I suspect most of you who visit my blog will already know me, but for those who do not my name is Joel Aispuro. I am married to my lovely wife Moriah. Through this post I will be giving reasons for why I started this blog site. I trust that those who follow me and read my future post will get to know me even better as you see what I as a Christian believe, disbelieve, things I may be confused on, certain theological topics in which I am going through etc. I want you all to know that I love dialogue and would love for you to leave comments, or ask questions. I am not a very good writer so I'll ask for your forgiveness in advance in case there is a time where I do not make sense, or misspelling, or whatever the case may be. So this brings us to my first reason why I started a blog site.
Reason number.....
1.
To work on my writing skills: Let me tell you about my background. I am 24 years old and God saved me when I was 19. I was born in San Diego and moved to Sandpoint Idaho when I was 9. I did the normal kid thing and went to school and all that. It wasn't until high school that I started getting into the "popular" crowd and becoming noticed by the girls and what not. That kept me more than busy with my time to be sure. I also was obsessed with sports, so that took up most of my time as well. I also was very much just as obsessed with Hip Hop, especially the East Coast underground style of Hip Hop. Dudes like Jedi Mind Tricks, The Wu-Tang Clan, Biggie Smalls and many more. I say all that to show you what all my time was built around: girls, sports and Hip Hop. So when i came to school I could have cared less, which then lead me to getting terrible grades which means I did not pay attention in class which means I did not learn the things I should have i.e English and proper grammar. It was not until I got saved that I started reading and caring about scholastics. I do know it was harder for me to learn all the big words than most people but I stuck with it. So after about three or four years of reading the puritans and theologians throughout church history I am now beginning to write and share my thoughts with others and share and teach the things that I have learned through my hard studies and work on my grammar as I do so. That I may be a blessing to an open ear. This now brings us to my second point.
2.
"You then my child...what you have heard from me...entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also" 2 Timothy 2:1-2: When God saved me He did not turn over a new leaf, oh no, He created a new person. God through His grace showed me my sin and His grace and granted me repentance and faith in His Son Christ Jesus. Everything changed: my life, speech, conduct (not perfection), worldview etc. I fell in love with reading the Bible and good books. After about a year or so of being saved God in His kindness somehow got some books in my hands written by A.W Pink and Charles Spurgeon. Let me tell you, if you want a good read then read those guys! So that started my journey in the deep ocean of Theology, more specifically reformed theology. To make a long story short I started seeing that the more I learned of our great Christian faith the more I saw the beauty and majesty of the God we serve. Paul Washer, who has had a wonderful influence in my life said these words which saved my life "theology is a means not an end, it's a means to an end and the end is knowing God." That quote saved me from a lot of pride which could have really hindered me. From then on it was instilled in my head that I wanted all my hard studies and reads and debates and discussions to draw me nearer to my Savior. Please know that just because that is ones focus, to do all things to draw us nearer to Christ, does not mean its always like that. We are still sinners and have to struggle with our flesh. The Lord still has to humble me and bring me back on track. So through this blog I want to share with people these wonderful truths of theology so that I may help others grow in the grace and knowledge of Christ and so that they could teach others and so on and so forth. To possibly teach others that may have a hard time figuring something out. The deep ocean of theology can be very intimidating to Christians, so intimidating in fact that it can neutralize the Christian. So one thing I love to do and desire to do with this blog is to bring the hard to understand things and make them understandable for the people of God so that we can continue to swim deeper in the theological ocean. I also desire those who read these blogs and may see the need to correct me or challenge me, to do so in love. I need to be sharpened as well and would love the dialogue. Now to my next reason.
3.
To create a helpful learning atmosphere for the student: What I mean by that is this is that I understand a lot of Christians do not get deep into studying because they do not know where to begin and they then get overwhelmed and give up. My desire with my blog is to have trusted websites and blogs and other Christian/Church resources readably available so one can begin his or hers journey. Instead of trying to keep track of site after site, one would just have to come to this blog site to be a launch pad to multiple sites. I hope this makes sense.
4.
To keep people posted on current event issues: As Christians we need to submit to the Word of God and the Word of God effects every area of our lives. Because of that even the political realm is important to the believer. Contrary to a lot of the modern belief, where Christians say something to the effect of "as Christians we should engage ourselves in the 'secular' realm of politics', we just need to focus on the spiritual things." Now I am not saying all Christians say that but that is the spirit of the age in many churches in our day. But as Believers there is no division between secular and sacred, it is all sacred. I believe as Christians we need to develop a comprehensive world view and not just pick and choose which areas of life we like or dislike. Politics matter and with the freedoms we still have (which are fading away) we need to use our rights to try to make a change in our country for the glory of God and the furtherance of His kingdom. There will be other blogs to come on this topic.
5.
To do book reviews: One thing I believe would be beneficial and fun for myself and others would to do reviews on the books I read. I will do so as time permits.
So there is a few but not all the reasons why I have started a blog. I hope it can be beneficial to everyone who desires to follow and read.
Grace and Peace
P.S This post would not be complete if I did not give credit to Helen Soderberg. She wrote a blog on "Ten reason to start a blog" and it had a tremendous impact on me starting a blog ;).
