Misquoting Jesus: Reviewed

I am still working through the book but I thought I'd take the time to go through some of what I have read and my thoughts on this interesting book.

Introduction
I really liked how Erhman begins: with himself. He tells the audience where he comes from and what things in his life had lead him to the point he is at now. I like this because it gives us a chance to see some of the presuppositions a person comes to the table with, which is important because everyone comes to the table with some presuppositions that can negatively or positively influence one's arguments.
One of the interesting things you will find out about Dr. Ehrman is that he became a "born-again" Christian after hearing the Gospel from a guy named Bruce as a sophomore in High school. He recalls that he had always felt an 'emptiness' as a teen, but when he had his 'born-again' experience, he felt as if the emptiness was filled. Read what he has to say:

"There was a kind of loneliness associated with being a teenager; but, of course, I didn't realize that it was part of being a teenager--I thought there must be something missing."
"Bruce was a completely winsome personality--younger than our parents but older and more experienced than we--with a powerful message, that the void we felt inside (we were teenagers! All of us felt a void!) was from not having Christ in our hearts." p.3

For me, this is very telling. I always find it strange when someone makes a universal statement ike that. I'm 22 and I can recall my feelings as a teenager and I don't once recalling a sense of "loneliness" nor "a void." in my life; and by all accounts I should have. I'm from a family of divorce. My parents split when I was young enough to not truly realize what was going on, but old enough to realize something was wrong. But hey, maybe I'm just the exception to the rule, I can accept that, but maybe there's something to the loneliness teenagers feel. Maybe as we get older, we try to fill that void with things and they work for a little while and then we have to find something new. Americans are infamous for this mentality. I think C.S. Lewis said it best:

“A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing."

More to come later!!

A New Direction

God has been doing some awesome stuff in my life the past few months. My internship at Manassas Baptist has been just awesome and I have learned so much there. Unfortunately, it looks like I will not be there much longer. Leaving that church will be hard, especially because I have developed relationships with the kids. But God is leading, and I know that the only thing I can do is follow because I want to be with Him every step of the way. So, that leads me to some other updates.

A couple of weeks ago, I e-mailed a pastor (Dave Waters of Sunset Hills Baptist in Alexandria) asking him if their church needed help with their youth group (I had heard that they were looking for a part-time youth guy). He e-mail me back with, "We have things covered." I e-mailed back with "ok! God speed!" (these e-mails were longer and more detailed, but those are the basics). A couple of days later, I received an e-mail from this pastor again, saying that he wanted to meet and have lunch. So, we met and things went really well. I turns out that although they were kinda set, they are a bit unsure about the future. So we talked and got to know each other (for only three hours). He told me that if in praying about this He feels that God is wanting us to move forward, we will. The next morning, I got an e-mail saying "let's move forward."
Amy and I had dinner with Pastor Waters and his wife. It was a great meeting. Afterwards, Amy seemed fairly excited about this job. For me, that was a good confirmation. I felt that God was leading us this way, but to see Amy get excited is always a good sign! Later that week, I got another e-mail saying that we should take the next step and I will be meeting with Sunset Hills deacons next Thursday. I am very excited about all of this, but I need all of your prayers! Pray that I continue to focus on God's leading and that I honor Him every step of the way.
There are some other things that are moving as well. In talking with Pastor Bradley during marriage counseling, I have learned about a new ministry starting up on George Mason's campus. Most of this is still in the works and I think some aspects will be a struggle, but God will provide. Please pray for this ministry and for everyone involved in it. I will talk about it more later.

Now, on to some things I will be covering in upcoming posts. I just started reading Bart Ehrman's book "Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why" and I want to go through this book on the blog, so be on the look out for my thoughts on the Introduction, coming sometime next week!