Science and Christianity

What’s this?? Another post, my third in as many days???* Amazing, I know. Don’t worry though, this is a short one.

The divide between Science and Christianity is a very wide one – to the point where many whom I have encountered (on both sides of the debate) say it’s really a divide between Intellectualism and Blind Stupidity (at least, that’s my understanding of their implications) – particularly in relation to the origins of the Universe, and the origins of life on this planet. I know many people who say that Science must be right (and thus the Bible must be wrong), and just as many people who has the Bible has to be right (and thus Science has no option to be wrong unless it agrees). This is difficult for me, as I walk in both worlds – I love me some Science, the harder it is to wrap my head around the better in some regards, and I have a personal faith in Jesus Christ, and believe that everything the Bible says it true. Knowing this, it may come as no surprise that I have a different opinion to both parties of the debate.

What I believe, as far as the formation of the Universe and the Origin of Life on Earth goes, is that both Science and the Scriptures are correct – in their own way. The Genesis account of creation is not so concerned with HOW the universe and life came to be, as it is concerned with WHO brought them about, and WHY he did so – there are many different things I can point to as evidence for this reading’s plausibility, but I want to keep this short (ask me again sometime). Science is concerned with the HOW, but not the WHO or WHY – simply because asking about the WHO or WHY means going towards subjective opinions, which Science isn’t meant to do (being meant to take objective information and confirm facts from those). This brings my view on this subject to ‘I believe – without a doubt – the God brought the universe into being by His Word, and that he formed the Earth according to His will. What I do not – and cannot – know is the exact details of how He did so. If the Genesis account is 100% correct, then awesome! If the Big Bang Theory and the Theory of Evolution are plausible ways in which God could have done it, then that’s awesome too! If it’s a completely different method that no-one has proposed or figured out yet, that’s awesome as well!’

Some might say that I am skipping the issue somewhat – sitting on the fence to avoid offending both sides – but this isn’t the case. You would be surprised how many Christians I know that dismiss my views on this outright – because I don’t affirm that every word of Scripture is 100% accurate without metaphor or other literary devices to make a hard topic easier to understand – and how many Non-Christians that I know that wonder how I can affirm that their views are plausible, but still choose to believe in an all-powerful Creator that holds the Universe together. The path I walk is one that has a tendency to alienate me from both sides of the argument….but it’s one that I have spent many years personally wrestling with, and my convictions have come out stronger for it.

 

*For those questioning, my third post across two blogs.

Some unfinished business

Before I move into a new year of blogging, I thought I should finish my wrapping up posts from 2011. Sorry it’s so late everyone…..

So, my regrets from last year, and my hopes for the one ahead……

Looking back on 2011, there are a few things that I regret. Chief amongst these is the loss if contact with a few of the people that I had come to know so well through my online games – most of them moving on after no longer having the time or inclination to play, and a few that just kinda stopped plating without warning. With the games I’m playing, there isn’t a lot of ways to connect outside of the game (a few games use Skype for real time communication, but I don’t play those anymore – see previous post), so when someone leaves for any reason, more than 90% of the time there’s no way to keep in touch with them (not that I’m great at keeping in touch with friends to start with…..). Whenever someone leaves one of the games I play, I can’t help but think of all of the missed opportunities I had to talk about God with them (often ignoring the conversations I did have with them), and feel some guilt and helplessness when I realise that all I can do now is pray that God brings someone else into their life to build on whatever foundation that He laid through what I’ve said.

I also regret not posting here (and at the Digital Missions Blog) more often. I’ve had several different ideas for posts over the past year, and either haven’t been near a computer, or haven’t found enough time at a keyboard to finish the post, and don’t go back to it later (and then the half written post languishes in the drafts folder forever). I’m working through a couple of the more recent of the latter, but the rule with the way I write is generally – unless an idea really sticks in my mind, or is incredibly current in the wider world (or what passes for the various subcultures I consider myself part of), or I have someone pull me up and remind me that I was gonna write something  (Thanks Craig!) – once an idea has passed on from my mind, I’m not going to come back to it, and thus it will never get written. Hopefully I can be a bit more regular in posting on both of my blogs in 2012, but – as always – I make no promises about posting schedules.

So, enough of my regrets (at least, the ones that I can still remember weeks later), on to my hopes for the year…..

