Does God hate me????

I came across another controversial story relating to a well known and influential Pastor in the US. The long and short of the story was that although God loves parts of us, he also detests and hates other parts. Like all good biblical teachers and preachers, said pastor gave a very compelling biblical argument for his viewpoint and left me wondering whether God really does hate parts of me. However in my thoughts of God's wrath and distaste for me there was a stirring in my spirit which was uneasy at the road I was going down.

I struggle when Christians place more value on experience than biblical teaching. The thought that what I experience in my life superseeds the word of God is not something I ascribe too. However, nor do I ascribe to the viewpoint that the word of God is alien and at odds with our experience of life. We can come up with compelling bibilical arguments for anything but if it does not find it's way into real life then it is merely a theological academic exercise. Now you all know (if you read these regularly) I have a son, whilst Myself and Sara are also expecting another child in spring next year. So what has the above got to do with whether God hates me or not?

Simple, I do not hate any part of my Son. Even when he drives me crazy and tries my patience I do not hate him. Even if he disowns me and wishes me dead I will not hate any part of him (Prodigal Son parable anyone?). My experience of being a Father leads me to an understanding that a loving Father does not hate any part of his children, even the difficult, disobedient ones. Now I can already hear people saying 'Well you are merely a Human, God is different'. Now I can't seriously argue against that but I can say this. I believe everything good and pleasing comes from God, our identity is said to be of God as we are made in his image, our emotions and spirit are connected to his encourager and the Holy Spirit and we are at one with Christ. Therefore is it a stretch too far to understand that the love I have for my son and baby-to-come is a drop in the ocean and an accurate glimpse of the love God has for me?

I know there are biblical points of God's wrath and anger against his loved ones. And somewhere in the mix of my biblical understanding and experience of God, in the here and now, I have to try to figure that out. But my absolute adoration of a 2 year old called Malachi points me more to the description of God is love, to the biblical stance of John 3:16, to a father who loves me so much he will come searching for me regardless of what I have done wrong or the failure my actions often produce. The problem I have with a God who hates parts of me is that it leads to a God of rejection, a God of fear, a God of partial Love and that is not my biblical understanding of Christ.

1 John talks about how this 'God love' drives out fear, that fear has no place and cannot stand the sight of God's love. I pray my Son will never be fearful of me and he will, regardless of what he has done, find acceptance, grace, love and freedom in our relationship. With all of that crammed in, there is no place for hate, not even partial hate. And if that is how a mere human, with limited understanding of the divine things and the completeness of love feels, then I'm okay. My God does not hate any part of me... he loves me despite all the parts he could hate...

Talking about talking to others with friends...

People who know me will be nodding in a smug acknowledgement to the statement that I can blag my way out of some of the tightest discussion points. Many times have I been given a topic to discuss without prior warning and blagged my way out of a difficult conversation, in my own head believing I have come out on top of the debate, although in reality most likely not. I've encountered times when a lack of preparation or communication has led to me having to come up with a preach /talk on the spot and survived with my 'reputation' seemingly improved. One time at college, during my history A level course, I was asked to be the person to defend the position of the 2nd World War Nazi's in a mock trial, something which obviously is impossible but something I almost blagged, before quite rightly failing at. The point is simple, I like to talk and hear the sound of my own voice. The picture of many of my friends nodding, whilst rolling their eyes at the truth that I like to talk, is a sobering, yet accurate, judgement.

We've got some wonderful new friends in Norwich who came round for food a few weeks back. And over the late night dessert and tea we got chatting about how we talk to others about faith, church and all things Jesus. We got talking about how inept we often are at it, how the strategies we use often fail and whether it was all good deed , or all preaching the word. Conversations developed into whether our relationships with those outside the church are agenda driven and manipulated to 'convert' them and what an authentic relationship looks like. Then my friend Pete delivered a line I think I'll remember for a while, "do you realise we are talking about talking to other people...". The absurdity of what we were doing hit us and left us laughing whilst also in sober reflection. This statement led to us asking what would people think in our communities if they could hear this conversation....

What if all of our book reading, evangelism strategies, seeker friendly services, manipulated programmes and relationally driven techniques are not what Jesus was trying to highlight when he uttered the words 'go and make disciples' (Matt 28:19) ? What if Jesus was moving the conversation on from the earlier statements of the second greatest commandment being loving our neighbours as we love ourselves (Matt 22:39). What if the loving our neighbours, which requires us to talk to them, leads to the opening up of lives and reveals the Christ in us the hope of glory (Col 1:27)? Does this lead to the making of Disciples? I would argue it inevitably will.

