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    Sacrilegious: A Challenge of Perspective
    Sacrilegious: A Challenge of Perspective
    Sacrilegious: A Challenge of Perspective
    Ebook107 pages1 hour

    Sacrilegious: A Challenge of Perspective

    By J.D. Fuller

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    About this ebook

    What happens when we create a pseudo-God? We get pseudo-Christianity. What are the repercussions of such a belief? A mediocre group of self-promoting do-gooders who are, in the name of all that is religious, enemies of God.

    Pseudo-God Pseudo-Christianity Pseudo-religious Sacrilegious

    Watch your perspective change as you take on the Sacrilegious challenge in the midst of a pseudo-religious culture infused with ambiguity.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherWestBow Press
    Release dateFeb 12, 2013
    ISBN9781449776398
    Sacrilegious: A Challenge of Perspective
    Author

    J.D. Fuller

    J.D. Fuller earned a Bachelor of Science degree in education and a Master of Arts in Teaching English as a Second Language. She has lived and taught both in the US and abroad. Her missionary travels have taken her to Mexico, Peru, Nicaragua, and most recently Eastern Europe, where she and her husband, Spencer, spent fifteen months connecting with people and sharing their faith. The Fullers have made their home in New Braunfels, Texas, and continue to live out their journey of sharing faith in everyday life.

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      Book preview

      Sacrilegious - J.D. Fuller

      Copyright © 2013 J.D. Fuller

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

      WestBow Press books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

      WestBow Press

      A Division of Thomas Nelson

      1663 Liberty Drive

      Bloomington, IN 47403

      www.westbowpress.com

      1-(866) 928-1240

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Scripture quotations from THE MESSAGE. Copyright (c) by Eugene H. Peterson 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

      Scripture quotations marked (ESV) are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

      "Definitions from Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate® Dictionary, Eleventh Edition©2012 by Merriam-Webster, Incorporated (www.Merriam-Webster.com). Used by permission."

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-7639-8 (e)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-7640-4 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4497-7641-1 (hc)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2012921668

      WestBow Press rev. date: 02/11/2013

      Contents

      Preface

      Chapter 1. im·age

      Chapter 2. fa·cade

      Chapter 3. usurp

      Chapter 4. plan

      Chapter 5. am·big·u·ous

      Chapter 6. hyp·o·crite

      Chapter 7. source

      Chapter 8. wage

      Chapter 9. pro·pi·ti·a·te

      Chapter 10. pre·tense

      Chapter 11. per·spec·tive

      Afterword

      For MK, especially PP

      For Joshua

      You didn’t think, did you, that just by pointing your finger at others you would distract God from seeing all your misdoings and from coming down on you hard? Or did you think that because he’s such a nice God, he’d let you off the hook? Better think this one through from the beginning. God is kind, but he’s not soft. In kindness he takes us firmly by the hand and leads us into a radical life-change.

      Romans 2:3-5 (THE MESSAGE)

      Preface

      Two different worlds collided.

      All of a sudden there wasn’t much of a difference between the mainstream people I came from and the group of people with which I now found myself. Both groups called themselves Christians. At first there seemed to be such a stark difference between the two--so much so I wondered how in the world Christianity could be claimed on both sides. If someone were to ask me, Are you a Christian? in this context, it would take me a while to answer--fearful of what presupposition that person had in mind. I might even have to ask for a definition of the term.

      It is often easiest to point out the imperfections in others. I found myself in a foreign country trying to pull the sawdust out of someone else’s eye, when I was broadsided with my own Redwood Forest. The things these people were doing in plain sight, what I was condemning them for, I was guilty of inwardly.

      This is a journey of challenging perspective.

      Chapter 1

      im·age

      a mental picture or impression of something

      To whom then will you liken God,

      or what likeness compare with him?

      Isaiah 40:18 (ESV)

      Christianity. As defined by those who call themselves Christians, it could be anything. It could look like anything.

      Good outweighing bad.

      Entering a place of worship on a regular basis. A state. Energy. Standing, sitting, or kneeling.

      An angel on one shoulder and its counterpart on the other.

      Feeling guilty. Feeling unworthy to pray. Wanting to do right but still doing wrong and knowing that when you do that wrong you will be forgiven.

      A promise to be rich. A promise to live without hard times. A promise to be poor or to give up everything you own.

      A picture of saints of old painted by not so contemporary painters. Stained glass, hidden hands or richly clothed poor people. A cross worn around the neck or a Bible sitting on a coffee table or beside the bed.

      Two-faced.

      Fake. Stagnant. A mystery. Something you earn. Just for the rich, or just for the unfortunate. For the good times, or just for emergencies. A why prayer or if you’re really up there prayer or a counted prayer prayed.

      A good feeling or chills on your arm.

      Inherited. Bought. Given by a church, a priest or a person.

      An act. Playing pretend. Playing dress up. Being social. Belonging to a social club.

      Watered down and ineffective. Powerless. Helpless. Selfish. Comparing yourself to someone else.

      Water, no matter the depth.

      A certain age.

      Piety. Just for men or just for women or just for children.

      Just for one day, or for a season like spring or winter. Christmas or Easter.

      A building.

      Despising another person or people group.

      Fame. A joke.

      A status. Changeable.

      Saying you believe something you don’t.

      A sword-point confession or the person holding the sword.

      A good deed. A thought or an idea. Good intentions.

      Being a good person. Cooking a meal or writing a letter or visiting a hospital. Signing a petition. Being patriotic. Religion. Being religious.

      Pearls. Gold. Beautiful buildings. Gracefully crafted statues. A specific place. A certain time.

      Confidence in another person. The failure of another person.

      A competition. A power trip. A game.

      Pointing to the sky. Bowing the head. Folding the hands. A moment of silence.

      A bandage. A crutch.

      Contemporary. Archaic.

      Saying the right words. Saying repeated words.

      An image of an old man with a long grey beard sitting on a gold throne with a golden pitchfork in one hand and a lightening bolt in the other.

      Answered prayer. Unanswered prayer.

      A championship game won. Or lost. Bowing a knee in the end zone. A sign of a cross or one worn around the neck. Publicly stating God bless and fill-in-the-blank.

      Memorizing scripts or scriptures. Trying to convince. Being a parrot. Or a puppet. Or a doormat.

      Is Christianity really about us? Is it really about what we can do? Is it possible for each individual to define Christianity according to his or her own preferences, as if a person is ordering from a menu at a restaurant?

      I

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