First things first, thanks to some mucking around with what my Bible College course needs, I’m finished with college (for now), and will be graduating with an Advanced Diploma of Ministry in early March. This is the end of a three year journey for me, and one that I’ve had a lot of fun with, but I am glad to have this chapter of my life behind me for a lot of reasons (which I won’t go into here, cause this post is getting a little long…….). I’m also hoping to get an Electrical Apprenticeship soon (which again, I won’t talk  much about here, it’s sort of outside the scope of what I see this blog as), it’s something that feels right for me, and I know that it’s where God wants me to be for at least the next 4-5 years of my life.

There are some big things for this year – things that I’ve been thinking about for ages that finally feel right; and things that I’ve never thought about before, but I’m thinking about them now, and I know I’m thinking about them for a reason. Some of them I don’t want to talk about (cause they’re either more personal than I want to talk about, or they’re just unfinished thoughts that would end up with me rambling), and some of them aren’t ready to be talked about (either the wrong time, or more unfinished thought rambling), but I will keep you posted on some of my ideas as they progress……

So that’s my wrapping up on 2011……again, sorry it’s all so late. I look forward to seeing what I’m going to write in 2012 (hopefully finishing up on some of those drafts to start with, but I never know…..), and I hope that you all enjoy reading/commenting.

Wrapping up a year

2011 is coming to a close, and with the end of a new year comes a bit of a retrospective period for me…..I’m looking back and remembering the joys and regrets of the past year, and making plans for the year to come. Time permitting, next week I’ll try and post more about some of the regrets and thoughts about the future, but since it is Christmas (which my personal thoughts on would be another post in itself – next year maybe…)*, which is meant to be the time of the year to consider a variety of joyful occurrences, I’ll post more about the joys of the past year.

Over the course of 2011, I’ve come to know more about me through a variety of different things – some of which I’ve shared with you guys, some of which I haven’t – knowing more about myself (where I’ve come from [and how my past has shaped me to be the person I am now], where I could be going [and hope to be going] in the future, and more about who I am at a more general level), and knowing more about God (through college [as always], but also just through my interactions with Scripture, with others, and with the world around me [a lot of which was shared here]).

Over the course of 2011, I also once again started playing both Tribal Wars (which I’ve talked about here), and The West (a different game by the same company), both with the intention of being a light to the communities that form within those games. I had some ups and downs with this (which I talked about here), eventually stopping playing Tribal Wars because logging on became something I dreaded (along with the realization that it had been a while since I had actually talked to someone in game cause I couldn’t become stable enough [i.e. successful enough or lucky enough to not be taken out immediately] on any of the worlds I was playing). On The West, however, I’ve been thriving as a part of a group of towns, many of which are really great people, whom I enjoy spending time with – and whom I look forward to spending more time talking to over the coming (insert unknown period of time here – unlike Tribal Wars, The West is much slower paced).

I’ve also become more acquainted with the wider online community (which I maintain exists, it’s just outside of social networking), mostly through following blogs (a few of which can be found in the links on the side), and it’s been encouraging to find more Christians out there doing the same sort of stuff that I am, and a few doing different things along the same theme, and some doing things that are completely different that I love to read about. It’s been great to interact and dialogue with a few of them over the year, and I hope to continue to talk to these guys, and discover even more people over the coming year. I suggest you give them a look, and I’ll be sure to add anything else I find to my links box….

There’s not much more that I can really say…..many of the other joys that I’ve experienced over the year have been intensely personal, or are very hard to describe in words, or would be simply repeating my old posts (which, if I may say so myself, are well written and should be read by all of you). If I have time in the busy week between Christmas and New Year (read, can get to and use a computer for any significant length of time), I’ll post more about my sorrows and regrets, before looking at what I could see happening in 2012 in early January….

Merry Christmas to all of you.

Fr33Lanc3r

*If you ever want to know, you may need to hold me to that…….and not let me try and get out of it……

Abolitionist Sunday

Yesterday was Abolitionist Sunday – a day about raising awareness about the continuing problem of slavery in our world today. As this is something very much on the hearts and minds of many people from my church, we set aside both services yesterday so that a group from our church could talk about slavery, and what we can do about it.

