One Year

I'm a day late on this one, but my blog is one year old. I started Spiritual Reboot on August 16th of last year in order to voice some of my opinions on the church and Christianity. There were some things that I needed to discuss that I didn't feel I could seriously let out by any other means. In that way, this blog has been a path to freedom for me to be able to talk about things that would never have been brought up in every day conversations. When this blog started, it was a way for people to see a side of me that many people had never seen before, and it has spurred a change in me. Now, I feel more comfortable having deeper conversations with people. In fact, I fear that sometimes I may annoy people with my opinions and problems.

This blog has been very therapeutic in many ways too. There were some occasions when I my mind would be a jumbled confusion and by making a post to this site, I was able to straighten it all out. I never expected anyone to actually want to read my blog, and there have been times where I have been surprised that they really do. But even if no one read my blog, the shear process of getting my thoughts into an organized block of words and being able to better understand myself through those words would be reason enough to have it.

And so the Reboot continues. A year ago, I was rediscovering what it meant to be a Christian. A year later, I'm beginning to realize that what I am going through, this Spiritual Reboot, will be a continuous learning process. Once I get my mind around the message of Christ and the role of the church in this whole scheme of things, the Reboot will begin again. I will keep returning back to the beginning, back to what everything comes down to: the love of God.

Here is a link to my first post. And here's hoping that this will be another good year of growth and learning.

Campus Cable

I just moved into Western's campus apartments a few weeks ago, and I'm just starting to get used to life in a new place. Life in WMU apartments has a few differences from life in normal dwellings. One such difference is the fact that I now have different television stations from the rest of Kalamazoo. I have what they call Edu-Cable, complete with Asian, Russian, and Bollywood channels. It's not a new thing. I had Edu-Cable when I lived on campus a couple of years ago. And this will not be news to many Western students.

I no longer have the Sci Fi Channel which, quite honestly, is not much of a sacrifice. The only thing worth watching there is Battlestar Galactica, but I'll probably be too busy to watch it on TV and will probably end up downloading the episodes anyway.

But something I noticed that I found rather peculiar is the fact that they have a different Weather Channel for college students. As I was getting around for work one morning, I was expecting to find the usual pleasant colorful palette of greenish-blue that the Weather Channel normally uses to hue its local on the 8's. Instead, I found an ugly mix of blue and orange backing a very rough looking display of graphics. Why the different color scheme? Well, it's the college version of the Weather Channel, of course! I don't really get this. Isn't the weather the same for everyone? Why have a different version for WMU? Perhaps there's a really good reason for this, but I don't see it. I'm being nit-picky, but it bothers me.

That being said. I now have a channel that I didn't have before: NASA TV. That's right, baby. For the last couple of days, I've been able to monitor the progress of the International Space Station and Endeavor in orbit and fully embrace the geek side of myself. I love it because they don't dumb stuff down for you. Most of the time, you're just peeking in on NASA missions and watching their live feeds. There are some stunning visuals too. I could just sit and watch the ISS's view of Earth for hours.

I like the live WMU cam too.

Heaven

I struggle with the idea of heaven. It's not that I don't believe in heaven. I do. It's the idea of what life with be like once we get there that I have problems with.

There are many different ideas of what heaven is like. A popular one is that we'll all have wings and will spend eternity on a cloud, strumming on golden harps. Another is that we'll live in mansions on streets of gold (I think that one is from the commercialist viewpoint). Still others think of heaven as a place where we will worship, day and night, the most high God in complete bliss due to our complete and sincere love for Him.

Well, for one thing, I don't believe that we'll spend our time in heaven with God. As I stated in my post Heaven is not Our Home, I believe that Christ will come to us on Earth, and later the New earth. But that still doesn't change the whole "eternity with God is bliss" thing. I find it hard to grasp the idea that we'll just be sitting around, worshiping God or enjoying our mansions or strumming our harps till the end of eternity.

My problem with this idea lies in the fact that we are all human. And most of what makes us human is the fact that we struggle. The very essence of humanity is that we are constantly changing, constantly evolving, and constantly battling all the circumstances and issues that come at us in our lives. The very reason we live is because we choose to live. We fight to live. Why do you think we fight God's direction in our lives? We are strugglers.

So if one day we will live in peace and harmony with God in eternity, does that mean that we will cease to be human? If we are no longer struggling, what will we be doing? Did God create us to simply worship him? I believe that one of the main reasons He created us was to worship Him, but not just by crying out, "Glory to God in the Highest" a thousand times a day. God has a choir of angels that do that. No, we worship God with our lives, by living out our talents and pleasures, by enjoying God's creation. Why do think He's making a New Earth? I think it is because he wants us to not only enjoy it, but to change it and make it our own. Why would he create us to constantly evolve and discover if we are to just stand around doing nothing forever?

So this is my struggle with heaven. Will we loose what it means to be human, or will God let his creation shine brightest in an unadulterated world where there is no separation between Him and mankind? Perhaps we will become far more human when that time comes. Perhaps only then, we will truly know who we are.

100th Post

My little blog has reached its first milestone. This is my 100th post on Spiritual Reboot. It seems that I had a thing or two to say about life, the universe and everything. Perhaps I'll have more to say in the future.

Stay tuned.

