💡 THOUGHTS FROM ME
I. Christians should not take advice about what it looks like to follow Jesus or be a Christian from people who do not follow Jesus.
If someone does not know Jesus, love Jesus, or walk with Jesus, they don’t actually know what it takes or what it means to follow Him.
This does not mean a non-Christian cannot say anything accurate about Christianity or Jesus, but the chances are much higher that what they assume Christians should do is not a biblically well-rounded perspective.
Instead, you’ll often get a caricatured version of Jesus that is shallow, incomplete, or simply inaccurate to who he really is. For example, many non-Christians will tell Christians they should be more loving because Jesus called people to love.
And yes, Jesus did call people to love, but he did not call people to “love” in the way modern secular society defines love, which, to give one example, means to affirm anything and everything someone wants or desires.
Christians should love like Jesus loved, which includes denying ourselves and not pursuing any desire that is unholy, even if we want it or it makes us feel good.
Yes, Christians can also get it wrong at times when it comes to what following Jesus looks like, but if they know Jesus, love Jesus, and are walking with Jesus, they’ll have a much better idea of what it truly means to follow Him.
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II. Never forget that Jesus didn’t come to die just for you.
He came to reconcile a people to God, of which you and I get to be a part.
The Gospel was passed along to you to make its way to someone else.
Don’t let the good news of Jesus stop with you.
📖 UNDERSTANDING THE BIBLE
The New Testament is not arranged in the order the books were written. Instead, it is organized by type of writing, then by author, and within those groups mostly by length. When an author has more than one letter, the whole group is placed based on the length of the first letter in that group.
Here’s the pattern:
Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John): First because they tell the story of Jesus. Their order is from church tradition, not length or date.
Acts: Follows naturally as the continuation of the story with the early church.
Paul’s letters (Romans to Philemon): Grouped together by author and arranged from longest to shortest. Romans is first because it is the longest, so Paul’s whole collection appears first.
General letters (Hebrews to Jude): Letters by other authors. These are grouped by author (James, Peter, John, Jude), and the groups themselves are placed in order mostly based on the length of the first letter in each group (for example, Hebrews is the longest single letter in this section, so it comes first).
Revelation: Last because it is a unique prophetic book and serves as the conclusion.
So the New Testament is ordered by type, then author, then length — not by when the books were written.
💬 1 HELPFUL QUOTE
I. Colin J. Smothers on the difference between Jesus and Mohammed:
“When Christians don’t live like Jesus, people are disappointed.
When Muslims don’t live like Mohammed, people are relieved.”
📚 1 BRIEF BOOK REVIEW
A book primarily about the Holy Spirit, the ways in which God uses people, and seeking to live under God's anointing in your life.
The book never really gives a concise definition of anointing, and at times it seems to vacillate between natural gifting that God then blesses and God's empowering presence in our lives.
Overall, the book was at times interesting and at times dry and not very interesting. Some of his anecdotes and stories were intriguing, while other times not so much.
By the end of the book, I was mostly just trying to finish it. Certain aspects of the book prompted me to think, reflect, and pray, which I appreciated. But at times, the book seemed to wander and had me wondering if some of the biblical passages the book was commenting on were being exegeted properly.
6.5/10
P.S. When you’re stuck in a sticky situation…
