Day 113: Gas Station Cuisine

Just a big ol' shout out to gas station dining. For one, I would probably never buy a burger from a gas station. Not sure why someone else would either, seeing how their is a McDonalds within 10-15 of any location you can be at in the United States.

I'm not putting gas station food down, just that I don't think I would trust the freshness and/ or hygienic condition of the area in which the food may be prepared. I mean, do they ring up a person, handle their money then turn around and pat out a burger? Do they arrange the Marlboro display then deep fry a corn dog? Who knows? I don't, but I guess it's just the perception that makes me not want to partake of their cuisine.

Perception is very subjectional, which I have learned first hand. In my 7 3/4 years of marriage to Chandra I have taken care of our banking and finances. She told me right off she wanted me to. I always took it as she depended on me to do these things. Not that that it was a dependence in a bad way, just that she put that on me and didn't want to worry about it. I have perceived the matter differently lately. I now see it as a trust, that she actually trusts me enough to allow me to be in charge of this area of our life.

So, what changed? Not the situation or how she perceived it, but how I perceived it. That's it. It's almost like I took a burger from a BP station and took a bite. My eyes were opened to something that I had looked at in a totally different manner. So much of our lives are spent dwelling on things in the same manner, never growing, never experiencing anything differently. We grow accustomed to how things "are" and probably don't really want to look at them from a different perspective. We grow dependent on those perceptions to stay within our comfort zone and do not think about the growth that can take place if we stretch those views that we have grown dependent on.

I pray that I lose my dependence on the perceptions that I have grown to love. I want God to stretch me and allow me to see things from different angles and really see how He sees, not how I want to see. I want to see that I am blessed that my wife trusts me with our finances. I want to know that I am useful to her and appreciated instead of the false assumptions that I made almost 8 years ago that were maybe not flase, but really not 100% accurate. I want God to stretch my understanding and allow for growth in His Word and take away all of the "junk" that I learned that was not really biblical. I want to know Him more, but I want to shed the baggage of me and drink in His living water and be refreshed.

Poll Results - What Is Most Dangerous To Christianity

I posted the poll question on the top right of my blog a while back. I had thought that when it had gotten to 100 responses I would write a little posting to tell the results. Well, it has gone up to 161 responses, so I figured I should go ahead and publish the current results.

The choices in the poll are as follows:
Atheism
Other Religions (Muslim, Mormon, JW, Etc.)
Worldly Influences (TV, Music, Movies, Etc.)
Lack of prayer
Apathy towards state of Christianity
Professing Christians that aren't truly converted
Disbelief

As you can see by the chart, 55% of responders said that "professing Christians that aren't truly converted". Of the choices I included, that was not my choice. I believe that "disbelief" is the top danger to Christianity. A disbelief of Christians that do not really believe that God will do what His Word says and a disbelief about what is actually in the Word of God.

Of the other choices I think that Atheism and other religions have no danger to Christianity. These false religions will always be, have always been. I do not discount their threat to the world, but to Christianity they are no threat. They are a result of man trying to please man, which is a result of my choice, disbelief.

"Professing Christians that aren't truly converted" also can go into that same category, as a result of disbelief. There are things that also take this out of the "disbelief" category, such as the Word not being properly conveyed, men eliciting an emotional response, etc. But it does boil down to a result disbelief in some form or fashion.

The remaining choices of apathy, worldly influences and lack of prayer are all direct results of disbelief, they are signs of the disbelief that is rampant across the world. Christians are very guilty of hearing sermon after sermon on what God's Word says about something and then as soon as we leave the building we have a memory loss. We go back to the same rut we have been in, doing the same things we have always done. We get "comfortable" again in our lives. We know we are to be Holy, to strive for Christlikeness, but we seem to not believe that we actually have to put forth an effort to be conformed.

I read a story a while back of a church that was opposed to a bar being planned in their neighborhood. They held prayer meetings, prayed during services and prayed during services. They asked God to not let the place open. When God did not answer their prayers they then prayed that the place would shut down. Out of the flesh, the preacher prayed for God to burn the place down, to send fire from heaven. Not long after the bar was struck by lightning and did in fact burn to the ground. The bar owner heard about the preacher's prayer and decided to take the church to court as the reason his bar burned. The bar owner was quite adamant that the church had been against him since his plans were first made known, that they had prayer vigils and had prayed days before that his bar would burn to the ground. The preacher and congregation said that although they did pray that the bar be shut down and did cry out in haste about it burning down, they didn't think it would happen. The judge during his statement said that it struck him odd that a man that did not believe in God believed that God had burned his establishment down, while those that professed to believe in God did not believe that God could or would do what they asked. Not sure what the verdict was, but it just goes to show that Christians can go through the motions, pray for things to happen, cry out in what is seen as earnest cries to God and still not believe that either God will not answer their prayers or is either incapable of answering.

Disbelief is the root of many besetting sins today. I am just as guilty as the next person. When we sin it is because in that moment we do not believe what God has said about that sin, we believe more in our temporary pleasure than we do in God's Words. Disbelief is also the reason for the other world religions. The false religions of the world do not believe that God alone can save a person, so they resort to works and man to accomplish salvation. Even a lot of professing Christian churches have done this, tell you that you have to make a decision, say a prayer or "just believe in Jesus" all are very dangerous because none of them are biblical. You must repent and believe the Word of God, put your total faith in Christ that died for your sins, turn from your sinful life and to the God of the Universe. It is that simple, but man thinks they have to do something to gain salvation. You just have to rest in God and He will do it all. Just trust and believe.