He is alive!

So we've learnt about His life, we've learnt about the ultimate sacrifice He made because He loves us.

Now, we're going to learn about his Resurrection.

After he died, Jesus was taken from the cross and placed in a tomb, with a huge stone rolled across to seal it. In Matthew, we're told that Pilate had guards placed in front of the tomb too - it was a super secure tomb.

So at this point, Jesus had been dead for 3 days. Mary Magdalene went to the tomb fully expecting to find Jesus - and didn't! She ran straight to Simon Peter and he went to the tomb and saw the linen that Jesus was wrapped in, but no Jesus.

Can you imagine how freaked out they would've been?! What would you have done in that situation?

In John 20:11-18 we see what Mary did.

Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, seated where jesus' body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, 'Woman, why are you crying?' 

  'They have taken my Lord away' she said, 'and I don't know where they have put him.' At this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realise that it was Jesus. 

  He asked her, 'Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?' Thinking he was the gardener, she said, 'Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.' 

  Jesus said to her, 'Mary'. 

She turned towards him and cried out in Aramaic,'Rabboni!' (which means 'Teacher'). 

  Jesus said, 'Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my  brothers and tell them, "I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God."'

  Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: 'I have seen the Lord!' and she told them that he had said these things to her. 

To Jesus, death was just a nap! Now there's something I want to draw your attention to here (apart from the obvious Resurrection!); 

The disciples forgot what Jesus had told them in scripture (John 20:9). Jesus had already told them that in three days he would rise again. 

Here's what I'm trying to say: Jesus is alive, and he's alive for us. We should never forget his teachings. 

If you guys have got any questions about ANYTHING you can contact us at: christianunion.blog@gmail.com

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'Good' Friday?

What is 'Good Friday' and why is it good?

Matthew 27:45 is the first time we see Jesus' death. 

45 From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land. 46 About three in the afternoon Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” (which means “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”).

47 When some of those standing there heard this, they said, “He’s calling Elijah.”

48 Immediately one of them ran and got a sponge. He filled it with wine vinegar, put it on a staff, and offered it to Jesus to drink. 49 The rest said, “Now leave him alone. Let’s see if Elijah comes to save him.”

50 And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit.

51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split 52 and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. 53 They came out of the tombs after Jesus’ resurrection and[c] went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, and exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!”

55 Many women were there, watching from a distance. They had followed Jesus from Galilee to care for his needs.

Normally death is something that is sad, something we mourn. 

But here's the thing - we shouldn't cry for Jesus! The only thing we should be asking ourselves about Jesus' death is WHY he died. 

Jesus' death was a very intricate and thought out plan by God. All through the Old Testament there are signs of Jesus' life and death. An example of this would be the story of Abraham and Isacc (Genesis 22)

God sent Jesus in order to give the greatest sacrifice for the thing He loved the most. US. 

I leave you with this quote from John 3:16 

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 

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Idolatry // What do you Worship?

Exodus 32:1-7.

"When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, "Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us out of Egypt, we don't know what has happened to him. 

Aaron answered them, "Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me." So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. He took what they had handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, "These are yor gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt."

When Aaron saw this, he built an altar in font of the calf and announced, "Tomorrow there will be a festival to the Lord." 

So the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings. Afterward they sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry."

During this part of Exodus Moses is leading some people called the Isralites from Egypt (where they were slaves) to land that God had promised for them. Moses had left the Isralites for quite a long time - the verses even open with "When the people saw that Moses was so long  in coming down from the mountain." Moses was talking to God up on the mountain while the Isralites had this conversation that we read of in these verses.

They decided that Moses was taking too long so they build for themselves a statue of a calf to worship. The Isralited 18 chapters earlier crossed the Red Sea with Moses. These people literally saw miracles, they experianced the awesome power of God. And here they are, worshiping a statue they made instead of God who made them. 

Don't you think the Isralites were a little stupid to make this calf their God and worship it - Would you worship a statue of a calf? 

I hope your answer was no.

It's easy to look back at the Isralites worshiping a calf and laugh but we do the same in 2014.

It just looks a bit different.

Everyone has a god weather or not it's the God of the gospel.

God is defined as whatever we make supreme. 

This dosen't mean that if we dont worship God then he's not God. God is God weather we worship him or not, however we can make things in our lives supreme - these are our 'gods', or what we worship. 

If you don't know what your idol is in your life, if you don't know what you worship in your life then it's probably the first thing you think of when you read the next sentance;

An idol is when you look at something and say 'if I have that, my life will have meaning'.

