...The Feast 1) It was a rainy day when I went to the BGC Feast. It was around 2:00pm when I finished preparing myself, it was raining very hard to the point that I thought that there's a storm. I told myself that I'll wait till the rain stopped. It didn't took 15 minutes when the rain suddenly stopped, I was amazed 'cause I was starting to worry that I might arrived late, due to traffic and all, but instead of being late, I arrived almost 30 minutues early than the designated time. When I arrived at the Fully Booked, I went straight to 4th floor. I peeked at the Top (to the venue of the BGC Feast), I could hear a lively music being played, I was enticed, I wanted to come up but my shyness won over me and so I decided to wait for my friends first. When my friends and I entered the room, I was really nervous, but the music calmed me. In the welcoming part, Mr. Benjamin told us that the guest priest will be arriving late and so he asked us to introduce ourselves to 3 people in the gathering. Instead of just 3 people, I made acquitances with more than 5 people, namely: Mafe, Jason, Ate Celine, Kwen, Kim, Abby and others. It was fun meeting other peoe around my age other than my schoolmates. People there were very welcoming and made me feel like I belong. When the mass started, I felt a little awkward. I don't go to Catholic masses anymore, other than those held at school, so I'm not that familiar on what exactly to respond on some parts and the lyrics of the songs, they kinda changed...
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...I’m a Believer “Once upon a time,” one of the most popular ways to start a fairytale style book or movie. While most fairytales are well known for the handsome prince and the beautiful princess; The DreamWorks, American computer-animated fantasy comedy Shrek, written by Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, Joe Stillman, and Roger S.H. Schulman, is a different fairytale movie than we are use too. This movie has a combination of romance, action, fantasy, and mystery in one great comedy movie. The movie Shrek is about a large ogre that goes on a worldwide adventure to rescue a princess. Shrek brings the meaning of a fairytale to a completely different level. A fairytale love story about a large green ogre, an outspoken Donkey, and Fiona, a princess different than most. The movie is an astonishing visual that has animation techniques that are very life like and fantastical all at the same time. DreamWorks motion picture Shrek is a well written movie with its great animation and wonderful characters. Shrek is a large green ogre that lives in a swamp surrounded by “Keep Out” signs. All that the ogre wants is to be left alone. Maybe he does not want to be left alone but maybe he is just lonely. Mike Myers is the voice of Shrek and he does a wonderful job. Eddie Murphy, the voice of Donkey, has a sense of sarcasm. Donkey is lonely and he just wants a friend and he loves to talk. Fiona, voice by Cameron Diaz, is the princess locked in the top of a castle that is protected by a fire breathing...
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...Being a True Believer In God Faith is defined as “complete trust or confidence in something or someone”. So what does it mean to have faith in God and in turn how does this faith make itself present in our everyday lives? These are questions that have been addressed by countless authors and poets of history. To fully invest one’s self into the belief of God and to truly call themselves a believer of God, a person must trust, or have faith, in God’s will, power, and plan. It is this faith that God will provide and protect that proves time and again to be an essential part of being a true believer. Authors like John Steinbeck and Robert Bolt have used this faith as essential themes in their greatest works The Grapes of Wrath and A Man for all Seasons. Steinbeck and Bolt both portray what it means to be a believer in God through their main character’s actions and beliefs. John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath, portrays life of migrants during the time of the dust bowl and specifically focuses on the migrant family, the Joads. These migrants and their families are traveling westward to California, looking for new opportunities to improve their lives and to provide for their families. On their journey the Joad family encounters death, homelessness, starvation, and extreme poverty that they never expected when starting out on their trip. Every member of the family is extremely affected by these images but none more than Jim Casey, a preacher and friend of the family. At the...
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...I am a firm believer that a healthy mind promotes a healthy body. I feel this way because without a strong mind, including both your attitude and lifestyle you will never achieve total health. Since the body and mind are connected and emotions play such a large part in determining one’s health status, if you try separating out the mind from the body and how they interact it only makes sense that it would be misleading. For example, if a person lives a healthy life such as, exercise regularly, weight management, eating healthy food and manage a stress free environment they would live a longer life span, then those who live a life style drinking alcohol, smoking, and party. With a healthy mind, we begin to apply health and wellness into our lives, and be able to encouge family, friends or co-workers to do the same. It is very important that we live an healthy life because a healthy mind promotes a healthy way of living. Proper diet and exercise or making the wise choice not to partake excessive caffeine, drugs and alcohol use as well. With a healthy mind, we begin to apply health and wellness into our lives and make conscious decisions in everything we do or choose to participate in. I also believe it is a body-mind connection and it all starts in our head. It is very important that I live my life in a health way such as to minmize the unexpected A healthy mind also promotes a healthy way of living because you are looking at the positives that comes from having a healthy body...
