God vs. Fantasy?

Throughout the Bible, witchcraft and dabbling in the dark arts is seen as one of the ultimate taboos.

But what does this mean?

GK Chesterton said, "Fairy tales are more than true, not because they tell us dragons exist, but that they can be BEATEN."

I grew up reading fantasy novels. My dad, a seminary graduate, read Harry Potter to me when I was little, as well as the Chronicles of Narnia. I grew up reading books about magic and wizards and brave knights and heroes.

Then came RPGing. I grew up when parents were scared that Dungeons and Dragons was leading their children into the occult and satanic practices.

Then the Harry Potter controversy.

Then, oh yes, World of Warcraft. The game that has attracted MILLIONS of players all over the world. Warcraft's world is full of monsters, demons, magic, healing, and fighting demonic powers.

I had been raised on fantasy novels and manga. It was no surprise I got into online gaming as well. I started playing Guild Wars, played the demo of World of Warcraft, engaged in ALL of Artix Entertainment's free games. Heck, when I was little, I played the card game Yugioh ENDLESSLY.

Is this wrong? Is this 'dabbling in the occult'?

I've read Harry Potter, Narnia, Lord of the Rings, Artemis Fowl, The Inheritance Cycle (Eragon), Broken Sky, some of the Warcraft novels, R.A. Salvatore's Forgotten Realms, and countless more.

I grew up reading-and continue to read-manga like Shaman King, Naruto, Bleach, Death Note, Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, D. Gray Man, Fullmetal Alchemist, and more.

I grew up watching- and continue to watch- Magic Knight Rayearth, Fullmetal Alchemist, the movies of Hayao Miyazaki, and TONS more.

I'm an avid comic book fan. One of my all time favorite superheroes is Hellboy, a demon who refuses to follow his demon heritage and instead spends his time trying to save the world!!

So, I've read tons of fantasy.

I've played RPGS involving magic and supernatural powers.

I've watched anime involving magic and elemental abilities.

So again: Am I sinning?

What are the pros of fantasy?:

1) Fantasy openly acknowledges a struggle between good and evil, often involving supernatural abilities under many names. Jutsu. Kido. Magic. Elemental powers.

2) Fantasy's heroes are often children of no special background rising to become heroes. This mirrors the Christian's call to Christ.

3) Other times, fantasy heroes are children who are long lost children of Kings. These children are often raised in a poor setting with a small family. This mirrors Christ being born as the child of a carpenter.

4) The abilites the heroes use are often a gift from a higher power. This mirrors the Apostles being given great power by the Holy Spirit to do miraculous things.

5) The hero is often called to sacrifice himself in order to save the world.

I could go on and on about lessons fantasy can teach us. But let's look at...

The Cons of Fantasy:

1) The use of magic. While this is solely a story telling element, it can be dangerous. It's hard to say.

2) The decision to ignore the conflicts of the Spiritual War and say life is boring. Thus, we read fantasy. By saying that this life is dull, we are leaving ourselves unaware and unprotected.

3) Possible desensitization to the powers of darkness.

4) The occasional protagonist who believes he must have more power constantly. This is seen in manga fairly often.

5) If Christians that read fantasy are scorned for reading fantasy by other believers, this can potentially push people away from Christianity.

So, I leave the decision to you. That's what this blog is about.

God bless.

Uh-oh....

"Turns out, I don't have as many thoughts as you might think."-Joey, FRIENDS

I've just noticed something. I'm out of spiritual musings right now.

NOT GOOD.

Shouldn't we always have spiritual musings? Isn't that what makes us Christians and truth seekers?

So far, I've minorly covered my musings on good and evil, demons, and a few other things.

Am I already out? Where did my spiritual musings go?

Praying for renewed spiritual vigor...

Let's See How Far We've Come

There's a line in this song that I love.