What did you think of? 

A huge TV?

A bigger house? 

A relationship with someone?

An iPhone?

Better grades in school?

A better job? 

To have something that isn't God as your idol is a very dangerous thing because if you worship something and you can't give it up then you don't own it, it owns you. 

If we skip forwards a few chapters in the Bible to Exodus chapter 20:3 we see God giving Moses the 10 commandments. Verse 3 starts with the first commandment, they are in no particular order but the very first commandment God gives to Moses is; 

"You shall have no other gods before (or besides) me."

And then we read on and the seccond commandment God gives Moses in verse 4 is; 

"You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in Heaven or on Earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them."

The very first two commandments are God basically saying 'Don't make idols. No seriously.'

Puting this in the context of our modern lives, we put our idols in place of God. Whatever it is that we can't live without we try to make them fit a God shaped hole in our lives.

What idol took nails to it's wrists and died a long and painful death on the cross so that every single thing you do wrong dosen't matter anymore? 

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

More than Conquerors

My main text for this post is Romans 8:31-39.

I've found that recently too much time Christians spend with each other in Church is spent dwelling on negative things. I.e. 'You shouldn't do this', 'Look at all the bad in the world, and even on our door steps'.
So, I've decided to write a talk that is (hopefully) uplifting.
As Christians I feel it's important we encourage and energise each other and where best to look for inspiration than Romans.

This will be in no way an in depth Bible study, just a collection of some thoughts I had that will hopefully strengthen and excite you.

Verse 32.

The first verse is pretty self explanatory so lets jump in at verse 32. 

"He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all." 

God didn't just give his Son - Jesus to us while he was on Earth. This verse says he literally gave him up forever so that Jesus could be our link to God by dying for us and that through him we can have eternal life in Heaven with God. God gave Jesus up not for just the good people, the people who give to the poor or who sing Hillsong songs in the shower. God gave Jesus up for us all. 

Verse 35 and 36.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?"

"For your sake we face death all day long."

Paul, the author of Romans isn't saying in these verses that 'if your a Christian and if you love God everything will be fine and dandy'. The Bible makes it very clear in these verses that Christians aren't exempt from hardship or troubles. Paul goes as far as to say that as Christians we face death all day long. This obviously doesn't mean people want to literally kill us (although this isn't the case for the whole World) but it means every day we wake up and live lives surrounded by evil and corruption, in school or work we could be around people who are totally against God. And that is a dangerous place to be. The difference is that even though Christians still go through all this, Paul makes a very definite point of emphasising the fact that no person can separate God from us. He is ours and he helps us get through these troubles.

Verse 37.

"We are more than conquerors through him who loved us."

The definition of conquerors is: 

"To overcome by physical, mental or force."

As Christians we are more than conquerors. We have more than overcome sin and death. We are living lives for so much more than sin and death, and that is amazing. What is more amazing is that we haven't more than overcome death and sin on our own. If we tried on our own there's no doubt that we would fail miserably. The verse says that we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. It's by what God has done for us.

Verse 38.

"Nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the Love of the Lord God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Paul lists a lot of things that can't separate us from God. These aren't little things either. He says that no angel, no daemon, nothing in the past, nothing in the future and he even says that nothing in the whole of creation can separate us from God. People can take away things we own, our houses can burn down. We can get to a state in our lives where we have literally nothing left in the whole world, but we will always have God. God is the only thing in our lives that a constant source of hope, love and guidance. 

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

The Earth revolves around the Son

In the early 1500's, Nicholas Copernicus, (basically a mega maths nerd) put forward a theory that said the Earth and all the planets in the Solar System revolve around the sun. without the sun the plantes would just float away.

What’s at the centre of your life? 

It could be money. Not so much for us as students who live off Pot Noodle, but for lots of people money can be a real problem to get. It’s not just a problem for those who don’t have money. People who have lots of money con get addicted to getting more and more and this results in loss of friends, family and ultimately God.

Family and friends can be at the centre of our lives. Sometimes we can’t help it, like when a family member or friend gets ill or is in need of help. Its other times when we’d rather spend time going out with our friends instead of going to church. (I suppose you could always take them to church...)

People often feel the way they look is the most important thing in their lives. Whether its hours in the gym, or hours in front of the mirror (and in some cases with Botox sessions) as a generation we are obsessed with how we look. (Worldwide we spend around £254 billion on beauty products alone!) But even in this consumer driven society we live in God doesn’t care how many times we’ve been to the gym, or how long we spent on our hair that morning.