As we talked about talking to others I was struck that so many times in the church we talk about loving people, yet often we don't. We don't invite our neighbours and communities into our lives to eat, share and find out about each other. We don't know what the families in our road need prayer for. We don't let people see Christ in us, the honest rawness of a Saviour who lifts us up. If I talked as much to my neighbours and those in my community as much as I talk about getting them into church then maybe there would be a few more disciples, maybe we would love each other a little more and maybe there will be that little bit more of God in our world than if I just keep talking about church.

As hard as it is for me to say, I sometimes need to shut up and get on with this loving others stuff. I think I'll ask our neighbours round for dinner in the next week. Maybe then the conversation won't be about talking about talking to others and simply be a conversation.

What's God's view of Amy Winehouse???

So this weekend was a little crazy. Dreadfully tragic events in Norway, Liverpool got hammered by Hull City 3-0, I had a weekend off and the musical genius Amy Winehouse was found dead at her home after a suspected drug overdose. Only two of the above were news worthy, thankfully Liverpool's poor showing was nowhere in sight and will be confined to the folder 'one of those days' for the boys in red. The events in Norway and the demise of Ms Winehouse however were, and still are, very much in our headlines.

Much has been made of the comparison of the two already. How news of the death of a drug addict and out of control singer knocked the tragedy of nearly 100 innocent people losing their lives from the main news story stage. I have even heard many Christians comment negatively on the demise of Ms Winehouse whilst speaking of God's obvious heartbreak to the tragedy in Norway. As myself and Sara reflected on the crazy goings on this weekend we asked the question. What's God's view of Ms Winehouse?

Whilst we read all sorts of stuff on facebook, twitter and the uncontrollable 'free speech' world of the Web, I was struck that the overarching opinion was one of 'well what do you expect?' towards Amy Winehouse, most of which came from my Christian friends. So that spun me thinking, 'Is that really what God thinks?'. No christian, or possibly person, would deny God's breaking heart at the tragedy that unfolded on a small island in Norway, but does God's breaking heart not extend to a drug addict who had lost her way? And therefore should our hearts as Christians also not do the same?

To be honest I was appalled at those believers who had so quickly forgotten of the grace afforded to them, the forgiveness the Father had showered on them in their times of weakness and need, of addiction and lack of self control. Scripture tells me that 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God' (Romans 3:23). ALL!!!!! that's you, me, Rob Bell, Nicky Gumbel, Tim Hughes, David Cameron, Dr Rowan Williams, the Pope and Amy Winehouse. All have fallen short, all are in need. As followers of Christ, we are not above others, we are not morally appropriate and able to cast down judgments to those who aren't. We are loved, we are forgiven, we are to forgive and lift others up and we are about loving those who are in need.

So what does God think of Amy Winehouse? My opinion is that as Amy died God wept and whispered over her the things she could have been, that God loved Amy as much as he does you and me and that if she had / has accepted his grace he would have welcomed her with a loving fathers embrace (Luke 15). So today I again recognise and accept God's grace in my life and weep with him for those killed in Norway and for a Lady, a little younger than me, that gave the world great music but could have given so much more.

Simplicity - Stop getting so complicated!!

Spoke to a friend of mine the other day who has been keeping tabs on my blogs and musings. I'm always keen to hear what people are thinking and to enter into a conversation about stuff that matters rather than the redundant "how are you (although I don't really care)?" sentiments. So when we got onto my blog and if he had any thoughts he gave me some incredible feedback. He told me that my thoughts and blogs were great but often he found them a too long.

After I got over my immeadiate rage and thoughts of "how dare you!!" I began to reflect on my sometimes wordy, long over complicated thoughts. Yes I believe it is important stuff I want to dialogue about, the gospels are about life and death after all, but, was I over complicating a simple God?

A scripture immeadiately came to mind and it is this scripture that all of our questions, answers, complicated theologies and intrisic philosophical frameworks need to be born out of. It is this scripture that all of life, justice, hope and faith comes from. It is this scripture that all our understandings, whether they be grand or more impressively childlike, about God need to flow from. And this scripture??

"Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love" 1 John 4:8

I desire so much to get into the compexities of God being love and what that means but i'm not going to. Instead I'm going to choose to know him and therefore know love. We all crave simplicity in our lives and we have a God who is simply LOVE. God bless you all.