Yes, Jesus was both God and man. No, I cant explain to you something I don’t fully understand myself.
But I do know the Bible is clear on both truths, and you don’t have to believe the Bible, but if you do believe it, then you have to believe its clear revelation on this.

“One of the oft-invoked arguments of liberal theologians against the deity of Christ is the claim that he never personally claimed to be divine. Since this flies in the face of all the evidence, as will be shown below, how can such claims be made? Henry notes that “the contention by some New Testament scholars that Jesus never claimed to be the Christ, God’s anointed one, invariably flows from critical theories that invalidate in advance the factuality of the Gospels as Gerhardus Vos has definitively shown. [v]
This, in turn, leads to the conclusion that the biblical writers deliberately, although not maliciously, falsified the evidence given in the New Testament records for apologetic purposes. They were recording what the early church chose to or wanted to believe rather than the hard, cold truth. However, “the fact that the apostles wrote from the standpoint of personal belief is evidence not that they fabricated the facts but rather that they professed to tell the truth.” [vi] Even those who knew him most intimately called him the Son of God. As Henry again notes, “Peter confesses him to be veritably ‘the Christ, the Son of the living God’ (Matt. 16:16, KJV), a conviction that Jesus in turn grounds not simply in subjective experience but expressly in divine revelation.” Source

But for those of us, who like me, prefer our media in youtube size bunches, Driscoll does a good job of explaining it.

Oprah talks about prayer as though it is an end to itself, or something where we tap into karma.

Oprah is full of it.

If you are praying, you should want to pray to a Being who is bigger, more powerful and able to do stuff you can’t.

Thats the point of prayer, to reach out to something which is beyond your own capabilities.

We Christians believe Jesus hears our prayers. Now hearing does not always mean we will get something we ask for, in fact the Bible warns us against asking for desires which are purely for selfish gain.

However the Psalmist does encourage us to ‘pray for the desires of our heart’

I reckon a sensible person knows innately what the difference between a selfish immature desire is, and what something deep within us is.

I often encourage singles, if they desire it, to pray for a partner to live life with. Some might think that is a selfish desire, it aint, its what God wants. God wants us to be happy and fulfilled in this area of our life. He has made us sexual, relational beings….and He wants us to enjoy each other in the marriage context.

If you have never prayed before, or maybe are wondering why things just ‘aint happening for you…don’t pray because it makes you feel nice, pray because the God who made the heavens and the earth listens, and cares about you.

This is fascinating.

“And you look around the world – that isn’t true. It’s true of Western Europe and it’s true of Australia, but it’s not true of most of the world. Most of the other areas of the world, religion is doing very well, and very much following the American model.

If you want a brilliant example of that, one of Rudd’s favourite countries, got to China. It’s close to 100 million Christians now, compared to 70 million members of the Communist Party. It’s a big change and it’s symbolic of what’s been happening around the world.”
“JOHN MICKLETHWAIT: One reason is the Government has cleverly hit on the one formula to make religion grow. It’s something the ancient Romans did to Christianity, and it was a brilliant way inadvertently to cause religion to grow. The Chinese have set a limit on the number of people that can meet in a place, basically 25. Once you reach 25 people meeting in one of these house churches, which take place in somebody’s home, once it’s at that level the church has to split and start again. Automatically it’s almost a formula for amoeba-like growth.”
Source

What this means for us….churches grow when they are forming, starting.
We need to find ways to keep our churches changing and growing. I don’t think small is the answer, I think change, desire, prayer is.

I have been reflecting a bit on this lately for a few reasons.
Firstly, seeing the transition of our own Baptist Union here in WA over the past few years.
Secondly, having recently becoming friends with John Finkelde and seeing what the C3 network does for its pastors.
Thirdly, no names no pack drill, seeing some of the issues other denominations have had, various ones…not one specifically.

1. A denomination should see its Pastors as the primary point of call in churches. They are the ones giving their full time life to the work of the church.
The denomination should exist to champion them, resource them, support them….and discipline them if need be. The relationship between the pastor and the denomination should be constant. The pastor should feel the denominational body is supporting them, and helping them. They should not feel it is some distant body, just after their money or attendance at some boring meeting.
Since Steve Smith worked hard at transitioning our own WA Baptist Union, it has become this for us. Mark Wilson has come in from Whitfords Church and championed and resourced the BU WA….it is a body that pastors in our state can be proud of.
I wonder about other pastors who I hear of around the traps, who see their denominational body as distant or cold. Recently I met with my pastoral peer group, and the differences in attitude towards the various denominational bodies was astounding, and saddening.

2. A denominational body should be a vocal public voice for the community, to know clearly what the denomination stands for. Frankly, this is a hard task for us Baptists because we are so diverse! Our Baptist Church is soooo different to others around us, and thats cool, we all are on the same team! But it makes a denominational voice difficult.

3. A denominational body should provide legal and ethical frameworks in which churches should operate. I suggest our Baptist denomination does an exceptional job of this. The ‘working with children’ stuff is essential for contemporary church life. Many other churches have let the kingdom down badly in this area, so all of us must be dilligent.

I struggle with churches who do not find themselves as part of a wider body, it may lead to immature or plain foolish decisions, which can hurt the name of Christ. While all for autonomy of the local church, and the local church being responsible for its own propery and finances, there must be a final point of responsibility to someone. Sadly, some of our own Baptist Churches fail to engage with our union. I think this is foolish. Our Union at the moment is trying very hard to support and work with the churches, for kingdom aims. I encourage all WA Baptist Pastors and Churches to get on board!

You will be able to listen to this message tommorow, here is the second paragraph, as I kick off this series for September.

“The picture we are using today is old…ragged…because we are talking about Jesus in the Old testament…and he is there…In fact it is really important to understand and know and believe that he is there because if Christ did not exist prior to His incarnation, before he came in the stable at Bethelehem, then He cannot be God. If He did not exist before the stable…then He is not God…if He did exist as the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, then he is God. It is important because the truth about who Jesus is, is the most important truth. Do you know what makes a cult, what makes a heresy, what makes a lie of the Devil? What someone believes about Jesus. Also I want us to have a real appreciation of the unity of the Bible….and a love for those old testament stories where we see Jesus, before He was the baby. .
Christianity by its very name has always had Jesus Christ as its historical and logical center. What you think about Jesus is the most important aspect of your life when it comes to understanding what you think about God. The vast majority of churches who have believed in the Bible have come to understand and know that the bible is really clear, that Jesus was God, He has always been God, and He will always be God…by very definition, God can never stop being God, so even when Jesus was on earth, as a man, he was still God, he could not not be God.
Lets start at the beginning…”

They are all a protected species.
A few years back Judd eye gouged another player, Campbell Brown, that player fibbed, and Judd got off. Later on Brown admitted he had lied to get Judd off.
Saturday night, Judd, Mr Nice Guy…was at it again. Will he get suspended? I doubt it. (Update – Judd offered two weeks suspension for his ‘death martial arts grip)

This is a video I have made to kick off our new series.
There is some beautiful video shots here from the Hubble Telescope site, where you can download the videos for free.
I have used my favourite Hillsong song at the moment, ‘His glory appears’, and some scripture from Colossions 1.

You can download it here.