THE ONE YEAR BIBLE CLUB

   ARE Christians altruistic? There's a question that deserves some thought! I personally don't know the answer to that, but I do know that Jesus was. I am amazed how many times Jesus helped and healed people, without first negotiating with them whether or not they would follow him. "If I heal you will you follow me, If I heal you will you repent, if I heal you will you be my disciple, will you join my group?", these were never words heard from Jesus. Jesus healed and helped (and some may be scandalized by this) without even preaching to them. So why did Jesus heal, without first getting a commitment? Why did Jesus heal, knowing full well he was just being used? The answer of course was because Jesus was truly altruistic, he was the epitome of selflessness. What are the motives of Christians today? Are we helping others and being nice, pretending to care when really all we want is for them to join our church and the moment we realize they have no interest in our churc...

  OUR idea of righteousness is not even close to what "righteousness" truly is. I was at a convenience store this morning, bought a refillable coffee cup cause I'm sick of paying for a cup every time I go (I digress) so the clerk offered for me to go in the back of the store to rinse the cup. I looked around and there was tons of goods lying around that I could have easily slipped into my pocket; any thief would have taken advantage of the situation. "But you are not a thief" you would say. That's right and I could walk away feeling quite smug that I was not even remotely tempted to take anything for my gain; I could feel quite smug about my righteousness....UNTIL I read today's reading. Let's be honest, WE would have broken this oath as quickly as we made it. You deceived me and there's no way I'm going to honor this oath! "but you gave me your word, you promised", they would say, and we would reply, "I don't care!!!"...

  I'm not so sure if "catch me if you can" is the best policy to follow in life. There is a mindset that says, "it's a win win situation", if they catch me me oh well, what will they do and of course if they don't, I get away with it, so why confess?". I'm sure Achan is thinking, "man, I almost got away with it, this is embarrassing, oh well, the risk was worth it". Achan says, "yeah, it's in my tent, you found me out, go get it" (paraphrased by me of course). Imagine his surprise when Joshua says, "take him outside the camp and stone him TO DEATH, and his wife & sons too". Now the RAMIFICATIONS of CATCH ME IF YOU CAN have been amped up. Now it's no longer a game of cat and mouse chase. God cannot stand the "catch me if you can" mindset. If we confess before we are caught, there will always be Grace and most of the time there will always be leniency with those you confessed to. That being said,...

  Joshua is a pretty impressive fellow! If I asked you to quickly mention something negative, most would not be able to give an answer within 30 seconds, try it! Couldn't come up with anything, could you? In our story today we do see signs of human frailty in Joshua. Right after the great conquest and victory of Jericho, Joshua sends in a small dispatch of 3000 men to go in an wipe out a small segment of enemies remaining on the outskirts, but when those men come back with their tales between their legs and explain how they were defeated and had to retreat, Joshua falls apart. Joshua starts blurting out statements as, "we should have just stayed on the other side of the Jordan" Really?! Joshua begins to panic and blurt out that now all their enemies will hear about this defeat and they will be doomed. He goes into panic mode and a defeatist mindset. It just goes to show, how easily our confidence is broken. One loss, one set back and our faith crumbles. After a victory, ...

  We all want to go to a party right? "Well, that all depends on who's having it", we would say. I guess you could say, "a Christian" (can we call JESUS a CHRISTIAN?) is having this party, still want to go? "I guess that means there won't be any alcohol?" Probably not! " I guess there won't be any drugs there?" You guessed right! " and I guess there won't be any chance of "hooking up" at this party either?" No, there won't be any hooking up, that's for sure! So, just let me know if you are going to be going? "Oh, I can tell you right now, I'm not going, sounds like a pretty lame party to me. I don't know who you're going to be able to get to go to that party". For many people, "a Christian Party" is an Oxymoron, because it's missing all the elements of a good party, ie: SIN! Jesus gives us a parable of a party He is throwing and people are not overtly interested in go...

I don't know how they did it, they, being the tribe of Gad, Reuben and the half tribe of Manasseh, but they did. They left their wives and children behind to go fight for the rest of the Israelites that still had not possessed their land. Imagine knowing and or thinking..."this is crazy, I have my inheritance, my land and here I am, out here fighting, I could get killed doing this and never get to go back to my family, who am I fighting for and why?! Let them fight for this land, they are the ones that want it, I already settled for my land on the other side of the Jordan!" I know what you are going to say, "they had already promised they would when Moses agreed to let them have that land". And to that I say, "big deal!" People promise all sorts of things when they are excited, but when reality sets in they retract every promise they made under the guise of, "it was irrational, c'mon, I was to excited to be thinking straight, I mean what would...