"Job: When the Righteous Suffer"

I just got back from the conference "Job: When the Righteous Suffer", it was awesome! John Piper was the only speaker, but he did a very good job.

Here are some things that I learned while I was there.

Satan has two weapens which he atempts to destroy our faith with. They are, suffering and prosperity (In America he usually uses the latter). When he uses suffering it will do one of two things, either it will bring us closer to God or it will push us further away from God. Ofcourse, Satan always wants us to move further away from God.
Job's friends tried to tell him that the reason for his suffering was that he had great sin, that since he was suffering greatly, therefore he must be sinning greatly. But obviously this is not true. God has many different reasons for our suffering. Everything that has ever happened in history God had not just one reason for, but many reasons. But he does not always reveal them all to us.
The bible gives all the answers we need for our suffering, but not always all the answers we want.
- John Piper

We need to be content with what God does reveal to us, it is the only way we will be content with what we are going through, whether it be suffering or not.

What to do?

Well, I've come to a conclusion for my blog, It's time for something new. I've been thinking about doing a few different things. I'm asking you to help me decide what to do by voting in the poll on the sidebar. Here are the options:

1. Move to wordpress

2. Shut down this blog and only post at TSA(Teens Set Apart).

3. Create a whole new website

4. take no action

Thoughts on Legalism

What is the main focus in our lives? You probaly already know that our main focus should always be Christ. The first commandment says, "You shall have no other Gods before me." This means that the most precious thing in our lives should be God, nothing should be more valuble to us than him... but sometimes this is not the case.

Legalism is a sign that Christ is not our main focus. Legalism is when we add man made rules to God's law, and we get so caught up in pressing that rule on other Christians that we forget what really matters. When our focus is on our made up rules, it is not on Christ. We never want this to be the case, so in order to keep Christ our main focus we must always look to scripture for what God would have us do. Life has many distractions, we can easily get caught up in the things of this world. legalism is one of those things, and we should always strive not to become legalistic.

I've been Tagged!

Meshaay from More Than the Here and Now blog has tagged me.

This is the first time I have ever been tagged by anyone. Here are the rules to this thing:

1. Link to the person(s) who tagged you.

2. Post the rules on your blog.

3. Write six random things about yourself

4. Tag sixish people at the end of your post.

5. Let each person know he or she has been tagged

6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up

Well, here are six random things about myself:

1. I've never broken a bone.

2. I've never been out of the United States(Mexico doesn't count:)

3. The first movie I ever saw in a theater was "Jurrasic Park."

4. I have eight brothers and sisters.

5. I have read "The Chronicles of Narnia" three times.

6. I hate oatmeal.

Now, who should I tag? How about:

Eric(The Voice of Experiance)

Erik(Erik B.'s Blog)

Bryanna(A daughter of the King)

Caleb(The Pursuit)

Sean(Passion 614)

Charlie(United Under Christ)

Teens Set Apart

Many of you do not know this, but in the past few weeks, Josiah Robertson of "Pro-Life Teenagers" and I have been busy creating a website called "Teens Set Apart" (T.S.A.). The official launch date is Tuesday, October 7.

What is "Teens Set Apart" about? As Christians we are called to stand out, to be different from the rest of the world. The world says we should "Go with the flow" and be more tolerant of sin, but God has called us to live a life that would glorify him, tolerating sin maybe easier but it does not glorify him. We have created this website to encourage other Christian teens to strive for rightousness, to have a place where we can share our prayer requests and simply to have a good time:)

Here is the link: http://www.teenssetapart.com/

Enjoy!

Anger, Part 2

Anger, Part 2

Do not be quick to anger.

"Know this, my brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness that God requires." - James 1:19-20

Man's anger is sinful, because it is for the wrong reasons.

The man who is Slow to anger has "Great understanding"

"Whoever is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly." - Proverbs 14:29

According to "Websters New World Dictionary" the word "Understanding" means:"The power to think and learn; intelligence." The "Bible" calls a man who is slow to anger, intelligent. We often get angry because our pride has been hurt, and pride is a huge obstacle for someone who wants to gain knowledge and understanding. Because we often don't want to admit that we are ignorant about some things, we don't learn anything. Someone who is quick to anger is not patient, and it takes a lot of patience to gain understanding.