In the words of one of my old Bible College Principle's, Dr Wayne Richards, "There is a lot of qualified garbage out there." He was talking specifically about Christian books and the premise that general western Christian will believe that something is of good quality based on no more qualification than a) it's something has been published, and b) it is being sold in a Christian bookstore.
I believe that the same principle can be held true of Christian blogs. Just because a person has a blog, and just because a person says that they are Christian does not automatically qualify them to be able to speak into the lives of people. For anyone to have the right of speaking into our life, trust ought to be established first.
And that is why I am writing a blog that discusses myself. It's an opportunity to expose myself to your scrutiny, to allow you to get a real sense (as real as one can get through cyber-space) of who I am and whether I am someone whom you can trust. Then, if you are comfortable with letting me speak into your life, I trust that my blogs shall do so.
I was born and raised in Australia, the only child of a young nominally Baptist father and a much younger nominally Catholic mother. Home life was usual until the divorce of my parents. This lead to the usual problems that divorce engenders in children.
At the end of a very manipulative, humanistic-philosphy-driven five years of high school I became friends with a group of drama students who also happened to be Christian's. To keep a really long story a little shorter, through my interactions with them over the course of the following year I became a Christian the day before my Higher School Certificate in '96.
While I have had some incredible highs throughout my Christian life over the last twelve years, I have also experienced some crushing lows. And some of those lows were due to my own sins that I was preferring over God. Some of the bigs ones included sexual impurity of varying degrees, anger and control issues. But God is gracious and patient and is not afraod of the long haul of sanctification (where I am becoming more and more like Jesus).
In the midst of being a sinful man, God's greatness and amazing grace has been made evident.
Over the years I have been a youth leader, a worship team member (which lead to a couple of CD recordings), a small group leader, a short-term (two weeks) missionary to China, Malaysia, Cambodia, and (one year) Kazakhstan, a staff member of my church, a state team member of a youth prayer movement, and most recently I am a husband and a home owner. I am thankful for my name, Shane. It is derived from the original Hebrew which means "God is gracious." Truly He is.
I have studied Bible college subjects on an unassessed and asesed level, though I've not as yet completed a qualification. And As of this year (God willing) I will be studying anthropology at university. But for now, i am one of the 50% of people in my 800+ member church who does not have a degree. I have a number of Certificate qualifications though. :)
So if I've been so messed up and don't have everything sorted out and perfect yet, why should I write a blog? Because I only need to be one step ahead of you in this journey of eternity in order to turn around and help you out. And being an INTP (http://www.intp.org/), I have studied myself enough to know that I have gone through things that will be of help to others. Why learn from your own mistakes when you can learn from mine?
I have some great accountability in my friends. One of which is my best man, Cameron Smythe. If you feel I have been out of line, or anything like that, he would gladly sort me out for you (provided the grievance is genuine). You can contact him through his blog, http://life.smythetek.com/index.php?option=com_contact&Itemid=3.
So that's a little about me. I blog because I'm a thinker. I live in a realm of intellect, ideas, imaginings, and revelations. And though I am not "qualified", I don't write garbage either. In the words of Rebecca St. James, "God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called."
Posted at: 02:12 PM | Add Comment
