Chocolaholics beware!
The Birmingham UK Chocolate manufacture is being fined after about 12 to 30 people have fallen ill after eating its chocolate. The fine is likely to be in the tens of millions of dollars although currently reported as ‘unlimited’.
The charges relate to an outbreak of Salmonella at Cadbury’s Marlbrook factory in Herefordshire, that was first detected on January 19 last year. Cadbury later admitted that it failed to report the incident, blamed on a leaking pipe, because it believed there was no risk to human health. Cadbury has already lost around £30 million because of the product recalls and are likely to face private litigation claims in the near future.
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Sinless perfection?
Today I attended two different church services. First, was at Wesley Methodist Church because I had to fetch my grandmother for her service and back home and so I decided to attend it myself. Second, was at my church, GLCC as it was my Pastor’s ordination service (that’s where he is ordained and formally appointed as the Pastor of the church).
Attending Wesley was nothing new, as I was attending that church when I finally decided to become a Christian. However, my beliefs (in relation to many aspects of theology and practice) were different, I decided to leave and eventually ended up at my present church (I believe its always necessary to find a place that you’re comfortable in, unnecessary to find one that you agree with completely, impossible to find a perfect one!).
The preacher delivered a rather unconventional Father’s Day message. She used the passage a Ruth, a book normally used in relation to Mother’s Day messages to highlight the contributions and godliness of lady from which it receives its name. The passage was Ruth 3:7-18. In a nutshell, the passage records how Ruth, a widow, and her mother-in-law were taken care of by Boaz who eventually married her and therefore ‘redeemed’ her. The message naturally focused on his actions.
It would appear that Ruth’s mother-in-law, Naomi, encouraged her to essentially to go to Boaz at night and after he had eaten and drunk to ‘offer herself’ to him. Of course as the story goes, he didn’t take advantage of her and instead, after first seeking out the person who was ‘next in line’ to marry Ruth (there was some kind of hierarchical structure at play in their culture), he married her.
This made me think of something. Many people, I’ve noticed this especially in some Muslim literature that I have read, have highlighted or challenged the Old Testament’s failure to cover up these not so glamorous details of the lives of the notable biblical characters. Many of these people like Moses, King David, King Solomon, Samson, and here Ruth, have committed actions in their lives that are, even by the non-Christian world’s standards, unacceptable and immoral. Moses committed the murder of an Egyptian soldier. David committed adultery, had the woman’s husband murdered, and then took her as his bride. Solomon apparently had many mistresses and committed every conceivable infringement of God’s moral law. And here, of course, Ruth attempted, upon the prompting of her mother-in-law, the mother of her very own dead husband, to offer herself to another man for sex (presumably the intention was that he would get her pregnant and therefore would be obliged to marry and take care of her).
Although many some of them committed these ‘sins’ before conversion, this was not always the case. Yet, these same people are celebrated in the bible as well as by Christians as ‘champions of the faith’, as godly people. So what purpose do these records serve? What are we to gleam from them?
I think that it is irresponsible on the part of Christians to brush these off as pre-salvation experiences or actions or perhaps even that it was a different dispensation. The fact is that if we claim that God doesn’t ever change (and this presumably applies to His moral laws as well since they are derived from His very nature) then it is essential that we reconcile these records with the claimed that these people were godly people.
One possibility is that we need to recognise and appreciate that all these people were human and therefore as susceptible to ‘falling’ into sin as anyone of us today. In addition, despite our tendency to grade the severity of sin or crimes, we have to realise that God does not so categorise them and that they are all equally as repugnant in His eyes. Furthermore, it may be the case that since sins, whether in our own assessment are ‘big’ or ‘small’, ‘serious’ or ‘minor’ are viewed as equally heinous by God, they may not necessarily affect our relationship with Him in the sense of making us any less or more godly.
The fact is each and every one of us commit sins daily (either by thought or deed). Irrespective of whether they are ‘big’ or ‘small’ sins, if they were to have any significant affect of our level of spirituality or closeness to God, we would all be disqualified. Furthermore, I seriously doubt that we are like these computer games, having a ‘god-o-metre’ at the bottom of the screen which rises and falls depending on how are handle any and all situations which are presented before us.
This does not mean that if we commit any infringement there are no consequences –there most certainly are as we can see in all the examples above (and many others in the bible). But it does mean that we are truly saved we are “godly”. Let me explain.
It is an accepted teaching that after a person becomes a Christian, Christ’s holiness is applied to the individual believer such that when God looks at us, he sees us as holy. It should follow that even when we commit sins, it doesn’t in any way diminish our ‘new found’ holiness or godliness. Thus it should affect our standing before God. Of course this is not and should not be a licence to live a life of debauchery, but having this in mind may help relieve the immense pressure and expectation that is often placed on Christians (whether by themselves or by others) to be ‘almost’ perfect. The fact of the matter is that none of us are going to be able to attain sinless perfection in this life, and I don’t believe we should be expected to.