Lastly, the things you own could be at the centre of your life. This could be anything material from your phone to your collection of Hunger Games books. It’s a bad place to be when you start thinking “I will get back into the whole ‘God’ thing, straight after I listen to this new CD I’ve wanted to listen to for ages and after I finish watching all the episodes of Sherlock back to back.

There’s a very well-known verse in the Bible, in John 3:16 that says;

For God so loved the World that he gave his only Son. So that whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

I won’t go into much detail about this verse as it’s used so much but what I think is important for this message is that God sent his only Son, he should be the only Sun that is at the centre of all our lives, because without him we would just float away. Just like everything revolves around the sun, we should revolve around the Son – Jesus.

Feel free to email us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com. 

What does a Christian look like?

Today in our Christian Union, I asked the kids to draw me a Christian. The responses we got were interesting to say the least… 

In the Bible, no one is excluded by Jesus. Jesus goes to see lepers (Matthew 8 and Luke 17:11) who were excluded by society. Jesus spoke to them and healed them because he didn’t care about disease or any social barrier. 

Throughout the bible, people who were used by God had several problems too! I mean

Noah was a drunk
Abraham was too old
Isaac was a daydreamer
Jacob was a liar
Leah was ugly
Joseph was abused
Moses has a stuttering problem
Samson has long hair and was a womanizer
Rahab was a prostitute
Jeremiah and Timothy were too young
David has an affair and was a murderer
Isaiah preached naked
Jonah ran from God
Peter denied Christ 
The Disciples fell asleep while praying
Zaccheus was too small
Paul was too religious
Lazarus was dead!

The most used verse from the Bible is John 3:16 

"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life"

It’s important to remember that this verse says whoever, not only those with white or black skin, or only those of a certain sexual orientation. 

  In John 7:24 Jesus says “Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly” 

As Christians, we should aim to follow in the footsteps of Jesus. Following these teachings are a way to start.

If you have any questions feel free to message/ask us anything! Alternatively you can email us at: christianunion.blog@gmail.com

Man with a plan!

Let me tell you a story.

Imagine an 11 year old Hannah full of excitement and dreams of going to Swansea University. From the ages of about 10-17 I wanted to go to Swansea University. You can imagine how excited I was then when I got two offers to study English there, right?

Nope!

Since we'd started the UCAS process, I felt that I was missing something. Something that was important. Every decision I made, although the people around me told me that I was doing the right thing just felt wrong. The day I got my offers, I declined them, with only three minutes consideration.

This decision was not only the biggest choice of my life but the quickest decision of my life, and as someone who likes to take time to consider things, I should be freaking out. But I'm not, because I know that Jesus helped me make the right decision. The decision that was best for me.

There's a verse in the Bible from the book Jeremiah 29 and I think it's one people should always remember.

"For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." (Jeremiah 29:11, NIV)

It's really important to remember that God has a plan for each and every one of us. A personalised down-to-the-last-detail plan. We may have plans and ambitions for our future, but if the Lord is telling us to go a different route, we should listen because it's for the best.

If you have any questions about this talk or any other issues please email us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com

Forgiveness

How many times have you been upset or angered by someone's actions?

A few weeks ago, my favourite TV show Sherlock was on the TV. It was the season finale but I had to watch it on IPlayer, meaning that I was watching an hour later than all of my friends who were watching the same show. I made sure to text all my friends with strict instructions NOT to text me. And, you guessed it, somebody did.

I was so angry. I spent 10 minutes storming around my bedroom muttering to myself about how my friends couldn't listen to me and how I would never ever forgive them for ruining the plot twist. However after a few minutes, I realised how much I'd overreacted. I mean, in the grand scale of things, a TV show spoiler isn't important.

But what if it was something important? What if someone had stolen from me or said something nasty behind my back?

Jesus was killed by humanity. As people, we killed Him because we were worried about material objects and temples collapsing.

Even as Jesus was nailed to the cross, He forgave us by saying "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." (Luke 23:34, NIV)

As Christians, we should live by Jesus' example and live by this parable;

^"44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? ⁴⁷ And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? ⁴⁸ Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." (Matthew 5:44, NIV)

If you've got any questions about this talk or anything else, feel free to email us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com

Who are we? (Part 2)

Hey guys! A few weeks ago Andrew posted his testimony and mentioned that I'll be doing mine soon - so here I am! If you haven't read Andrew's yet but you'd like to, you can find it here.

