Here I am, on the other side of the simple living time, still alive and not deathly ill. Probably the most surprising food item we made from scratch was pop tarts. My roommate found a recipe for it, so we made them one day and they were actually quite good. You might be thinking the title of this post has to do with a particular fruit we weren't allowed to eat during our simple living/scratch cooking endeavor. However, that would only apply to fruit that was already prepared in some way. The title was actually inspired by a conversation I had with a man at Cedar Ridge last week. I have been talking to him quite a bit and he seems very willing to talk about God and the Scriptures. He has obviously spent some time studying. A lot of the questions I asked him had decent responses that at least demonstrated some knowledge of the Word. Then he began telling me of his view on the fall of man. He doesn't think that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or the fruit on it were literally physically there. He thinks it is symbolic because there are other trees and fruits in Scripture that are symbolic, like the Vine and the branches or the fruits of the Spirit. Since he doesn't see eating a fruit as that terrible of a sin, he thinks the fall was a result of some sexual sin committed with some of the other people that he thinks lived on the earth at that point. I am amazed at how much thought he put into it all, but I still don't understand why he doesn't just accept the plain meaning of the text. He did seem to enjoy our conversation and said he is willing to learn. Since I have a limited time with these guys, it is often hard to know which issues to focus on and which ones are not quite as crucial. I do think he is a believer and I really want him to understand the things that have been freely given to him in Christ, that he might grab hold of those. The exciting thing about sharing that kind of information with someone is that gives us the opportunity to reflect on those things!
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Is simple always easier? I like simple things and that is probably because they are generally easier to do and understand. Maybe it's just my natural tendency toward laziness and comfort. But this week we are starting a 2 week time period that they call "simple living". There used to be a "jungle camp" where missionary candidates would go build a jungle house and live there for six weeks of the training. They haven't been able to have the full fledged jungle camp here, but part of the experience of living simply will be covered in this time period. We are asked to not use electric appliances and regular AC lights should be off by 9pm. We are supposed to limit the use of our computers and stay off the internet during this time. Also, we will be making all of our food "from scratch". This means no microwave stuff and no instant anything. We must make our own bread, much like we may need to on the field.
So, I will not be blogging for at least a couple of weeks. Hopefully after the class is over, I will have time to write a little more. I have been staying rather busy and was away on a trip all weekend without my computer, so I decided it would be good to inform my readership of what I've been up to. See you in a few weeks! |
AuthorWe are normal people who believe that God would have us serve Him in Brazil. We are saddened by the existence of people who do not have access to the gospel due to their location and language. We want to live among such a people group and plant a church among them, shepherding the believers as they grow to maturity. Archives
November 2019
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