Friday, October 21, 2005

Rick Warren States a Foundational Truth

Rick Warren: 'God Didn't Need Us, He Wanted Us'--interview with Saddleback pastor and Purpose Driven Life author Rick Warren -- Beliefnet.com:

"We were created for a relationship, not a religion - not rituals, not rules, not regulations. "
Today we are standing at the tipping point of history. More and more people are realizing that there is one God, Jesus Christ, and that He loves us truly, deeply, and forever. More and more people are discovering that faith is not about guilt and condemnation, it is not about holy men or holy places, it is not about human power and control, dogma or doctrine or tradition - true faith is about each individual realizing that God loves them. It is about each individual accepting that love and giving it to others. It is about service, hope, love, inspiration, strength, and confidence. It is about exercising the full power of God's love in our relationship with God and our relationships with other people. Jesus summed it up best when He said, "The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath" in Mark 2:27.

The Lord God Jesus Christ created us because He wanted someone to love, someone to be in relationship with. He gave His Word not to limit us, but to free us. His commandments are not so much a list of "Thou Shalt Not.." as they are an encapsulation of how healthy relationships work. His Word is not just a collection of history, prophecy, and stories - it is God's method of communicating His eternal messages to all people. It is His love letter to the human race, His compassionate attempt to explain the lifestyle and decisions that lead to happiness, peace, contentment, fulfillment, success, and eternal life. It is His invitation to a lasting relationship with Him, an eternal friendship with your Creator. Salvation is not just the goal, it is the lifestyle. Heaven is not just a destination after death, it is a way of life right here, right now.

So Amen, Rick, keep on reaching one more for Jesus, because the truth is: "We were created for a relationship, not a religion - not rituals, not rules, not regulations. "

Thursday, October 20, 2005

In Boundless Mercy - A Hymn by Emanuel Swedenborg

At the heart of a person's belief lies their heart. The passion that moves them, the love that gives their life its unique quality. And so I was delighted to discover a hymn, written by Emanuel Swedenborg, that seems to uncover the heart of this servant of our Lord Jesus. You can find the music together with the following words for "In Boundless Mercy" on cyberhymnal.org

In boundless mercy, gracious Lord, appear,
Darkness dispel, the humble mourner cheer;
Vain thoughts remove, melt down the flinty heart,
Draw every soul to choose the better part.

Thy presence fills the universal space,
Thy grace appears to all the human race,
Oh! visit us with light and life divine,
Fill every soul, for every soul is Thine.

Thou, blessèd Jesus, art my Lord, my Love:
Thou art my King: from Thee I would not move,
Hence earthly charms, far, far, from me depart,
Nor seek to draw from my dear Lord my heart.

That uncreated beauty, which has gained
My ravished heart, has all my glory stained:
Thy loveliness my soul has prepossessed,
And left no room for any other guest.

Wednesday, October 19, 2005

Emanuel Swedenborg and Time Magazine

On July 1, 1935 Time Magazine ran an article, The New Jerusalem, stating:

Son of a Lutheran bishop, Emanuel Swedenborg spent his time between the ages of four and ten in "thought upon God, salvation and the spiritual experience of men." Some of his precocious revelations made his father & mother conclude that angels were speaking through him, decide to put a stop to "these celestial excursions." But at 57 his anatomical search for man's soul turned Swedenborg once more to supernatural intercourse. This time he had no doubt that the angels and spirits were real. They scattered sweet or disagreeable odors on his body, produced pain, heat, cold. One night some evil spirits got into his scalp, fled at dawn "with a slight hissing sound, like when some little distended vesicle is perforated." For the next 27 years Swedenborg made almost daily excursions through Heaven and Hell, heard the meaning of the Scriptures expounded by angels, spirits and the Lord Himself. All that he saw & heard he dutifully set down in 29 fat Latin volumes.

Christ, he firmly believed, had chosen Emanuel Swedenborg as the vehicle of His second coming. But for all his complex system of theology, he did not attempt to preach or found a sect. His New Church was to embrace all Christendom, revitalized by his revelations.

Emanuel Swedenborg would again resurface in the magazine on February 7, 1938 in an article, For Swedenborg, about notable Swedenborgians and on June 28, 1954 in an article, The Great Swede, once again discussing his long list of personal achievements. And finally, on June 26, 1964, in an article about The New Jerusalem where the author notes the Second Advent of Jesus Christ:
Who was the most brilliant mind of the 18th century? A good case could be made for Newton, Voltaire, Samuel Johnson—or for Emanuel Swedenborg, the polymathic scientist and seer whose fame lingers on not just in literature but in churches that honor his writing as the vehicle for the second coming of God's word.
In all, the Time Magazine Archive lists 22 articles and letters that mention Emanuel Swedenborg dating back as far as 1925 with the last one published as recently as 1985, an article titled In Search of Immortality the Tree of Life which notes that John "Johnny Appleseed" Chapman believed in Emanuel Swedenborg's revelation.

But here is the interesting piece for me, why is it that in all of these articles Emanuel Swedenborg's science, philsophy, engineering, and personal achievements overwhelm the fact that he was chosen by Jesus Christ Himself to publish the completion of the Word of God in bearing witness to the Second Coming of Christ? Surely the Second Advent of our Lord is bigger news than some guy inventing a prototype airplane, or figuring out how the human body works.

I can assume the answer is summed up by the author of the July 1, 1935 article who observed:
...the fact remains that in most U. S. minds Emanuel Swedenborg and his doctrines are sadly confused with advice to the married, physical culture, Rosicrucianism and patent can-openers. That is because most citizens have met the great Scandinavian savant only as a tiny picture in the back pages of popular magazines, tucked away in one-inch advertisements offering HEAVEN AND HELL, "632 page book treating of the Life after Death," for 5¢.
For some reason, people who have been reading the theology written by Emanuel Swedenborg, for the last 200+ years have missed their most crucial message - that Jesus Christ rose from the dead fully united with His soul, "the Father" - i.e. the risen Jesus Christ is the one and only God. By making the details about the afterlife to be the main thrust of their message and belief, the movement which could have been working new life into Christianity sidelined itself out of the mainstream and into mysticism, spiritism, agnosticism, and philosophy. Making the Second Advent of Jesus Christ wait for over 200 years to be announced and realized in mainstream culture.

In the article, The Great Swede, the author reports the President of a Swedenborgian denomination saying:
"The Second Coming of the Lord is a process already going on, changing the very environment ... of all mankind. It is not to be a bodily Coming . . . That Second Coming is as the very spirit of truth . . . We feel Swedenborg has been a chosen instrument ... to make the truth concerning the Second Coming better known."
This is as close as any of the 22 articles that Time published come to actually getting the full truth, that Jesus Christ returned to earth in 1745 when He appeared to Emanuel Swedenborg and asked him to write and to publish everything that he was about to learn. The Second Coming of Christ was real, it was historical, it happened between 1745 and 1772 and the full story can be found in the books that Emanuel Swedenborg wrote and published during that time.

Monday, October 03, 2005

Follow Up: Video About Computers for Mississippi

In cooperation with Charity in Action under the direction of Frank Vagnone and the Seabees coordinated by Lt. Martie Johnson NMCB 7, Quest For Tech donated 100 computers to De Lisle elementary school in Pass Christian school district in Pass Christian, Missippi. See the Marsha Hill video on ABC 13 Biloxi Gulfport Pascagula at Marsha Hill Reports On School Computer Donation