, ,

Does God hate homosexuals?

There is much confusion and inaccuracy in how people think about this question. God does not hate homosexuals but rather loves each of us. Many so-called Christians have failed to show love around this issue and become more known for what they think about this issue than what Jesus taught. The unfortunate result is that many people with same sex attractions have been deeply hurt and driven away from family, community and their faith by those that claim to follow God.

Homosexuality is a very real, emotional and personal issue. Whether we believe we are born with this desire or come to it naturally is not the issue. The world is broken and all of us are born into sin. The real question is whether these desires and attractions are from God and what he wants us to do with those.

Since the first sin, man has tried to justify or explain away the things we do that go directly against God’s word. In this case, despite how we try to interpret, twist or discredit God’s word, it is clear that any sex (gay or straight) outside the marriage of a man and woman is sinful. The godly response is not to bury our heads in the sand and pretend the desire doesn’t exist but rather seek God’s strength to act in a manner that shows our love for him.

The real good news is that, whatever our actions have been, God loves each of us and offers us forgiveness of our sins through Jesus Christ. Let there be no doubt that God loves you and wants to be in your life. That choice is yours and is open to each of us. Rest in God’s love and find the strength to live for him. Don’t let the loud voices of condemnation convince you otherwise.

Believing God loves homosexuals is a big question and we would love to discuss it with you.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Does God really care if I go to church?

God does care about you being in Christian community and he loves you. This question seems to be growing in frequency with some simply not believing church is that important or being disillusioned with “religion”. Others prefer to spend time with God in their own home. The real question is not what we feel or prefer but whether God has anything important to say about this. The answer is God absolutely has given us clear guidance on the importance of living and worshipping with other believers in the body of Christ.

Any conversation about church should be kept in perspective. Going to church saves no one. That only happens through faith in Jesus. And those who trust In Jesus do not lose their salvation by missing church. However, it is important to understand why God says church is important and good for us.

When we become followers of Jesus, we become part of the universal church. This means we are united with every other Christian believer to make up the body of Christ. In the Old Testament, the temple was the place to meet God but now we meet him with through the body of believers. The bible talks about how this body is made up of all different parts and only works when those parts work together. This means we each have a role and need to be part of this holy body for it to work optimally. Church should be where we gain spiritual maturity through being taught, prayed for and encouraged by other believers.

God also takes the time in scripture to talk about how the church should be organized and what qualifications someone should have to serve it. Why would God spend that time if it were not important to him and to us?

We pray you will assess your heart and seek accountability within a church home. Find a place where the word of God is taught with Jesus as the center of worship and sharing that message with others is a priority. Worship is ultimately about giving glory to God and not just serving ourselves. When we do this our hearts are strengthened and we grow closer to God.

Whether God cares about you going to church is a big question and we would love to discuss it with you.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Does God have a perfect spouse for me?

Culture has taken some interesting positions on marriage over time and currently suggests that it is not important or necessary. Despite that, many seek to find that perfect spouse thinking life will somehow be perfect with that. The simple truth is there is no perfect person nor does God have one person picked out for each of us to marry.

God loves you and graciously gives you a choice about marriage and who to marry. He may bring several people into your life that may make godly spouses. However, there is no perfect spouse as we all have our imperfections. The challenge is to find someone that is a believer, that you believe God will help make you all you were created to be, and someone not filled with emotional unhealthiness.

There are several biblical guidelines for choosing a spouse. We see information about what godly men and women look like as well as what healthy marriage looks like. However, God does not dictate how to choose a spouse.  God offers you the choice. When you enter into a true and pure marriage covenant, with Jesus at the center of your marriage, then God acknowledges your choice and blesses it as His will.

Some people still ascribe to the concept that there is one perfect match for them. This is certainly a romantic concept, but it is not biblical and simply wrong. If we think about this logically it would mean the entire universe of perfect spouses is forever poisoned the minute one couple breaks the perfect chain.  This concept also leads to unrealistic expectations within a marriage.

The fact is there are multiple people that may be the right spouse for you. When a single person that draws you closer to God comes into your life and you decide to get married, it’s then up to both of you to commit to the each other every day working through every problem with God’s help.

Surprisingly, one thing that can be misleading is the idea of love.  We all desire to be in love and find perfect love. However, relationships are hard work and people with different outlooks can find that even more difficult. Many people have different goals and objectives, or unhealthy family dynamics, and relying solely on the idea of being in love is not enough of a reason to get married.