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...In recent years, a wave of anti-vaccination beliefs has been sweeping the nation. However, vaccines “protect us from diseases that used to routinely kill hundreds of thousands of children in the United States and still kill hundreds of thousands globally” (University of Pennsylvania, 2012). Even with this knowledge, many parents have refused to vaccinate their children over fears of side effects, but this has created a significant health risk for the greater public and those more at risk, such as children too young for vaccines and the elderly. Much of the anti-vaccination sentiment is based on misinformation and uninformed positions. Vaccines have benefited humanity greatly and the only thing to outperform the benefits of vaccines to public health is clean water (Andre, Booy, Bock, Clemens, Datta & John et al., 2008). Vaccinations are an essential part of disease prevention as when children are not vaccinated, they can spread diseases to others and face serious health risks of their own from vaccine-preventable diseases. Vaccines rely on a herd, meaning that they are only very effective if nearly everyone receives them. This helps to eradicate the diseases from the bulk of the population, making it very unlikely that at-risk and unvaccinated individuals would be exposed to the diseases. As a result, the more unvaccinated people there are, the greater the risk of an outbreak. Therefore, “if a high number of children go intentionally unvaccinated because of personal belief...
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...What is meant by the problem of suffering for religious believers? Examine two solutions to this problem. The concept of evil and suffering is generally seen as a serious problem for religious believers. Evil and suffering can be seen to pose strong challenges against the existence of a God, more specifically an omnipotent and omnibenevolent God. Whilst John Hick describes evil and suffering as “physical pain, mental suffering and moral wickedness”, the problem is widely seen to refer to the existence of both natural evil, such as natural disasters, and moral evil, heartless actions such as murder, along with the suffering that is often a result of these. Perhaps one of the most significant aspects of the problem of suffering, the issue suggests that only two of the three features of the God of classical theism can be possible. If God is omniscient, he is all knowing and is knowledgeable of the suffering that exists. If God is omnipotent, then he must have the power to stop this suffering, and if he is an omnibenevolent, all-loving God, he must wish to stop this suffering. The existence of suffering suggests that God cannot be omniscient and omnipotent and still be omnibenevolent in agreement. As David Hume describes, God must be either malevolent or powerless for the other two features to remain applicable. Aquinas also argued this case, but referred to the idea that “the name of God means that He is infinite goodness”, which signifies that a God that did not meet...
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...Like a lot of of people in the world, I used to ridicule and make fun of artists - all kinds of artists. Anyone in the arts and fine arts stream, though I just kept that to myself. But i recently hit another way of thinking. Something which made me respect them over most other jobs in the world. If you think about it, God made us all using a variety of combinations of things (which we identify as elements today). Humans are made out of carbon, just like diamonds. So technically, isn't that what all artists are doing today??? Using the things around them in different combinations or showing the something in a different light. Like a scientist, or an architect. But the same goes for say writing literature, painting, sculpturing, photography, dancing, singing, etc etc. For example, if one makes a song, you need the key melody which is a combination of sounds that we hear in nature, then the tune is built on that, lyrics are needed to give it meaning in a way we can understand it, different instruments and beats are needed, and lastly, a well trained voice to bring it to life. Then the song is layered and it goes on... BUT Isn't that exactly what all artists strive to do everyday?? Isn't it similar to doing something only God can do, though its on earth? I think that's respectable. I think that deserves the high amount that artists earn. It deserves respect since not many people can do it to that degree. Seriously, they are giving life to something which most people recognize...