This was a bit of a challenge for me. I’ve been aware of the fact that there is an illegal slave trade going on around the world (that’s affected more lives than the English-American slave trade that many people condemn outright) for some time, and I’ve struggled a bit lot with the question of ‘What can I do about it?’ Yesterday the speakers encouraged everyone to think about how they can use whatever gifts they have (whatever is in their hands – which I can’t tell if it’s Christianese or not) to do their part towards the abolition of modern slavery. I spent a lot of time yesterday thinking about this, and (as usual for me) I finally came up with an idea while I was trying to sleep. I’m still considering this, but I thought I’d share it anyway.

I’m currently thinking – somewhat inspired by the ongoing Desert Bus For Hope (A gaming marathon that raises money for Child’s Play) –  that maybe I could set up some form of Gaming Marathon for Children that don’t get a childhood (the situation that most distressed me about slavery being that most of todays slaves are children – who are enslaved to fight in wars, work to produce coffee, tea, and many others, or as prostitutes). I’m still working through details, but the money would go towards one of the many groups working to bring people out of slavery and help them through the trauma their experiences produced. I’m thinking about playing through one of the games of my own early childhood (Word/Math Rescue; Commander Keen; etc) in a sort of ‘revisit my own childhood for those who don’t have one’ theme – and doing something along the lines of the more donations that come in, the longer I (and anyone else who wants to join in – possibly taking shifts for health reasons) play for. I might even (if this idea comes to fruition) set it up so the experience is taped and posted on Youtube or something – although if that happens maybe something else should happen throughout as well……….

As I said, this is a halfbaked idea that came to me in the middle of the night, so I’m completely open to input/suggestions/critisisms/etc. But I do want to encourage all of you to make a stand on the issue of modern slavery, and use whatever gifts you have, whatever positions you hold, and whatever influence you can exert to affect a change in the world – whether large or small.

It’s Quiet……….too quiet….

It’s been fairly quiet here lately (WordPress tells me that it’s been over a month since my last post), and I’d like to apologise for that. My blogs are one the first things that get put aside when life gets busier – even though I set this up as a place for me to share the things I’ve been thinking through, and the stuff I’ve been studying – and the last month has been a bit hectic for me – mostly because my bad study habits…….

So catching up – I’ve finished College. The overseeing board changed the requirements of the Advanced Diploma of Ministry (the course I’ve been doing), and with some wonderfully complex mucking around, It’s been decreed that I’m eligible to graduate provided I pass this semester’s subjects (which I’m feeling fairly confident about). I’m not sure where I’m going to go from here, I’m looking to find some work, and will probably just earn some money without studying for a while – but I still don’t have everything worked out (which I’m not sure is a good thing or a bad thing).

I’ll try and update both this blog (I’ve been mulling over some things that I probably should post one of these days), and the Digital Missions Blog over the weeks leading up to Christmas. I’m not going to try and invent stuff to post about for either, so I cannot guarantee anything regular, but I will probably start posting the various things that go through my mind now that life’s calmed down a little……

An Announcement

So I have an announcement to make, which was hinted at in my last post……it’s a little exciting, a little daunting (to me at least), and I feel that it’s an important step on the path of where God is leading my life…….So here goes.

I’ve started a second blog, dedicated to sharing about the ins and outs of Digital Missions – rather inventively named the ‘Digital Missions Blog‘. This is something that’s been stirring for a while, particularly since this blog has moved away a lot from what I originally wanted it to be and still want it to be – a place for me to share my more intellectual struggles with what I’m learning, and what’s going on in the world around me - and turned into a place where I’m sharing more and more about what I’m doing as a self-described Digital Missionary – which I don’t feel that this blog is suited to being. So this blog will move back into being a space where I talk about the issues that I’m wrestling with (in all their random goodness), and the new blog will be a place to share about what’s been going on particularly in my experience of digital mission, and to talk about the principles behind digital mission in depth. Also, it is my hope that the Digital Missions Blog will turn out to be something that is more than my own endeavor – I’m hoping and praying that others wrestling with the same questions will find it, and contribute to discussions (and start some, I won’t turn away other authors if they are genuinely interested in writing something useful and relevant, something that everyone can benefit from).

Also, I’m looking into starting a forum with the same sort of idea in mind – a place where people involved in Evangelism/Mission online can get together, encourage one another, and share what’s happening in their lives and ministries. I’m still looking into options here and praying about whether this is the right thing to do, but I’ll let you know when there’s something more concrete. Also, if you know of a good, free, forum provider that doesn’t require a private server, let me know.

Black Stump!!!

So I’ve been at BLACK STUMP this past weekend!! As always, I’ve had waaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy too many donuts(!!), got drenched, been challenged in my faith, and had a reaffirming that I’m headed in the direction that God has for my life.

