Parlez vous Christianese?

English: The Shekinah Glory Enters the Tabernacle; illustration from The Bible and Its Story Taught by One Thousand Picture Lessons. Edited by Charles F. Horne and Julius A. Bewer. 1908. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Hallelujah! After the worship (during which we’re hoping for contributions), an anointed apostle will be opening the Word to us – we’re believing for salvation and sanctification, amen?!

Depending on your background, whether you’re a Christian or not, and the sort of church you attend, there’s a pretty good chance that you were either inspired by the above quote, or left like a rabbit in the headlights.

This year I’ve had the pleasure of visiting a lot of different local churches and if I’ve spotted one thing more than any other it’s that every local church has its own language, which can make you as a visitor feel a lot like an outsider. A couple of examples:

Names of clubs, groups, meetings, etc

Something every church seems to want to do is name its kids groups and prayer meetings something fun and catchy. Nothing wrong with that, but when you’re told during the notices that ‘Trail Blazers is meeting this evening at the usual time at Fountain House,’ you haven’t really been told anything.

Use of unfamiliar words

Non-Christians simply don’t talk about stuff like ‘regeneration’, ‘the Shekinah glory’, or odd foreign words like ‘hosanna’. Using them alienates everyone except the inner few.

Unfamiliar use of familiar words

Some words are used outside of Christian circles in a different context; ‘worship’ means singing for a lot of Christians whereas a non-Christian would never make that connection (this really annoys me), and ‘the Gospel’ means ‘good news’ to Christians but ‘a bunch of rules’ to non-Christians.

There’s a solution

I know this is tricky, but how about we just stop using Christian jargon altogether without explaining it first? To assume makes an ass out of u and me so would it be so hard to just use normal language when talking about Christianity?

Football will continue

English: 116 Clique on DWYL Tour 2009 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Because my to-do list is not full enough of things which are neither urgent nor important I subscribe to The Guardian’s daily e-mail about football.

It’s called the Fiver because it’s meant to arrive at about five o’clock, and when I first saw it the question that came to mind was: How on earth is there enough new to provide a daily update on football? Well, a couple of weeks ago they really struck something by explaining themselves. Here’s a brief quote:

…right now only one thing seems certain: despite repeated Fiver campaigns, football will never stop. Every second of every day for the rest of your life, there will be a happening of football going on, some story, some outrage, some brouhaha. At the exact moment you die, many years from now, football will be happening somewhere. And in the moments after your death football will just keep happening, all over the place, horribly vital, fresh storms and spats and swoops and sagas brewing up even as your eyes close for the last time and light begins to fade, and the last sight or sound your senses are aware of is a sensational swoop for a 13-year-old Peruvian wonderkid, or a managerial reshuffle in Russia, or a man saying a thing about another thing solely because he was asked a question by a man whose job it is to ask questions and thereby create out of thin air some football to happen.

Now what’s really depressing about that quote is that it’s actually true. And not just true about football, but true about all sorts of things. Other things that will simply roll on into the future, with or without us, include such joys as politics and soap operas, and thinking about this reminds me that we only live once.

When my eyes are preparing to close for the last time will I be thinking about the possibility of a Peruvian wonderkid becoming a world-famous footballer, or will I be reflecting on a life well-lived and a legacy left behind me?

Don’t.

Waste.

Your.

Life.

Man, that really annoys me

Matthias Grünewald – Complaining Pharisee – WGA10802 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Do you know what annoys me? People complaining.

That, and the definition of irony in the Oxford English Dictionary.

Well, actually, people complaining in and of itself doesn’t annoy me, but in the vast majority of cases it does, and they tend to fall into these categories:

Complaining about things you can’t change

People complain all the time about the weather, taxes and late trains. Complaining about these sorts of things adds nothing to anyone except to further annoy you and spread the annoyance to others. So it seems pretty pointless to me.

Complaining about things you can change but haven’t

This is worse: people complain about the fact they overslept, or that they’ve spent all their money, or that they can’t stop looking at naughty pictures. If you put as much effort into correcting the things you’re complaining about as you do complaining, you’d be a happy person. So get happy.

Complaining about things you’ve tried to change and failed to

Less common. Most people who try to correct a situation but fail just get unhappy, so complaining can actually be a useful vent. I don’t mind this that much.

Complaining to God about stuff He’s done

This can actually be useful too! Complaining to God by saying ‘You’re an idiot!’ doesn’t help anything, but saying ‘I don’t understand what you’re doing!’ can actually remind you of your insignificance…

I like coffee

I recently discovered this poster advertising London’s first ever coffee shop. Outstanding.

Six degrees of separation

Me, My friend and The Chuckle Brothers (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I’m sure you’ll have heard of the theory that every individual on the planet has a maximum of six degrees of separation from every other individual. In layman’s terms, a friend-of-a-friend is someone who is one degree separated.

So in a partially fictional way I’m friends with someone who’s friends with the Chuckle Brothers (1), who are friends with some producer at the BBC (2), who plays golf with the FD of a national baker (3), whose brother-in-law’s (4) family (5) lives in Uganda and know a witch doctor there (6).

The theory goes that I could get to absolutely everyone on the planet in a maximum of six.

