F1|25t P057!!! (That's "First Post," for those of you who don't read l33t).

Greetings!  


So this is a blog.  It's called The Imperfect Church Blog.  There's a reason for that.


But I'm not quite ready to reveal what that reason is just yet.  I assure you, when I talk about it, it will be filled with great wonder and glory, and will surely become one of the most talked-about blog posts since some guy named Steve incorrectly used a punctuation mark in a blog post and all the grammar sticklers descended on him in a rage of perfectly-typed English.


Still, I'll let you in on a little bit of what this blog will be about.  I'll post on a lot of theological topics, but for the most part, I'll approach it all exegetically.  Meaning that I'll post up a passage from Scripture and just talk about it, verse-by-verse.  Generally, I'll do this by asking five questions of each passage:


1)  What did this passage mean to its original audience?  (This can include both the people in the narratives/letters/etc., and the audience the author wrote the piece of literature to.  For example, in the Gospel of Mark, chapter 1, this question could talk about John the Baptist and the people he baptized, as well as the audience who read the first draft of the Gospel after Mark penned it around 60 A.D.)


2)  What does this passage mean for us, today?  (Sometimes it means exactly the same thing; sometimes we have to account for all the cultural and temporal distance.  For example, how does "do not steal" apply to a world of digital content, where downloading is simply making a copy, instead of removing the original item from someone's possession?)


3)  What does this passage call us to do?  (Despite some people insisting that church is only a matter of the heart, Scripture actually does call us to do things, from time to time).


4)  What does this passage tell us about ourselves?  (Scripture is the only perfect book that has ever been written.  As such, it perfectly and accurately describes the human condition in its many books.  So what is it telling us about ourselves in each passage?)


5)  What glory of God is this passage revealing?  (Every page of Scripture is about Jesus.  It is written to His glory; He is the main character.  So what is this passage uniquely contributing to this revelation?)


I'll post later today on Mark 1:1-8, where I simply ask these five questions and wrestle with the text until it gives me the answers.  


For the boring purposes of copyright issues: everything I write in these posts are my own thoughts, unless I indicate otherwise.  Given that I've attended Wheaton College for a major in Bible in Theology, then Trinity Evangelical Divinity School for a Master of Divinity degree, I've got a lot of sources pouring ideas into my head.  As such, it's possible I may unintentionally refer to someone else's ideas.  I will endeavor my hardest to avoid this, and I'll cite whenever I take a thought or quote from someone else.  But for the most part, the content of these posts is coming just from little ol' me.  Which is to say, it's all the result of the gifts God gave me, so all glory should go to Him for anything good that I write.  And as for anything wrong... well, I'm still an imperfect person, and this is an imperfect blog.  So if you see anything imperfect, just let it spark a longing in your heart for the New Heavens and New Earth, when all imperfection fades away and we are left with the perfect beauty of God dwelling with us.