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Book Recommendation: Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell

Rob Bell is my hero. I saw him at his last Everything is Spiritual show in December and I've been listening to his Mars Hill teachings online a lot lately. I love this guy.

For those who don't know, Rob Bell is the teacher at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grandville, Michigan. I attended Mars Hill twice last Summer, but he was on tour with Everything is Spiritual at that time, so I still haven't been able to experience the visual aspect of his teachings yet. I'd like to sometime soon, though.

Bell is an excellent and charismatic teacher with a lot of theological knowledge. But it's practical knowledge, not just the intellectual stuff that gets people on a pedestal. Although Mars Hill has a congregation of about 10,000 and would be considered a "mega-church", what draws me to him and that place is the compassion and the heart that they have for their community. To Bell and Mars Hill, caring for people in need and sacrificing your time and services for them is much of what being a Christian is all about. The belief here is that evangelism is not just about telling people the message of Christ, it's about living it too.

Velvet Elvis mirrors a lot of this. I read this book as a once-a-week devotion and it never ceased to stir something within me. Bell highlights many different subjects from church doctrine to what it means to be a disciple of Jesus to the story of how Mars Hill got started. And through every subject in this book (and every weekly teaching as well), there is one common theme.

God is everywhere. He is involved in every aspect of our lives. He is that "something" that holds everything together, and he takes joy in being involved in our lives.

I used like Mars Hill because I thought it was emergent. Now I like it because I know that it's not. It's not anything. It's simply Christian. Bell isn't concerned with titles or status, in fact, he's pretty humble about his growing fame. He cares about what is real. He's constantly breaking through barriers of churchiness and traditionalism that has plagued Christianity for so long and shadowed the reality of what being a Christian really means. But at the same time, he rejects the bitterness toward these things, which is something I've been going through, personally. He loves God, and he loves people.

This book is awesome. I have never met a person who has read it that has said otherwise. I highly recommend reading it. Hopefully it will stir something up in you as well.

Happenings and Thoughts

It's been a while since I've last blogged, partially because I've been busy with classes and work and partially because I've felt rather uninspired as of late. Actually, unmotivated would be a better term for it. I have ideas of things I want to blog about, but I don't. I just don't.

I finished my first class of the Summer and didn't do so well, and two days later I started my second class. Meanwhile, I look around and realise that we're already halfway through Summer. I've been tired a lot lately and a bit apathetic too. After getting pretty stressed and burnt out over my first class, I don't really have much motivation for my present one. I'm still doing the homework, but I've become a lot more laid back about it, for better or for worse.

I moved over the weekend. I now live on campus again, for better or worse. Right now, cardboard boxes loaded up with all my belongings are strewn throughout the place. I also don't have the Internet on my computer yet. I'm currently writing this post from the XP office, as it is my closest source of unfettered Internet access.

The new place doesn't really feel like home to me yet. And even though I know that it will eventually feel like home and it will be awesome having a roommate come late August, I'm not completely enjoying the place yet. It smells of cigarette smoke and there are a lot of hoops to jump through with Western's staff in order to get anything done. Again...I don't have the Internet yet. Mostly, I don't have time to get anything done. All of Western's offices close at five and I get off work at 4:30. It takes fifteen minutes to get home. Go figure.

I complain, but it's probably a good thing that I don't have constant Internet access yet. I spend way too much time Googling random things and looking at Youtube videos when I do. Probably more time than is healthy.

And while I'm still on the subject of WMU staff, I feel the need to remark on an observation I made the other day. While driving around campus, I noticed that campus police cars are a heck of a lot nicer than Kalamazoo and Portage police cars. The campus police "nazis" are notorious for writing parking tickets and leaving them on the cars of poor college students simply because they wanted a convenient place to park, rather than parking in the issued spots on the edges of campus, behind staff parking, so I'm not really surprised at the quality of their vehicles. I just thought it was an interesting thing to note.

What Every Christian Should Know #7

Here is #7 of Keith Giles' monthly series, TOP 10 THINGS EVERY CHRISTIAN SHOULD KNOW (But Probably Doesn't). I haven't had a lot of trouble with this particular subject in any of the churches I grew up in, but I know that this can be a real issue some times. It's worth checking out.

Here's a snippet:

Number 7- "Work" Is Not A Bad Word

There is a pervasive mind-set within the American Christian community that to do works is somehow in opposition to the Gospel. If you've ever heard a pastor or a well-meaning Christian chastise someone for acts of service by saying, "That's works, brother" then you know what I'm talking about.

It's easy to understand how this idea has crept into the Church here in America. We've equated the idea of doing good works with Liberal Theology, or cultic misunderstandings of the gift of salvation. By doing so, we've defined service to others out of existence, and in some cases we've even made people feel guilty for acting out their faith in any overt way.

Our mantra has become, "Salvation is a free gift! You can't do anything to earn it, and you don't need to do anything to keep from losing it." Therefore, we've concluded by inference, or by direct argumentation, that works of any kind must be in opposition to the concept of the free gift of salvation offered to us by the work of Christ on our behalf upon the cross of Calvary.

However, this idea of works being against the Law of Grace is a twisted concept. Paul the Apostle never teaches this, Peter never teaches it, and Jesus certainly doesn't ever suggest that doing good works is against the will of God. Far from it. The fact is, Jesus and the writers of the New Testament all agree that to be a follower of Christ is to be a doer of good works.