Goodnight Ronnie....

We've only just come to the end of the third month of the year and my childhood legends are being stripped away one by one. 
 
I'm still in shock with Bowie going and the genius way in which he orchestrated his final days, an artist to the very end.

Even to the point where his ex wife Angie who was in the Celebrity Big Brother house at the time, learned of his death and managed to confuse and convince the other housemates that David Gest had in fact died in the house!


If David Bowie had a sense of humour I'm sure that particular gem would have had him rolling in his grave! 

His song release Lazarus stirred up all sorts of comment on David's beliefs and whether he could now be in Heaven, a response to these comments and questions was summed up wonderfully by David Robertson known as The Wee Flea here.


Now Ronnie Corbett, my absolute favourite comedy legend along of course with Ronnie Barker, it was always the Two Ronnies for me, I never was a Morcombe & Wise fan but the two Ronnies had me in stitches every time. I loved their big musical numbers at the end of each show, and the way they played with words was incredible. I could probably still now recite some of their sketches word for word, one of my favourites was them talking in a funny accent in a cafe with the subtitles coming up on the screen as initials: 'L.O.' 'R.U.B.C.?' 'F.U.N.E.X?' Translation: 'Hello' 'are you busy?' 'have you any eggs?'! and I know the lyrics to most of the daft songs!

In between of course the world lost Alan Rickman, Glenn Frey, Paul Daniels, Terry Wogan, George Martin and many more besides, and the social media posts pleaded with 2016 to 'stop killing off our heroes'. 

But most of these heroes we've lost were in their late 60's, 70's and 80's, and I believe the people we looked up to and called celebrities in our childhoods 30odd years ago, we invested more into them, they were special, individually talented, and deserved their celebrity status so we stumble in disbelief when they're gone.  But they've got to go, I'm 40 something, my heroes are nearly in their 70's and 80's, they can't stay forever!

I'm preparing myself, it's only a matter of time before we lose the other half of The Who or The Beatles, Sean Connery or Cliff Richard; actually has he already gone? 

That's the thing, when you don't know the person you forget they've died, it's a running gag

between myself and my eldest daughter to keep reminding each other Cilla Black is dead, to the point where now if anyone says 'oh, don't forget...' we chip in 'Cilla Black's dead?' because for us nothing changes, we can still play the music, watch the film and it's as if they've never left us.

So with that in mind I'm going to pretend I'm about 10 again and watch my favourite musical number, goodnight both of you!

                              

Throwback Thursday: A Post From The Past

Today's post from the past is a book review in honour of World Book Day.  I chose this review in light of the recent retraction from Alex Malarkey about his trip to Heaven, and because Colton's story was made into a film last year. This post was initially written on 14/12/2011 

Colton Burpo is not quite four, when he has an emergency appendectomy.  In the months that follow, he starts to tell his parents about how while he was being operated on he was in Heaven with Jesus, and the Angels sang to him.

If you are a non-believer you could probably say this is a clever book of fiction by a Pastor with Biblical knowledge.

I am a Christian and I believe Heaven is for real, but I don't know why I find it hard to accept that Jesus would let a child visit Him in Heaven and tell us of his experiences.  It's not that I disbelieved Colton's story, I just suppose it's so supernatural it's hard to get your head around - imagine how his parents coped as he casually told them about meeting his mis-carried sister!

The story naturally unravels without coming across as overly sentimental or cheesy.

Colton's Pastor dad backs up his accounts with scripture references, and the end of book poses questions to make you think further beyond what you have read.

Heaven is for real? Yes it is. 

Did Colton Burpo visit Heaven? Why not?

Anyone got a light?

I thought our house had been blacklisted, but apparently not.  I was up to my elbows in the u-bend when the doorbell rang, I de-marigolded and answered to whom I immediately recognised as Jehovah's Witnesses. 

'Ooh fun!' I thought, as I introduced myself as a born again Christian.

"Oh good, so you'll know Gods views on smoking then?"