=========================
Minister salaries
As mentioned above the second service I attended this morning was at my own church for my Pastor’s ordination. The Senior Pastor (who’s stepping down) preached a message titled ‘Your Pastor’s humble requests’ which was meant to give the congregation an understanding of the difficulties that the incoming Pastor is likely to face, with the hope that we would be aware and understanding of them and then to act accordingly.
The point which caught my attention above all the others was on how the church needs to support the Pastor(s). Now, with many churches gravitating towards teachings such as the ‘Health and Wealth’ Movement – where apparently God necessarily will bless people materially (allegedly according to your level of spirituality) and that such blessings are claimable, it should follow that the Pastor should be the riches of the lot! In many such churches, some of them present even here in Singapore, Pastors drive BMW 7 Series cars or Jaguars and live in massive million-dollar mansions. This culture (and perhaps abuses) inevitably leads to churches going to the other extreme and Pastors feeling afraid to raise genuine needs in relation to their salaries. Often it is held that Pastors or full-time Christian workers must live sacrificially, by faith. I believe that such thinking is down-right wrong!
A Pastor’s job, just like the head of any organisation, is extremely difficult. To make it worse, the Pastor job-scope includes giving weekly or bi-weekly or more messages which requires significant amounts of research and study. He also has to meet up with people to counsel them, not to mention oversee the efficient running of the church. It is nothing like what someone once joked to me that a Pastor’s job is to be ‘invisible 6 days of the week, and incomprehensible on 1’!
It surprises me because I would have thought that no one would understand this more than Singaporeans. After all, with the recent talk on Ministeral salary increases, I would have thought that Singaporeans should be very familiar with the justifications for and used to paying Ministers the amounts that they presumably would command in the private sector. In the case of the incoming Pastor, he is a medical doctor by profession. It must be realised that, at least from a Christian perspective, he didn’t choose to become a Pastor – God did (and we believe that since God chose him, he could not but become the Pastor. Staying in medical practice is no longer an option).
Even if it is accepted that he had to make a sacrifice, believe you me, the nature of the job itself is sacrifice enough (would any of you want to trade places, bearing in mind that you have to prepare and deliver at least 1 different 45min -1hr speech every week, listen to numerous people and help them with all their problems, and be ‘on call’ 24/7?).
Their salaries should definitely be commensurate with the nature, scope and volume of the work and should also be comparable with (although it may not be identical to) what they would be able to command in the private sector. It is only fair.
The Birmingham UK Chocolate manufacture is being fined after about 12 to 30 people have fallen ill after eating its chocolate. The fine is likely to be in the tens of millions of dollars although currently reported as ‘unlimited’.
The charges relate to an outbreak of Salmonella at Cadbury’s Marlbrook factory in Herefordshire, that was first detected on January 19 last year. Cadbury later admitted that it failed to report the incident, blamed on a leaking pipe, because it believed there was no risk to human health. Cadbury has already lost around £30 million because of the product recalls and are likely to face private litigation claims in the near future.
==========================
Sinless perfection?
Today I attended two different church services. First, was at Wesley Methodist Church because I had to fetch my grandmother for her service and back home and so I decided to attend it myself. Second, was at my church, GLCC as it was my Pastor’s ordination service (that’s where he is ordained and formally appointed as the Pastor of the church).
Attending Wesley was nothing new, as I was attending that church when I finally decided to become a Christian. However, my beliefs (in relation to many aspects of theology and practice) were different, I decided to leave and eventually ended up at my present church (I believe its always necessary to find a place that you’re comfortable in, unnecessary to find one that you agree with completely, impossible to find a perfect one!).
The preacher delivered a rather unconventional Father’s Day message. She used the passage a Ruth, a book normally used in relation to Mother’s Day messages to highlight the contributions and godliness of lady from which it receives its name. The passage was Ruth 3:7-18. In a nutshell, the passage records how Ruth, a widow, and her mother-in-law were taken care of by Boaz who eventually married her and therefore ‘redeemed’ her. The message naturally focused on his actions.
It would appear that Ruth’s mother-in-law, Naomi, encouraged her to essentially to go to Boaz at night and after he had eaten and drunk to ‘offer herself’ to him. Of course as the story goes, he didn’t take advantage of her and instead, after first seeking out the person who was ‘next in line’ to marry Ruth (there was some kind of hierarchical structure at play in their culture), he married her.
This made me think of something. Many people, I’ve noticed this especially in some Muslim literature that I have read, have highlighted or challenged the Old Testament’s failure to cover up these not so glamorous details of the lives of the notable biblical characters. Many of these people like Moses, King David, King Solomon, Samson, and here Ruth, have committed actions in their lives that are, even by the non-Christian world’s standards, unacceptable and immoral. Moses committed the murder of an Egyptian soldier. David committed adultery, had the woman’s husband murdered, and then took her as his bride. Solomon apparently had many mistresses and committed every conceivable infringement of God’s moral law. And here, of course, Ruth attempted, upon the prompting of her mother-in-law, the mother of her very own dead husband, to offer herself to another man for sex (presumably the intention was that he would get her pregnant and therefore would be obliged to marry and take care of her).
