Exciting Things at OCBC + The Greatest Sin

a) Exciting Things at OCBC
Today’s worship service was a train wreck. Despite this, there were good things happening:
1. We might be getting a new building near Chinatown and its huge (exactly what I think is an ideal size for a Church)!
Note: this contributed to the train-wreck nature of today. Someone presented a fifteen minute talk on the new building, which included (I AM NOT JOKING) pictures of the washrooms and the boiler room, an explanation of every requirement we were looking for (including 9 classrooms and it being "closed to the bus routes"*), and a viewing of the floor plan of the building and a road map of the area (I guess to assure us that it was by the highway).

2. We may be getting a new English pastor, who will be focusing mostly on the youth and young adults!
Note: I gave him a tour of campus with Jeremy and Peter, followed by a theology quiz by Peddy. He passed. And he’s a good preacher (I saw the tape when I got back from Toronto). Just got two issues: a) He lets his kid run around everywhere during Bible study (it made me ponder the question – "at what age can you start spanking kids?") and, b) he regularly reads the nlt (the Ottawa Sun of Bible "translations"). But those aren’t big things. Anyways, please pray for these things.**

*I probably shouldn’t pick on Chinese people who make spelling mistakes.
**Hmm, after reading this over, I realized that I’m going to have to trust that if he does become our pastor, he’ll have a sense of humour and won’t take these things too seriously.

Shifting gears…

b) The Greatest Sin
12Be appalled, O heavens, at this; be shocked, be utterly desolate, declares the LORD, 13for my people have committed two evils:they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water. – Jeremiah 2:12-13

Last year, I was sharing the Gospel with a Baha’i friend of mine. I explained that we all deserve God’s punishment, because we are all sinful, but that Christ’s blood has paid for our sins such that if ANYONE repent and have faith, they will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. He asked me the following question:

"So, if a murderer becomes a Christian, he gets into heaven. But if I don’t accept Jesus, I go to Hell?"

I said "Yes"

He was shocked and saw this as total foolishness*.

How is this God just? Today it has been confirmed (a lot) in my mind and (a little less) in my heart that God is just in this because everyone has committed a way worse sin then murder.

They have rejected God. This is the greatest of sins – God loves us and has given us everything. There is literally nothing worse in the universe than rejecting God. And we do it everyday.

This is a VERY radical thing to say. It means the following statements are true:

The Holocaust was an atrocity BUT the rejection of God in a three-year old child is WORSE than the Holocaust.
I have done something worse than the Holocaust.
Mother Teresa committed a worse sin than initiating a genocide, committing rape, and engaging in incest combined.

I think it’s a very difficult thing to believe, but if God is the God He says He is –whose love reaches to the heavens and whose faithfulness stretches to the sky, then to deny Him the Honour He deserves is the greatest crime in the Universe.

*don’t worry, it was still very civilized and I tried my best to say all these things in as non-confrontational a way as possible.