Relationships // You've Got a Friend in Yahweh

What is a friend?
Someone you trust, someone you can go to when in need?
According to my phone, a friend is a person who is not an enemy or opponent and they are someone on equal standing with you. This basically means that the friend is no better or no worse than you are.

John 15: 15 - 17:

"I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learnt from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit - fruit that will last - and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other."

Those of you familiar with the Gospel of John will know that this is Jesus talking. How great is this.

Jesus chose you.

He could have chosen someone taller, someone better looking, someone smarter but he didn't. He chose you! (And I don't know about you but I'd rather be a friend of Jesus than a few inches taller or a few grades smarter...)

He chose you, so that...

• You may 'bear fruit'.
• Whatever you ask for in the name of the Father he will give to you.

To 'bear fruit' is a strange phrase (bear fruit) but what does it really mean?

Basically it means to gain or to increase. And since we're talking about the bible and being Holy, Christ - like people this probably doesn't mean financial gain or financial increase (although, this in turn doesn't mean we all have to be poor and live of cold tin beans from Lidl). 

In regards to this verse to bear fruit could mean a wide range of things but it will most probably include spiritual gain or spiritual increase. (Which is better than money both in the long and short term anyway).

Whatever you ask for in the name of the Father he will give to you is a tricky one to try and explain. If you ask God for a bike or an iPad, you probably wont find yourself looking at Apple's latest product floating down from the sky right in front of your eyes. 

However having said that, God will provide all the things necessary for you to live, be happy and of course tell others about God. Another important thing to mention is that God lives in an eternal state, there is no 'present' for God - He is everywhere at every time (crazy, right). So if God has put you in a situation that you don't think is maybe fair or right for you remember: God could see the outcome of whatever it is your going through before it even started.

Going back to the verse we started with, where Jesus says 'I no longer call you servants', that word servant originally was slaves. That's a BIG jump. We've gone from slave to friend. Why? Well, it's not because of anything we've done. As Jesus describes in these verses it's because Jesus has made known to us (slaves) everything he learnt from God. And Jesus says because a slave doesn't know his master's business, we are now friends of Jesus. 

That's all that Christianity is, a friendship.
And that's flipping awesome.

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Faith // Bible 101

Lets be honest - the Bible can be one intimidating book. All those names and places you can't pronounce, the first half of Isaiah, Leviticus, the predictions in Revelation - it's a mental block we've put on it all.

Are you someone with a mental block on the Bible because you can't possibly understand it?!
Never fear (literally, Psalm 27:1!) we've put together a 101 on the Bible, just to get you started.

Basic Bible Facts 

• The Bible is, obviously, the oldest book written
• It was originally a collection of separate books then brought together. I don't know why but lets face it - it's super convenient. 
• It's a collection of 66 books: 39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament
• It was written by over 40 different people from all different backgrounds - Kings, peasants, disciples, literate, illiterate...
• The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew 
• The New Testament was originally written in Greek (which is also called Aramaic)
• There are over 115* versions of the Bible available in all different languages (I stopped counting at 115!)

Something I find that complicates the Bible more is the time line. Because I flick from book to book from Old Testament to New, I often confuse myself. The Bible took place (events, writing) between 0 until about 100 A.D.

I also found this beauty of a time line to illustrate when books were written.

Don't freak out! (Side note: The faces of the kids in CU were absolutely priceless when this came up) The first time line is the time line of the Bible. A massive chunk of the Old Testament was written in the first section where the dates are unknown. This time line leads right up to the last book in the Bible, Revelation.

The time line at the bottom of the picture is that of the Israelites, which is basically the narrative of the Old Testament.

Another question we always get is how should we read our Bibles? Should we only read them on Sunday? Should we read them when we're happy?

We should read the Bible like our favourite book.
My favourite books are the Harry Potter series. Whatever time of day or month or year it is I am guaranteed to have one of the books on hand. I read it whenever, wherever and however I'm feeling. That's how we should read the Bible.
Sad? Bible.
Angry? Bible.
Lonely? Bible.
Happy? Bible.

To finish, I'd like to link you all to a video by a guy called Jefferson Bethke. If you haven't already listened to his spoken word 'Jesus>Religion' go and do it now! It's worth it.

In this video Jeff really touches on how we should look at the Bible, and I really like how he does it.

I really hope this was helpful for you and if you have any questions at all you can contact us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com

*information was counted at biblegateway.com

The Bread of Life // You Are What You Eat (Part 1)

John 6:25-59 is the main text for this blog post - I know it's a long passage, but it's a good one!

