No Works Necessary. Faith Only

So recently someone very close to me expressed concern over their destination after they die, or when the rapture happens. Whichever comes first. I asked why they thought they might go to Hell and their response was that they felt as though they were not good enough, not nice enough to other people even. They said that they have mean thoughts about others and just don't feel like they are a very caring individual. Their feeling is that since they struggle with this, that they find it difficult to be caring to others or even keep the negative thoughts out, that they don't see how Jesus can love them and let them into Heaven. This broke my heart so badly. I tried to tell them that how they are viewing Christianity, Heaven, salvation, God,...the whole thing, just isn't right. If you ever feel the same way as this person, please read on. I have good news for you about who Jesus is and what he has ACTUALLY done for us.

Although we as Christians are called to love each other, everyone, even the non-believers, it is not a requirement for Heaven. The checklist to get in is actually very short. A very important thing is on their, but really, there is only one condition. It isn't that we do so many good deeds, or give X amount of money to charity, or attend church Y amount of times per month, or even that we read our Bible Z amount of times. The only thing that we have to do to spend eternity with our Father in Heaven is to accept what he has already done for us. "What is Hunter talking about?" What I am talking about is when God came down to Earth in the flesh and did miraculous things for us simply because he loves us. "Well what did he do?" He came down as a baby, a king, but still, just a little baby boy. He grew up teaching the truth about who God is and how he wants us to live, in the process casting out beliefs and practices that are not what he envisioned for his people (for instance, one of these is that salvation is a works based process aka that we have to earn our way into heaven by doing good deeds or attending church or performing rituals.) In the end, the real purpose for Jesus being here was to be persecuted by everyone, hated even, to be killed on a cross, and then here's the real awesome part, RISE AGAIN! "Why would he do that?" Well he did that because it is what we sinners deserve to happen to us. Because all of us are like the friend I described to start this post, we all suck at being nice, we all fail to love others, we all are jerks to not just our enemies, but our friends at times as well. We are all sinners. Because of our sin, we all deserved to die the death Christ died. Knowing this, out of his love for us Jesus essentially said "I love you too much to let this happen to you and keep you from spending eternity in paradise with me and our Father. So here, let me take it for ALL of you." That is exactly what happened, in his death, he paid for EVERY SINGLE one of our sins. Not just mine, not just yours, not just the really bad ones or just the little ones. EVERY sin has been paid for and forgiven.

However, you have to believe it and accept that he did that for you. Unfortunately for the non-believers, they have a problem with where they are at now since they don't accept the gift we have been given. Their sins are still forgiven, Jesus didn't die in vain, but they just don't receive the reward of eternal life in paradise. But for those of us who do believe it, even when it is hard to do so, we get the prize. And trust me, even for the most rock firm Christians, its hard to understand how this is possible. It doesn't make sense from the mortal sense that we don't have to earn eternal life in paradise. That is not comprehensible from the standpoint of our human minds. Our nature says that anything you get, is something you earned. Prime example is Christmas. We grow up saying, if you are naughty, Santa won't bring you gifts. Gifts by definition though are things we receive without doing anything to earn them. Salvation is a gift from God. We don't earn it. We get it from God because he loves us just as we get gifts on Christmas morning because our parents love us. Even though we are bad, they still love us and want to give us things just because of love.

Now, I am not saying we should forget about doing nice things for other people and serving them and loving them in every way we possibly can. We are called to live as Christ lived too. The point is that, even in trying to be the best we can be, we are going to fail. We are human. We are not Jesus. That's why Jesus rocks. He was like "Hey, its ok you're not perfect, I am and I will cover for you. Come hang out with me in Heaven and I will introduce you to the guy who created the ENTIRE universe and loves you more than you will ever understand."

