There was a stir in the town of Wittenburg about five-hundred and two years ago. That idiot, selfish monk had dared to argue with the popular beliefs of the day. He nailed 95 arguments to the local bulletin board a.k.a. the church doors, and actually expected to have logical conversations with educated people.
 
            The educated people knew better. What right did Luther have to tell people they couldn't save themselves? What made that impudent monk consider the fact that indulgences couldn't redeem, nor the pope forgive?

         Oh yes, my friends. This monk's beliefs were very unpopular. In the following years he would be excommunicated, shunned, betrayed, kidnapped by friends(long story), hounded all over Germany, and watch people throw his books into the fire.
      
            At the Diet, or Council of Worms where Luther was asked if he would recant his bigoted and intolerant beliefs, he responded with a now well-known statement:

     "Since your most serene majesty and your high mightinesses require of me a simple, clear and direct answer, I will give one, and it is this: I cannot submit my faith either to the pope or to the council, because it is as clear as noonday that they have fallen into error and even into glaring inconsistency with themselves. If, then, I am not convinced by proof from Holy Scripture, or by cogent reasons, if I am not satisfied by the very text I have cited, and if my judgment is not in this way brought into subjection to God’s word, I neither can nor will retract anything; for it cannot be either safe or honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise; God help me! Amen."

         Note those last lines, "It cannot be either safe nor honest for a Christian to speak against his conscience." 

     What a notion, my friends, how could he think such a thing, didn't he know that God is love, that being a Christian is all about showing others how much you support them, even if they're heading to hell? Didn't he realize that tolerance, not honesty is what this world needs?


        (If you don't realize I'm being heartily sarcastic by now, you don't know me well enough, but I'm putting this in because, I know some people who might think I'm being serious. Alas, sarcasm doesn't convey well over text!)

       Seriously, good readers, I have realized that we have the kind of world we have today because men like Luther were willing to draw their lines in the sand and say, "Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God."

         Today, I wish to publicly declare my line, and stand there along with Luther, Calvin, Knox, Tyndale, Riddely, Latimer, Hus, Galileo, Wilberforce, Paul, Lady Jane Grey, and a host of others to declare that I cannot go along with the world, and I cannot twist my beliefs to fit with the zeitgeist of this age. 

          This issue I wish to declare is that regarding murder. If I could nail a document to the local bulletin board with 95 arguments against the popular evangelical church, the first one would be with regards to the sanctity of life regardless of how small it is and within whose womb it rests.

             What grieves me is how many people claiming to be Christians pussyfoot around this issue, unable to offend anyone, unable to speak an opinion that might be unpopular or taken badly.

          I little under a week ago, I spoke with five people running for public office in Rolesville. Of the five, though I believe all were against abortion, only one was willing to out and say it, two would not give me an answer. Two told me that it was not their place to judge and that they should not let their personal opinions get in the way of loving people and showing them God's love.

          I was frightened, to be honest. It was the first time in my life somebody said something that made me feel almost like throwing up. I guess in the case of a mother who has decided logically and unemotionally that her one-week-old is unplanned, inconvenient and hazardous to her health, these people would just stand by with tears in her eyes and tell her they support her, that God loves her, and that it's not their place to judge while a doctor gave her baby a sedative, ripped it limb from limb and either tossed it in the garbage or sent it away to a science lab for scrutiny regarding cures for life-threatening diseases.

            My friends, we can too easily get caught up in semantics when it comes down to this. A baby is no less alive in the womb, and abortion is murder. Argue what you will about rape, health hazards, or quality of life for the child. It is murder, and I refuse to call it anything else not treat it any less seriously than the life of that one-week-old, or two-year-old, or teenager, or elderly individual. 

               Here I stand, I can do no other. God help me.


 ~ Christianna


 

         About two months ago, three young men in White shirts, black pants and ties, set up a table outside the Wake Forest Coffee company. I knew they were Mormons right off the bat. I also knew something of the Mormon missionary temperament: Polite, friendly, and capable of running mental circles around the average evangelical.

    There certainly was a bit of pride in the mix. Perhaps, I'll admit, I was curious, but mostly, I think I wanted to understand what it is that Mormons actually believe about God, and what makes the cult so attractive to outsiders.