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...experiencing it and is always a positive event and they have a religious element to them. A believer can have a vision a vision is an image or event in which there is a message and are always non-empirical, this could mean a number of different things depending on the believer however most are numinous this is what Otto described as a feeling of fear and fascination. A vision could gain understanding, an example of this is Julian of Norwich who determined that God is a mother she had this feeling of sudden understanding this can also be described noetic quality. An effect on the believer could also be that it reinforces faith, for example in Genesis Jacob has an imaginary vision in which he sees a stairway to heaven with angels ascending and descending and at the top sat God, this reinforced his belief and when he awoke he felt God’s presence in the place. A result of a vision could also be a social influence, this could be by discovering a healing spring such as St Bernadette who had 18 corporeal visions in which she saw the Virgin Mary who told her to dig and she found a healing spring, this had huge impacts to Lourdes bringing in hundreds of pilgrims. Visions are always spontaneous and leave the believer feeling at peace with themselves and they can feel closer with God, they are also Transient, this means that they do not last long however their effects could last long depending on the believer, for example the Toronto blessing changed...
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...exists. There are two types of evil that cause suffering, these being natural evil and moral evil. Natural evil is that of the natural world such as, floods, diseases and earthquakes. Moral evil is humans doing immoral actions, such as 9/11 bombings or the Holocaust. These horrific events were carried out by humans. God allowed us to have free will so moral evil challenges God’s nature as God allowed these incidents to occur which caused many innocent people to suffer and die. If God was all loving then surely God would want to put an end to evil and suffering? Incidents like these bring about questions about God’s goodness and causes some people to believe that God is not all good. As an imperfect God is not of classical theism, some believers could say this God is not worth worshipping if that God isn't omnibenevolent. A solution to the problem of suffering is the Augustian theodicy, proposed by St. Augustine (AD 354-430). His theodicy, an attempt to justify the existence of a loving God in the face of evil, argues that God created the world and it was perfect, without the existence of evil and suffering. He defines evil as the absence of goodness so evil is not an entity in itself meaning that God could not have created it. The...
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...2 (a) (i) In what ways may suffering be seen as a problem for a religious believer? Give an account of two solutions to this problem. (21) (ii) To what extent is one of these solutions more convincing than the other? (9) i) Suffering may be seen as a problem for religious believers because it may make them question the existence or qualities of the God of classical theism. For example, the inconsistent triad as proposed by J.L. Mackie has three different corners, where it is impossible for all three corners to be true at the same time. The corners of the triangle are “god is omnibenevolent”, “God is omnipotent” and “evil exists”. If God was omnibenevolent he would not want evil to happen, and if he was omnipotent he would have the power to stop evil from happening. Therefore, as evil exists, one of these qualities must be false which means the God of classical theism cannot exist. This is known as the theological problem. If God is not all powerful or perfectly good, it forces the question of whether he is worthy of worship. If God does not possess the qualities that define him as God what is the purpose of worshipping him as a God. Another problem for religious believers is that if God is omniscient he knows everything that has happened and that will happen. Therefore, he knows when evil is about to happen and yet does not do anything to prevent it. This presents another problem that God may also not be omniscient, which again, brings us to question whether...
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...Personal Life of Author and Focus of Book John Ortberg the author of The Life You’ve Always Wanted, If You Want To Walk On Water You’ve Got To Get Out The Boat and Love Beyond Reason was previously the teaching pastor at Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington, Illinois and is now on staff at Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in Menlo Park, California. The following book review is concerning his work presented in The Life You’ve Always Wanted. There’s a point in every Christian’s life where you begin to ask questions like; am I doing all that I was created to do? Am I as intimate with God as I ought to be? Is this life I’m living pleasing to God? The list of questions could go on and on. John Ortberg’s book The Life You’ve Always Wanted gives very clear and precise ways for accurate analysis of our lives through a ministerial, biblical and cultural lens. Ortber’s perspectives, life examples and raw truths are vast and practical for pondering and application. This book voices a line of reasoning in the areas of Hope of Transformation, Spiritual Disciplines, a Well-Ordered Heart, and Living a Life of Endurance. Hope of Transformation Ortberg begins this book with the everlasting ache of disappointment many Christians have experienced as they continue in their personal relationships with God. He places great emphasis on the feeling of disappointment. He states “…the feeling of disappointment is not the problem, but a reflection of a deeper problem – my failure to be...
