Tag: bible study

religion

Hell Week – Back to the Beginning

Allow me to take you back to the halcyon days of the early aughts. Wikipedia was new. Destiny’s Child was still together. The first Lord of the Rings movie was coming out. And I was re-reading the Old Testament. I think a lot of people have had the experience of re-reading something like the bible and realizing that you didn’t absorb any of it the first time through. This was exactly what was happening to me. As I read the bible again, I was a bit overwhelmed by a lot of the mucky stuff in it. The guy who sacrificed his daughter to fulfill a pledge. Lot offering his virgin daughters to a mob. Samson killing everyone and cutting off their foreskins. The cannibalism. The commands to kill men, women, children, babes-in-arms.

I think it was after reading the story of Jael who put a spike through the head of a man in her tent that I put the book down and asked God that timeless question: “WTF?” And I actually got an answer: “I work it all out.” I remember praying about it and when I was told that God works it all out, it carried with it a sense of totality. Everything gets worked out. Everything. And I was still thinking, “WTFudge?” I felt like a shark with a beach ball – I just couldn’t grab hold of the idea. It was too much.

Part of the problem was that at the time I was a pretty standard Evangelical. Which means that I was inordinately concerned with who is saved and who is going to hell. Continue reading “Hell Week – Back to the Beginning”

Unknown's avatarRebecca Trotter12 Comments
religion

A God of Love, A God of Hate?

You know that old canard that love and hate are not opposites, but two sides of the same coin? Neurobiology seems to have confirmed that there is a lot truth to that idea. It turns out that we have something that neurobiologists refer to as a “hate circuit” in our brains. It is a set of three structures in the brain which all light up together when we experience hate. And the more intense the hatred, the more intense the activity in these structures is. (Each structure is also involved in other activities so it’s not that they exist purely for feelings of hatred. It’s just that when we experience hatred these three work together.) Interestingly, two of these structures are also involved in the feeling of intense love.

Continue reading “A God of Love, A God of Hate?”

Unknown's avatarRebecca Trotter7 Comments
book, giftedness, religion, thoughts

Christianity and Giftedness

When I was putting together my book The Upside Down World ~ A Book of Wisdom in Progress last summer, I went back and forth and back and forth about including an essay I had originally published here titled “How Being Gifted Means Being Different”. It was one of the most popular posts I had done. And many people had contacted me since I put it up to thank me for writing it. However, it didn’t seem to fit. The book is very grounded in my faith and the post is about being gifted. The two seem incongruent. But every time I went to take it out, there was that little tug that I’ve learned to listen to telling me to leave it be. So I did without really know why it was there. And I’m sure that those who read it wondered what it was doing there as well.

It wasn’t until some time later that I began to understand why it was there. The fact is that the church as a whole does not do a good job of making room for or embracing those parts of the body which are smarter and more creative than the norm. We see this in those parts of the church which fiercely oppose science and will even claim that those who engage in the work of science are doing the devil’s work. It is present in those who insist that a “plain reading” of scripture is good enough and refuse to consider context, history, translation or any of the other issues which affect the way that we read and understand the text. It shows up in how churches deal with their members who produce art, literature or music. Continue reading “Christianity and Giftedness”

Unknown's avatarRebecca Trotter4 Comments
religion

A Fishy Story

After Jesus and his disciples arrived in Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma tax came to Peter and asked, “Doesn’t your teacher pay the temple tax?”

“Yes, he does,” he replied.

When Peter came into the house, Jesus was the first to speak. “What do you think, Simon?” he asked. “From whom do the kings of the earth collect duty and taxes—from their own sons or from others?”

“From others,” Peter answered.

“Then the sons are exempt,” Jesus said to him.“But so that we may not offend them, go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”

I wonder if Peter actually went out fishing after this conversation? Most commenters on the text assume that he did and found his coin and paid the tax. Another of Jesus’ miracles. But the bible doesn’t say anything about it. You would think that it would at least add, “Peter did as he was instructed and found it just as Jesus had said” or something. I kind of think that he didn’t do it. Continue reading “A Fishy Story”

Unknown's avatarRebecca Trotter1 Comment
religion

So, What’s the Deal With Adam and Eve? Part 1

Facepalm. Words. They fail.

I am fascinated with the creation stories.  I have mentioned before that it was the habit of ancient Hebrews to meditate by holding two thoughts which seem opposed together in your head at once.  I may have also mentioned that I have both a very high regard for scripture and I value science as a tool for understanding how God’s other testimony – creation – works.  Which right there creates a conflict which many people think they can make go away by picking the side that makes sense to them and hanging out there.  But I always figured that if God made the world (which I believe he did) and scripture is true (which I believe it is – in all sorts of surprising ways) and science was saying something different, God had an answer.  And not like, “well I only made the earth look billions of years old in order to see if you would trust me enough to think it’s really 6000 years old.”  A real answer.  Two true things cannot contradict one another.  If they are in conflict, it doesn’t mean one is right and the other is wrong.  It means we don’t understand them well enough yet.

So with this as my mindset, I set out holding these two ideas – biblical creation and the evidence of science – in my head at the same time and meditating on them.  Continue reading “So, What’s the Deal With Adam and Eve? Part 1”

Unknown's avatarRebecca Trotter8 Comments
religion

A New Fundamentalism

I, Rebecca Trotter, hereby declare that the time has come for a new form of Christian fundamentalism.  It is my belief that this new fundamentalism is needed in order to preserve what is most sacred and true to Christianity against assaults from without and within the Christian church.  Although there is freedom in Christ which allows for a variety of ideas and understandings to be … Continue reading A New Fundamentalism

Unknown's avatarRebecca Trotter8 Comments
religion

Salvation 1

This pobably isn’t the best way to re-start my long dorment blog, but I have a need of doing a word study on the word salvation in the New Testament and I figured that I would do it via a series of blog posts as a way to give it some structure.  Sooooo. . . here goes.

We find our first uses of the word salvation in Luke 1:67-80 in the middle of John the Baptist’s father Zechariah’s prophesy over the infant Jesus:

Then his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel,because he has come to help and has redeemed his people.  For he has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David, as he spoke through the mouth of his holy prophets from long ago, that we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all who hate us.

He has done this to show mercy to our ancestors, and to remember his holy covenant – the oath that he swore to our ancestor, Abraham.

This oath grants that we, being rescued from the hand of our enemies, may serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him for as long as we live.

And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High. For you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give his people knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins. Because of our God’s tender mercy the dawn will break upon us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.”

And the child kept growing and becoming strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day he was revealed to Israel.

OK, first we need to start with some context.  At the time of Jesus’ birth, Israel was under the control of the Roman Empire.  Historically, those times when Israel was living under the control of other powers, it was understood to be a judgement on Israel for its sin and faithlessness.  Therefor, the political condition of Israel and it’s spiritual need for redemption and forgiveness was seen as entertwined.  In the past, God had worked through righteous Israeli leaders to bring about the release of Israel from foreign rule.  These times were also a time for Israel to be redeemed from their sin and return to following God’s laws.  Again, the political and the spiritual are woven together. Continue reading “Salvation 1”

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