Even in a Sandbox while Playing With Frogs…

People who have known my wife and I during her many pregnancies find it fun to guess the name of the soon-to-be-arriving addition to our family. After our first two sons, Micah and Noah, people began to see a pattern and would have fun guessing names. Well one of the criteria that I would consider is what the name means or who has had the same name in the past. And when it came down to selecting Noah’s name, I was not primarily thinking about his name-sake’s building, populating, and sailing of the ark, but I was thinking about how Peter described Noah as “a preacher of righteousness” (2 Pet 2:5).

My one and only main hope for all of my children is that the Lord saves them. All of the other hopes of a father are there – health, safety, success in life – but that one is primary. And by the grace of God, both of my oldest boys have made positive professions of faith. Last year Micah and I witnessed to one of his little neighborhood friends. Micah was helpful and active in the conversation, and that was very encouraging. Today I was talking to my wife and she relayed a story that she learned about today but it must have occurred yesterday. Hannah (almost 3) relayed the story that Noah had gone up to a neighbor boy and said the following, “You believe in fake gods but you need to believe in Jesus.” Now this friend is a little Hindu boy, and during our Bible time in the evenings we’ve talked about many things – one of which is that some people and some of our friends don’t believe in the real God.

Upon hearing this, she checked it out with Noah and found that the story was, in fact, true. Stephanie then encouraged Noah to be direct, but ask his friend if he knew that Jesus could forgive his sins if he repented and believed in Him. Noah’s reacted by saying, “Okay, I’m going to do that right now!” He marched outside, went to the fence, and talked to his friend. Now his friend reacted like most people do and didn’t want to hear about Christ, and I was pleased to hear that Noah was not downcast at this rejection by his friend.

So – back to the name – I’ve always hoped and prayed that Noah would not only believe in Christ but that he too would be a preacher of righteousness. Not that I have a 30 year plan laid out for him to get him into a pulpit somewhere, but my desire is that he would be a preacher of righteousness wherever he is. Whether he ends up in working in a factory or sitting behind a desk of a large corporation or anything else; wherever he goes, my desire is that he be a preacher of righteousness while he’s there…even, and especially, in a sandbox while playing with frogs.

Soli Deo Gloria

Kicked Out of Como

Last night my brother-in-law asked if I wanted to go out witnessing to people at Como Zoo today. I sooooo wanted to go, but today has been booked up for me for a while what with studying for seminary and preparing a sermon for Sunday (I know...not going out evangelizing because I'm studying is pretty lame, but its my only day off to study before I preach 3 weeks in a row and have a paper due for Seminary right after that).

Well, I am sitting at my desk working when my brother-in-law calls me. It's about the time when he said he'd be leaving anyway and so I excitedly ask him how it went. His answer was, basically, that they just got started singing a few hymns and then were asked to leave because "we don't allow this here."

So a small group of Christians were asked to leave a public place (I don't believe Como is privately owned) because they're singing a few hymns must have offended people (and apparently 93X was playing on some speakers there - go figure).

Well, if nothing else - I'm not going to miss the next time!

For the Waywardness of the Naïve Will Kill Them

²⁰ Wisdom shouts in the street, She lifts her voice in the square; ²¹ At the head of the noisy {streets} she cries out; At the entrance of the gates in the city she utters her sayings: ²² "How long, O naive ones, will you love being simple-minded? And scoffers delight themselves in scoffing And fools hate knowledge? ²³ "Turn to my reproof, Behold, I will pour out my spirit on you; I will make my words known to you. ²⁴ "Because I called and you refused, I stretched out my hand and no one paid attention; ²⁵ And you neglected all my counsel And did not want my reproof; ²⁶ I will also laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your dread comes, ²⁷ When your dread comes like a storm And your calamity comes like a whirlwind, When distress and anguish come upon you. ²⁸ "Then they will call on me, but I will not answer; They will seek me diligently but they will not find me, ²⁹ Because they hated knowledge And did not choose the fear of the LORD. ³⁰ "They would not accept my counsel, They spurned all my reproof. ³¹ "So they shall eat of the fruit of their own way And be satiated with their own devices. ³² "For the waywardness of the naive will kill them, And the complacency of fools will destroy them. ³³ "But he who listens to me shall live securely And will be at ease from the dread of evil." (Proverbs 1:20 – 33)

Praise God that His Word is not trivial or able to be fully grasped or understood by reading it once. My daily reading of the Scriptures had me read the final verses of the first chapter of Proverbs where a condemnation of death and destruction is decreed on those who are complacent fools or waywardly naïve. It was the harshness of the language of this section of Proverbs that shocked me. I am sure that I’ve read this passage before, but I must say that I was taken aback.

