Welp, just for those of you out of the loop, I’m (We’re) back in Canada. Right now I’m in good old Saskatoon. We got back Thursday night, after a long wait trying to get home. We got from Frankfurt to Toronto fairly easily, but flights were booked up solid for two days from Toronto to Saskatoon (yeah…I know…hard to believe). But thankfully after a lot of prayer, we got on the standby list for the first flight into Saskatoon, and made it on the plane. So now Kim and I are gonna take a little trip down to Winnepeg (pronounced Winter-Peg) till the end of the week before I go back to Edmonton and get ready to move back to good old Saskamatoon.

So today I was called a “radical Christian”…No one has ever said that about me before. But hey, if someone thinks I’m a crazy person living completely for the Truth that was brought by Jesus, then hey…I can’t argue with that. Here’s my beef and why I was called a radical. My thought is that Jesus came to save our eternal souls. He died on that Cross for us so that we may have everlasting life. Now if anyone can just go “religion shopping” and choose their own way to heaven, then that means that all Jesus did was for naught. If Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6) either He was a liar for saying so, or He really is the only way to know God and experience eternal life. Either Jesus’ death meant something and His death is the only way that we might receive salvation through accepting it, or else if we can reject it and still go to heaven, then that would mean that He died for nothing. I refuse to accept that His death was meaningless. How can the death of the ONLY man in history who lived a perfect life be meaningless?

People who enjoy sitting on the fence like to believe that any path they choose is the right path for them. They think that Jesus might have been saying the truth, but no one knows forsure. John 3:18 (NIV) (Emphasis Mine) says “Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.” I’m probably sounding like a typical “my way is right and the rest of you can go to hell” kind of Christian. I’m not at all trying to sound that way, but I just don’t know how to convey that either Jesus is the way…or He’s not. It’s either one or the other, either you can believe in Him and accept that He’s died for our sins, or you don’t accept it. It’s clear cut in that respect. And if Jesus did die for our sins and we might receive salvation from Him, how could we just easily sit on the fence and not let others experience this as well? Life through Jesus is real life! If we accept Jesus, how could we not want to tell the rest of the world this glorious Truth?

And as Moses lifted up the bronze snake on a pole in the wilderness, so I, the Son of Man, must be lifted up on a pole, so that everyone who believes in me will have eternal life.
“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. God did not send his Son into the world to condemn it, but to save it. There is no judgment awaiting those who trust him. But those who do not trust him have already been judged for not believing in the only Son of God. Their judgment is based on this fact: The light from heaven came into the world, but they loved the darkness more than the light, for their actions were evil. They hate the light because they want to sin in the darkness. They stay away from the light for fear their sins will be exposed and they will be punished. But those who do what is right come to the light gladly, so everyone can see that they are doing what God wants.” – John 3:14-21 (NLT) [ NIV | AMP | MSG ]

So then if that makes me radical for believing that Jesus died so that we may have eternal life, then so be it…I’m a radical.

What on earth are we here for? Well…it’s actually quite simple…only problem is…people have their own selfish desires that keep them from doing what we were put here to do. We’re here to serve God and have a relationship with Him. Serving God involves serving others and letting go of selfish desire. If anyone actually wanted to look into the Face of God…they would immediately feel complete awe and try in whatever way possible to serve Him. That is what life is about. Putting others before ourselves, loving others. Making relationships with others who may seem to be the type that might not deserve a relationship with you. It seems so easy to think about and so obvious. But is it really that easy to go through with? It is only by the Grace of God and the death and ressurection of Jesus Christ that we are able to have the blessings we have from God and the knowledge that through Jesus we can live forever in His presence. How could anyone receiving this gift not want to share it with everyone else he/she comes into contact with? Many people say that there are three basic methods of learning. Auditory, Visual, and Hands on. Why don’t we stop just using one of those methods when trying to show/tell people about God, and use all three.

Start with Visual
Let people see that you’re living for Christ. That you are there to serve God by serving others. Live your life in a way that God’s light reflects off you.

Hands on Comes Next
Give people a taste of what it’s like to receive grace. Show them your love for them. Accept who they are just as Jesus accepted you and died for you. I can’t stress enough to give them love.

Then tell them
Auditory, I think, should come last. Once they’ve seen and felt that you are different than the ordinary shmuck that’s living for himself (or herself), tell them why you live the way you do and why you have so much love to give. Explain to them who this God is that sent His Son to die for us and let them in on the secret that shouldn’t at all be a secret.

Telling people about God isn’t bad. Sometimes that’s the only way some people might hear about Him. But they won’t properly readily accept the Holy Spirit unless they can see that it is real and have a demonstration given by your life as an example.

Soooo….I’m done with Ireland…yeah, I know…I sound like I’m chickening out and everything…but I don’t care. I feel like I’ve done my thing, had my experience, I don’t need three months of it. Kim’s coming home early too, so we’re gonna meet up in Frankfurt a little earlier than what we had planned before. I miss her so much…wherever she is, that’s where I need to be right now. Call me whatever names you want. But I just don’t have any conviction to stay in Dublin any longer.

In other news, I visited the Guinness brewery today…nice enough place. It was fun. And I did enjoy my complimentary Guinness at the end (with my €9 admission) I got some stuff from my adventure to take home too…so yeah.

So I went to a Unitarian church today. There’s only one Unitarian church in dublin…and there aren’t many people who go there. For all its claims of being a radical church and one that stirrs up trouble and stuff…it seems very traditional. We sang hymns out of a hymn book, we prayed the Lords prayer (with a few differences), we read from the Bible, and we heard a sermon. Most of the sermon consisted of telling us how great Unitarians were in history (Sir Issac Newton, Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison, etc). One of the things that bothers me is the fact that they don’t believe in the trinity. They say that Jesus was just an ordinary man approved by God to deliver a message from God (kinda like the muslims). They claim to believe the Bible and say that Jesus spoke truth, but they say “We believe everything Jesus said, except the part where He says ‘I am the only way to heaven.’ We don’t think He really said that.” So I guess maybe they’re reading a different Bible than I am…who knows.