So, Hello! My name's Hannah. I'm seventeen and this is my story.

I was raised by a non-Christian family. This meant that the only information that I got about God was the prayers I did in assembly and from my Grandfather. When I was about four, I went to my first Church. Even though my Mother had been baptised, she'd lost faith and had never encouraged me to go to Church. I loved every minute of it. I loved singing songs about "some guy" called Jesus, and sitting on massive comfy sofas in Sunday school to hear stories about Jesus. I wanted to go back, so I did. I went to Church for about a year when my family received some devastating news. 

My Nanny had primary liver cancer and secondary bowel cancer. She wasn't going to get through it.

Through the time of her having cancer, she started coming to Church. She became a Christian and even started to read me stories from the Bible. On January 19th 2002, I was rushed down to my Grandparents house and waited upstairs while the grownups mourned. That night I prayed my first prayer to myself; Please, don't let her die.

I think it was after I'd learned what had happened, and after I realised that my prayer didn't 'come true', I started to blame God for things. Something wrong? Gods fault. Friends not talking to me? Gods fault. I did this all through primary school and most of secondary. Not a great start, eh?

When I was 13, I got into a pretty rubbish relationship and was stuck in it for just over a year. That year was one of the hardest years of my entire life, and my partner just didn't understand what I was going through and why. After a year we said enough was enough and broke up. I thought that this was God sending me a sign, that things were going to get better, but they didn't.

Skip forward six months - I'm sitting in school hating everyone and everything. My parents have just got a divorce. Dad's moved in with his new girlfriend. I have more homework than there are hours in the day and everywhere I turn, people are coping with stuff I'm not.

It's fair to say that life at this point was pretty rubbish. However, it was at this point I met my lovely boyfriend  & best friend Andrew. Andrew and I used to hang out all the time and talk about everything. For once in my life, I felt like I was being myself with someone I could trust. One day, Andrew invited me to his baptism.

"I've been to one of those things before. It's (and I quote) the thing where they hold you under the water and bring you up really fast!"

*face palm* I know, I was an idiot. anyway, Andrew got baptised and he was stupidly happy. And I mean like, over the top sunshine and rainbows, all the time. So naturally I asked him why he was so happy, and he started telling me about God.

At first I was all "great I've managed to get mixed in with a mentalist Christian like you see in films". However, what he was saying made sense. It was like something in my brain was plugged back in and finally I could see what I needed. I needed God! And so one day after school, Andrew came down to the cricket field with me, and I became a Christian.

However, after two weeks I started to feel like I'd been cheated. I wasn't happy, I still had problems and things definitely weren't getting any easier. I'd been to Andrew's youth group, cried, run out and hadn't gone again. Being Christian was not as easy as people made it out to be. I looked at other Christians and was jealous of their relationship with God. Why didn't I have that? I prayed about it for a year. Then something happened.

In the December of 2012, Andrew asked me to go to this festival called Soul Survivor. "Why not?" I told myself, and so I found myself going to that same Youth I had cried in and going away to spend a week with them on a field. I'll be honest with you, I'd painted a picture of me standing in a field, in the rain, crying, surrounded my thousands of insane people.

Instead, I found myself standing in a MASSIVE tent, listening to songs about the same guy I'd heard stories about as a kid, laughing until my ribs hurt and meeting with God and the Spirit - and it was freaking awesome!!!!!

I'd never experienced anything like it in my whole life. I cried and laughed, and laughed with crying in between. I'd met people and made awesome friends and had THE BEST MILKSHAKE ON THE PLANET. And that was just day 1.

On day 1, all my prayers from over a year were answered. The speaker Mike Pilavachi asked those who weren't Christian to get up and be saved. I watched hundreds of people get up and feel God's grace. Then Mike said something that changed my life forever. "If you're unsure, confused, feel you have no relationship with God - get up". Before I could even finish my blink, I had grabbed Andrew, blubbed something about being saved and dragged him to the front.

I was saved in front of TEN THOUSAND PEOPLE.

Having social anxiety and just general anxiety, THAT WAS THE WORST THING I COULD HAVE EVER DONE EVER IN MY LIFE.

But it wasn't the worst - it was THE BEST!! I felt like I was happy. For once in my life i was being taught that it's not just the awesome good people who get Jesus - its the depressed and the hurt. It was damaged beyond repair people who get him too! And I'm one of them!!