       First of all, if you are a Mormon reading this, I hope you'll read through the entire post and at least hear my argument, just as I patiently listened to the Mormon missionaries and read through the entire book of Mormon a couple months ago. I also hope, that perhaps you'll take some time to consider what you believe, and determine for yourself, not on anyone else's say so, whether the one true God actually appeared to Joseph Smith, the single man on whose testimony all Mormon claims reside.

         Secondly, to those of you who are not Mormons, I don't want you to imagine that this is going to be a a well researched, highly documented expose on Mormon theology, these are merely a few of my thoughts based on my discussions with the missionaries, and my read through of the Book of Mormon.



      
          1. The Brain Stops Here
                  "Now [the Bereans] were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so. Therefore many of them believed..."  ~ Acts 17:11-12


      I could give several more examples of people who were praised for intelligently researching the message of the gospel before they believed, one of those, most notably, being Thomas. Notice that Jesus didn't scold Thomas when He showed up among the disciples again, after Thomas loudly proclaimed that it would take physically touching Jesus's wounds to make him believe that Christ had risen. Instead, Jesus, without ceremony, offered Thomas the proof that he requested.    
         Also, remember Gideon, trembling in doubt when an angel appears to him claiming to come from God. Or else when God specifically commanded him to do things, and he kept asking for signs to be absolutely certain that it was God who commanded them.
      God neither scolded nor refused to perform the signs, and Gideon was duly satisfied. 
Never in the Scriptures does God refuse to confirm an honest question stemming from honest intelligence regarding his existence or commands.


       However, this was something I ran into when I started talking with the Mormon Missionaries.
     "How can I know this is indeed another revelation of Jesus Christ?" I asked them. Having grown up in a reformed baptist context, reading content from Answers in Genesis, and comparing claims of secular authors with those of Christianity, I expected something similar. Perhaps a list of logical points I could confirm on my own, perhaps a polished ontological argument based on apparent truth claims. 
       No, instead, the first thing I was referenced to was a passage at the end of the book of Mormon:
"And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask god, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, He will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost."  ~ Moroni 10:4
 
       All well and good, right? Well, when I ask God to make things clear to me in such a manner, I do expect an answer. I remember once praying to God with a very sincere heart to tell me whether the doctrine of the Trinity was actually real. The answer I got was very concrete, "yes." But, this wasn't a feeling or a voice in my head. I stumbled across a very nice bit of research in a book by Dr. Walter Martin in reference to the subject, and then another bit of logical dogma presented by some writer who's name I can't recall. What I do recall are the arguments they made. Well researched, backed by Scripture used in context, and ontologically solid. It was something I could stand on and believe with my mind. I considered that an answer from God.
 
         When I asked the Missionaries, however, how I could know the book of Mormon was true, their best answer was "you just know." When pressed further, one admitted it was a kind of feeling. They said that the Holy Spirit inside you reveals it to you in some ephemeral way. 


       I was miffed, and this was the first red flag in our conversations. In all my born days with relation to Christianity, I have never been told when I questioned a particular doctrine, that I just had to pray and God would give me a feeling. Up 'till that point, I had thought Mormons were thinkers. They had a lot of educated people within their fold, they encouraged thinking, I thought. For certain, I thought I'd find at least an appearance of intellectualism. Nope.


       God never requires us to leave our brains at the door when investigating the truth claims of Christianity, and yet here these polite young men were informing me with straight faces that I was to trust my eternal state upon the basis of a feeling I would get after a sincere prayer. 
 
        Let me ask my Mormon friends this, why did God give us brains if He didn't intend that we should use them?

        2. The Mormon God is Created in The Image of Man
   
       This was something I noticed shortly after embarking on my reading of the book of Mormon. Very soon I came upon a passage that described the Holy Spirit telling a man to kill his enemy in cold blood while he slept. Yes, from the previous passages I learned that this was indeed a very bad man, and he certainly would have caused the righteous ones more trouble had they let him live. These were the arguments the missionaries presented in defense of this passage. Plus, they added, God has the right over life and death, and He decided he should die.
 