Although many some of them committed these ‘sins’ before conversion, this was not always the case. Yet, these same people are celebrated in the bible as well as by Christians as ‘champions of the faith’, as godly people. So what purpose do these records serve? What are we to gleam from them?
I think that it is irresponsible on the part of Christians to brush these off as pre-salvation experiences or actions or perhaps even that it was a different dispensation. The fact is that if we claim that God doesn’t ever change (and this presumably applies to His moral laws as well since they are derived from His very nature) then it is essential that we reconcile these records with the claimed that these people were godly people.
One possibility is that we need to recognise and appreciate that all these people were human and therefore as susceptible to ‘falling’ into sin as anyone of us today. In addition, despite our tendency to grade the severity of sin or crimes, we have to realise that God does not so categorise them and that they are all equally as repugnant in His eyes. Furthermore, it may be the case that since sins, whether in our own assessment are ‘big’ or ‘small’, ‘serious’ or ‘minor’ are viewed as equally heinous by God, they may not necessarily affect our relationship with Him in the sense of making us any less or more godly.
The fact is each and every one of us commit sins daily (either by thought or deed). Irrespective of whether they are ‘big’ or ‘small’ sins, if they were to have any significant affect of our level of spirituality or closeness to God, we would all be disqualified. Furthermore, I seriously doubt that we are like these computer games, having a ‘god-o-metre’ at the bottom of the screen which rises and falls depending on how are handle any and all situations which are presented before us.
This does not mean that if we commit any infringement there are no consequences –there most certainly are as we can see in all the examples above (and many others in the bible). But it does mean that we are truly saved we are “godly”. Let me explain.
It is an accepted teaching that after a person becomes a Christian, Christ’s holiness is applied to the individual believer such that when God looks at us, he sees us as holy. It should follow that even when we commit sins, it doesn’t in any way diminish our ‘new found’ holiness or godliness. Thus it should affect our standing before God. Of course this is not and should not be a licence to live a life of debauchery, but having this in mind may help relieve the immense pressure and expectation that is often placed on Christians (whether by themselves or by others) to be ‘almost’ perfect. The fact of the matter is that none of us are going to be able to attain sinless perfection in this life, and I don’t believe we should be expected to.
=========================
Minister salaries
As mentioned above the second service I attended this morning was at my own church for my Pastor’s ordination. The Senior Pastor (who’s stepping down) preached a message titled ‘Your Pastor’s humble requests’ which was meant to give the congregation an understanding of the difficulties that the incoming Pastor is likely to face, with the hope that we would be aware and understanding of them and then to act accordingly.
The point which caught my attention above all the others was on how the church needs to support the Pastor(s). Now, with many churches gravitating towards teachings such as the ‘Health and Wealth’ Movement – where apparently God necessarily will bless people materially (allegedly according to your level of spirituality) and that such blessings are claimable, it should follow that the Pastor should be the riches of the lot! In many such churches, some of them present even here in Singapore, Pastors drive BMW 7 Series cars or Jaguars and live in massive million-dollar mansions. This culture (and perhaps abuses) inevitably leads to churches going to the other extreme and Pastors feeling afraid to raise genuine needs in relation to their salaries. Often it is held that Pastors or full-time Christian workers must live sacrificially, by faith. I believe that such thinking is down-right wrong!
A Pastor’s job, just like the head of any organisation, is extremely difficult. To make it worse, the Pastor job-scope includes giving weekly or bi-weekly or more messages which requires significant amounts of research and study. He also has to meet up with people to counsel them, not to mention oversee the efficient running of the church. It is nothing like what someone once joked to me that a Pastor’s job is to be ‘invisible 6 days of the week, and incomprehensible on 1’!
It surprises me because I would have thought that no one would understand this more than Singaporeans. After all, with the recent talk on Ministeral salary increases, I would have thought that Singaporeans should be very familiar with the justifications for and used to paying Ministers the amounts that they presumably would command in the private sector. In the case of the incoming Pastor, he is a medical doctor by profession. It must be realised that, at least from a Christian perspective, he didn’t choose to become a Pastor – God did (and we believe that since God chose him, he could not but become the Pastor. Staying in medical practice is no longer an option).
Even if it is accepted that he had to make a sacrifice, believe you me, the nature of the job itself is sacrifice enough (would any of you want to trade places, bearing in mind that you have to prepare and deliver at least 1 different 45min -1hr speech every week, listen to numerous people and help them with all their problems, and be ‘on call’ 24/7?).
Their salaries should definitely be commensurate with the nature, scope and volume of the work and should also be comparable with (although it may not be identical to) what they would be able to command in the private sector. It is only fair.
posted by Clem | 1:01 AM
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