I spent the rest of the week getting healed by Gods presence, and realising that I was never on my own. It was an amazing experience, and if you ever get the chance to go to Soul Survivor - GO.

After Soul Survivor, I started taking Christian Union seriously. This was about teaching young people that God is for everyone not just the people who are raised in the Church.

I absolutely love running Christian union, and I hope you guys enjoy coming.

Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed! If you've got any questions for us - you can reach us at christianunion.blog@gmail.com

Speak soon! : D

~ Cats and pizza (Hannah)

Even sinners love people.

Luke 6:32-35.

'If you love only the people who love you, why should you recieve a blessing? Even sinners love those who love them!'
And if you do good only to those who do good to you, why should you recieve a blessing? Even sinners do that!'
And if you only lend to those whom you hope to get it back, why should you recieve a blessing? Even sinners lend to sinners, to get back the same amount!'

I was reading my bible the other day and these few verses really jumped out at me. As I read these verses I asked myslef;
'What makes me different from sinners?'
The music I listen to?
The clothes I wear?
Weather or not I put a nativity scene up as part of my Christmas decorations?

What I feel Jesus is trying to get across in this verse is that as Christians, on the surface at least, we are no different from sinners.
Are you nice to the people who are nice to you?
So are sinners.
Do you love the people who love you?
So do sinners.
Do you give back what you owe to people, and expect people to give back what they owe you?
So do sinners.

As Christians we need to stand out from others. We need to be friends with the friendless and helpers to the helpless. It's important that we remember that before w were saved we were sinners too. Just because we are Christians doesn't make us better than people who aren't, It means we have a saviour who is holy enough to forgive us.

What do you that sets you apart from sinners?

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

Who are we? (Part 1)

You guys may be unaware that Christ and You Christian Union is run by two people. In this blog post I'll be talking about how I became a Christian and what my life was like before I came to know God. When a Christian does this, it's called a testimony.

Testimony time!


I am very blessed to have Christian parents who are heavily involved in the work that goes on the Church. The first time I ever went to Church was when I was 8 days old. Ever since then I have gone to church every Sunday (once in the morning, then sunday school in the afternoon and once again in the evening). Even though I was brought up in the Church every day when I went to school I was surrounded by people who were not Christians and some who literally resented the idea of God for one reason or another.
Looking back I can see that my peers were probably the biggest reason for me putting off becoming a Christian.
When I think back to the time I spent in Church growing up it's filled not with listening to amazing sermons, powerful worship and dynamic fellowship. Instead it's filled with trying to get to the next level on the super Mario game I was playing on my game boy advance. I literally spent the first 13 maybe 14 years of my life playing on my game boy rather than actually listening to the preacher. *facepalm*
When I think about it I don't know what's worse, going to church and considering yourself a Christian but all the time your there you just play video games or not going to church at all. I suppose my
upbringing in the Church did help a lot with me becoming a Christian, but it upsets me that I missed 14 years of two sermons a week and I'll never get a chance to learn from them again.

Anyway, when I was in year 10 of school (aged 14 years old) a friend of mine started up a Christian Union in my school. I went along, not because I wanted to learn more about Jesus, but because I wanted to be a good friend (and I had nothing else to do on a Wednesday lunchtime). One of the only talks I remember her doing was a talk on the rapture. We we're shown a video of a cartoon version of the rapture happening and one person who thought they were a Christian got left behind on earth. This literally scared me. I didn't want to be like the person in the video who thought they were Christian and was left behind because they were living a lie.
Skip forward a few months and nothing had changed, it's not like I was a bad person, I just didn't want to be a Christian.
In the same year all this was happening I got invited to go to a local night of worship for the youth of
the local area. Reluctantly I went.
I can't remember what the talk was that night, nor can I remember what songs we sang for worship.
But I can remember in that little Church I became a Christian, and my life hasn't been the same since.
About 2 years ago I started leading worship on the piano in the Church I've gone to since I was 8 days old and as of earlier this year I play the piano, guitar and sing every sunday in Church. I love leading worship and I hope to do it until I get to old to stand up on my own.
Last year I got baptized in water and it was the most surreal experience of my life, made even better by getting to invite people to church who wouldn't have gone to church other wise.