*I sat down on the street, took a look at myself. I said "Where you goin' man, you know the world is headed for hell?"Say your goodbyes if you got someone to say goodbye too.*

I think for a lot of people that's how the moments goes. When God chooses the time to have them choose, this is how a lot of people feel I think.

Because people usually come to God in hard times. Right?

Chosen to choose to be chosen.

We were chosen by God to choose whether or not we would follow him- and even though he knows what our choice will be (to be chosen), he still offers the choice.

That's the little blurb of the day.

How then should we live?

*This life is beautiful! I give it all to You, all for You!*

I've been thinking about what I'm going to do with my future and stuff, and an interesting thought occured to me.

Our physical life is sort. To quote the band Reilly, "We're living on limited time."

We are called to give ourselves wholly to God.

We have an eternity with Him.

So, should we put aside what we want for the future so that we can do what we are called to? Should I give up my passions and skills, all my plans for my life, and instead live as a missionary? As a teacher? A pastor?

We're living on limited time, but soon we'll have an eternity with the Lord Himself. During this eternity, we will be praising Him constantly. In this life, we praise God through the gifts he gives us.

In the movie Chariots of Fire, Eric Little says to his sister:

"Yes, God did call me to be a missionary. And I'm going to. But he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure."

So, what if we decided to live our mortal lives doing everything we could to spread the Gospel? To be a force for good? What if, instead of pursuing our passions on our career path, we threw ourselves into the work for God wholeheartedly?

We can enjoy the gifts He's given us in Eternity.

But really- don't we have work to do now? Our calling?

Just something to think on.

FOLLOW-UP QUESTION:
Can our gifts become an idol of ours?

Knowing Is Half The Battle

Obviously, you've heard the expression, "Knowing is half the battle". It's used in ads ranging from various diseases and STDs to game show slogans.

Why am I using it today?

Because we completely misunderstand demons.

We paint horns on them, and draw them as hideous monsters. They love causing death and destruction, blood and war. And this is the wrong way to understand demons.

What are demons? As us humans understand through Scripture, demons are angels fallen from heaven who have chosen to follow the first fallen angel, Satan. They are spiritual beings, whereas humans are physical/spiritual beings. Of two natures.

It says in the Scriptures that Satan comes in the form of an angel of light. He doesn't come for you in fire and brimstone, with a pitchfork and fangs. He instead chooses to imitate the beauty of God's angels.

I think the most common misconception on the devil and demons is the way they work. We think they kill people close to us, or cause immediate pain. What we think of as physical evil acts.

But CS Lewis, in his wonderful book "The Screwtape Letters", puts it another way through the view of Screwtape, the demon mentoring the younger one Wormwood. Screwtape chides Wormwood for being so excited when Wormwood observes the beginnings of WWII. Screwtape tells Wormwood that although it might be slightly entertaining, war is bad for their cause. Death and near-death experiences cause humans to reconsider life and God. An athiest will often pray on his death bed.

There's a great quote that was in one of my teacher's classroom. It said:

"Apathy is the glove into which evil slips its hand."

That's the way demons and the devil work. They deceive by lulling us to sleep, numbing us to things like God. They don't attack directly. No, they use a means of distraction.

Often, we don't even catch that they've diverted us from the right path until much later in life. They can deceive a Christian into believing things about the Bible that aren't actually there. They can deceive a Christian to walk around threatening people with Hell unless they convert.

Demons are behind the scenes bad guys who are like the puppet masters. They don't really DO anything. They place thoughts. Like how Satan simply asked Eve, "Did he really say you can't eat from any tree in the Garden?" and other questons. Simply pushing her in that direction without actually doing anything.

Demons are, for lack of a better term, psychologists. But there is some REALLY good news.

Ted Dekker, in his novel "The Slumber of Christianity", describes Satan as a beast in death throws. Wounded, already deafeated, and yet insistent on continuing trying to win. The war is over.

It's nearly Easter by our calendars, which is a day we take to commemorate the winning of a war. Jesus crushed the Serpent's head under his foot.