Oh? smoking? Yeah, of course I know Gods views on smoking, He posted a meme on face book the other day. Hates it. 

I mean where do the JW's get these ideas? They seriously believe that smokers, because they're smokers, will not enter Heaven! You'd think with the numbers getting into Heaven being so tight, they'd be glad of  a few people scuppering their chances with the odd cigarette, it would improve their odds of entry no end.

I did say I thought they would alienate people with that as an opening gambit. People don't take kindly to being judged about life choices, let alone eternally judged about their life choices.  

I'm pretty sure God would prefer we were opening our conversations about Him with talk of His love for us and the world, and His want for the best for us in our lives, and sure, smoking is not the best for us, it's unhealthy and unsociable, but so is overeating; c'mon, we've all been to
social occasions with food, where we're looking forward to another piece of quiche (this is a Christian gathering - there will be quiche) and the overweight guy is tucking into the last slice, how unsociable!  

And the lady at my door certainly looked like she'd had her fair share of pies, her argument about respecting the body God gave you kind of faltered there.....I wonder if she'll be allowed in?

In Matthew the Pharisees were testing Jesus by asking him about the greatest commandment in the Law. Jesus responded ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’

Love. Not judgement. Not rules. Not do's and don't's. Love.

In being Christians we attempt and often fail to live in this loving way, to accept others and their lifestyle choices, but even if they are choices that are not Gods best desire for them, it won't be those choices that prevent them from entering Heaven. Dismissing Jesus as Saviour is the only thing that can prevent us from entering Heaven. Jesus said  “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." Belief and acceptance of Jesus is our way to Heaven, smoker or not!

So I wonder whether you will give up smoking or take up Jesus, both will have dramatic effects on your life, one will secure your eternity.

Praying For Fabrice Muamba

Why are our tabloid papers urging the nation to pray? Is it because of poverty, abuse, crime etc? No.  It is because a young footballer collapsed from a cardiac arrest during a match on Saturday.

Fabrice Muamba a 23 year old footballer is in a critical condition in hospital and the football fans want him to pull through and their first thoughts are prayer!

I don't follow football; I have an idea that two teams attempt to get a ball in a goal and whichever  team gets the most goals wins the game - that is the extent of my football knowledge!

I was shocked to see a young sports person - a fit and healthy young person being stretchered off a sports pitch with a heart attack! I didn't pray for him initially, I don't know if I should feel bad about that or not, I found the story interesting but I wasn't initially moved to pray.  Until I started to notice his family requesting prayer on twitter, and not in a desperate way, but in a faithful way, then my twitter time line seemed to be full of nothing but requests for prayer for Muamba.

The tabloids had headlines like "God is in control" and "Praying for Muamba".  In times of fear and crisis, most people's first thought is God, and it seems for now God is answering those prayers; Muamba is now breathing on his own and has spoken a few words.

I don't know if Muamba is a Christian, I suspect many of the fans that prayed for him may not be Christians, but my prayer is that God's truth is revealed to the people that wrote the headlines, the players that were on the pitch, the fans in the stadium.  Every single one of them is a child of God and loved by Him, and if last weekend's events brings even one of them into a place where they truly find God as their Father, then that will make headline news in Heaven!

God's house, God's rules.

Why can't 'good' people get themselves to Heaven?

God is a loving God, surely he wouldn’t see someone who has been kind to their neighbours, brought up polite children and dunna lotta work for charidee sent to Hell?

Heaven is God’s home, and just like your home, there are rules. Love his son Jesus, repent of your sins, live your life as best you can to honour Him. Not too hard is it, even if you screw up the living to homour Him bit, he will forgive you!  And you may enter His house.

But what about the type of ‘good’ person I mentioned earlier?  I have a friend who won’t let anybody enter her house with their shoes on, (She’s a clean freak).  I love her dearly but, her house, her rules.  Think of the ‘nicest, goodest, sqeakiest, cleanest’ person you know, who you suspect may not be a Christian yet – if they went to the door of my friends house, they would have to remove their shoes, a really simple rule to enter her house.

