the world and its affairs, matters of faith or the absence of it and so on...
However, lets hold it a minute because we all put our ‘faith’ (trust) in something don’t we? Oh, I know you are now feeling like I am trying to corner you and most certainly are considering switching to read something less in your face, I understand if you do as there are moments for everything. If however, my deliberate play on words causes even a modicum of intrigue, then I invite you to read on.

None of us live in a vacuum. We have all had our ‘lens’ misted’ by something. The relativist tells us that ‘all roads lead equally to Rome’, the moralist that life’s deeper meaning is too mysterious and that all that really matters is being a good citizen and decent human being.

None of these thoughts developed in a vacuum.

Even Kevin Myers, the gnarly social commentator (Irish Independent) recently admitted in his column (September, 2010) that the opponents and detractors of protagonists of ‘Creationist’ views of the world’s origins (‘Intelligent Design’) are way less credible than the views of their ‘fodder’! It takes someone as ‘worldly’ as Myers at times to get people to sit up and ask some serious questions of what we believe and why we believe it.

The Biblical expression of how to interpret God's place in the affairs of His will can be summarised in the word Sovereignty. God being a Providential God who has ultimate control and power over His creation but has refused to harness the creation in a tight fisted grip of robotic dictatorship. No, the ultimate accolade we can give God is simply to recognise and respond to Him as He truly is, not because we have to but because we want to. That was the ‘risk’ of a Sovereign God granting human freedom.

Common worldviews or faiths that many hold in differing measures, even sub-consciously, in our day:

1. Atheism – the belief that eminates from evolutionary theory, that there is no God or higher power. Remember Atheism is surely also a ‘faith’ in something, even if it leads to a ‘faith in nothing’!

2. Polytheism – the belief in many gods or higher powers. Hindus’ pay homage to a host of gods and idols and may at times offer worship to one in order to appease another. Some Christians have suggested that idolatry is no less prevalent, albeit in a more sophisticated form, in 21st Century western society, a problem God lambasted Israel for in the Old Testament writings!


3. Deism – a belief in God that is based on reason based on nature and science. Sees the universe like a machine, believes in God but as a distant and remote being who is not involved in earthly affairs. The Bible and Christianity in general are based upon God having revealed Himself through Jesus Christ, to witnesses, in His Scriptures (inspiration) and so on. Deism refer to any ‘revealed religions’ as they call them, as ‘superstition’, including Christianity.

4. Astrology – star signs etc given a platform of inspiration and guidance from ‘other-worldly’ cosmic sources. Witchcraft and Satanism are also faith based practises active today.


5. Chance and fate – many believe in ‘Murphy’s law’, some in a haphazard ‘happy-go-lucky’ way, others have a deeper sense of ‘Fatalism’ which can have a more sinister effect on people’s lives. Even religions such as Islam and Christianity can be steeped in fatalism eg. The will of Allah as a carte blanche statement following events, Hyper-Calvinism which has twisted the Bible’s teaching on pre-destination and given it a fatalistic bent.

6. Relativism - a common post-modernism, that there is no such thing as absolute truth, that it is a subjective matter. In this case there is no one way to salvation for example, no one God to believe in, we can all chose our path, take whatever medecine 'suits us'. According to the Christian worldview this makes a mockery of the work of Christ on the cross as the only means of salvation.

7. Moralism - this puts faith in man's own 'goodness' and worth. It involves measurement against some subjective perception of right and wrong and often comparison against others, as the means of 'righteousness'. Many from nominal Christian backgrounds base their lives upon such assumptions. Again, the work of the cross is side-lined under such a view.


These are just a few of the worldviews that shape what people believe today. Even if a person wouldn't label themselves as belonging to any one of these ideologies (or others) it is most likely that there are at least trace elements or in some cases dollops of some of these influencing worldviews. Everyone believes in something, no one exist in a vacuum, my question is:
Do you believe that what you believe to be real is really real at all?
Jesus Christ spoke plainly of Himself. He said, ‘I am the way, the TRUTH, and the life. No man may some unto the Father but through me’

This was an exclusive claim. He came to bring salvation to a world of all kinds of worldviews. Many rejected Him and continue to. Is what you believe to be true still really true to you, or true at all?

Any comments?

Compassion in your gut

Brendan Manning tells a story about going to down to pray for a dying man in hospital. The man's 35 year old daughter had come to his house in tears because she had three times asked her Pastor if he could go down to do the same, three times he agreed, but three times got side-tracked in busyness and administrative duties and forgot or overlooked this most urgent and vital of pastoral duties. What a tragedy!

