Judas Iscariot is infamous throughout church history as the betrayer of Jesus.
The story of Judas brings up a heap of issues such as
Did Judas have a choice? Was the life of Judas predestined for evil?
Was his betrayal necessary for the salvation of humanity? If so, should he get some credit here?
Some say the sins and subsequent suicide of Judas forever condemned him to Hell – Could the atonement of Jesus not be sufficient for someone so instrumental in history?
What was going through the heart and mind of Judas as he hung himself?
The one question I’ve been fixated on for the past month comes straight from the Scriptures. In Matthew 27, Judas goes to the chief priests and elders, repenting “I have sinned for I have betrayed innocent blood”, to which the religious leaders respond “What is that to us? That’s your responsibility”.
This one breaks my heart. I know we as the church do it all the time. People come to us wanting change, acceptance, hope… and we leave them ‘hanging’. Who has committed the greater sin here? Could the church have prevented his death? I doubt Judas went to them seeking further condemnation.
What is that to us?
What if rather than ignoring those who we might deem as ‘too sick and twisted’, ‘too messed up’, or ‘too awkward’, we welcomed them? What if we didn’t simply acknowledge them, or pray and empty prayer, but took their sins as our responsibility? And what if, a big what if, someone was ‘predestined’ to a life of sin, so that you could learn what it means to truly love another human being?
According to Global TV: There’s a Christian reformation stirring in Canada’s Christian churches. Forsaking the traditional pew and altar, these Christians are dropping pop culture references, defying the orthodoxy, and creating their own brands of worship. Suddenly, it’s hip to be holy.
To which I say, really? I can’t honestly say I see a ‘reformation’ happening. Inklings of goodness coming out of the cracks absolutely, but the church still has a long way to go in Canada.
My friend Nathan Gerber will be featured in it, which will definitely make it worth watching. (Revealed: Hip 2B Holy on Global TV Monday May 25 10pm EST, 9pm Central, 8pm Western).
See the video below interviewing director Karen Pinker and Kevin Newman about the show. They sound like tourists who’ve read all the brochures, but haven’t quite lived with the natives yet.
I sure hope it’s not lame. Pray that it’s an honest depiction (beauty and ugliness and all), and that it actually helps move conversations across the nation forward.
Update: Some clips from the show laced with post-production reflections.
Your thoughts on the ‘reformation’ of the Church in Canada?
Seth Godin argues the Internet has ended mass marketing and revived a human social unit from the distant past: tribes. Founded on shared ideas and values, tribes give ordinary people the power to lead and make big change. He urges us to do so.
SolarCrash.com now runs on the thesis framework. I bought into it because I wanted to refresh this site and am planning on doing some site development for others. I’m also really banking on the search engine optimization hype all over it. Finding a promotional discount also helped.
I was exploring Thematic, and some other frameworks at first, but felt that a lot of them were still glitchy and in beta stages. Thesis seems to have reached the tipping point where the kinks have been ironed out and there’s a large support community around it.
It’s definitely powerful, but having said that, I wouldn’t get it if I was completely code-illiterate, unless you’re willing for your site to look like an increasing number of other Thesis-driven sites out there.
This site still needs some work, but I’ll have to let it slide till I have more time to tinker around.
Some changes so far
- cutting the load time by half - added a social profile icon bar at the top - creating a ‘brighter’ look with the background - rounded corners – using some new css features – that won’t work in IE though. - shifted the nav bar down below the header - removed redundant links like home / subscribe - added a intro section hook above the sidebars - removed some dividing lines for a cleaner feel - edited the threaded commenting system so it’s a bit more engaging
I still hope to eventually make a new logo/banner, layout the navigation pages better, and probably remove those google ads once I hit the next payment clip. I’m getting a bit tired of ‘Sexy Christian Singles” ads. Hopefully I’ll get some sponsors at some point (can you believe I made 10% of my income last year, through this blog?)
If you plan on purchasing Thesis, you can click my affiliate link so I can get some cash back.
Let me know if you’ve got ideas on making a better site, specifically this one!
Dino what are your thoughts on inviting those who have yet to stumble into Jesus to serve along side of us? And what are some good ways of doing so without it being too weird as our intentions in serving may not entirely overlap?
Thanks for being a part of the Servolution Blog Tour. And what a great question, Lon! I’m all for it. One of the greatest ways to show people what the love of Jesus is all about is to have them be a part of an outreach.
If someone wants to serve alongside you in an outreach, there’s a good chance they’re already curious about something they’ve seen in you. Sure, there’s a chance their purpose isn’t the same as yours, but I’d guess the root of their intentions is to find out what in the world is making these people want to get out on a hot day and give away free bottles of water – no strings attached. I’m not saying you shouldn’t use wisdom – don’t put someone you don’t know in charge of children’s church.
Leadership carries with it a different requirement than simply joining you on an outreach. But by all means, I’d encourage you to take people with you on an outreach who haven’t made the decision to follow Christ yet. It just might be what draws them all the way across the line.
I helped beta test APEST 360 recently, developed by Alan Hirsch.
The APESTassessment is a profiling instrument designed to assist you in finding your ministry style in relation to the philosophy of the fivefold ministry of Ephesians 4 (Apostles, Prophets, Evangelists, Shepherds, Teachers). It has emerged from 10 years of practical application of this model in various ministry contexts.
The 360 version integrates feedback from others into your profile as well.
My personal results: ATPES – Apostolic 44 / Teaching 25 / Prophetic 22 / Evangelistic 19 / Shepherding 8
Apostolic + Teaching
The Apostle Teacher inspires by communicating the need to pioneer new endeavors. The AT takes time to explain so others understand the dynamics of mission. The AT has a keen sense of systems, particularly the inherent logic of Christianity as a whole. The AT is creative and inventive with words, moving people forward with new ideas. The AT promotes active learning in the process of mission. The motivation of the Apostle Teacher is the urgency of taking the Faith outward, crossing boundaries of understanding to reach those who need to know. The AT is thus a natural activist-philosopher – ideas serve the cause.
The Apostle Prophet is motivated engage great causes – no matter where it may take them. The AP is one who knows what needs to be done, and will mobilize others to engage in mission. The AP is not the most politically sensitive type and can put people off Their sense of urgency and vision makes up for their lack of political savvy. The nature of the AP is to see the world through a relative black ad white mentality. The motivation of the Apostle Prophet is to further the message of God’s kingdom through an urgency of the immediate tasks and large strategies
Note – Out of 9 responses however – 2 of my friends skewed my results because they thought they were taking the test on behalf of themselves! I can’t seem to take their results out of my score.
Apostolic is clearly up there, obviously my friends don’t think I’m that hot at teaching, and we can agree that my shepherding abilities are poor.
As with all of these types of profiling tools, I’m always left with, “uh huh, now what?”
Join the Origins projectcommunity – A network initiated by Dan Kimball, Erwin McManus, Scot McKnight, and many others. There’s a group just for Canadians as well.
Check out Refresh Worship, a hub for events going on in Toronto
Need cool motion graphics design work? Get in touch with my friend Jeff.
Wedding and Engagement photos? See Claudia – She helped with the SolarCrash Event photography project and we’ll be booking her if/when we do a vow renewal party.
My friend Ming is organizing Project SWAP – shopping with a purpose, June 20th, check it out.
BTW, if ANYONE, has ANY contacts in the Toront District School Board, my wife is looking for a referral for just about ANY elementry school in the city, ASAP.
