Scott Douglas's Blog, page 2
July 29, 2016
July 27, 2016
DevotedWednesdays: The Eye of God
"If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there." -- Psalm 139:8 (NIV)If you’ve read the Lord of the Rings or seen the movies, then you are familiar with the Eye of Sauron—the giant fiery eye. It’s a stunning image to seen (and read). It can be seen from afar and gives the eerie impression that it’s watching you. Sauron represents evil…but it got me thinking about God. nWhat if there was an eye that represents good? What if no matter where you are you actually could see the eye of God watching you? How would people treat that? I think part of the problem with the world today is it has lost all touch with the all-powerful God.
Spirituality has become so fluffed that there really is no God to be fearful of; he’s your friend not your foe. Part of that is true, but it completely shreds the concept that God does discipline. People today don’t have this guilty sense that God is always watching them; they don’t have the conscious telling them no; their morals have gone out the door and it’s anyone’s game.
God’s still there, but people don’t see him—they don’t want to delight him. People believe God is there to make us feel better—that he’s not there to be served.
In many ways we’ve lost the sense of the Holy. We make things up to make us feel better about what we do wrong—and take our spirituality buffet style in the process…picking and choosing whatever feels write and leaving behind whatever we don’t like.
God is everywhere. In heaven…he is there; on Earth…he is there. He is loving. He is kind. But commands to be served.
July 25, 2016
MondayMourning: Exporting Fat
When cigarette sells began to decline several years ago because people didn’t want to die of lung cancer, the tobacco industry didn’t rethink their product—they just rethought their strategy and began to work on increasing brand awareness in less educated countries. Without their redistribution of toxin we might never have had the smoking Indonesian baby.Today there’s a new global export: fat. Obesity is on the rise and Americans aren’t taking it sitting down—well some are—but a growing number are trying to get bit by experimenting with healthier food options. That’s good for health insurance providers because it results in less illness, but not so good for those who rely on our glutinous bellies.
Taking a cue from the tobacco industry, we’ve taken our fat global. Sending cheap, addictive, sugary food to third world countries is great for business…but poor for health. Think diabetes is bad in America? Look to China, where 90,000,000 people suffer from it—four times more than America.
Obesity is on the rise in America. But it’s not an American problem. It’s a world problem.
July 22, 2016
July 20, 2016
DevotedWednesdays: Son of a Whore…A Great Man Indeed
Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty warrior. His father was Gilead; his mother was a prostitute. -- Judges 11:1 (NIV)Jephthah was the son of a prostitute.
That’s not exactly the start of greatest; far from it—it’s really the start of something that’s doomed to failure before launch. In the eyes of man, Jephthah is pretty much dirt—as low as you can get. Surely not fit to be a warrior that leads Israel to victory. But the Bible rarely gives us what we expect—it only gives us what we need. Israel wanted a mighty warrior—a respectful figure. God gave them a warrior—but on his terms. God, time and time again, shows that family doesn’t make you; religion doesn’t make you; money doesn’t make you. There’s only one thing that makes you: God. Constantly God turns a nothing into a something.
God doesn’t go out and chose the ones who should excel. He doesn’t find the large, strong man to lead his people; he finds the outcasts and weak men—the men who are better off tending to sheep. And with these men he makes greatness. What does it show? It shows that in God’s eyes that no man is better or stronger or more fit for his grace; we are equal to him. He doesn’t need to find the norm to do the job, because to him the norm is any man and to him any man can do the job just as well.
The thing about God is he never sees anyone or anything like man does. He doesn’t see circumstance—he only sees opportunity. He can turn all of us into opportunity if we let him. There is no one greater and no one less in God’s eyes—every person, when we open our hearts to change, can do amazing things through God.
July 18, 2016
MondayMourning: HIV - Forgotten But Not Gone
For most of my 1980s childhood, HIV was either the gay mans disease or something you got from leading a sinful life. We now know otherwise—not that our compassion should be limited to only those who live a lifestyle we approve of. Today, however, the disease is sometimes forgotten—by no means has it been irradiated, but it’s at least controlled by better education. For those who have it, it may not be curable, but it’s treatable with medication. Globally it’s an entirely different story. According to recent estimates, nearly 40 million people are living with HIV; of that over 2 million are under the age of 15. Over 70% of all people living with HIV and almost 90% of all children living with HIV are in Africa.What can be done? It used to cost over $10,000 to provide treatment to someone with HIV; keyword: used. That cost has dropped, and continues to drop, significantly. Today the cost of helping a person in a third world country is about $100. That means if you can spare about $0.25 a day, you could provide treatment to someone infected with the disease.
