The Secret Wireless

(This is the first in a series of sermons on our Church's mission statement.  To read the subsequent sermons click here: 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 .) If it is not of God it will fail, and fail spectacularly.  If it is of God , you cannot stop it.  That is the advice from Gamaliel, a famous teacher of the Law, a Pharisee who apparently also trained Saint Paul in the Hebrew Scriptures of the Old Testament.                 Although Gamaliel was not a Christian, certainly not an apostle or disciple of Jesus, he speaks the truth.  If the 12 disciples of Jesus were simply a fringe group of lunatics then their crazy cult would end in destruction for them.  The Romans would put an end to it.                 If, however, they spoke the truth, if their message and their movement were of God, then there was nothing in this world that could stop them.  God is the master of history.  He is the Lord of time and space.  Things always work out according to His will and you cannot oppose

 You may think that you know me because you read my blog.  But you are wrong.  You don't know me. The internet is a wonderful thing, and it allows us to communicate with people all over the world.  It also, however, allows us to create alternate versions of ourselves, avatars they are sometimes called.  So you don't know me.  You know my avatar. And this can be confusing for people.  Today people gush over the "raw" or "authentic" posts or articles that they read.  They assume that they are getting a real person.  We become "friends" on Facebook.  Maybe we think we have some really close Facebook friends.  But it is all an illusion. What goes on the internet only goes on through a series of filters.  This happens in personal communication too, but the filter there is only the human brain.  With the internet, blogs, Facebook, etc. the medium also serves as a filter. I have been thinking about this post for weeks.  It has been stewing in