As of last year my friend Hannah and I started Christian Union in our school and since then we have 9-10 regulars and 4 people have become Christians (which is awesome!!!!).
I know I speak for Hannah and I when I say we love doing Christian Union and we both want to continue to do Christian Union once we've left school.

That's it! (So far anyway).

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

Andrew :)

God so loved who now?

If someone asked you to think or name of a bible verse then chances are the first verse that would come to your head would be John 3:16.

This verse goes; For God so loved the world that he gave his only son, so whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. 

This verse is told over and over all over the world. Bumper stickers, T-shirts, posters, phone cases. You name it, if you can wear it or hang it up then it's probably had this verse on it. But what does this verse actually mean? What do you think is the most important part of what is proably the most repeated verse in the world?
God so loved the world?
Will not perish?
Have eternal life?

'Whoever believes in him will not perish but have eternal life'. This part of the verse really stuck out for me. God didn't come to save just the good, he didn't come to save just the people who go to church every Sunday. He came to save whoever.
Murderes? saved.
White people? Saved.
Black people? Saved.
Hated by everyone? Saved.
Never been to church? Saved.

You only have to take the 'leap' of faith to God and he will come. It dosen't matter who you are, God still made you in his image and Jesus still loves you.

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

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? Part 2

We read, in 1 samuel chapter 17 (Here) about a man called David and a big scary giant called Golaith. I'm not going to go into much detail about the story as it isnt necessary for this talk so I'll just give it a very brief recap.

So, David is a shepheard and he basically spends all of his time with his sheep. (I don't know if he has any other animals to look after but I like to think he has some hamsters also.) His life and work is his sheep. David is also a Christian. David has a few brothers who are in an army. Davids bothers were fighting an army who had this huge giant called Golaith. Golaith is, so far unbeatable. (Probably because all of the solidiers are afraid of him. I know I would be.)

One day it's Davids job to take some food to his brothers in battle. When he got there all he could see on the soldiers faces was fear. Everyone was afraid of Golaith. Golaith had been threatening the army for quite a while. David took it upon himself to fight this huge giant. All of the Soilders thought David was a bit of a fool for wanting to fight this unbeatable giant, they proably thought he was going to die. David, not being an army man, didnt have the same muscles or weight as the soildiers so none of the armour that he could use would fit him. He couldn't even use the swords the army used becuase they were too heavy for him.

Instead, David used a sling shot. He went down to a lake and picked up 5 stones/pebbles and went on his way to defeat Golaith.

To cut a long story short David took one stone/pebble and with his sling shot slung it right at Golaiths forehead. Golaith fell face first down to the earth, he was dead.

To see the long version of that story click the link I posted earlier.

Now that you roughly know about David and Golaith here are some little facts for you (please correct me if i'm wrong).

Golaith was 9.8 foot tall. Which dosent sound very giant to us but back in the olden days people would have been a lot shorter than we are today so to David he would have certinaly have been a giant.

Golaith weighed 57 kilograms. Again this dosent sound a lot but this was back in the olden days where people had to literally go out and kill a cow for a big mac.

A soilder would weigh 7 kilograms. So this means Goliath was roughly 8 times heavier than a soilder. Thats the same as one average male man verses 5 average size elephants!

We also have to take into thought that David wasn't the weight of a soilder he was much skinnier. Therefore David must have looked like a small dot compared to Golaith. 

Right, so we have David a small, unskilled worker who spent most of his time on his own against a giant who could proabably squish David with his little finger if he wanted to. How did David win? With God. 

David knew that God wouldn't leave him when he needed him most. 

All that David needed to kill Golaith was one stone/pebble and some faith in God. 

Those keen eyed readers out there might have noticed that David picked up 5 stones/pebbles to kill Goliath with. Was this becuase David thought that he couldn't kill him with 4 stones/pebbles? Was it becuase he doubted Gods ability to help in the first 4 times? No. The reason David picked up 5 stones/pebbles was because (wait for it..) 

Golaith had 4 other brothers. 

David thought that when he killed Golaith with one stone he might have to kill all his brothers too. So he picked up 5 stones, just to be sure. 

#plottwist.

As long as you keep a strong faith in God remember that you can overcome any Golaith in your life. 

I don't mean go out and kill the talest person you see. 

I mean if anything ever you come across something that you think is too big to get over or people who are 'better' than you cant get over, try bringing God into your problems. I can assure you you'll be amazed at what you can do.

I'm sory it was a long one.

email us at christainunion.blog@gmail.com with any questions you might have. 

:)

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.

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

:)