What wasn’t part of the usual ‘Stump’ experience for me this year was the opportunity that I had to run an elective (Practical session of teaching essentially) during the weekend, in which I spoke about my passion – online evangelism/digital mission. I was surprised by the turnout – it wasn’t large (by any stretch of the imagination), but there were more people than I expected, and all of them (with the exception of the ‘moral support team’ from my family and church) were already talking to people online, and asking many of the same questions that I had been. I was energized by what was said (by both myself, and by everyone else), and was encouraged to realise that there are others out there having the same ideas that I have been.

That said, there’ll be some changes to this blog, to what I’m already doing, and to my life…….I’m still sorting it out (cause I’m short on sleep and only got home a couple of hours ago), but I’ll probably be following this up by the end of this week (or early next if I’m pressed for time) with some more details. So sorry this is a shorter post than normal, and stay tuned…….

God Bless,

Fr33Lanc3r

P.S. Welcome to anyone who came to that elective and decided to find my blog!! You guys are included in a fair bit of what I’m thinking about at the moment, so stick around…….. It’s gonna be an exciting journey! Also, if you didn’t get my details (or are just interested in talking to me…), and want to ask questions/make comments, feel free to comment, or to email me at: fr33lanc3r_001@yahoo.com.au

Cheers!

A Clarity of Calling

The past few weeks have been pretty tough for me. Between trying to get assignments started and the various little things that pull on my time, I’ve found that I’m staying up later, waking up earlier and generally just trying to get through day-by-day. But in the midst of all this, I want to share with you the events that have happened over the weekend just gone (25th-28th August). Over the Friday and Saturday, the Revive Conference was on – many of the workshops and main events of which I found insightful, challenging and moving. There isn’t much else to say on that – I’m still processing a lot of what I saw and heard there. However, after heading home on Saturday, I went to watch the new video from the ‘Extra Credits’ team (I’ve mentioned them before – but they’ve moved, so there’s  a new link).

What I watched broke my heart. The last two weeks they’ve done episodes about Game Compulsion/Addiction. The first episode addressed the hype, and some of the issues surrounding children being completely focused on games – and they raised some really good points. The second was more challenging. In a 20 minute – two part video, one of the team shared his personal struggle with game Compulsion during High School. He spoke about in general how High Schools are often only accepting a certain type of person, and video games are often a place where the traits that aren’t accepted in High School are encouraged. There is a massively personal journey that he went through, but I won’t detail it here (watch the videos!!). I will say that it brought back aspects of my story – which goes deeper than game compulsion, but game compulsion certainly played a role in my life just a few short years ago. I won’t write it out again, but I’ve posted it on their forums – here.

His story turned out to be a happy one – life welcomed him back, he managed to break away from games, and has used the skills that he learnt while playing the games that used to be the focus of his life. But not everyone’s story end that way – he shared that his best friend from that period of his life never managed to pull away from games – whenever life offered him opportunities, whenever something got too hard he ran straight back to games, afraid that life would reject him again. This idea, this knowledge that there are people out there that life has just dumped on, who are turning to games to fill the void in their lives broke me. I teared up while watching those videos (and now as I’m writing them I’m tearing up again), and eventually broke down and cried while praying at Church on Sunday night. I wept for everyone who has ever been in that situation, and for the people who are currently wrestling with those demons. And I wept because for the first time since I started college I felt a complete clarity about where God was leading me. I am called to be a missionary to the world of online games, and I am called to minister to the broken people that cannot escape from them. I don’t know what it’ll look like, or the path that I’ll be walking along the way, but I know that this is my calling, and that God will never leave nor forsake me while I walk with him.

Ministry Woes

I’m going through a tough stretch with my ministry on Tribal Wars. Most of it isn’t anything I can control, but I want to sit and talk about it anyway, so here I am.

For a long time, the tribe I was a part of had been in a cold war with a much bigger tribe – they occasionally took some villages from us, we took a couple from them, status quo mostly returned, etc – and a week ago they decided that they were in a position to wipe us out once and for all. The end result of this was the breakup of the tribe, and because of this I’ve lost contact with a lot of the friends that I had made there. I’m not sure where I’m going with that ‘world’ now, as I can either restart it and build everything back up in a new tribe, or quit that ‘world’ and start on a fresh one.