        According to their chronology, the ten commandments had already been given including the one stating "Thou Shalt not Murder." Note that the Hebrew word is murder not kill in the Old Testament. Killing someone in the heat of battle was never a punishable crime in Old testament law, neither was killing someone accidentally, as the law even makes provision for the perpetrator in such cases. But never, in all of Scripture, did God ever command a man to slay his enemy in cold blood even against the scruples of the man's conscience.


         I am reminded of David, who found himself in almost the exact same situation, and his reaction was quite different. Compare these two passages:


"And I beheld a man, and he had fallen to the earth before me, for he was drunken with wine. And when I came to him I found that it was Laban....And it came to pass that I was constrained by the Spirit that I should kill Laban; but I said in my heart: Never at any time have I shed the blood of man. And I shrunk and would that I might not slay him. And the Spirit said unto me again:Behold the Lord hath delivered him into thy hands. Yea and I also knew that he had sought to take away mine own life; yea, and he would not hearken unto the commandments of the Lord; and he had also taken away our property.....(at this point a whole column of arguments are cited, which you can read for yourself if you wish)....Therefore I did obey the voice of the Spirit, and took Laban by the hair of the head, and I smote off his head with his own sword."
  ~ 1 Nephi 4: 7-8, 10-11, 18
 
        And this:
     "And behold, Saul lay sleeping inside the circle of the camp with his spear stuck in the ground at his head; and Abner and the people were lying around him. Then Abishai said to David, "Today God has delivered your enemy into your hand; now therefore, please let me strike him with the spear to the ground with one stroke, and I will not strike him the second time." But David said to Abishai, "Do not destroy him, for who can stretch out his hand against the Lord's anointed and be without guilt?" David also said, "As the Lord lives, surely the Lord will strike him, or his day will come that he dies, or he will go down into battle and perish. The Lord forbid that I should stretch out my hand against the Lord's anointed."  ~ 1 Samuel 26: 7-11




      Do you see what's happening here? David understands that it's not his place to pass such a judgement upon his enemy. He understands that Vengeance belongs to God, while Abishai clearly believes that this is an opportunity straight from God. And of course, it makes sense, if you believe that feelings are to be trusted, but David, in spite of any feeling of providence, knew God's commandments. He knew that this could not be from God, because God had clearly stated His command elsewhere.
        Whereas, Nephi seems to think that a mental argument and a tempting opportunity is enough to tell him that God is speaking to him. 
        You see the dilemma? How are we to know when God is speaking to us, and when it's our own sinful hearts? According to the Mormons it's a practical argument.


      But I just said a good argument is what God provides didn't I? Yes indeed, take a look at those passages again. Both men reason it out, though Nephi takes a whole lot longer, and in the end what I see as the basis of Nephi's argument is "He deserves it anyway, and if I let him live, he'll cause me a whole lot more trouble so God must be commanding me to kill him." 
David's argument, however, is: "He sure does deserve it, but it is not my place to kill him. God will take care of that." 
 
At the root of David's reasoning process is an unshakable trust in God's goodness and a steady grounding in the righteousness of His commandments.


At the root of Nephi's is retribution and convenience. 


One is a very logical and submissive trust in a God who obviously understands the situation better than man does, the other would be a practical human response to a sticky situation.


This what I mean when I say that the Mormon God is made in Man's image. And the more I read through the book of Mormon, I saw this character play out. It was that of a short-sighted, humanistic God who contradicted Himself and commanded his servants to go against their consciences. Every now and again, when the Book of Mormon plagiarized from the KJV Bible, which it did extensively, it felt out of place. The two gods are not the same.
 
Paul warns the Colossians against exactly this kind of subtle mind trick: 
    "See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ."

     3. Salvation by Grace....and a Few Works

             Mormon theology, I discovered shortly, is rather inconsistent on this point. On the one hand the missionaries told me that we were saved completely by the grace of God, but then they added that you had to be baptized to be saved. "What if someone, hypothetically, accepts the Mormon doctrine and is saved, but then dies before he can be baptized, is he damned?" I asked.
       This is where it got rather odd, "Well, in that case, we believe in Baptism by proxy." The fresh-faced youth responded, looking me in the eye. 
        I'll admit I almost laughed, so, there are just a few works needed to get into the Kingdom of God.  I discovered another thing about Mormonism throughout my study. It's called the Word of Wisdom which calls Mormons to abstain from alcohol and all  hot drinks such as Coffee and Tea. I'm not sure if Hot-Chocolate is allowed, I think it is. What happens if you don't keep the word of wisdom? Well, you don't get to go to the Mormon temple, and when you die, you go to a lesser heaven. I don't know about you, but that sounds like a works based religion to me.


