Some loosely related thoughts....

Over the course of our week away, at the conference..... traveling to and from the conference….from several different (very far flung) sources I came upon unique ways of expressing some key concepts I’ve talked about on this blog.  The first one came from a sermon preached by David Levister. The conference focused almost entirely on the “finished work” of the cross so Jesus, his death and resurrection were a constant theme.  

I’ve often heard Jesus referred to as the mediator between God and man….but tweaking it just a bit in his sermon, he referred to Jesus as “the connector.” That fits with an example used in several of the sermons I heard (don’t ask me whose…I listened to 10 sermons in 4 days) In the example, Jesus reaches up and grasps God with one hand and reaches down and grasps mankind with the other.  Thus…the perfect connector.  An example that is not really contradicted by any of the standard theories of atonement. 

And another little ditty that stuck in my mind was from a song by the Lake City Christian Fellowship Praise Team.   David Bunch writes most of the music for the Praise Team and the lyrics reflect the beliefs of the church….the finished work of the cross.  You can check out some of the lyrics and even listen to the full version of about 10 or so of their songs here.

In a song called “The Tongue of Life” the lyrics talk about speaking life through Jesus Christ….and the finished work of the cross. It mentions one of the things that was accomplished at the cross which was:

Learned behaviors and second natures
Were swallowed up at Calvary

Learned behaviors and second natures.  Kind of an interesting way of describing the egoic mind/carnal nature, don’t you think? Which leads me to another idea that stuck in my head over the course of the week….

And it came from the Koran.  Yes…I did leaf through a book entitled The Essential Koran during the drive there and the drive home.  The book is a compilation of excerpts from an English translation of the Koran... translated into English by Thomas Clearly.  I base my faith on what I find in the Bible….but it so expands my view of God’s magnitude when I hear concepts from scripture in the sacred writings of other cultures…in contemporary literature, in movies and secular songs.  I love to hear his voice in unexpected places.  It really drives home the OMNIPRESENT facet of God’s nature. 

In several verses in Cleary’s translation, he refers to “satan” as the Obsessor.  Is Satan an actual being?  Maybe....but I know many times when scripture refers to satan it is talking about the egoic mind/pain body/adamic man/carnal nature. Since my egoic mind doggedly dwells on and obsesses about my problems, issues, worries, concerns, the term Obsessor is so fitting!

Just a few loosely related thoughts about a few loosely related words...