If you would like to donate money to either HIV / Aides research, or would like to contribute to helping provide treatment to low income communities, visit: http://aids.about.com/od/advocatelinks/a/Top-20-Hiv-Aids-Charities.htm
NOTE: I am not associated, nor do I endorse, any of these charities; before donating to any charity, it is always advisable to research them and make sure the money is being used responsibly. One of the largest charity watchdog groups has a database here: http://www.charitynavigator.org/
July 14, 2016
July 11, 2016
MondayMourning: The $2.50 Club
3 billion people live on less than $2.50 a day. Let that number sink it. 3 billion. Some of us pay twice that just for our coffee. But it actually gets worse. Because about 1.3 billion people live on less than $1.25 a day. Apple is worth over 700 billion; Exxon Mobil, over 350 billion; Berkshire Hathaway, over 350 billion; Google over 345 billion; Microsoft over 330 billion. There are over 5,000 companies that earn more than a billion dollars a year.But let’s not forget us as consumers? Because every year we spend nearly 100 billion on beer, 65 billion on soda, 40 billion on lawn care, 15 billion on chocolate, and 10 billion on romance novels.
I’m not telling you to give up your beer—to mow your own lawn—or to stop reading Danielle Steel. I’m just using the numbers to point out how good we have it. By wiping out five things that we don’t actually need, we could actually help the people who don’t have what we have.
If you would like to help fight poverty—either financially or through volunteering—below are a few organizations to look into:
Project Bread: www.projectbread.org
Mercy Corps: www.mercycorps.org
The Hunger Project: www.thp.org
While we may typically think about poverty in terms of other countries, it’s still very much a thing in America as well. Feeding America (www.feedingamerica.org) is one organization helping to fight poverty in our own country.
NOTE: I am not associated, nor do I endorse, any of these charities; before donating to any charity, it is always advisable to research them and make sure the money is being used responsibly. One of the largest charity watchdog groups has a database here: http://www.charitynavigator.org
July 6, 2016
The Virtue of a King
The women living there said, “Naomi has a son!” And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David. -- Ruth 4:17 (NIV)There were plenty of good kings and bad kings alike in the Bible; above all of them in greatness—at least to the Hebrews—was King David. David wasn’t a great leader; sometimes he wasn’t even a great man. But he had high virtues and a strong regard for God. He had character values that made up for what he lacked in what some might call good characteristics for a strong leader.
A lot of what he had came from Ruth—the little woman who would not leave her mother-in-law, and was blessed by God as a result. Sometimes we have good virtue for no reason, but more often then not it’s passed down from parents and grandparents.
When it comes down to it, we don’t need strong people—we need good people; people with high moral character. The greatest leaders in the Bible rose from less than ideal circumstances. They came from circumstances that should have failed them.
God can make possible the impossible with anyone who listens and obeys his words. You don’t have to be a great leader, because when you believe in God, God will make you great.
It’s no coincidence that Jesus Christ came from this royal line. It wasn’t because they were great, it was because they had virtue.
July 5, 2016
Four Forgettable Moments In Christian History
THE FOLLOWING IS EXCERPTED FROM "#ORGANICJESUS: FINDING YOUR WAY TO AN UNPROCESSED, GMO-FREE CHRISTIANITY"
Millions of Christians have fallen, some harder than others. Below is a list of some you may have never heard of, who gave Christianity a bad name in the process.
AD 50-ish
Ananias and Sapphira were two very early members of the Christian church. They are remembered more for what they did than who they were. In Acts 5, an account is given of each of them instantly dying after lying to the apostles about money. It was probably the first real scandal of the church following Christ’s resurrection. People to this day continue to argue about why they had to die.
1609-ish
The Baptist church we know today started in a place not often thought of when we think of Baptist: Amsterdam. While it has no one creator, many cite John Smyth as its most prominent figure. Smyth rejected baptism of infants, and a movement was born and quickly began to spread. Smyth first baptized himself and then began baptizing other adults. But not long after the movement began taking off, Smyth had a change of heart. He decided that baptizing did not count, and he left the movement he was largely responsible for starting. He began the process of becoming a member of the Mennonite church, but died before his membership went through. Many of his followers became Mennonites as well.