The passage starts with Jesus arriving on shore at Capernaum just after he has walked on water to find a group of people waiting for him. - The same group of people who at the start of John chapter 6 Jesus fed with 2 fishes and 5 loaves of bread!
Jesus greets this crowd of people by saying 'Very truly I tell you' - There's a lot of 'Very truly I tell yous' in this passage from Jesus, it just means that the next thing he's going to say is (guess what) very true.

"Very truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill."

Jesus greets these people by basically saying 'You only came to find me becuase I gave you food, not because you were amazed at my miracle.' Harsh? Maybe. True? Definitely.

Then, straight after Jesus says this, in his next breath he goes on to teach them about Heaven and eternal life. He says; 

"Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you."

Jesus tells these people not to work for food that spoils. Whats food that spoils? Every food. Bread gets mouldy, potatoes grow white bits, leftover Chinese gives you food poisoning and milk turns green. But then Jesus talks about working for food that 'endures to eternal life'. What Jesus meant here was don't work for stuff that will spoil, stuff that will rust, stuff that could get stolen from you. But work for God. Live out a life worthy enough for the plan God has created for you. - This will endure to eternal life. 

The crowd of people understand this and then want to know what they need to do to fulfil the work God requires them to do. Jesus answers with 

"The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent."

Wow, pretty easy right? All I have to do to fulfil the work God requires me to do is believe in Jesus? That might sound pretty easy, but it's actually very hard. As the crowd of people demonstrate in the next few verses. The crowd of people ask for a sign from Jesus so that they will believe him. They even quote some of the Old Testament, they talked about the Israelites and how God gave them manna  from Heaven to eat. 

Jesus goes on to say that this bread - the bread of life - is not from Moses, but directly from God. Then he says 

"For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from Heaven and gives life to the world."

The crowd get excited by this statement - who wouldn't? And ask Jesus to always give them this bread. 

Then Jesus drops a bombshell. 

"Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life.

Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty."

After this Jesus says in the very next verse that there will be people who would have seen Jesus but still wouldn't believe Jesus. Then Jesus says it again at verse 44;

"I am the bread of life."

Lots of the people - especially the Jews - got very angry at this and didn't believe him. Jesus then goes on to say; "unless you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you."
We now know this to be communion, but back then it's no wonder the people had some doubt (I know I would have).

This is the end of part one of 'The Bread of Life // You Are What You Eat. - Part two coming soon!

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He Lives // My Favourite Verse

In the last chapter of John verses 1-14 (John 21:1-14 ) we read about Jesus' last encounter with humans before he ascended to Heaven.
In these few verses we see that these seven men decide to go out to fish one night. They spend the whole night out in the boat fishing and catch absolutely nothing.
Then, early the next morning Jesus was standing on the shore next to a small fire he built for the breakfast and asked the men "Friends, haven't you any fish?"

Now, I'm no Bible expert, but I think that Jesus, the son of God would have known that these men hadn't caught any fish. Jesus must have been there for quite some time anyway to have had enough time to build a small fire and get some bread and fish to cook on it. So my best guess is that Jesus knew that these men hadn't caught any fish - the reason why he asked them is clear in the next few verses.

The men reply with a simple no, then Jesus tells them to throw their nets over the right side of the boat.
Some of these men were disciples, some were fishermen, all of them were rubbish. These seven men spent all night in a boat trying to catch some fish and can't even catch one. Also, notice that none of them recognise Jesus straight away - it takes a miracle for them to realise it's Jesus talking to them.

The men throw their nets over the right side of the boat, with no questions asked and immediately their net is filled with 153 fish. It's full of so much fish in fact that the seven men on the boat don't have enough strength to pull the boat ashore.

The men row the boat back to shore to meet Jesus (who they finally recognise) and arrive to see that Jesus is standing there with a fire cooking some bread and fish. As soon as Jesus sees them he says "come and have breakfast."
These seven men spent all night not being able to catch any fish, then Jesus turns up, shows them the right way to fish. They catch 153 fish and Jesus brings his own fish just in case 153 wasn't enough!

This is one of my favourite passages of the Gospels.
These seven men had been fishing all night, then in the early hours of the morning Jesus performs his last miracle and gives them enough food to feed an army (or a small youth group).
Then, just as the sun was rising over the sea they all ate breakfast that Jesus cooked them, on the beach!
The Bible doesn't say what they talked about but I'm pretty sure whatever they talked about would have been amazing. When I was reading these verses three main things stuck out to me.
1) The men on the boat - like everyone else who's ever been alive - were rubbish.
2) Jesus was awesome.
3) I would have loved to have been on this beach eating breakfast and talking with Jesus just before the ascension.