Partly linked to the second option, I’ve started up a tribe on the newest ‘world’ (less that 24 hours old at time of writing) with my little brother – who’s also had a lot of experience on Tribal Wars. This is something new, since I’ve never joined a brand new world with running a tribe in mind. We don’t have many members yet, but we’re kind of on the fringe in a well populated area, so I’m hoping we’ll grow. It’s been an interesting day setting everything up and discussing with the third member of the tribe – who’s American – and I’m hoping some time soon I can report something about what’s happening there.

Still not sure about what I’m doing with the first world though, I might start over in a different area of the world with a new group of people, feel free to suggest ideas, and I’ll keep you posted about that too.

Cheers,

Fr33

catching up

Sorry it’s been so long since I last posted, life’s been a bit hectic lately – so once again we have a (possibly long) catch-up post. Here goes…..

I’ve gotten involved again this year with the online game Tribal Wars - something that forces beyond my control (such as my brother completely using the download limit in a day early in December) caused me to quit at the end of last year. It’s been great getting involved again, and ministry wise I’ve learnt a lot from the mistakes I had made the last time I played. So I’m not involved in running the tribe I am a part of, and I’m once again simply putting out an offer to talk to, and pray for the other people who are in the tribe. The response so far has been interesting – the first time I posted the offer there were over 200 replies to the forum post within a couple of days (an impressive feat – as people who are connected with forums of any sort would know). While most of these replies were people trying to bait me into saying something rash, there were some genuine questions about what I believed, and a few of the other Christians in the tribe joined in, and were encouraged to come to the defense of both me, and the faith that we share – which is encouraging in itself. I’ve also had several people – Christian and Non-Christian, take me up on the offer to just talk (about all sorts of things, from serious things, to a random swapping of jokes), and the offer to pray for specific issues that they are going through. From a gaming perspective, the world that I have joined this time around is a ‘trial’ world that removes one of the major strategies that players use (the ability to loot and take resources from other people’s villages) – which has caused the world to be much slower, and to be more politically focused (since wars are now harder to win). This has been perfect for my playing style, since I was never very good at ‘farming’ (as the looting of other villages is called), and (while I get sick of the sheer under-handedness of the politics sometimes) there is always a lot to catch up on when I log back in of a morning, and there are very few dull moments when the politics does get into full swing.

Another thing that’s happened recently is that I’ve picked up a new series of games – a series of role playing games (i.e. I take control of a character, chose what path they take – what weapons they use, what choices they make, etc) called the ‘Fable’ series. This series is famous (in the circles of those who like games like this) for offering the player a lot of choices – i.e. your character can buy up real estate (pretty much every house, shop, tavern and landmark is for sale), take jobs doing various things (hammering swords, chopping wood, bartending, etc), take on a variety of side quests (in addition to the main storyline), and marry Non-player Characters (starting a family, which offers some small benefits to the player – for example, they will randomly buy you gifts if you keep them happy) – and I have been having a ball playing through the series (so far – I’m partway through the second game cause my brother gets upset if I get further along the story than he is). However, I have noticed something that says quite a few things about myself while I’ve been playing through these games (particularly the second one). I’m starting to feel guilty – personally – when I direct my character to take an ‘evil’ action (not whenever I do something that the game considers evil – i.e. eating food that has had animals harmed during it’s production [still not sure why that's evil] – but when my character accidently broke down someone’s door [cause I pressed the wrong button trying to knock], I felt bad). It’s even at the point where I’m having issues with the way my brothers play the game (as two of them are currently trying to be the evilest person the game will let them be – to the point where they gun down random NPC’s in the streets), cause they shouldn’t be thinking like that. I’ve got a feeling that this might be some sort of outward sign of the change that God’s working in my life – but I’m not sure. I’ll think about it some more and get back to you – and hopefully have a few more implications of this to share with you.

Finally, I found an interesting article that links back to some of the stuff that I’ve said earlier, and you have no idea how encouraging I found it. There’s not much else to say on the subject that I haven’t already said, or isn’t covered in the article (which I encourage you all to read), other than I hope to one day be able to attend (or help out at) CGDC (Christian Game Developers Conference – the conference in question).

So thanks for reading another long post - there’s been a bit of catching up to do – and hopefully I’ll be able to post more regularly for at least the near future, so this shouldn’t be necessary until at least the next time I have several assignments and exams due in a short period of time.

Cheers,

Fr33