1926
In the 1920s and 30s, Aimee Semple McPherson, also known as Sister Aimee, was a rock star in the Christian community. For a time, she was one of the most known figures in the country. Married three times, Sister Aimee could never be considered a saint in the love territory, but it was another story that rocked her legacy. In 1926, Sister Aimee went out for a swim at the beach—and disappeared. She was almost immediately presumed dead by drowning.
Soon ransom notes began showing up at Sister Aimee’s church. They were, for the most part, just considered hoaxes. Then over a month after her alleged death, she stumbled out of the Arizona desert and claimed she had been drugged and kidnapped, but had managed to escape and make a thirteen-hour trek through the desert. The trouble was, some considered the condition of her health and her clothing to be too good to t her ordeal. Witnesses soon began popping up claiming they had seen her in various places. Reasons for her disappearance varied widely; abortion, publicity, and plastic surgery were all popular rumors. In the end, whether she had told the truth or a lie remained unknown.
1940s
Few Christians would argue that the Nazis were right; unfortunately, “few” means that some in fact believed they were. While there are stories of Christians helping Jewish people hide, others tell of Christians who assisted the Nazi party. Two notable examples:
Robert Alesch: A French priest who worked as an intelligence agent for the Nazi party. Under his actions, dozens of people, if not hundreds, were tortured by the Germans. He was executed by ring squad in 1949.
Jozef Tiso: While anti-Semitism in the Nazi Party is typically linked to Hitler, many in the party helped make it happen. One of the biggest leaders was Jozef Tiso, a Roman Catholic priest who helped with the deportation of thousands of Jews. For his role, he was hanged in 1947.
Millions of Christians have fallen, some harder than others. Below is a list of some you may have never heard of, who gave Christianity a bad name in the process.
AD 50-ish
Ananias and Sapphira were two very early members of the Christian church. They are remembered more for what they did than who they were. In Acts 5, an account is given of each of them instantly dying after lying to the apostles about money. It was probably the first real scandal of the church following Christ’s resurrection. People to this day continue to argue about why they had to die.
1609-ish
The Baptist church we know today started in a place not often thought of when we think of Baptist: Amsterdam. While it has no one creator, many cite John Smyth as its most prominent figure. Smyth rejected baptism of infants, and a movement was born and quickly began to spread. Smyth first baptized himself and then began baptizing other adults. But not long after the movement began taking off, Smyth had a change of heart. He decided that baptizing did not count, and he left the movement he was largely responsible for starting. He began the process of becoming a member of the Mennonite church, but died before his membership went through. Many of his followers became Mennonites as well.
1926
In the 1920s and 30s, Aimee Semple McPherson, also known as Sister Aimee, was a rock star in the Christian community. For a time, she was one of the most known figures in the country. Married three times, Sister Aimee could never be considered a saint in the love territory, but it was another story that rocked her legacy. In 1926, Sister Aimee went out for a swim at the beach—and disappeared. She was almost immediately presumed dead by drowning.
Soon ransom notes began showing up at Sister Aimee’s church. They were, for the most part, just considered hoaxes. Then over a month after her alleged death, she stumbled out of the Arizona desert and claimed she had been drugged and kidnapped, but had managed to escape and make a thirteen-hour trek through the desert. The trouble was, some considered the condition of her health and her clothing to be too good to t her ordeal. Witnesses soon began popping up claiming they had seen her in various places. Reasons for her disappearance varied widely; abortion, publicity, and plastic surgery were all popular rumors. In the end, whether she had told the truth or a lie remained unknown.
1940s
Few Christians would argue that the Nazis were right; unfortunately, “few” means that some in fact believed they were. While there are stories of Christians helping Jewish people hide, others tell of Christians who assisted the Nazi party. Two notable examples:
Robert Alesch: A French priest who worked as an intelligence agent for the Nazi party. Under his actions, dozens of people, if not hundreds, were tortured by the Germans. He was executed by ring squad in 1949.
Jozef Tiso: While anti-Semitism in the Nazi Party is typically linked to Hitler, many in the party helped make it happen. One of the biggest leaders was Jozef Tiso, a Roman Catholic priest who helped with the deportation of thousands of Jews. For his role, he was hanged in 1947.