The love of God is unfair. Fortunately for us, its unfair in a way that benefits us. We gain literally everything out of this unfair thing called "grace." Just remember, even though you should try your best to do good things and be nice to others and love and serve them, if you fail at that, that is not what will keep you from your Father. The mere fact that you recognize your short comings and feel remorse about it is a step in repentance and THAT is what leads you to Heaven. For the person that I talked about at first, if you are reading this, I have told you already, but the fact that you realize that you need to change this about yourself and you want to, that is a step towards Heaven. God loves you, so do I and so many other people. Keep praying and working towards loving others better and I will see you in paradise when our Earthly missions are over. You may think you don't love people well, but you do a much better job at it than you give yourself credit for. I pray for this person, and for all of you, that you find peace with your failures and shortcomings that they are covered, paid for, forgiven and forgotten about by the only one who matters and as long as we accept that gift, we will get to personally thank Him one day.

"For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is NOT your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." Ephesians 2:8-9

Be Joyous

So this is kind of a continuation of the last post. I have really seen what I wrote about before become more and more true in my life. The more I fight back against the crap that Satan and the world are throwing at me, the more I feel the pain and the more of a struggle it is. Not giving up though and here is why. There is a verse that comes to mind immediately off the top of my head in James, actually right at the beginning of the book directly after his greeting to his audience, which is the twelve tribes...

"Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." James 1:2-4

Wow. What is God saying to us here through James? Well, he is saying that first of all, we are going to face trials. It is unavoidable and just part of life. It is going to happen and we should not fool ourselves otherwise. Get ready. Secondly, this is saying that we aren't supposed to just be like "well, this sucks, but I guess it is for the best. Blah." Pause. I have been doing this as of late. I know God has a plan, I do and I trust in it. However, I am honestly tired of facing trials and temptations and depressing circumstances. OK play. What this is actually telling us is that we are actually supposed to be JOYOUS about facing trials and hardships and things that are not fun. Wait what? Really? That can't be right.....but it is. Again though, don't stop reading there. WHY are we supposed to be joyous? We are not called to just be happy that things are hard. That doesn't make sense, but when you read it all, it does. We are called to find it all joy, because through those trials and hard times, we are going to be made complete and whole and perfect (oh hey sanctification, I didn't realize that was you again.) This is God's grace through sanctification AGAIN. Good news for us all.

So the verse is saying, "Hey, things are going to be hard, often. However, its ok, its actually good, because I, God, the King of all things, am going to make you perfect and holy and lacking nothing in the process. Cheer up and check out how cool I am."

Here is some more scripture to ponder...and we will stay in James. He seems to have a good idea about this temptation/struggle/trial stuff.

"Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him. Let no one say when he is tempted 'I am being tempted by God,' for God cannot be tempted with evil and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire, when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it has fully grown brings forth death." James 1:12-15

Ok, so pretty much we already established this stuff, but it is good to see it in scripture and verified so we know its not just something that we concocted in our minds. So when we face trials, we are blessed when we remain steadfast and still keep our eyes to the heavens rather than shifting our focus to worldly things aka IDOLS. Also, NO ONE, I repeat, NO ONE has ever been tempted by God. That is Satan's claim to fame. He uses worldly things, or evil things, or even seemingly good things, to tempt us away from the blessings of God. These things become desires of ours or are even previously good desires that we had, that have been corrupted by sin. Now I will bring it back....RELATIONSHIPS. Boom, I said it. This is obviously what is going on with me and I know for a fact that it is something that at least 74.79% of you all struggle with as well.

Relationships are a good thing. They are. God made us to be in relationship both with him AND with each other (Gen. 2). However, Satan uses that desire for companionship and to be with someone to corrupt our minds and take our focus away from the relationship with God. Now its not good. Because now we are worshiping relationships with people instead of God and that is not good at all. Thats what we do though. Not intentionally, but we do it. And thats what sucks about that jerk Satan, he is sneaky and doesn't let us realize what he has done until we are already idolizing something else.

Don't confuse what I am saying here. Remember, relationships = good. Relationship being too important = bad. Keep that in mind. And thats true with EVERYTHING. Not just relationships. Food, tv, video games, friends, fixing up a car, working, following sports, playing sports, blogging, facebooking, tweeting, etc etc etc. You get the point.