The relationship and commitment to Christ is the first place to look and there are numerous other variables that will shed light on whether someone is the right spouse for you. Other factors to consider include views on children, finances, careers, family, church commitment, friendships, moral values, and conflict resolution.

Finding the right spouse and marriage are huge questions and we would love to talk with you about that.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Does God care about me?

God does care about you and loves you. That can be hard to believe in those times when we feel alone. Other times we may acknowledge God but feel like he is very difficult to connect with and far away.

This becomes even more difficult when life is filled with pain and heartache. God seems either distant or unloving and we can’t understand why he does not step in and make things better. Of course, this view assumes he isn’t helping. We typically fail to think that it may be even worse without him or that something even bigger than our current challenges may be happening. The simple reality is we live in a broken world that has been fractured by sin. This is complicated by the fact that God honors our free will and he may feel more distant because we choose to work things out on our own instead of turning it all over to him.

The thing we need to focus on is that God’s attitude towards us is one of unconditional love. He created us for relationship with him. Christ has died for our sins and offers complete forgiveness. His Holy Word is not meant to burden us with rules but rather to teach us what is good for us, show us how we can be at our best and bring us closer to Him.

God’s knows each of us at the most intimate level and has an eternal perspective. He works in ways we often don’t realize or understand. The question is whether we will trust in that or whether we will decide to do it alone.

His promise is that if we draw near to him, he will come closer to us. He does not promise that only good will happen or life will be free of pain. There are times he will not jump into our situation the way we want but he is there. His promise is to be with us and help us through our troubles. His promise for eternity is much bigger and includes perfect love with no pain, tears or suffering. You can experience that and come to see that not only does God care, but that he loves you no matter what you have done.

Whether God cares or loves you is a big question and we would love to talk with you about it.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Why do bad things happen?

We live in a world that has been fractured by sin. It is filled with pain and suffering and that can be hard to understand. God is sovereign, so all that happens must have at least been allowed by Him, if not directly caused by Him. This makes it hard to reconcile bad things happening with God being good, but we must keep several things in mind.

First, we do not have a perfect, all knowing perspective of the future and so we can never fully understand God’s purposes and ways.  He tells us that he will redeem all he allows so we have to look past the pain of the moment and consider what else may be happening.

Second, bad things may happen but this world is not the end. Those that trust God know we can look past this life where all things will be renewed one day. This allows us to look beyond what we see today and focus on what God promises in eternity.

Third, God can use bad things for an ultimate, lasting good. Sometimes we only see truth or God’s love through experiencing things we would never sign up for and want. This happens throughout scripture as people have stories that start with horrible circumstances only to see those bad things make God’s story that much greater.

Fourth, Bad things can equip us for deeper relationship with God and ministry to others. God comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. Those that grow closer to God and see how those difficult times changed them are now able to offer a similar hope to people experiencing the same challenges.

Lastly, we can take comfort in how Jesus himself experienced terrible things. He suffered more than we can imagine and did so for our sin. Christ’s example is encouragement that God has a plan and will bring you through it. Jesus knows your pain.

God allows things to happen for a reason. Whether or not we understand His reasons, we must remember that God is good, just, loving, and merciful. Often, bad things happen to us that we simply cannot understand. Instead of doubting God’s goodness, our reaction should be to trust Him.

Whether you believe God is with you in hard times is a difficult question and we would love to discuss it with you.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Does God forgive all sin?

We often wonder, “does God forgive?” God does offer his forgiveness and love to all. Every person is a sinner, as we have been born into a fractured and sinful world. Because of this every person is in need of God’s forgiveness. God does not want us to live in guilt or in separation from him. This is why he offers his forgiveness. It is all about his love for us and not about what we deserve or earn.

Our sins are serious and have consequences. Jesus came to die for all sin and offer forgiveness because he loves us and knows we can’t earn our own forgiveness or save ourselves. Despite that truth, we let our minds trick us into thinking we must make things right and can’t approach God before doing so.

The most common emotions most of us have after sinning are guilt and shame. We either don’t understand or believe that Jesus still loves us. We find it hard to accept that he is willing to forgive and help us change. We worry that he will be silent, disapproving, judgmental or unloving. Satan wants to deceive and have us feel like God is disappointed instead of confidently trusting his grace.