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...L25178504 New Orleans, LA December 12, 2013 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page I. Introduction 1 a. Thesis and introductory explanation b. Historical development of doctrine II. Arguments for the Existence of God 3 c. Cosmological Argument d. Teleological Argument e. Anthropological III. Atheism Versus Existence of God 11 f. Evidence used to disprove God’s existence g. The believers evidence to counter IV. Conclusion 13 h. Summary of the arguments i. Applications in the church today V. Introduction The existence of an omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, immutable, monotheistic God has come up against enormous resistance from the beginning of time. Early believers such as Moses, Elijah, Paul, and Peter all had to demonstrate that their God is the one true God at times. These believers even encountered persecution and ridicule for holding on to these beliefs at times. Nevertheless the challenges to these early believers tended to be demonstrating that their God was greater than their accuser’s god or gods. At times, it was through the words of men that the God of the Bible was shown to be greater, and other times it was through the action of God in the world and the inaction of the other gods that demonstrated His power and existence This paper will explain three arguments used to demonstrate the existence of God through scientific principles. His existence will be...
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...Liberty Theological Seminary Share Jesus Without Fear A Paper Submitted to Dr. Douglas Munton In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Course Contempary Evangelism EVAN 525-B16 By Clay Potter 15 September 2013 Bibliographical Entry Fay, William and Linda Evans Shepherd. Share Jesus Without Fear. (Nashville, Tenn.:B & H Publishing Group) 1999. William Fay, a former chief executive officer for a major corporation and a former owner of one of the largest houses of prostitution in the United States, is now a chaplain with the Federal Drug Enforcement Agency. He also has his own radio show which is internationally syndicated and known as “Let’s Go”. Since receiving the Lord Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior in 1981, Fay attended Denver Seminary from which he graduated in 1987. Fay has shared the gospel with more than twenty-five thousand people. He lives in Ft. Myers, Florida with his wife. (p. 195, back cover) Linda Evans Shepherd, an award-winning author, travels around the United States speaking to women’s retreats. As a nationally known speaker, she is a member of the National Speaker’s Association. She lives with her family in Longmont, Colorado. (p. 195, back cover) Content Summary Share Jesus Without Fear is a comprehensive blueprint for teaching any would be Christian evangelist how to put aside any fears or hesitations and follow a step...
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...In order for outsiders to see Christians as the church, believers need to be more committed to God, be more compassionate when sharing their faith, and be more transparent to visitors. Without these qualities, the church can seem uninviting. As Towns explains, "God designed the church to be a place where interactive relationships help believers experience God" (108). How can visitors experience God's love if believers are not being more like Jesus? This is why it is so important to be aware, as believers, how outsiders view the church as a whole. With these thoughts in mind, the church can only improve. A few ways, for believers to become more committed to God, is for them not to be caught up in the everyday lifestyle. There is so much technology in our world that distracts our attention from God. We need to be in the Word every day to feel His presence. God is our Father. As Towns informs, "family is the foundational social institution of society" (107). Staying committed to a local church is another way for believers to strengthen their relationship with God. Attending only on Sundays; or holidays, does not seem trustworthy or genuine. Towns informs, "The church is a flock that follows the Shepherd" (106). Daily attendance at a local church allows believers to grow in relationship with fellow believers. We were not meant to go through situations alone. The church is one body, with members of unique gifts. The church is suppose to help each other with whatever they need. Outsiders...
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...views of baptism as identified by Erickson. Baptism as a means of saving grace. Baptism as a sign and seal of the covenant. Baptism as a token of salvation 3 current views of the intermediate state. Soul Sleep – the soul during death and resurrection reposes in a state of unconsciousness. Purgatory – upon death, an individual’s eternal status is determined. Instantaneous Resurrection – upon death, believers receive the resurrection body that has been promised. 5 characteristics of the second coming of Christ. Personal, Physical, Visible, Unexpected, Triumphant and Glorious. 3 prominent millennial views. Postmillennialism – believes that the preaching of the gospel will be so successful that the world will be converted. Premillennialism – believes that Christ will return in person and body to commence the millennium. Amillennialism – believes that there will be no earthly reign of Christ. What are the 3 tribunal views and what distinguishes each? Pretribulationism – 2 phases in Christ’s coming and 3 resurrections. Posttribulationism – 2 resurrections; the resurrection of believers at the end of the tribulation and the resurrection of the ungodly at the end of the millennium. Midtribulationism – the church will experience tribulation, but will be removed before the wrath of God is poured out. The basis of the final judgment? Those who appear will be judged in terms of their earthly lives. Identify 5 reasons to study eschatology? It is a major topic and...
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