It kind of feels like I have strayed away from the original point, but I promise I am still here. The point to be made here is that we have to make sure that our priorities have not been shifted away from our Father. It is when we put something else above him, that we get burned and face trials and etc. I put a girl too high on my priorities. Maybe not ahead of God, but maybe I did. I dont really know for sure. I still feel like I kept God at the top, but I know I put a lot of importance on her and I in my emotions and too much of my heart into it for the stage that we were at. Lesson learned though, but maybe that is just how I am. I am an emotional guy who puts my heart into things. It is something that we have to be careful about in life. Be wary about what you are investing your heart into and how much of your heart you are investing into things. ALWAYS BE SURE GOD IS GETTING THE TOP SPOT. It is when we lose sight of that is when Satan gets a foothold and is able to come in and mess with us. (See, told you I was still on track)

God bless you all and thank you for reading. I am open to suggestions from you all too at any point about things you would like to read about or just get my thoughts on. With those, it might take me a little longer to get a post together because I will want to research and pray about it first, but I would be happy to have suggestions from you guys. Again, thanks for reading, I love you all, and will be praying for my readers that they hear God through me, not just me talking about God.

Life is Hard

The past couple weeks have been not an easy time for me. Sometimes the world just is not an easy place to live. The world is full of sin and corruption and things that don't want you to be close to God. The world wants us to worship it, rather than who deserves our worship and praise and trust. The key is to notice when we are being tempted away from our God and fight against it. Be ready though. If you are going to pick a fight with the world, and really want to fight for your faith, get ready for a fight that will be rough. Living here is hard, but fighting against the evil and sin here in order to be with God and trust God and live as Christ did, is the hardest thing to do because it goes against everything in society and Satan is going to join the battle too.

I recently saw the movie, Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader. C.S. Lewis really was a disciple of Christ and true servant of our Father. The message of the movie was pretty much, the more you try to be like Christ and follow God, the more the world is going to hate you and try to destroy you and fight you every step of the way. Everything you will come across is going to try to deter you away from accomplishing your goal and try to make your goal anything else apart from following God and becoming like Christ. Obviously, it wasn't so blatantly spelled out in the movie, it is written in Narnian, fantasy terms, but the message is definitely there.

How much I needed to hear this and see this! Recently I experienced some pretty rough heartbreak. Things were going really well in a relationship I had with someone who meant a lot to me, and still does. She is one of the most amazing people I have ever met and she really likes/liked me as well. For some reason, it didn't work out to the confusion of both of us. Both of us had been diligently praying about it and pleading for God to be a part of what was going on and our journey in getting to know each other. This might be the point where you think I am going to say something depressing. Sorry to disappoint. God WAS with us and working in us and our journey in getting to know each other. It may have come down to timing, or just fears about other aspects of our lives outside of our direct relationship with each other, but regardless, for now at least, it is over and we hope to one day resume a friendship.

At first I questioned why God would allow such heartbreak to happen so unexpectedly. Things had been going PERFECTLY between her and I. Then out of nowhere, things ended. It was devastating and to a certain degree, still is. I didnt understand why when I felt like I was pursuing God so hard and wanting Him so much to be a part of what was going on between me and this girl, and trusting him so much with it, why would he not bless it and allow it to work out. I was looking at it wrong though. COMPLETELY wrong.

It is when we are striving to be like Jesus with all our might that the world, and Satan, fight back. It is when all we want from life is God, that we face trials and temptations. It is in those times when evil says "No, I will not let God win easily." Friends, don't give in. Keep fighting. God is the winner. Jesus Christ has already won. Thus, we have won. You may not know it yet, but you have. We are the winners. Grace, peace, love, forgiveness, hope....all are victorious over greed, lust, rejection, despair, depression, and hate. We just can't give in to those temptations.

Don't get me wrong. I am still feeling the pain of the loss and it hurts like Hell. That is how I know though that I am on the right track. That I am going in the right direction towards our God. I am being assaulted by evil because I am not giving in. The more we fight back, the more it is going to hurt, but in the end, we will reach a day when pain, tears, sadness, and loneliness are all forgotten. Not only will they not exist, but we will forget what those things even were. How glorious a promise that is!

