Three ways to live

Here is a short interview with Gabe Lyons, the author of “unChristian“, a book about how Christianity is perceived by younger generation. Nothing really groundbreaking here, but still very sobering. Again and again, non-Christians are saying they do not want to be treated as a product, that Christians only care about “spreading the message” and not about many ills of our society. One important aspect of Christian mission - to be fair representation of what God is - is often completely neglected. It’s not surprising that by looking at us non-Christians will think that God only cares about people been saved.

In case you are not aware, this movie is the first installment of “His Dark Materials” trilogy by well-known atheist Philip Pullman. It is soon (Dec 6) to be released in Singapore. As it often happens with art, it very well represents Pullman’s religious views, which are strongly anti-Christian.

I found Christianity Today article “Fear Not the Compass” to be very helpful and well-balanced summary on what Christian response to the movie should be.

Scott Mackay has a series of interesting posts on what it means to work for God:

1. Part I
2. Part II
3. Part III
4. Revisiting

It’s a long read, but highly recommended! Here is my own summary of Scott’s summary (do not mistake it for the real thing):

There are two kinds of work, creation work and new creation work. The former is taking care, cultivating God’s creation, was was a direct command from God right after Creation and is still valid today. The latter is participation in God’s work of reversing the Fall, building up the church and bringing in New Creation. Both are important, but new creation work has the priority now - without reversing effects of the Fall, creation work makes little sense.

Reading this reminded me of a war situation. When a nation is at peace, men are doing their usual stuff - studying, farming, mining, building, etc. But a war creates a new kind of work - fighting for your country. Both works are important, but fighting has priority. After all, if your nation get destroyed by enemy, other work won’t matter at all. Yet, it’s wrong to think of fighting as the only worthy thing to do. It is temporary, while common work is lasting. It is impossible that everybody fights; it needs to be supported by all other activities, like farming, building, even entertainment.

I remember this scene from an old Russian movie about World War II, where a young guy (let’s call him Dimitri) is trying to decide whether to voluntarily join the army, or go study in University (he had a great talent for sciences). His older friend is trying to change his mind, “Dimitri, you have to think about the future. This war will be over soon, and our country will succumb without people like you”.