God is a God of compassion. He is surely longing to release His compassion upon a hurting and broken world, through us his 'compassion bearers'. Are we too busy or distracted or discouraged to notice what is happening around us? The flicker of sadness in an eye, the depth of despair or loneliness in a look....do we have eyes to see and ears to hear what is happening around us, or are we too self-involved to notice? May it not be so Lord...

The Gospels record that Jesus was 'moved' with compassion. Not only was he 'moved' with compassion but he allowed the compassion to 'move him' to take action, and bring healing and comfort and dignity to the broken and shamed. The original word for 'moved' is rooted in a language that is literally - a pain or wrenching deep within the bowels and gut! Now that is graphic and descriptive alright!

Brendan Manning offers this stunning but most provocative challenge to all believers of the goal of our faith being to be expressed in love and compassion. I leave you with the quote and may God meet you today in your need and out of the comfort you receive cause you to be a blessing to the hurting and broken. God is love.

Quote by Brendan Manning,

"You are never more Christ-like than when you are choked with compassion upon the brokenness of others"

Any comments?

A prophetic word given by Ali Shiels March 2010

Prophetic Word – Arise Dublin March 2010
Ancient Wells Prophetic word:

The following word was given at an 'Arise Dublin' meeting and was sent around the Arise Dublin network at the request of the Arise Dublin team:

While worshipping, the Lord showed me a picture of Ireland, and dotted all over our nation were WELLS. The Lord showed me that these are Ancient wells…. Wells that have been dug by saints of old.
But as I looked closer, the Lord showed me that the wells were stopped up. They were filled with grit and sand and mud…… where once pure fresh water flowed, now the water was stagnant, and dirty and not flowing.
The mud I believe symbolizes TRADITION, RELIGIOSITY, and SELF!!
The mud symbolizes where we have clouded and ‘dirtied’ the pure fresh water of God, by living lives that have been focused on SELF, on chasing after the things of this world, and not after Him…….

Then the Lord showed me that the time was now upon us, where He was going to unblock and unstop those Ancient wells. Where once again, the fresh pure water of God would flow through our land and wash over our land bringing new and fresh water to a thirsty and dry nation. As I looked, the wells did not just begin to flow, but the water EXPLODED up and out of the wells (much like when we strike oil, and the oil shoots up meters into the sky), and flowed out through the streets….. I saw clean, pure water flooding our streets and flowing through this city and this land……..

I believe that the Lord is encouraging us, that we have served him in a time of drought, and have proven faithful, but that now a time is upon us where we will experience an ABUNDANCE of His Spirit, where thirsty hearts and lives will ‘taste and see that the Lord is good’. It is a time of REFRESHING for the church in this nation. A time where we will begin to reap from the foundations of the wells that were dug hundreds of years ago…….

Ali Shiels (South City Church)

Beyond Hope Deferred

A Proverb of Scripture says

'Hope Deferred makes the heart sick'

Every one of us knows that horrid feeling of deflation where hope seems to have ebbed from our souls like a sagging party balloon. From being over-looked when teams are picked in the play-ground, the teen-age crush turned heart-break, a redundancy that comes out of left-field - 'restructuring' - a recessionary term that classically understates the trauma caused, to the greatest diappointments life can throw at us - marriage dreams shattered, tragic deaths...the list goes on and on. The potential for 'Hope deferred' seems endless.

Bill Johnson has described the HOPE God gives as 'the soil faith grows in'. It provides the necessary spiritual context for faith to take root and grow . Clearly despair is metaphorically soil that has gone toxic, the heart has grown sick as hope has been deferred.

Hope is the light that shines the way ahead for us. The Bible portrays many promises that seem utterly elusive amidst 'wilderness' experiences of utter despair and darkness.

History tells us that God is not a God though of heartless and tantalising mirages

but rather a God of substance,faithfulness and justice who is true to His Sovereign plan even when life appears to take detours and descend into dark times.

Many are indeed experiencing those 'dark times' in our times where 'Hope deferred' has made their hearts sick. Its a horrible place to be in. The Gospel is Good News and is found in the Person, the Hope of the Nations, the Promised One, Jesus Christ. The Gospel by definition is hope for the hopeless and in this more than some 'comfort blanket', but more substantially - mercy to the undeserving, Grace to the lawless, all because of one PERFECT SACRIFICE for sin.

Any of us who regard ourselves as followers of Christ are supposed to be the mid-wives of this hope into the world, ambassadors of another kingdom. For this to happen, dear friends, let us throw off the chains that bind us, and drink the delights of our God, even in tough times, that will help make sick hearts rejoice! Look beyond the mists and drunken confusion of your own disappointment and hope once more...its Christ in us that is 'the hope of glory'

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, "So shall your offspring be." Romans 4v18