SoulThirst

"feelings are essential to our spiritual life and to our discovery of God's will for us. The key to spiritual discernment is realizing that our emotions are central to understanding how God is leading us in our choices in life. We do not mature in our Christian experience unless we mature emotionally."

The above reprinted from a comment on the previous post. Thought I'd bring the statement out onto the main page. I'll respond to it later

posted by Andy Chang @ 5:37 PM 0 comments

A thought to get this started... a purpose-statement for this blog, if you will.

"There are no purely intellectual Christians... the ultimate aim of theology is worship"

What do I mean by that? I suppose I could rephrase the same thought by saying that every Christian- every follower of Jesus- is by definition, a minister. Perhaps not in the vocational full-time sense. But a Christian who does not engage in ministry- to the church, to the community, to those in need- has not fully imitated Christ. Even the apostle Paul, arguably the most brilliant Christian mind in Scripture (second only to Christ)... the author of over half the New Testament & the one who is responsible for the foundations of all our theological discussions... even Paul, in between his writings, was a ministry, whose depths we only glimpse in pieces from his epistles.

Paul wrote with great affection to his churches, and with even greater affection to those whom he mentored (i.e. Timothy, Titus). There was a certain relational dynamic to Paul that is ministry-minded. His theological discourses and instructions were not isolated fragments, but part of a larger message- that of loving followers of Jesus and pressing them forth into greater Christlikeness and steadfastness in their faith.

And so to all who will eventually read this. I do hope to bring a certain level of informed, thoughtful reflection (didn't go to Wheaton for no reason). However, I hope that in my writing and your reading, there is a marriage of theology with worship- our reflections with our response. Craig Barnes wrote once that "any theology that does not hold up in a hospital emergency room ought to be questioned." While one might feel that Barnes is overstating his position, I do believe that Scripture (and all thought that flows from Scripture) was not given to us to understand as an end in itself. To repeat what I said at the beginning, from one Wheaton professor, "the ultimate aim of theology is worship"

And so if this blog ever deviates from that statement, kick me.

posted by Andy Chang @ 12:55 AM 0 comments

Taking the advice of Mike, I've decided to give a blog of a theological nature a try. Perhaps this is where all the muddled thoughts from endless hours of reading will go.

posted by Andy Chang @ 11:20 PM 0 comments