Dear friends and family,

Thanks for stopping by. This is my first ever post for this blog. I will be using this blog for journaling experiences and sharing whatever I feel like sharing from my Discipleship Training School and School of Worship at YWAM Denver in 2007-08. Yes, that is quite a ways off from now, but I just felt like getting a blog going for it now anyways. Now, obviously I won't have much about YWAM until I, you know... start it... but for right now I might just randomly post about stuff that's just kind of on my mind - things I discover or wrestle with in worship, in prayer, in the Word, in class, through other people and their experiences, or whatever else.

I'll start today with what I've been reading in 1 Corinthians.

In case you don't know, I am currently a freshman at Concordia University, St. Paul. I have lots of music classes (choir, piano, voice and guitar lessons), New Testament, and "Honors." Honors is one class that focuses on many different "subjects" and areas all in one class. It's not a specialized class, really. So there's tons of work in Honors. And other classes. But hey, it's college, I don't really expect anything less. This semester in Honors has been all about focusing on the poor, or the marganalized of our world. This has been really awesome, and an area that I really feel that God is placing on my heart and mind. (Maybe another post I'll expand...) Anyways, we just finished reading the book The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman, Concordia's Book of the Year, sadly.

Sadly??

The book is all about globalization. That is, how the world is becoming "flat," because of the internet, uploading, downloading, companies outsourcing and digitizing everything, and all that jazz. The first half of the book is fine - Friedman gives a detailed account of what he believes are the ten biggest "flatteners" of the past 15 years. The second half, however, is where I lost it for this book. He talks about how best to thrive in this flat world. He stresses competition - you've got to "beat out" the competition. If you've got a low-paying job and you're struggling - get a better one! is basically what Friedman says. Easy for him to say (he's a columnist at New York Times and his wife is an heiress to a fortune of shopping mall property, making them one of the richest families in America), but what about the millions and millions of people around the world who live in quite an unflat world? What about the poor? What about the people who go day by day wondering what they're going to get their next meal? There is little regard for them it seems. Friedman spends almost all of his time on golf courses, in five-star restaurants, and 30,000 feet in the air in a first class jet.

But enough bashing Friedman. I have quite a ways to go with my outlook and my regard for the poor myself. God, open my eyes to those less fortunate...

Anyways, where am I going with all of this and what does it have to do with 1 Corinthians?

Well, with all this globalization talk, I've been reminded of how our society works - you go to school to better yourself, you learn to better yourself, and you use all that to get a job, to compete with other people (directly or indirectly, knowingly or unknowingly) to BETTER YOURSELF. That's what I believe Paul would call the "wisdom of the world."

1:20 - "Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?"

Wow.

All that is foolish. God has made it foolish. Compared to God's wisdom, this wisdom of the world is foolish. So what then is God's wisdom? Verse 30 says, "It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God - that is, our righteousness, holiness, and redemption. God's wisdom is more than head knowledge. It is righteousness, holiness, and redemption.

So am I saying that we should all quit school, quit our jobs, and quit learning anything because God has made it foolish? Absolutely not. But if we are learning and striving towards something in this life and God has no part of it, then what's the point? Where is that getting us?

I pray that when I learn, when I work, when I live, that by the grace of God through Christ Jesus may I come to know the things of God, the wisdom of God, first and foremost. "For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom" (1:25).

And it is only by His grace, through the Holy Spirit, that I am able to do this. Thank you, Lord.




Please feel free to email me about anything and everything at bartelsc@csp.edu or bartels.christopher@gmail.com. Either one works.

Also, when I write like this, I'm just throwing my thoughts out there - it's pretty much sparatic, and I don't proofread or anything like that. If I am in the wrong somewhere, please let me know. I will be grateful, not offended. If you disagree with me on something, awesome! Let me know, I'd love to hear what you think. I'm claiming to be nothing more than a servant of Christ, writing down what comes to mind.

Chris