And surely Facebook etc has shown this in real-life. One person says something interesting, it’s ‘liked’ by his friends, and suddenly the audience for this comment is multiplied exponentially. Apparently some salesman called Joe Girard (he’s meant to be a Big Deal) claimed that everyone has 250 important contacts, which means that only two friends away we know 15 million people.

A lot.

Is the effect that we have on our closest friends significantly greater than it first appears? I think it might be.

Today I feel…European

German Slogans (Photo credit: Mr. Ducke)

I heard a radio interview a bit ago with a German man-on-the-street who said that he felt European first, and German second. And at the time I thought…’what?’

As a Brit, that’s pretty hard to get. I know that I’m European, but it would probably take me a moment to declare allegiance to the concept of being European after thinking that I’m British or English.

I also think I heard somewhere that people from Texas think of themselves as Texans first, and then as Americans. I don’t know if that’s true, but I think I’m starting to understand what that German guy was on about. Someone from rural Wales probably thinks of himself as Welsh first British second, whereas I spoke to an English person recently who said they felt British first English second. And certainly I know a lot of people would identify themselves as English first British second.

European probably fourth or fifth.

But where am I going with this? It’s all about Jesus. In terms of national identity, do British Christians feel more shared identity with fellow Brits, or fellow Christians?

Surely if our identity is in Christ then being a Christian should be the national identity that we cling to above everything else; we’re ambassadors for Christ but are never going to truly understand that if our Christianity is a secondary concern after being English, or American, or Chinese, or Somali or whatever.

I prayed about it, so stop bothering me

 

English: Christian Bible, rosary, and crucifix. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Does anyone else think it’s funny that many Christians claim to have been created in the image of God, yet their God seems more to have been created in their image? Not funny ha-ha, more funny strange, that is?

What I mean is: there seem to be a lot of people who end up making decisions which seem to contradict God’s instruction under the guise of ‘I prayed about it, and God said it was fine.’

I was a university student when I became a Christian, and if I knew one thing about Christianity it was that Christians don’t believe in sex before marriage! Whatever that means. So when a very, very Christian fellow-student told me that she started sleeping with her boyfriend when he proposed to her, I was confused. But she said that she’d prayed about it and that ‘God had given her peace that what he was really talking about was a lifelong commitment.’

Hmm…I’m still confused about that today. And Ed Welch has written a pretty useful article about people who have ‘prayed about’ stuff and coincidentally found that God has made them an exception. Here’s a sneak peek:

“I prayed about it”…is invoked when Scripture clearly teaches one thing and the person wants to do another. For example, a Christian woman is (somehow!) granted that coveted spiritual exception to marry an unbeliever. When challenged by her friends, she says: “I prayed about it.” Or another follower of Christ is startled to hear the Spirit say a resounding “YES, you can move in with your girlfriend,” or “YES, you can leave your spouse, because, after all, I want you to be happy.”

What “God” are these people praying to? This perverse, self-deceived foolishness is apparent to everyone except the person involved. How can we respond? We have a few possibilities.

The obvious place to start is to wonder if we are looking in the mirror. Where do I justify my own desires? Yikes, I don’t have to look hard. Lord have mercy on me.

Amen. Have a read of the entire article to get the full picture.

Every FD can learn from Charles Dickens, and so can you

Pounds Sterling (Photo credit: 917press)

I work in an accountancy firm. I’m not an accountant, and I don’t mix with accountants that much, but I’ve had to learn about accountancy. It’s basically maths minus all the logic and plus a whole bunch of complexity to stop ‘normal’ people being able to do it.

In particular there’s one accounting concept which frustrates me: materiality. Materiality states that providing real life is no more different than a set amount from financial reports, there’s no point worrying about it. In other words, if I tell you that I have £1,000 but I actually have £900, providing materiality is 10% or more I’m effectively telling the truth.

This is for risk management purposes so is generally fine, but £100 is not an insignificant amount.

Nor, actually, is £1.

If two people earned £50 today and Person A spent £49.50 then they’ve got 50p profit, but if Person B spent £50.50 then they’re in minus numbers.

£1 might not sound like that much of a difference on its own, but over a year Person A will have almost £200 to spend on a special treat, while Person B will be stuck searching for that much.

Charles Dickens knew this when he wrote David Copperfield, and I think we’d do well to take his thoughts on board:

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery.

Somebody that I used to know

Well now. This ridiculous song which became the biggest selling of 2012 in the UK is both incredibly annoying and incredibly catchy.

And this video is probably the best expression of what that feels like. Enjoy:

Why God doesn’t tell us everything

Ever found that some questions just sit there, and God remains silent? Questions about death and pain pretty much steal the headlines here but they all basically come down to the same thing:

I get that you’re God and I’m not, but you could at least tell me what’s going on!

Well, Jon Bloom’s done a pretty good little article over at Desiring God to help explain that it’s actually good for God to keep some things hidden. I’d encourage you to read it all, but the highlight for me comes in the form of a quote from Corrie Ten Boom’s The Hiding Place, which stood out for me when I read it. Corrie asked her Dad where babies come from, and her Dad handed her a big suitcase:

“Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?” he said. I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with the watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning. “It’s too heavy,” I said. “Yes,” he said. “And it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It’s the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.”

He sums it up well at the end:

God is very patient and merciful with us. Someday, when we are older and stronger, he will let us carry more of the burden of knowledge. But until then let us happily keep letting him carry our burdens.

If you’d like to see the full reasoning behind it, read the whole article.