October 27, 2010 by Sal Termini.

How do you define spirituality? How can a person best serve God? These are the questions we must ask ourselves if we are to find our true purpose in life. We can fulfill God’s will in powerful ways in our everyday life. If our life is lived purposely to glorify God we understand more than most people about spirituality. To glorify God means to remind people of God’s character and reflect it by doing the right thing in every circumstance. It is living in a way that honors God.

When a mother feeds, clothes, and cares for her family’s needs she is doing the will of God. Her actions will one day reap a spiritual reward because she acted in the natural world in a godly manner. Every day fathers and husbands go to work to bring provision home for their families they are doing God’s will. Our jobs are essentially a calling from God. Where we work is our sphere of influence and we can make the lives of others around us better. On the practical side, Apostle Paul taught, “if we don’t work we won’t eat.” He thus made work part of our spiritual life. We disconnect the secular from the sacred not realizing their interconnectedness.

It is important to become part of a faith community. In that community we will participate in prayer and serving others, and grow in spiritual truth. Our spiritual life is to be lived out in the secular world to glorify God. On the other hand, when God is of little importance or marginalized because of our secular and work life, we fail to become a complete person. A danger sign that we are becoming unbalanced is when we spend little or no time with God or our faith community.

The connected life must have the right attitude then strike a balance of time between our calling and our worship.

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October 19, 2010 by Sal Termini.

Atheism is a belief that there is no God. The new atheism, as it is presently called, is at war with any belief in God. This new virulent form of atheism is seeking to eradicate faith in God, wherever and in whomever they find it. Live and let live is not in their creed. All religions are lumped together and are believed to be dangerous delusions causing great harm in the world. The new atheists want to deconstruct the foundations of religious belief by proving that faith in God is foolish.

To these new atheists faith is only wishful thinking. Faith is seen as a sentimental unfounded hope in a future spiritual existence. The point they want to drive home is religion is used as a means of escape for humanity’s fear of death. This is a bogus argument as atheism proves we can face death without religious belief. Transcendence is not based upon fear, but the same thing science is based upon, the hunger for truth and meaning. In the same respect we can say atheism is as an escape from their fear of accountability to a holy God. The autonomous man, freed of moral restraints and God (atheism) by our fallen nature, is a rebel in need of an excuse, a doctrine and a belief to bolster their atheism.

Atheist will go to great lengths to prove God is not good, there is no moral standard, and we are cosmic accidents. Billions of years cannot take chaos and turn it to order, beauty and a creation inhabited by rational beings. What the atheist fails to understand is that the organizing principle of creation is God.

• There is not enough time to make a creation of such such splendid order and beauty
• There is not enough time to create a man that knows he’s born for sacred duty
• There is not enough time for life’s intricacies, reality, hopes, and dreams to come to be
• There not enough time in the random jumble of chance and time to create you and me
• There is not enough time to create beings so gloriously crowned with mind and love like mankind
• There is not enough time for chaos to make a creation so complex, simple, and so sublime
• The common man in common sense knows more than the atheist puffed up mind
• The atheist with his arrogant intelligence before God will one day stand at the end of time

To say religion is mere hopeful sentiment is the same as saying science is a mere hope that reality exists. Consciousness is metaphysical. Life from non-life is metaphysical. Something from nothing is metaphysical. Yet in all these matters atheists are in denial. We cannot separate reality into the natural world and the transcendent one. This is the atheists’ delusion. We cannot separate reason from hope. They are just conclusions made by choosing to believe or disbelieve certain facts. We cannot divest human nature of either reason or hope. The reasoning part of humanity is just as much a part of humanity as hope is. The natural and the transcendent are just two parts of a picture of human reality. We must not separate reason and emotion, each has their place.

We also must not separate reason from morality. Christianity answers the transcendent questions of why we exist. Science answers the empirical questions of how we exist. We must stop making them enemies. Both Christianity and science were forged from the same divine fire. God and mind are one. The Bible states, in the beginning was the divine mind spoken, (The Word) then incarnated in Christ. Therefore, discovery of both the natural world and a transcendent God are one. These human abilities are at their best when they complement one another. This alone will bring about true human wholeness. Reason is not king but must rule in a democratic harmony with morality and a transcendent God.