How can God, who is the supreme embodiment of love and mercy (among other attributes), declare that He will laugh at and mock those who have scorned Him when their calamity comes? Furthermore, how can it be that someone who seeks diligently for God will not find Him? This seems to run contrary to what we know and understand about the gospel of Jesus Christ. It may seem contrary or contradictory, but I trust that the God of all truth is able to communicate His message without contradicting Himself. And if that is the case, how then could it be that someone will seek God and not find Him? God’s Word, of course, provides us with the answer to this dilemma.

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being My priest. Since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children. (Hosea 4:6)

Too often today, and to a fault, I believe that the gospel message is dumbed-down to seemingly the lowest common denominator. This is done with purposing that the most people can hear it and then they, being unoffended by it, can agree with the message and call themselves Christians. The problem with this sort of presentation is that when you cut out the offensiveness of the gospel, you also cut out the effectiveness of the gospel. Or, stated another way, it becomes something other than the gospel and then cannot save anyone. In no way do I want to make the gospel more complicated than it is or intentionally make it convoluted, but we cannot boil it down to something that is less than the bare essentials or water it down so much that it removes the sharp bite of a necessary ingredient.

So, how can it be that someone who calls on God or who is seeking Him diligently will not find Him or will not be heard? Well, if that same person doesn’t know who they’re calling on or seeking, they’re not going to find God. It is one of the greatest sins against the masses of lost and ungodly people that a Christian preacher can commit when he neglects the Law of God and doesn’t make it plain who God is in the fullness of how He has revealed Himself to us in the Bible. In other words, we do not preach the gospel if we do not make a firm declaration about the incarnation, by means of the virgin birth, of the uncreated and eternal Christ. We do not preach the gospel for it to be believed if there is no talk about the mystery of the Triune Godhead. We do not preach the gospel of salvation if we do not preach the just penalty of sin at the hands of the Almighty who cannot tolerate sin in His midst.

Preachers will have a lot to be accountable for before God. Make no mistake about that. However, with that being said, not all of the blame lies with the preachers. God has saw fit to preserve for Himself some faithful preachers and believers, unfortunately probably not a majority of ministers even among those inside of Christendom, throughout history who thunder about the Law and about God’s just wrath at sinful man while, at the same time, they speak softly, gently, and lovingly about the great mercy and grace God our Savior. They preach salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone which brings about good works and a changed life as evidence of true salvation. The problem here lies not with the preacher, but with the hearer. How many church going people, however regularly they attend or how involved they are, have heard the message of the cross time and time again but have never been changed by Christ nor have they been born again by the Spirit? It is not because of a lack of knowledge that these people will be condemned, but because they act as “simple-minded” and live out their lives in the “complacency of fools” by not repenting of their sins and placing their faith in Christ that they will be lost.

Do not tarry and do not let the message of the cross go in one ear and out the other without letting it sit and soak into your heart. Do not shun the fear of the Lord or the call of the gospel! Listen and hear what God has said. Do not assume that you will be able to repent and believe in Christ tomorrow, for tomorrow may never come. Do not take comfort in the fact that you know so much about God and the gospel when it has not yet transformed your very being nor changed your desires. And do not neglect to learn about the God of the Bible and who He really is, for if you do not know who to call on, you will not be calling on the only true God when your life is in crisis and you are desperately seeking salvation.

The Parable of the Speed Limit

If you were to take a completely unscientific poll of people in modern western Christian-influenced culture to find out what the greatest sin is, you might hear the loudest condemnation proclaimed against intolerance and judgmentalism. And when you boil these two down, they come to the same common denominator that is best expressed by the commandment that is most beloved, at least by my contemporaries; the eleventh commandment. Of course, there is no “eleventh commandment” but the misunderstanding, misinterpretation, and cultural acceptance of Jesus’ statement to “judge not lest ye be judged” in Matthew 7 has been elevated to the status of the one thing that no one should ever dare to do, especially if you are a Christian in America.

"¹ Do not judge so that you will not be judged. ² For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. ³ Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? ⁴ Or how can you say to your brother, `Let me take the speck out of your eye,' and behold, the log is in your own eye? ⁵ You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.” (Matthew 7:1-5)

Now I must note a few things about what our Lord says in Matthew 7. First of all, He is winding down the Sermon on the Mount and He is not saying that His followers are never to make a discerning judgment about anything or anyone. If He really meant that we are never to challenge what people say, then why did He tell believers to beware of false teachers who can be known by their fruits (c.f. Matthew 7:15)? But most people don’t want to understand the meaning of Jesus’ words or the teaching of the New Testament on sin and the role that sin plays in the message of the Gospel; they just don’t want to be judged. Tragically, many of the proponents of this type of false tolerance toward sin, false religion, and an inability to alert sinners of their own sin are firmly inside the perimeter of modern popular-Christendom.