          What does grace mean to a Mormon? Quite frankly, after a few hours of talking with the missionaries, I'm still not quite certain. That should tell you something.

      4. History Protests

             It was only as I got farther into the book of Mormon that I realized that this was talking about a group of Jews who traveled across Europe and sailed across the Atlantic to colonize America. Apparently when they got there there was nobody there, but they proceeded to "multiply exceedingly" across the land, and get into several kerfuffles during one of which the rebellious side was cursed by God with dark skin (another example of a different God). Well, long story short, lots of cities were built in North and South America, the evil dark-skinned people eventually wiped out the faithful, and all the cities were destroyed.


         My first question  to the missionaries was where the Native American Indians came from. I had a horrible time not laughing at their answer. Apparently, the American Indians are the remnants of the cursed race. Of course, reality starkly contradicts this, as such a precedent would make the American Indians Semitic in origin, when, in fact, they are distinctly Mongoloid. 
         And, as for a multitude of cities, I should have thought we'd have found some archeological evidence of such massive structures as were described if there had been any.


       You see, the more we study history in the Middle East, the more it confirms the already accepted  historical events of the Bible, as well as shedding light on the more esoteric events. However, the more we study archeology in America, the more we discover how very little there is to discover. In many ways, any kind of civilization in America is fairly recent, the only remains prior to the Vikings being the remains of the Aztecs who existed long after the first Mormons disappeared.
          When something claims to be historical, and history doesn't support it in the slightest, one has to be suspicious. Other little technicalities exist such as the fact that since the original group was Hebrew, and Hebrews held their language very high, it would have been considered a travesty to write records in any other language but Hebrew. Yet, the original version of the book of Mormon was supposed to have been written in "Reformed Egyptian" which Linguists claim never existed not to mention, it being a strange language which a Hebrew man would choose to keep a record.


          Once again, the Mormons ask very much of their followers. They tell them to leave their brains at the door and believe something history has no category for. Can we, as rational human beings, created in the image of God, be expected to swallow such a thing as coming from Him? 
 
I don't think so.

       5. God's Work Upon Their Shoulders

             After three meetings of heavy discussion, mostly regarding the four points above, one of the missionaries turned to me and said, "I'm sorry, but I don't see any point in continuing this conversation. I don't think we're going to convince you."
        I proceeded to assure him that he was probably right, and then, as lovingly as I could, urged them to consider my arguments, and think through things for themselves, as they constantly, throughout our talks, referred me to the higher ups who had, apparently, already figured these things out. 
         However, what really bugged me about this statement, was that the Missionary assumed that he could possibly save me. He had the idea that if I didn't immediately accept the things he was telling me, it must mean his work was done and I was a lost cause. 


         I was reminded of Christian missionaries I know who have labored with unbelievers for years seeing any apparent fruit. I was minded of fellow believers, who have unbelieving friends to whom they have witnessed for years and still have not witnessed them bow the knee before their Creator. And these young men, when they saw I wasn't going to immediately fall on my knees in awe before the Mormon god, simply gave up.
          I'm not sure if they thought I wasn't saveable, or only that it would take too long to try and help me understand their point of view. 


           That's the ultimate difference between Mormons and Christians. We believe that God alone can lift the veil that lies over the hearts of men and bring them to an understanding of the truth. We will continue to meet with an unbeliever for years on end, because we care about him, and because we know it's not up to us. Our job is to be faithful right where we are. To live out and proclaim the gospel until we breathe our last, even if we never see the fruit of our labour. 
           
       Unlike the Mormons, we don't disassociate with our non-christian friends when we discover them to be tough cookies. I have a few atheist friends, most of whom I sincerely doubt will ever come to Christ, that is, if I believed the burden was on me. 
           
