Whether or not Christians need to deconstruct their faith really depends on whether or not it is measuring up to Christ. If something doesn’t look like Jesus, then it needs to be chiseled away and burnt in the fire of sanctification and testing. If it doesn’t look like Jesus, then why would we want to keep it? It needs to be dismantled.

It is quite evident that the problem at Corinth is not that some are going around engaging in baby talk. Rather there is something happening that is “childish” and not mature. To discover what the childish behavior is, one can look at the first few chapters of the letter.

“I heard about a mansion he has built for me in glory…” so goes the old hymn Victory in Jesus. The author, of course, heard about that mansion from the text of Scripture. In John 14:2 (KJV) we read:

“In my Father’s house are many mansions, if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.”

But if you read from new translations the text reads, “In my Father’s house there are many rooms…” (emphasis mine). Why do modern translations take away our mansion? What does Jesus even mean in John 14 and how is this meant to be encouraging?

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I know that there are things on this earth that are wonderful and beautiful and are able to captivate me. They are deep blessings, but they also have a taint of sin built within them. Can you imagine, if God is able to give you substantial joy in this fallen world, what will happen when the “poison of evil and sin” is removed forever? God knows how to make us eternally happy.

To circumcise the heart means to remove the cold, dead, calloused, stiff-necked hearts that so often marked the people and to instead turn fully — with the whole self — to the LORD in dedication.

If one wants to solely make an argument from Scripture, you’d be hard pressed to concoct a creation story that Adam’s fire wife was a demon who ended up haunting babies. The Scripture is not only silent on this—it tells an entirely different story.

The worship leader introduces the song for the morning and says, “Alright, y’all let’s stand up and praise the Lord.” If we place this same worship leader into the exilic period and give him a psalter, all those words could be shortened to one word: “hallelujah”

The popular drummer, Dave Grohl, once referred to guilt as a cancer. “Guilt will confine you, torture you, destroy you as an artist. It’s a black wall. It’s a thief.” The actor Jude Law compared guilt to regret as something that is “no good” and that has to be “snipped out.” Angelina Jolie perhaps sums up the contemporary view of guilt the best when she says: 

“I don’t believe in guilt; I believe in living on impulse as long as you never intentionally hurt another person. And don’t judge people in your life. I think you should live completely free.”

To many, guilt is a negative emotion. It’s a false feeling that is imposed upon us by the strict rules and judgment woven into our society. Therefore, we must fight these negative feelings. The way, according to the world, to rid ourselves of guilt is to either deny it or find some way to make amends to assuage those feelings. 

Does the Bible share this view of guilt? Is guilt a real thing or a false feeling? And how does the Bible speak of our rescue from guilt?

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From the very beginning God was marching toward our redemption. When the first couple sinned, they placed themselves on a path of enmity. It was a path of enmity with one another (we see it in their blaming each other), a path of enmity with God as well as with creation, and even their own bodies. But in Genesis 3:15 there is a clue that a Redeemer is coming.

If you’ve ever heard the word martyr, it’s likely to have been either in the context of someone talking about having a martyr complex or hearing about religious persecution. In the secular world, the word has a negative connotation. When someone says, “Stop being such a martyr!” they mean that you should stop putting yourself in the position of a suffering victim. But in a Christian context, martyrs are considered to be heroes of the faith. “Be a martyr” would have been the mantra of the early church. So what is a martyr? 

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Was Jesus actually sweating blood? Is this even medically possible? What has our Lord in such agony? We’ll find that this actually is a medical condition—though rare—and his agony here is important for our understanding of what took place on the cross. The agony of Gethsemane leads to the victory at Golgotha.

“Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.” -Yoda

“Before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves.” -Confucius

“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.” -Gandalf

Wisdom. When I think of wisdom I tend to think of the long grey beard of Gandalf, or the quiet demeanor of Yoda, or the pithy statements of Confucius. But is this what the Bible means by wisdom?

The dictionary definition is “the quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment.” Certainly Yoda, Confucius, and Gandalf would fit within that definition. But the Bible defines wisdom a bit differently. In Scripture, wisdom is directly related to living in accordance with how God has ordered the world.

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Fashion designer Coco Chanel once remarked, “gentleness doesn’t get work done unless you happen to be a hen laying eggs.”

Sadly, this dismissal of gentleness is not reserved for the world. In our increasingly polarized society, Christians are also succumbing to the idea that what we really need is brute strength to get things done. Far from dismissing gentleness, the Scriptures speak of gentleness as the way the kingdom of God "gets things done."

But what is gentleness? And does it accomplish things?

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I do not believe that a simple reading of Scripture would lead one to believe that there is an extended time of purifying that a believer must endure upon their death. On the whole the Scriptures seem to proclaim that to depart is to be with the Lord Jesus.