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Jesus // The Boy in The Temple

The book of Luke is the only place in the Gospels where we get a little glimpse of what the early years of Jesus' life were like. Everywhere else we don't see what Jesus gets up to for the first 30 years of his life.
In Luke 2:41-52 Mary, Joseph and a twelve year old Jesus go to Jerusalem for the Passover feast and then, when it finishes, Mary and Joseph leave without Jesus - because they think he is with them - and they take three whole days to find him again.

I assume that anyone who reads this will have been 12 years old, is twelve years old, or will be twelve years old very soon. What were you doing at the age of 12?
Playing computer games?
Watching TV?
Playing with your friends?
Waiting to finally become a teenager?

I think I can safely say probably no other twelve year old has spent 3 whole days straight at their nearest temple or chapel listening and asking questions about God.

Something that really struck me when I read this the first time was that Jesus had to learn. These verses don't say that Jesus was teaching the other people, he was being taught. He even asked them questions!

When Mary and Joseph finally find Jesus sitting in the temple learning his mother says "Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you." To this Jesus replies "Why were you searching for me? Didn't you know I'd be in my Fathers House?"

Notice that Jesus is quick to make a comparison between his earthly and Heavenly Father. Mary says "Your Father and I have been searching for you" and Jesus says "Didn't you know I'd be in my Fathers house?"
From an early age Jesus realised, just like we should realise, he had an earthly and Heavenly Father.

Another thing that struck me was that these are the first words of Jesus ever recorded in the Gospels.

"Why were you searching for me?"

Why are you here? Why are you reading this blog post? Why are you searching for Jesus?

Are you searching for Jesus? 

The last thing I'll mention, and it's something that when I worked out I just sat back in awe. Everything in the Bible points in some way to Jesus and the cross and Resurrection. 

It took Mary and Joseph 3 days to find Jesus. Jesus, as a twelve year old boy was lost for 3 days. 33 years later Jesus died and 3 days after that he came back to life!

Jesus saw the importance of asking questions about God and his faith from the very young age of 12, if you have any questions you would like to ask us please feel free to email us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com. 

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Do you believe in God?

If I asked you 'Do you believe in God?' hopefully a lot of you would say yes. However, if I asked you 'Do you believe in God?' I'm guessing less of you would answer yes, and this isn't bad. We can often talk of God and Jesus and all the amazing things that they have done or can do for people, but when it comes to doing things for us, sometimes we're unsure about his ability to help.

There's a film called the miracle maker. It's all about Jesus and it's awesome!! The film follows Jesus through his life, but also follows a young girl. In Mark 5 21-43 we meet the girl and her father Jairus. 

Now Jairus' daughter really wants to listen to Jesus, and wants to follow him round Israel while he preaches, but she's really ill. Jairus and his wife are really worried about her so they don't let her go to see him. She tries to explain that Jesus is the Son of God but because Jairus is a synagogue leader, he just thinks that Jesus is some random man claiming to be God's son. 

One day Jairus goes home and sees his daughter, and knows that she's going to die. He's taken her to see every doctor in Israel and nothing has got better, so he's at his last resort. He runs to Jesus and says 23"My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live". So Jesus goes with him. As he leaves, there are hundreds and hundreds of people around him, and in this crowd there's an old woman. She's had internal bleeding for 12 years, which is a long time to be in so much pain!! She had spent all her money on treatments but every time she just got worse. She'd heard about Jesus so she pushed through the crowd and said 28"If I just touch his clothes, I will get healed." She reached out and touched his cloak and instantly, her bleeding stopped. As soon as she touches him, Jesus stops and asks "Who touched me?" Now I can imagine the disciples saying that Jesus is being silly. There are hundreds and hundreds of people around him and I'm pretty sure one of them has brushed past him, just as this woman has. But Jesus asks again and says that he felt the power leave him. Then the woman comes forward trembling with fear and tells Jesus what happened to her. And Jesus said 34'Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.'

While Jesus is talking to the woman, someone that has come from Jairus' house tells Jairus that his daughter has died. Jairus doesn't see the point in Jesus going to the house to heal her anymore but Jesus overhears the men talking and says 36'Don't be afraid; just believe.' He carried on walking to Jairus' house and when he got there, he found that everyone was crying. And Jesus couldn't understand why they were crying and said to them 39'Why all this commotion? The child is not dead but asleep.' 

And the people laughed.

You know when you say something, and you know that you're right, but no one believes you so you want to prove them wrong? I can imagine Jesus feeling like that. He goes into the house, takes the girls hand and says 41'Talitha Koum!' which means 'Little girl I say to you get up!'

Immediately, the girl stands up and starts walking, like nothing had ever happened.

