Success is usually measured in terms of enumeration – things that can be counted: bank balances, house square footage, annual income, tax dollars averted, etc. Success also inhabits the related domain of the numbered: number of subscribers, of customers, of widgets sold, number of congregants, Twitter followers, IQ score, etc. In one sense, there’s nothing wrong with this. After all, Jesus . . .
Lie: Passive use of the internet is harmless.
Truth: Passive use of the internet is participation in hidden, mass, personal data collection, analysis, and control and insidiously leads to idolatry.
At the time of this writing in 2018, the majority of people I see walking about carry their smartphone in hand. They’re either texting, surfing, watching, talking or just having it at the ready. And if it’s not in hand it’s not far from them. This obsession is well documented, both the good and the bad.
In Part 1 I laid out the highlights of our big data system structure and the four major components of this system of systems: the smart device the internet and wireless service providers the data collector/processor the control system This system of systems is unprecedented in history, and all of
Lie: Christians are sinners saved by grace.
Truth: Christians are saints who have sin.
This is a stark divide. Who are we – saints or sinners? We can’t possibly be both, can we? To get right to the heart of the matter, the real question is: do we have an un-eradicable, sinful nature carried over essentially unchanged from our state of unbelief? In other words, are we as Christians still essentially, in our hearts, sinful by nature? Can we get our theology straight on this?
Lie: The powerless are insignificant.
Truth: The powerless, teamed with God, overcome the powerful.
I’m sure that the giant Goliath mistakenly believed this same lie too as he sized up David. Goliath never considered that the reverse might be true. He couldn’t imagine that, in five minutes he would be dead. But such are the exploits of God who . . .
Lie: Suffering is bad and is to be avoided.
Truth: Suffering is good if embraced with hope in God.
Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. — Hebrews 12:11
Suffering comes in many forms and from many sources, but all forms of suffering are ultimately redeemable by God, even from the most evil sources and means. Some suffering is temporary, some permanent; some physical, some emotional; some mental, some genetic; some suffering is purely from . . .
Lie: I’m unavoidably too busy.
Truth: I have the time to do all of God’s will.
What is busyness?
Busyness is a form of overcommitment. It’s like three things:
clutter – too much stuff for the space it must occupy.
debt – too many financial commitments for the amount of income.
gluttony – too much food for the gastro-intestinal system to process at one time.
We know the symptoms: hurry, lateness, frustration . . .
Lie: Rest must be earned.
Truth: Rest is given.
Do you ever: feel guilty when you relax? have trouble receiving unsolicited gifts? need to stay busy? If you do, you may have imbibed this subtle lie: Rest must be earned. The truth is that our rest was so important that God built it into his world from the very beginning.
Lie: More is better.
Truth: Less is better.
The maxim – less is more – is now a commonplace, but still seems counterintuitive. Most however, would agree that the accumulation of more and more stuff has a point of diminishing returns. Witness the hoarders or even the cluttered homes and closets of the average suburbanite.
From the Los Angeles Times:
Consider these statistics cited by professional organizer Regina Lark: The average U.S. household has 300,000 things, from paper clips to ironing boards.
The volume of artificial things has exploded in the last one hundred years: coasters, bookmarks, disposable cups, plates, sporks, watches, dental floss, plastic bags, dog treats, mechanical pencils, light switches, welcome mats, pillows, fans, magazines, lamps and on it goes. But that’s just the physical things. . .
Lie: I’m immune to deception.
Truth: We are complicit in our own deception.
Nothing is so easy as to deceive oneself; for what we wish, we readily believe. — Demosthenes
We like to be deceived. — Blaise Pascal
Not only are we susceptible to deception – we ourselves are complicit in it. That may seem impossible; after all, how could we deceive ourselves – deception presupposes that we be unaware of it. But we forget that our deception runs deeper than we think. Much deeper. To understand this we must first see what deception is and then how it works.