        I believe it's up to God to change their hearts. All I do is speak the truth and display Christ in my life, and we will keep meeting to talk at the coffee shop, perhaps 'till the day I die. This is my mission field, friends. Anyone who meets me will discover pretty soon where I stand, and, if not a Christian, will probably be witnessed to if he sticks around long enough. But I leave the salvific work to God, because,
      "God did not call me to be successful. He called me to be faithful." ~ Mother Teresa


And that's precisely what I do. As a follower of Christ who holds Sola Scriptura, Sola Gratia, Sola Fidelis, and Sola Christus, as indelible doctrines of truth my mission here is to fulfill the final "Sola" in my life; Sola Deo Gloria. 


  To God Alone, be The Glory.


        I'll close with one of my favorite hymns which gives a rather good synopsis of the true Christian's worldview. A hymn that reminds us of the truths we as Christians all hold dear; The Church's One Foundation.

      May Jesus Christ and Him alone forever be our one foundation.
         If a Mormon ever tries to tie you up in knots with his doctrine, start asking him about the Sufficiency of Christ and Scripture. He won't get far.

     Farewell For Now,
  
            ~ Christianna
    

         A month and a half, or so, ago I played one of the very best scrabble games in my life. Nobody was chirping in over my shoulder telling me what to do, nobody was leaning back with a huff while I sorted through combinations in my head and told me the game was boring. Best of all, to my infinite satisfaction, we used up every single letter in the game on legitimate words. I also learned that Yup is, indeed, in the dictionary. Who would have thought?
         The whole thing reminded me, once again, however, of just how minute my vocabulary still is. In an attempt express a thought that I had last night, the pang came back in full force. I stumbled over two syllable words whose mundane usage rebelled against the grandeur of the feeling I was endeavoring to vocalize.
          To read a well-written poem with exquisitely placed words, so formed that it comes to life, is a thrill to my soul and I long to possess the vocabulary necessary to communicate even so well. And yet, I know, even if I were to master every single word that exists in the English language (or any other language for that matter) I would still have thoughts I could not verbalize. It's a horrid feeling, in many ways. I really do feel as though I'm about to explode, and not only that, but also that I would feel infinitely better if I did.
           Why is it that I can have thoughts and emotions that no human tongue can articulate?

         When I hold my little nephew in my arms, his tiny head resting on my arm, those soulful eyes, so naive, and yet so intelligent, gazing into mine, I think about what he will be like when he's older, when he's not so ignorant of the world around him. What will he be? And a sympathy and yearning that I never knew I possessed, aches and throbs within my breast. Perhaps it's the early pang's of a mother's love, having never been a mother before I cannot be certain, but I do know, suddenly, right then, that I would do almost anything to protect and help that little baby.
            He's no angel. He bawls when he's grumpy, makes a ruckus when he's hungry. Heaven knows he has little enough to complain about, and yet he does it with all the vim and vigor the whole two-feet of him can manage. And still, I love him more than is possible to disclose with that little, four-letter word. And yet, even if, like the Hebrews, we had four words for love, I'm not sure I could manage to communicate what I feel.
         In this case, along with the feeling comes a desire. A desire that's lain dormant in me for most of my life, budding every now and again, but now yielding to full blossom. The longing to have a child of my own. Almost, as though, if I did, all the tenderness I posses regarding Jayden might be adequately manifested through one of my own. And yet, right now, it is not to be. And even if it was, I know that it would still fail to satisfy the craving.

       Why do I have good and right longings when I cannot fulfill them?
       My youngest brother Benaiah, though I mother him far more than I should, is still very much a brother to me. When I scold him, or when we get into fights, it's only because I see him making a choice that I regretted when I got older, or he has some form of faulty logic which he'll later do a face-palm over. We have a decent relationship, but every now and again I feel miles apart from him.
       He often thinks I take delight in calling out his faults, and I know I need to be more encouraging. A balance must be struck, and even then, sometimes he misconstrues an honest, and, what I thought, expedient action on my part.
 
