Selfishness. Ali's true religion. Me

I've began to think about what it actually means to be a Christian. I have thought about my faith, my worship, my prayer, my sin, my bible, my achievements, my experience... and realized this is not life. Why am I concentrating on myself? Isn't it about Jesus?

I hurriedly typed some thoughts into my phone over the last few weeks... around my selfishness and my (lack of humility), I came to the rash conclusion that Christians are inherently selfish...

Often my lack of humility can get in the way of my life with God. I am full of pride of my achievements, that are all God-given. I am full of pride with my life as a christian (what is there to be proud of?!), as I love my works, my achievements, how holy I am, even when all the work has been done entirely by the Lord. 

The love of myself leads me to selfishness amongst friends, to lust and a want for more of me. 

The love of myself gives me a dull joy when the full joy is from the Lord alone. 

Where does this inward looking selfishness come from? I need to stop looking at myself and look to others and then I will meet God.

So after these weeks of thinking about me and how selfish I am, the lord spoke through Ali Scott at the weekend away very clearly. He echoed all the feelings I had had about selfishness by looking at True Worship in James 1. He pointed out that when we concentrate on ourselves, on our religion, we become religious fools, but not fools for Christ.

(Ali used words from James 1 v26-27, Amos 5v21-24, Isaiah 1 v10-17, Isaiah 58 and others)

James 1 talks about how true religion should be finding the widows and fatherless, the lost, the broken, the run-down, the tired. When do I do that?! When do I yearn after the people Jesus did? When do I actually follow the way Jesus set out?

The message puts it like this:- "Anyone who sets himself up as "religious" by talking a good game is self-deceived. This kind of religion is hot air and only hot air. Real religion, the kind that passes muster before God the Father, is this: Reach out to the homeless and loveless in their plight, and guard against corruption from the godless world." (James 1 v26-27)

(the message version of Amos and the Isaiahs are equally as excellent)

I am not sure what form this may take, but I am beginning to realize it is not about me.

It took me a while.

I guess it will continue to take a while.

Memories. Significance. Relativity

"Vamos, one more"

I just had the immense pleasure of watching the film 'Zidane: A 21st century portrait', a really interesting film.

I loved the intensity of the film, the changes in music, changes of the sounds (of the crowd, of Zidane personally; his breathing, his voice, or of feet touching the ball and grass), the intensity of the game (changes of Zidane's emotion and reaction), the excellence of the photography and camera angles (the view of Zidane collecting Beckham's long ball is sublime), and the cameo appearances of greats like Raul, Luis Figo, Fat Ronaldo, Michael Owen, Roberto Carlos (shares a joke with Zidane near the end), David Beckham, Iker Casillas, Diego Forlan.... The film shocked me, made me smile and made me reflect on several different things.

Over the half-time break we are shown a series of events that happened on the 23rd of April 2005, the same day of the football match between Real Madrid and Villareal, events like 'A puppeteer brings Bob Marley to life', 'Hundreds of homes are destroyed in Serbia-Montenegro during the worst floods in forty years', 'Elian Gonzalez speaks on Cuban national TV',.....'Car bomb in Najaf, Iraq, kills 9 in wave of escalating attacks' (A picture of the attacks shows a man with a Zidane shirt on...), 'Sir John Mills 22nd February 1908 - 23rd of April 2005', 'a specialist team was sent to rescue trapped workers after a mine explosion in Turkey', 'My son had a fever this morning', 'The wory-billed wood-pecker believed to have been extinct since 1920, has been spotted in North-America', and 'the Asian-African summit comes to a close in Jakarta'. The film then goes on to talk about significance, and how this ordinary day could be remembered or forgotten as more or less significant than a walk in the park. These events (as well as some others mentioned) mean very little to me. I do not remember them even though I may have heard about some of them. The day, for me, has been forgotten or dismissed, when for Thousands or even Millions, it would be cherished through it's importance.

This kinda frightened me.

Why, with life-changing,  maybe world changing events occurring around me, does the 23rd of April 2005 mean absolutely nothing?

What memories are significant to me? The day I met somebody special. The day something changed. What memories stand out above the rest? 9/11. My first day of School. My Joy in Worship. My Sister's Wedding.

... these memories, may hold no significance to other people. Other events happened on these days, some more important than my memories. Significance is relative. Memories are relative.

However, as often, my thoughts came to the lord, how even the hairs on our heads are significant (Luke 21v18), how each person that has ever lived has hairs on their heads that were significant, how this almighty creator finds every single thing we do significant, exciting, important. That's massive.

And, fueled by my love of nostalgia, this film has encouraged me to look at significant events for myself and for others, to really take them in and appreciate them. 

Everything is important.

Not much of what I say makes any sense.

Madrid won 2-1. Zidane was excellent.