An additional message, also inspired by Beilby's book · 8:27am Dec 1st, 2019
I've talked about this before, but it's worth saying it again, because people forget and besides, who's going to look back at blogs from months or years earlier?
Becoming Christian does not mean that one's life is full of easy living and wealth. These things can be given as gifts by God, but the things of this life are temporal (which, admittedly, I forget a lot :(), and very often life can get very tough. We're not promised wealth or positions or possessions in this life when we truly commit to Christ. What we are promised is an eternity with Him, in a kingdom without sin and misery.
In addition, by accepting Christ as Lord, the devil is going to do what he can to bring you down. He can't reverse a true salvation, but he can try and nullify you message, your voice, your efforts to bring more people to God, give bad advice, and ruin your life however he can and by whatever means he's allowed to have.
Life is already tough for believers in places like Pakistan, where Asia Bibi was hounded for supposedly mocking the (alleged) prophet Muhammad, in Laos (communist atheism, buddhism, or traditional animism are the only accepted alternatives, believers in Christ are hounded and arrested and beaten), In North Korea (jail or death if you believe), in Indonesia and other countries where either the government, the crowd, or both are hostile to the Word of Christ.
People like the ones above don't have the advantages that we have here in the West (or had, at any rate). Ask them if their lives are easy by any means.
Again, this isn't to say that God won't give health or wealth or both to a believer, but the receipt of these gifts should be seen as just that, gifts, given by grace alone, and we should use those gifts, where possible, to aid others and help spread the faith.
We must trust our God, even in the worst of circumstances (from our point of view). Life isn't always easy, and perhaps more accurately usually isn't. A person without a wealth problem may have a spiritual or emotional cross to bear.
So, lets be careful about "church culture," which I'll define as beliefs about Christianity that are held up as true even though they aren't (such as the prosperity gospel and the idea of people becoming angels after death). We should focus on the Way, the Truth, and the Life, who is Christ the Lord, and His teachings alone.
Please explain to me in the clearest way possible to you, how the conditions that Christians are living under in regions where it is dangerous to be Christian, are comparable to your lamentation over your losses of advantages in Western Civilization.
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I am not trying to minimize their suffering. What I'm saying is that we are in a time where Christian values are being attacked, if not by persecution then by ridicule and with laws that try to force immoral actions upon us, such as drug stores being forced to sell abortion drugs irrespective of the conscience of the store owner. I'm not making light of the persecuted, I'm saying that we are losing rights, and will keep doing so. We need to stand up, now, while it's still early, instead of letting those rights die.
That said, we still have some measure of protection here in the West. People in North Korea and these other places have no such protections and no one other than the Almighty to appeal to.
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Thank you for the clarification, and I do apologize for coming off as aggressive. The subject of Human Rights, or rather the fact that it is still a conversation at all: is aggravating. Humanity should be mature enough about it but we're very good at finding reasons not to be.
Either by purest irony or Divine Prank, that's what's being said on all sides of every conversation regarding rights.
I can say from experience: learn how to protect yourself. Things are gonna get worse before they get better.
Blessed be