To have hope in any form, whether spiritual or natural, is considered a weakness by the new atheists. The brave new world is to look nihilism in the face and be courageous, knowing our end will be horrible and inevitable. The hatred for Christianity is that it has the power to give hope. In giving hope it robs atheists of their power to convince us of blind meaningless chance as the core of human existence. Christianity is not a sentimental hope based upon wishful thinking but grounded in the historical resurrection of Jesus Christ. Christianity’s understanding of death is that it is a temporary restriction upon humanity until God redeems and rescues mankind from its power. There is no reason to believe that death is the end. There is no evidence to this. If science is based upon evidence, atheists are severely lacking any.

Christianity believes materialism is an interpretation of isolated facts because of a fallen, corrupt, and limited mind. Christianity is God’s mind given to us that both the natural and spiritual realities are partners and can coexist. The arrogance of the new atheists is to strip people of their humanity which is a transcendent and natural reality. In the end we not only have hope but value because we are made in the image and likeness of God.

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October 15, 2010 by Sal Termini.

My son Sal just returned from Japan. He brought back with him many wonderful gifts for my wife and I. Sal went to Japan with a friend of ours named Sam Talbot. He has been on TV and partnered in events with other famous chef’s. In the summer he is the head chef at Surf Lodge, a hotel and restaurant in Montauk, NY. It is here we first met Sam who loves to surf and standup paddle board. Sam is a master chef and a fantastic young man filled with kindness, class, and mega talent. Sam went to Japan on a tour for several large Japanese companies promoting them and recipes he designed. Not only are they culinary masterpieces, they are also nutritionally sound. I have eaten his delightful recipes many times and believe me, he is a culinary genius. Sam’s friendship is a rare gift to our family and to others who know him.

When Sal came home he talked enthusiastically about how beautiful Japan is. He wanted toshare with us his experiences. He told us how he thought about us during his trip. Our communication with him was sparse but heartfelt. He was busy and communication to Japan is prohibitively expensive. Every day we waited for news from him about where he was and what he was doing. When we received the news we felt as though we were right there with him. Children sharing their life with their parents is a beautiful experience.

The gifts we received from our son were both thoughtful and practical. They reflected Japanese culture and were decorated with art and beautiful colors. We felt we knew a little more about the people of Japan. Through these physical gifts we believe we have received and even greater gift — Sal sharing his life with my his mother and I. In all the world there is no greater gift than sharing our lives with one another. The gifts from Japan meant a great deal to us because of our love and admiration for our son. We enjoy Sam apart from his gift of cooking because he is a wonderful person to be around. The meaning of life is to nurture the relationships that blossom all around us. I have found the places I visited take on a greater beauty because of the people I have met.

I was sharing the gospel with someone who was tripped up by not really understanding what God is really like. I told this person to think about the most wonderful kind of person they could think of. Imagine that person wants more than anything to share himself with you. God is that person. He created this world to give us the greatest gift imaginable. God wants to share himself with us. He wants us to share ourselves with Him. When I think of Sal and Sam what I enjoy most about them is the time we shared together.

I want to spend eternity with God. I realized my relationship with Him gives me a greater joy then anything this world can offer. I am careful to nurture that relationship, respecting who He is. I desire His love because it has made my life so much better. Behind all the burning stars, the ever expanding universes, powerful black holes, great ocean depths, glorious mountains, and magnificent sunsets is a God of infinite love. Through all these things He is sharing Himself. He is sharing His grandeur, majesty, power, love, and purposes.

One day God saw our love had grown cold towards Him. God came, Himself, in the person of Jesus Christ. To meet Christ is to love Him. Compassion, wisdom, kindness, purity, and hope are all personified in Him. He came to teach us to love God and one another again. Jesus returned back to heaven. He left love letters to us called the New Testament to remind us of His love. To those who know and love know Him, He is waiting for us to return one day to make heaven our home too. Like Sal and Sam, even though we were far apart our thoughts were always with them. We know we will one day be in the presence of God with all those we love.

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