Friends, don't lose hope if you are facing crap in life. No where are we promised a life of ease and luxury in Christ. Quite the opposite. If our goal is to be Christ-like, why should we not have a life similar to his of rejection, scorn, and condemnation to death? Dont forget the last part though, he rose from the dead. As will we. I have been told many times by a great mentor of mine, "How can we be resurrected if we don't die?"

Going through all the crap and trials of life is something that is not immune for Christians. But we go through a process called sanctification. This is where God uses the crap we go through to refine us and make us new and improve us. To burn away the bad crap we have. Like refining metal. Metal has to be heated to extremely high levels in order to refine it and make it stronger and purer. Or even look at the classic example of pruning a plant. Snipping off the dead leaves and branches to keep the rest of the plant healthy. Sure, it hurts if your leg is dead to get it amputated, but it is going to make the rest of your body healthier. Same with plants and metals and our soul. Santification: painful, yet beautiful and graceful. C.S. Lewis says "We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be."



"It is through many persecutions that we must enter the kingdom of God." Acts 14:22

“But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” 2 Cor. 12:9 – 10


^18(A) "If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. ^19(B) If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because^(C) you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. ²⁰Remember the word that I said to you:^(D) 'A servant is not greater than his master.' If they persecuted me,^(E) they will also persecute you.^(F) If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. (John 15:18-20)

New blog/Osama bin Laden

Ok, so I kind of addressed the reason for this blog in my description or whatever, but I just wanted to have an actual place to write about stuff that I have going on or just see in the world. I have realized how nice it was on a less significant level with my sports blog to be able to just write my thoughts out, that I figured I would do the same with my general life stuff. Mostly this will probably end up being my theological thought process where I kind of just think out loud and am open to thoughts from the readers as to how you guys see things as well. It wont be limited to just theological topics, but anything I write about, I will obviously have that Christian viewpoint present and it will most surely not be hidden. I will approach things as best I can through Christian light  and analyze it through Christian standards. I hope you catch my drift, if not, just keep reading and you will see maybe after a couple posts what this will be like.

I want to start off by looking at the recent world events. More specifically the death of Osama bin Laden. I have mixed emotions on this issue. My initial reaction was simply "wow." I have to admit, part of me was relieved, possibly even a sense of happiness. However, as I processed this, I realized that I did also feel sadness. This feeling of sadness was furthered as I got online and watched television and saw the reactions of many Americans as being jubilant at the least. This, in my opinion, was a little disturbing. I feel that the happiness or relief was not properly placed and poorly directed. We can take happiness and comfort in that a very dangerous man who was intent on causing pain and death has been removed from doing so. However, its seems that most people are not just happy about that. They seem to be genuinely joyous that the man has died. That he has beathed his last breath and even I have seen people that have expressed the pleasure they have knowing where he will be spending eternity. This does not sit well with me, especially as I see so many people who call themselves Christians with such sentiments.

I would encourage these people to re-read their Bible and listen to what Jesus actually teaches us about how we are to live our lives. Here is what is said in Matthew...

⁴³ “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? ⁴⁷ And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? ⁴⁸ Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.


This is Matthew 5:43-48. We see here that we are being taught to not only love those who love us, because even the pagans and non-believers do that. In order to truly show the light of Christ and follow Him rightly, we are to love our enemies as well. Show them compassion. Is this not what Jesus himself did? He showed love for the people who despised and spoke down to him. It doesn't stop there though. We are not only to love our enemies and show them compassion, but we are called to PRAY for them! How radical a calling this is. This is what sets us apart and what makes us distinctly the children of God. In doing things that are not natural for humans to do, that are actually Godly, is what sets us on the true path of discipleship.

Long story short, I don't feel that the angels in Heaven are rejoicing at the death of a soul that has been damned to spend eternity in Hell. Despite Osama's sins, and they are great in the eyes of man yet equal in the eyes of God, it is not something that we should be joyful that he was not able to be reunited with his creator and is now condemned to spend eternity apart from our father. I can not find any happiness in this and although I hate the acts he committed, I feel we should try our best to not hate the man himself and should still continue to pray for him now. Maybe I am off-base here, but this is how I feel we are called as Christians to be treating this situation.