...when in Rome...

so, i'm reading this book, Beyond Opinion by Ravi Zacharias. it's a christian apologetics book, and it addresses all of the opposing worldviews that are against christianity.. ok... i guess i could have just called it a christian apologetics book and left it at that... anyway, if you don't want to think about things, don't read it. ... just sayin...

so, i thought about things...

we want our cake, and we want to eat it too.. we tend to want God to intervene on the bad things in our lives... why doesn't He stop the evil? why does He let bad things happen? if He would just do something about it!! and then... at the same time... we DON'T want Him to control our lives. we don't want to be puppets!! we want to be able to make our own choices.. to have a "free will" to choose... He probably thinks we are one crayola short... missin a few nuts and bolts.. we pray, "Dear Lord, please give me money... please give me a new car... please don't let me keep screwing things up... " but at the same time, we don't want Him to force His will on us..  am i making sense?

"there is none good, no not one"... we think, i'm basically "good".. i feed my kids (most of the time), i'm honest (most of the time) i don't hate my neighbor (most of the time)... but, how do we know what "good" is? what is our comparison point? yeah, most of us are "good" compared to the nut job across the street who abuses his family, or steals, or cheats... but this isn't our measuring stick.. how do we know what "good" is? God is good. Jesus told us that... so, if we hold our "goodness" up to His "goodness"... how does it compare? i know, right? God's "goodness" is perfect, unable to sin, Holy, Holy, Holy... so then, if we look at it that way, compared to Him... we may not make the cut... we may get voted off the island... thank God, for changing the requirements... because if it were up to me, and my choices, and my natural ability to screw everything up... i would be saying ... "no stairway!! denied!!!"...