     Why can something good possibly be interpreted as something so bad?
         A lovely friend of mine came from Arizona to visit a couple weeks ago. To say that we had a lot of fun would be a gross understatement. It made me realize that the two friends I feel closest to, that have the best influence on me, live miles away. One in East Tennessee, and one across the country in Arizona. If I'm not careful, I'll sometimes go off on thought tangents, imagining what would be the case if both these friends lived within ten miles of me, or I of them. Even better, throw in another really great friend who lives in Colorado, and how about the one in Ohio, or Washington state, or Oregon, or Texas! It's frightening the way I can build my little utopia with all the people I like best and immediately my wonderful life here seems infinitely more drab.

I have a few great acquaintances here. Yes, I have to make more of an effort to be friends with them. We don't think in sync like I do with these others, but that's a good thing, right? It sharpens and challenges me.
       Still, in the face of indisputable logic and common good sense, even when I see so much around me to be thankful for, I sometimes suffer myself to sulk. How can I be so pig-headed? To want what I want so badly that I make myself miserable over it?

       Why can such a blessed person as myself find it in me to miss out on the good that is before me because I'm seeking the good, perhaps even lesser good, that is removed from me?



        Last night, I stood on a grand stage with just a choir. There might have been an audience behind me, but I didn't notice. It was just me and the above, magnificent piece of music.........
..........Actually, I lay on my bedroom floor, headphones on, my CD player rattling away on it's little ball feet, and I was conducting the ceiling. Yet this room of mine was transformed into a place of infinite magnificence. I could see my choir singing, heads up, mouths wide open, I could see them  respond as I gave all the right cues in all the right places. I knew then, that one of my deepest longings on this earth, one that goes hand-in-hand with being a wife and mother is to someday stand on a stage and conduct a choir like this.
         Will it ever happen? I know not, it seems so far away, and yet I want it so badly. A moment of almost heavenly bliss. An utterance insurmountable. A glimpse of God's glory.

         That's when I realized it. All these longings, these desires, these frustrations, are all mortal attempts to grasp the divine. Many of them good, some of them twisted, but all, like a sunflower reaching to the sun, the feeble striving of a creature to be like its Creator. That's why it feels like I want to explode sometimes, and that it might be good. We can expect no less from the finite reaching for the infinite.
            I wonder if the baby feels it before he can speak. Trying to communicate thoughts he doesn't yet have the knowledge or the vocabulary to fully understand. Perhaps that's why he can be such a "grumpalumps." We tell the grownup who complains not to be such a baby. But, in a sense, that's what we are: little children in the face of incomprehensible majesty.

     What do you do when you glimpse eternity? One part of me yearns for it with a longing that will never go away, and another part, I think, goes mad from the sheer grandeur of it all, never to recover.

      What can we do? Well, like the child, we learn to wait and trust.
            "If I find in myself, longings and desires that this world cannot satisfy, the logical conclusion must be that I was made for another world." So writes C.S. Lewis. The child must trust that someday he will be able to grasp what was once incomprehensible. We all remember being told, at some point or another, you'll understand when you are older. And, most of the time we did. How can anybody possibly enjoy sitting around a table talking when you can go outside and play tag or invent silly games instead? Well, when I grew up, I understood what the grownups found so fascinating about those after dinner conversations.

          Someday, I'll graduate from this world. Someday, I shall behold the face of the infinite and not die, for I will have already done so. This mortal will put on immortality.

          Until then, these glimpses that make my heart ache, and my lungs feel like exploding are simply signposts. My mount Pisgah in this life. Someday, I shall understand as I was intended to. Someday I shall know fully, as I, also, am fully known.

          Until then, my friends, life beckons with joy, and, I'm sure, a great deal of sorrow, but through it all, you shall see a glint in my eye, hear a whisper in my soul, behold a single indistinguishable pigment in my art. It will be that one quivering, pulsating note that vibrates in all of us.

Don't dampen the string when you feel it begin to thrum.

Don't turn away and lock the door.

Don't wrap your heart in iron bands so that it will not break.

Let it break, and burn, and overflow.

The strings of the piano only make music when they are hit with a hammer, the leaves array themselves in their most glorious colors when they are dying, and we, my friends, are dying too. Dying that we may live a life eternal.


 Happy Fall....(Y'all!)

     ~ Christianna