Signs and other thoughts...

It has been a good week, cannot say I've been sticking to my Jenny's and exercise...but I have been doing very well with my daily devotions and book reading.

I'm starting this year with the devotion "Night Light" by James and Shirley Dobson...as this year I am trying to make a concentrated effort to improve my marriage.  I have a tendency to build 'emotional walls'.  And I have to get beyond that.   It is a daily step by step decision.  But having a Christian perspective on love and marriage is a great start.

Also am reading Unfinished by Steven K Scott for a Bible Study.  Our pastor gave it to the board members for Christmas.  I had a rough start, Scott makes some claims in his intro that made me go 'huh?"....but, gotta admit I'm liking the book.  He is a businessman, so he is breaking down the Christian walk into 'missions', then 'assignments' then 'action".  

And am reading What Jesus Demands of the World by John Piper.  He is a reformed Calvinist teacher, so I go into this book knowing his pov.   Pov has become so important to me lately.   It tells me the 'filter' the writer is giving us...this was a lesson I learned with a biography I read so many years ago.  There simply is no 'objectivity' in writing anymore.  

I am enjoying this book also.  Piper looks at the gospels and finds 50 commands from Jesus, and gives us a chapter on each one.

So, why did I title this post Signs...???

Last night I got the opportunity to watch the movie Signs.  May have been my, oh 4th or 5th time watching it.  To me, it is such a wonderful movie...I really like the acting and the message.

For me, this time around, it is more than the coincidences working together to help the family survive, it became more about the struggle of faith.  Our church is going thru something.  A decline in membership, but also a splintering of viewpoints.  We have our very conservative half...and our liberal half.  At the last meeting I was feeling like these 2 cannot be reconciled, and the church will have to make a choice...which church will we be?

But Pastor Dusty said something in last Sunday's message about 2 what can look like conflicting teachings in his passage, is it either or?  or is it both...and it can be both.

So, I watched Signs, and there is this terrible accident and the tragic aftermath that this family goes thru.  Each of them have a 'quirk'...that seems so random...yet in the end it is the combination of these quirks that save them.

We have a church, that views God's word thru our own filters.  Some see the judgement and accountablility of God and others see His love and compassion...can it be both?  Can it be that because we as human beings have difficulty reconciling both we cling to one or the other?   Can it be that we need to have both in a balanced church?

Well, gotta leave it at this, MJM has the truck running.   I don't have answers but will be praying for insights.