My Point of View as a Blogger

As of May 19th the Lord has allowed this website to continue for one year.

I began writing this blog during the trying times of studying Computer Science at USC (via the distance program). At the time I was afraid of getting caught up in the demands of my studies. For a while I feared compiler design was going to take over my whole life - my relationship with God, my relationship with my wife, my relationship with my family.

It was then that I reflected on the image of the burning bush and considered how it was consumed but not destroyed.

During the early part of 2006 I was posting a lot on Mere Orthodoxy, and the site creator, Matt Anderson, had suggested I take up blogging. The idea seemed ridiculous to me at first. Before then I was ministering in my own way, but after starting school I lost the time I needed to do it in the way I was doing it.

I liked Mere Orthodoxy. The title was clearly a creation of two books: Lewis' Mere Christianity and Chesterton's Orthodoxy.

As I have mentioned before I don't care for Lewis' style (at least in his non-fiction). Chesterton has a truly poetic expression. His message is essentially identical to Lewis: Jesus came to share ideas with us so that we could understand God through education, literature, and, most importantly, philosophy.

After a great deal of exposure to these two writers (and comparing them to the Bible) I found them too cerebral. I stopped reading them and began reading the Bible.

I understand where Mere Orthodoxy gets its name, but the name troubles me. Orthodoxy alone is just not enough for me. Doctrine did not die on the cross for my sins. If God should find it in His good pleasure to allow me into heaven, doctrine will not be the first thing I go running to find. Ultimately, I do not believe orthodoxy is the first thing God wants to find in me either.

The royal command is to love God with all one's heart, with all one's soul, with all one's mind, and with all one's strength. The requirement is to love, not to indoctrinate or to have all the orthodox views.

In truth, I believe that if one genuinely loves God and is fully devoted to Him, the doctrine will come on its own.

One of my Bible school professors was a man by the name of Dr. Fred Sanders. I think he caught wind of the competing names, "Mere Orthodoxy" and "Mere Devotion", and he attempted to mediate somewhat the difference between the two saying that both orthodoxy and devotion are required.

In my response I pointed out the way the unclean angels like to debate doctrine and cling on to it as a way of justifying their dark activities. (In the example I used from the book of Acts it was fairly difficult to see why the demons were proclaiming doctrine, but they were proclaiming doctrine).

Dr. Sanders had some concern with this blog (I say this as a way of boasting in my weakness). He had perhaps thought I could write somewhat but was concerned because, 'Devotional writers are typically unremembered and not taken seriously by theologians'. This is perhaps why he suggested we needed to be orthodox and devoted.

His words have been -perhaps prophetically- true for me at this website.

Clearly there is no army of readers waiting to read this post. At times the number of comments I have received from others on a single post has approached the double digits, but usually only SocietyVs responds and, in the past, SoulFoodDude.

I do, however, have another who reads my posts. I say to myself, "Ah! If only He would read my work. If only it would be acceptable to Him!"

Consider the shepherd boy, David. The world does not care much for nor long remember shepherd boys, but God had a plan for David. He wrote most of the Psalms, and the Psalms are the most referenced Old Testament book in the New Testament.

From what little I can gather David's Psalm-writing did not start out to be noticed by theologians. And the herds listening to him were not enough. Ultimately, he wasn't after Jesse's love or the acceptance of his brothers, and he couldn't find the right audience even before Saul, the king.

If David had studied at the greatest places of learning, perhaps Oxford, if he had the greatest professors at home and abroad, if he had found a champion of a wife, if he had an interesting job he could boast in, he would not have found his peace in any of those things.

I will go on boasting in the corrections and criticisms I have received.

At one point a certain blogger, SuperDuper, a man who I understand has stopped going to church and has led his family astray on this matter, suggested that Jesus did not want any attention for himself. SuperDuper also suggested only the Father was worthy of worship.

I relayed a question to him from the Lord, "What do the Scriptures say?" And I pointed him toward a few places in the Bible.

SuperDuper was totally offended. He claimed it was too "Sunday school" to go looking toward revelation for answers. I assume he was saying that only little children take the Bible as a suffecient guide for their lives.

Then may I never be considered to be anything more than a little child!

Perhaps the best aspect of the this blog has been the forum it created for me to consider how the Lord has been speaking to me. While writing some of these posts my heart has changed in several ways about certain things, and -as far as I can recall- these changes have been for the better.

I do consider the people who read this blog and sometimes post against what I see as systematic substitutes for mere devotion in the world, but ... I often find I am the one who needs to change, to repent.

In summary I am glad to see the direction this blog has taken. I am very glad for having it. It has been criticized and overlooked, but the criticism and neglect have become something of a blessing for me. I am grateful for those who have been blessed by it.