We do not need to fix ourselves, serve self-imposed penance or try to make things right before going to God for forgiveness. God forgives out of love and mercy not merit. The Bible tells us that it is not enough to just believe God exists. We must acknowledge our sins and believe and trust that Jesus died for our sins. We must have faith that His death is the full payment for our sin debt. We must depend on His resurrection as the guarantee that we will be raised to eternal life after death.  This involves recognizing both our need for forgiveness and our need for his help in becoming who he created each of us to be. Trust Jesus and let him forgive you.

Forgiveness is a big question and we would love to talk with you about it.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Does God answer prayer?

God hears our prayers and desires for us to be in a right relationship with him. Unfortunately, we often seek God as the last resort after our own failed attempts at getting what we need or want. We may go to him even though we have no real faith, no desire to change, and no heart for a relationship with him. We may have sinful behavior or motives sitting between us, but we still send our prayers to God. We want to be clear that this type of prayer does not work as praying is much more than sending requests to a cosmic wishing well.

God loves us and wants to be in direct relationship with each of us. He knows us better than we know ourselves and loves us more than we love ourselves. He has died for our sins so we can be forgiven and desires that we come to him with faith, trust and confidence in him. He tells us to pray according to his will and not our own. When we pray according to his will, and seek things that glorify him, then he answers our prayers. We should do this knowing and trusting the character and promises of God. And when we do that, we may not get answers that align with our requests, but we receive a peace that goes beyond what we can find on our own.

Part of trusting God means we also understand that his answer may be “no” or “not now”. He answers our prayers with a perfect and eternal perspective. That may mean he has something better in mind or his timing is different than ours. When we trust God, we recognize that his wisdom exceeds ours and his response is the best possible answer. That is true even when the answer is completely different than what we desire and we can’t understand how it is good for us. In the end, God makes all things beautiful in time. He loves us too much to give us all that we seek when we have no idea what the future holds or what is truly best for us.

Whether God answers prayer is a big question and we would love to discuss it with you.

TALK NOW
/by
, ,

Is the Bible really God’s Word?

This a question that the world has debated for centuries. Many who claim it is not God’s Word have never read it or done any actual research and there are others who insist it is that are equally uninformed. There are both internal and external evidences that the Bible is truly God’s Word.

The internal evidences are those things within the Bible that speak and testify of its divine origin. One such internal is the unity of the Bible. The Bible is actually a collection of books written by 40 different authors in three languages over the course of 1500 years. Despite the diversity of authors, we end up with one unified book from beginning to end that shares a consistent story of God’s love and is without contradiction. This unity is unique from all other books and is evidence of how God inspired the words written.

Another of the internal evidences that indicates the Bible is truly God’s Word is the prophecies contained within. The Bible contains hundreds of detailed prophecies relating to the future. Unlike the prophecies found in other religious books, biblical prophecies are very detailed. In addition, there are over 300 prophecies concerning Jesus Christ in the Old Testament alone. These concern his birth, death and resurrection and were fulfilled perfectly. There is no other book of any kind with the proven prophecy record of the Bible.

A third internal evidence of the divine origin of the Bible is its unique authority and power. This is seen through the countless lives that have been transformed through the power of God’s Word. We are not talking about short term life change or self-help books but people undergoing inexplicable change and being willing to die for it.

The external evidences that indicate the Bible is truly the Word of God include the historical accuracy of the Bible. Through both archaeological evidence and the works of other historians, the Bible has been proven to be accurate and true. The totality of all this outside evidence make the Bible the most- documented book from the ancient world.

Another external evidence that the Bible is truly God’s Word is the story of many who wrote the book. Many were willing to die brutal deaths for what they wrote and believed about God. They were often eyewitnesses to what they recorded and showed incredible life transformation as they shared what the saw.  Their lives and deaths testify to the fact that the Bible truly is God’s Word.

One last thing to consider is the indestructibility of the Bible. Because of its importance and its claim to be the very Word of God, the Bible has suffered more vicious attacks and attempts to destroy it than any other book in history. Despite this, the Bible has maintained its accuracy and withstood all of its attackers to still be the most widely published book in the world.

Whether the Bible is God’s Word is a question that has been debated for centuries. We would love to discuss it with you.

TALK NOW
/by