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This morning was perhaps the best morning i've had in a long time. Maybe it was waking up an hour early, maybe it was the oatmeal, maybe it was the coffee, but it was probably a steady mixture of all the above with a nostalgic layer of flurries to seal the deal. It was good.

Then, I bought The Welcome Wagon's new c.d...... do whatever you have to to get that c.d. (welcome to the welcome wagon)..... One word: Sufjan

I wrote a letter to the editor at the times in Gainesville masked under a title concerning athlete's clueless parents in Hall county......which it was about, but perhaps the title was incomplete.... it should have read, "Athletes, Parents, often have their priorities wrong.....also this town makes me want to vomit for the rest of the day." http://www.gainesvilletimes.com/news/article/13912/

I'm going through some discipleship with a new believer and friend.... we're going through Jesus Wants to Save Christians by Rob Bell and Don Golden. Excellent book. In it I fell like Bell finally gives a more complete picture of his theology. Not only that, he finally gets a little specific about certain issues and tragedies in the church. The kid that I am going through the book with, asked me some excellent questions which I must say, I have been asking older, wiser people than me for about 2 years and have yet to receive a biblical answer.
Here are a couple he threw at me:

"I just don't understand, I am reading through the Gospels for myself for the first time, I mean actually reading them, and I just can't reconcile parts of the church to them......."

"......How do so many people in the church support capitol punishment? I see zero basis for it in the scriptures (NEW Covenant scriptures)"

"How does the church advocate violence as much as it does? A 7 year old who can just now read could gather that violence is wrong from the scriptures"

"How does the church support war as much as it does?" "I know in the old testament or covenant or whatever God commanded war, but that was the OLD covenant, what was Jesus and the new covenant for then?"

(If we(gentiles) are grafted into the tree(the Jewish one that is), then we all take part in the new covenant, the way of Jesus.)

I have asked these questions, and not once have I ever been given a biblical answer to justify these things.

I usually get crazy hypotheticals like:

"So you walk in your house and a crazed man on 11 drugs is raping your whole family, would you not kill him?"

"So are you a pacifist? So what about WWII? The Revolutionary War?"

Sadly I never hear scripture supported answers.

And praise God that I do not hear:

Well how about when Jesus picks up the first stone and begins to stone the adulterer? (Of course, that didn't happen)
(It was the law to do so, a law given by God to Moses...So I guess that was Jesus breaking his own law?, or perhaps just giving us a clearer picture of how a person interacts with man in the New Kingdom, perhaps He was saying, "no, more killing will only get us farther from Eden, but forgiveness, forgiveness will get us back there."

I really need to study for a GOVT test,

Michael

Listen to more Jon Foreman, The Welcome Wagon, and Arcade Fire than you are now.