Now the point of this was to show you guys that faith is important. It's all well and good to say that we believe in God, but to actually believe that He can raise people from the dead, or can heal people's suffering is soooooooo important. The old woman in the story didn't even need Jesus to acknowledge her existence. She would've been find if Jesus kept walking to Jairus' house, and when he does turn around he says that it was her faith that healed her. He doesn't say that He's this amazing man who can do all sorts of awesome things,  he tells her that her faith saved her. And your faith can heal you to. If you have a problem or a worry - pray about it. And sometimes it just feels like we're talking to ourselves, but like the woman in the story, if we have faith, we will be healed.


~catsandpizza

What can you do?

Ever had anybody ask you about what you can do?

Say you were meeting somebody new for the first time and they wanted to get to know you better. They might ask 'What can you do?' and you might answer with 'I can play an instrument!' or 'I'm really good at sport!'. 

However, there are two ways of asking this question.

The other way this question might be asked is in a sarcastic way. Like the person asking you the question thinks that your a nobody and that you can't do anything.

'What can you do?'

You, or someone you know might have already been asked this question in the negative way in the past. I know I have and it does actually make you feel like you can't do anything. Which isn't the case for anybody.

So, lets look at what the Bible has to say about people who are completely hopeless and who some people might look at and ask them 'What can you do?'.

In my opinion, the people in the Bible who are the best example for this are the disciples.

The disciples are Jesus' very close friends. Chosen specially by Jesus to stay with and travel with him almost all if the time. However the disciples aren't what you'd call particularly 'skilled' or 'talented' people. 

Some of the disciples were fishermen and if we take a look at the first few verses of John 21 (here) we see that the disciples are rubbish fishermen. And if we read Luke 24 verses 13-18 (here) we see that Jesus' special people, the people he kept close to him 24/7 the people who were mourning Jesus' death, didn't recognise Jesus.

How are Jesus' disciples looking to you now? Do they look like the sort of people who might get asked the question 'What can you do?'. But, with Jesus the disciples also did countless acts of awesome works that include feeding 5,000 people with just 5 loves and 3 fish and even healing people. 

How did the unskilled, uneducated disciples do this? 

With God.

This is why I think it was important to Jesus that his disciples weren't incredibly clever or incredibly talented. They were just like you and me. And if they can do amazing works for God then that means so can we. 

Joshua 1 verse 9 says 'Remember that I have commanded you to be determined and confident! Do not be afraid or discouraged, for I, the Lord your God, am with you wherever you go.' 

Remember not to let what other people think of you become the way you think of yourself.

If you have any questions or queries feel free to email us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com.

Love

The Bible was originally written in Greek. Where as we have only one word for love with only one definition the Greeks have five separate words for love with five separate meanings.

The first is Eros. Eros according to Dictionary.com means a physical love or a sexual desire. This type of love would be used in the context of boyfriend/girlfriend, marriage context.

Next is Philia. Philia is the kind of love associated with friendships and the relationships we have with our friends. This type of love would be used in the context of friendships and people who are in our day-to-day lives and even people we pass on the street.

The next word is Agape. Agape is used in Greek as an official 'I love you' statement instead of the physical love that we see in Eros.

The last word for love that I am going to use is Storage. Storage love would be used in the context of affection between say, a mother and son. This word is almost exclusively used as a descriptor of relationships between family.

Now, compared to that us English speakers only have one word for love.

Love. According to Dictionary.com Love is 'A profoundly tender, passionate affection for another person.

So it's important that in the Bible when the word love is used to think about the context of the word and what type of Greek 'love' it might be referring to.

With this in mind when we read verses in our Bibles like Romans 13:8 where it says 'Whoever loves others has fulfilled the law' God doesn't mean to physically love everyone but to care for people regardless of who they are. 

Probably the most well known verse in the bible is found in John 3:16 and it says 'For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal live.' I don't read Greek so I don't know what type of love was used in this verse, but it could have been either Philla, Agape or Storage love.
This verse is used lots all around the world. But what does it mean? Well it's pretty simple. God sent Jesus to live on Earth and when Jesus was on the Earth he died on the cross. Something I think you all know very well. The reason Jesus died was so that all of our sins and all the things we do wrong can be forgotten about in the eyes of God. Also the cross acts as a 'bridge' to heaven as the verse says 'whoever believes in him will have eternal live'. This means that as long as we believe in God, become a Christian and read our Bibles we will not perish, but have eternal life in Heaven.
This verse doesn't just apply to the 'good' people either. In fact the verse even starts off with 'Whoever'. meaning anybody can have an eternal life in Heaven with God.

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:)