In Revelation, there are a lot of scary things. They talk about Christians becoming horribly persecuted, and people being killed unless the bow to demons. But here's the great part: it's just a battle! Already, God and Jesus have won the war! Those massive events that they say will stretch on for years and years- in the eyes of a completely immortal, indestructable King, that's only a few moments! It's one battle!

It's Satan's last stand, his last desperate attempt to win. And I think he already knows he is going to lose.

Lot's of people are scared of demons and such. When we are in Christ, we don't need to be! Sure, we need to acknowledge them, but we are also so protected by Him that the demons can't hurt us unless He allows it! So you know what we can do to Satan?

We can stand there and laugh at him. Because he can't stand being mocked. Demons can't stand it when we are aware of their presence but feel no fear. And we feel no fear because the war is already won- our Lord rose from the grave and conquered death! He won the war!

It's Easter! God bless.

But I do not do what I want to do.

"For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now, if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that is good. So now it is no longer I who did it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to do what is right. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who did it, but sin that dwells within me." -Romans 7: 15-20

Wow. If you're like most people, by now you are scratching your head and saying, "Whu?".

Me too.

When we fell from grace, we fell hard. I like to think of it like this:

Imagine this beautiful sort of forest, massive in size but doesn't fill the entire world. It's got boundaries too. There's this feeling of happiness, like those lazy summer days without the laziness. No discomfort from heat- everything is like climate controlled and awesome. Everything is beautifully dark green, and simple. The animals don't fight. The fruit is always perfectly ripe. There's this sort of subconcious music playing all the time, and people feel it more than hear it. It's like a wonderful dream.

But then we ate what we shouldn't have. And there was this sudden falling feeling, like when something goes very wrong and you feel your stomach fall. And you can't hear the music anymore. And there's this sort of massive vibration you can't hear, but you feel, like a sonic boom. Everything is quiet, and everything seems rougher.

This is the fall.

Ted Dekker, in 'Black', puts this story into a wonderful new form. There are two forests: the Colored Forest and the Black Forest. The Colored Forest is full of beautiful trees and takes up almost the entire land. But this Black Forest is scary, and all the trees seem dead. There's a massive green river dividing the two, and a small white bridge. Good and Evil in physical form, divided only slightly.

Eventually, one of the characters drinks some of Teeleh(Satan)'s water while ignoring Elyon(God)'s command. The Shataiki bats, these giant black bats of Teeleh's, swarm across the river in a massive black tidal wave. As soon as they cross, things start to die. Whenever the horde passes Elyon's trees and fruit, it withers. These huge bats attack anything living. And everything just starts dying.

This is our sin nature. Temptation and doubt led us to the Fall. Faith and wisdom will have lead us to God.

Paul puts the sin nature right there on the table, in words a small child can understand. In bullet-point fashion:

-We know what's right, but don't do it.
-We desire to do what's right, but don't.
-We desire to always do what's right, but can't. (...I know nothing good dwells in my flesh.)
-We are incapable of doing the completely right thing without God.

I see this in myself all the time. I am constantly aware of when I'm sinning, and so many times I do so willfully. So, questions to mull over:

-What does it take for us to be able to- with God's help- do the right thing?
-Considering 98% of our sins are willful, how can we be forgiven when we are told willful sinning is not forgiven?
-Is willful sinning sinning and not caring at all or knowing it's wrong (like Paul said) and doing it?

You see, the last two can, for all intensive purposes, be put into black and white.

Sinning and not feeling any remorse or caring is WRONG.

Sinning while understand it's wrong and having any guilt at all is how we should feel. And it's hard. It's VERY difficult to feel bad for your sin. I'd say 50-55% of my prayers are "Lord, make me hate and feel guilt for my sin."

Referencing Ted Dekker again (love this author), there's another set of events in the book 'Black' which I absolutely love, though not for the same reasons most Christians do.

Thomas Hunter, so desperately wanting to know and speak with Elyon, jumps head-first into Elyon's water. This would be something like trying to look at God.