Same person almost perfect, but as far as you’re aware they haven’t yet accepted Christ as their personal Saviour.  They get to the door of Heaven, is God going to let them in?  That will depend on their heart. God’s house, God’s rules.   You say “oh they’ve definitely got a good heart, remember they do all the charidee work etc.”

Oh yes, who’s that glorifying? God? Or perhaps it is for their own glory, or for their organisation, or the charity they work for.

We are clearly told in Ephesians 2:8-9 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-not by works, so that no one can boast.

Seems unfair doesn’t it.  God may turn you away from His house, because you didn’t accept His gift to you, you didn’t accept his grace and forgiveness.  The easiest thing in the world for anybody to do, you were such a ‘good guy’ as well, what a waste.

If you agree it seems unfair, think about your own house, your own life, your own rules.  It’s up to you who enters, and guaranteed there will be someone, somewhere, you wouldn’t admit to your house, so why should it be a free for all in God’s?

Of course it is free………… for all who are prepared to accept Him in their lives.

Love Wins.........of course it does.......

God Is Still Holy and What You Learned in Sunday School Is Still True: A Review of “Love Wins”

For a full and intellectual review, read the above.


For a short and simple review, read the following.


Firstly I believe when I die I will go to Heaven, because I have accepted that Jesus died and rose again, and I now live on a daily basis with the Holy Spirit. So not only will I have eternal life in Heaven when I die, but I have got Heaven, here, on Earth now, just as Rob suggests. Because I am attempting to live my life in the way Jesus taught. This hasn't fully excluded the odd Hellish day though!


If I didn't take any note of the fact Jesus bore my sins on the cross, I believe, if I died, I would spend eternity in Hell.


But for me, the book takes a lot of the Bible verses without looking at their full text, which makes them read out of context.


Page 11 "all we have to do is accept, confess and believe, aren't those verbs? And aren't verbs actions?"


Further down the page "Isn't that what Christians have always claimed set their religion apart - that it wasn't, in the end, a religion at all - that you don't have to do anything, because God has already done it through Jesus?"


Yes Rob, and once you have the faith that God did do all those things through Jesus, you feel led by his spirit to accept, confess and believe.


A few pages on Rob is still asking what saves us (which as a man who says he is a Christian, baffles me). He skirts over John 3 in which Jesus tells Nicodemus if he wants to see the "Kingdom of God" he must be "born again".


He could have completed the book there and then by referencing John 3: 1-18. Simples.


Some parts of the book I really identified with e.g page 152
"Imagine a high-school student whose family is part of a Christian church. She belongs to a Christian youth group, has only Christian friends, reads only Christian books and has to attend Christian chapel services, because it's mandatory at the Christian high-school she attends.


That student can potentially become so anesthetized to Jesus that she is unable to see Jesus as the stunning, dangerous, compelling, subversive, dynamic reality that he is . She has simply sung so many songs about Jesus that the name has lost it's power to provoke and inspire.


Her "nearness" can actually produce distance."


I was brought up with the 'wrath of Hell, save yourself today, before it's too late Gospel'


I do regret this approach, as I feel I have wasted a lot of years in fear, rather than in love.


What bothered me most was that the book really only concentrated on our choices and life here on Earth, where the real questions surely lie in the afterlife, whether you're a believer or not.

Rob makes out that God wants us all to be with him, so obviously it will work out that way because he's God. Why would God turn a perfectly good, but dis-believing human being away?

The answer surely is that God will not turn anyone away, there is no limit to who can have eternal life with him in Heaven, he sent his son to die for every single person on the planet.  It's not about an elite of who's out and who's in. Absolutely everyone who believes in Jesus Christ taking their sins on the cross for them personally, will spend eternity in Heaven.


God does not and can not turn away from us. But we absolutely can and do turn away from him............at our peril.


Another review that might interest you over at discomfort foods.