Anyway, he get's in there, and, in Ted's own words, 'immediately knew it was a mistake'. Just a few seconds after complete submersion, Thomas begins to ripped to pieces. At first it's like he's being electrified, and then as he's drowning, the water turns red. He feels the pain of his own sin and hears the weeping of Elyon as he feels Thom's pain, as Elyon shoulders it. It literally almost kills Thomas, and he's about to die, when he hears Elyon screaming in pain, weeping in agony as he completely shoulders Thom's sin. And then Thomas really wants to die.

Most people love this scene because it shows how much God cares about us, but that's only one of the reasons I love it. I love it because it reminds me that if I were to stare my own sins in the face, I would literally be torn apart. It would kill me. I wouldn't be able to handle it. It would not only kill you, it would literally feel like you should be un-created.

And I'll admit, I almost cried reading that 3-4 page scene in the book of Thomas in the lake. Not only because of finally feeling like someone understands what would happen if we were to see our sin, but because the next part, which is why most people love it.

Finally, Thomas' pain stops and he is overwhelmed by raw joy and pleasure, not just because of what he's just seen but because it's being thrown at him by the lake. It's Elyon's joy. Thomas breathes in the water, and is fine. And he's laughing and swimming in it, and a voice asks him "Do you like it?". Ted describes the next part as Thomas shouting yes with every possible fiber of his being, both with voice and soul. And the voice says. "I made this." And while Thomas is still just so overwhelmed by the experience, Elyon tells him that he is loved.

It's got to be one of my favorite scenes in a book EVER. Because it just hit every note.

We have a sin nature that has consumed us so much it's nearly impossible to do the right thing. And when we try to do the right thing, it comes out all twisted and messed up. We have alterior motives and adulterous hearts.

It's impossible for us to do true good in the world, because only God is capable of true good. And I hope that when I finally see him, I can 'jump into the lake', because only once I've seen my sin and felt that pain will I ever even begin to understand what true goodness is.

*I'm a saint, I'm a sinner. I'm a lover and fighter. I'm a true believer with great desire.*
- This Is Who I Am, Third Day

Well

*Rhythmical moving,
emotions are rising,
quivering to music,
trembling bodies in song.
Go unsteadily sliding,
devious gliding.
So beautifully sailing and floating on.
Life's real when angels and serpents dance.*
-When Angels and Serpents Dance, P.O.D

This blog isn't about answering the questions that are being asked so much as it is to inspire readers to think about these questions. These ideas. These thoughts.

I'm not perfect. I don't know the Bible cover to cover (yet, hopefully.). But I'm a truth seeker, searching for answers from a Christian perspective.

Rob Bell, pastor at Mars Hill Church, defines it this way:

"The word theology comes from two parts. Theos, meaning God. And logos, meanings talk or speak. Theology: God talk. Anyone can do theology."-Rob Bell, Jesus Wants to Save Christians

So, I'm definitely not perfect, and I don't have all the answers to these questions I'm posting. But I'm hoping that, by inspiring you to dive deep into the amazing world of theology and the Bible, we all can learn and grow in Christ.

Know this: As well as being a truth seeker, I'm a doubting Thomas. I'm the person who wants to put his hand on the scars before he believes, not after. My doubts are part of the inspiration to start a blog that can help people think about the same huge questions someone like Thomas would've pondered. Just because you doubt doesn't mean you don't believe. If you're worried about your doubts, you haven't lost your faith or gone astray. A dead fig tree doesn't worry about such things, because a tree worried about bearing fruit isn't dead.

Also, know another thing: I'm not building off of any theology, really. I'm a Calvinist, but I'm just reading the Bible in context and thinking about exactly what it says.

I trust CS Lewis and John Calvin the most when it comes to matters of theology, but I'm not taking anything from them. I'm trying to remove myself from all prerequisites and demands, just as Paul prayed.

God bless. Dive deep.