When the objection to any kind of Christian witness or evangelism is based upon this eleventh commandment, it is usually brought up when someone is told that what they believe or do is wrong and sinful. On one hand I sympathize with those who simply don’t want to hear that they’re sinners; I wouldn’t want to hear that if I were an unsaved sinner either, but it is the truth. The biggest issue at this point, on some level anyway, is to make it clear that all sin and all sinners deserve hell and they are headed that way. One of the many different listing descriptions of the people’s character who will be condemned is penned by Paul in his letter to the Corinthians,

“⁹ Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, ¹⁰ nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.” (1 Corinthians 6:9,10)

This is one of the texts in the New Testament that makes it absolutely clear that God’s hatred for sexual immorality, whether hetero or homo in nature, has not changed. However, my point is not to bang the drum only on the basis of sexual sin here. This Scripture says that thieves, drunkards, swindlers and the covetous will be condemned. I have never met one person who has been able to completely avoid coveting; it is impossible. Therefore, all people, no matter how moral their lives may appear and how nice they are to you or me, are in the cross-hairs of God’s wrath if they are not found in Christ. But before we can truly explain the gospel and truly explain the way of salvation, the man or woman must understand that they need to be saved. And in order to do that, the person must see that they are a sinner in truth and in deed.

This understanding is not something that can be accomplished by a casual agreement between the evangelist and the sinner with the generic “we’re all sinners,” I believe that it must go deeper and be more personal than that. It is true that we are all sinners, but the individual sinner still has the idea that “I’m not that bad,” and that needs to be dealt with head on. It is when we get down to the nitty-gritty level of coveting, lying, lusting, and idolatry (among others) as we attempt to illuminate the sinner’s understanding of their own personal guilt before the entire panorama of God’s holy standards, if not before this point, that we are accused of breaking the sacred eleventh commandment.

If you have ever felt that you were committing the one unforgivable sin of being judgmental when you call a spade a spade, or call someone who admits to lying as being a liar, don’t be dissuaded when you’re told to deal with “the log in your own eye” first. Now, if you are witnessing to someone you know well and the testimony of your life is such that you are known as a hypocrite, then you may have forfeited your credibility with that person. And the reason that you need to work on your own testimony and lifestyle is not only so that you will be able to witness to that person, you may not be saved if your life is that of a reprobate sinner.

But, if your life is characterized by striving to live and serve God in submission to His will and conformity to His Son, you will still sin. And when you do, it is important to own up to it, repent, and move forward. So if this is the case and you find yourself witnessing to someone, anyone, who throws the same objection to you, don’t stop. Don’t fear that by showing someone God’s standards and their personal guilt before them that you are judging in a way that Christ forbids in Matthew 7, you’re not.

Suppose you are driving down the Interstate at 75 miles an hour. It’s not a big deal because there is not a lot of traffic and the cars that are on the road are going as fast, if not faster, than you are. As you are going, you pass a sign that reminds you that the maximum speed allowed by the law is 65 miles per hour. When you look down at your speedometer, you notice that you are, in fact, going much faster than that. Does the driver get angry at the speed limit sign for judging him? Now the driver may well attempt to justify his actions in light of the fact that he is breaking the speed limit so that he can continue in his course of action. “I’m not hurting anyone by speeding,” “it’s a dumb rule to have this slow of a speed limit,” and “I’m in a hurry.” But most famous, and pathetically cliché, is the objection, “Everyone else is doing it.”

When an officer of the law pulls that driver over, it doesn’t matter if the entire city was speeding along with him; the law clocked this particular driver at speeds in excess of the allowed limit. There is no excuse or reason valid enough that will be convince the officer that the driver is innocent of breaking the law, and so the just punishment will be given.

Now, in Christian terms, we are not the legislative body that makes the laws. We are not the police officers who hand out the citations. We are not the judge who hears the case, sustains the citation, and enforces the punishment. Christians who witness are much like the speed limit sign that the driver sped past. The sign did not create rules or pronounce any kind of judgment on its own accord or power, but it only represents what the legislative body, the police, and the judge who make and enforce the laws have already put in motion. Any guilt that the sinner feels at this point is usually not from the questions and loving opening of the Truth of Scripture, but it is the echoing of their own guilt coming from their own conscience. Simply calling the sinner’s own attention to the fact that God’s standards have been given to us, and that by their very testimony (usually) they are breaking those laws is not judgmental. It is an act of grace to bring it to their attention.

Soon after I moved to my current home, I went out to get some food for my wife and I. On the way back from the fast food place, I turned on a little access road between the main highway and my residential street. I was cruising along at 40 miles per hour when for a block or two when I saw the flashing lights behind me. I pulled over and was informed that the speed limit was only 30, not 40. When I apologized to the officer and informed him that I thought the limit was 40, he was not moved. I even informed him that there was not a speed limit sign from the point where I turned onto this street until where he pulled me over. That is true; the only sign for quite a ways was posted before my intersection, so I could not have seen it. However, that didn’t matter. As much as I hated it, I was still in violation of the law.

The point is just this; the law is the law whether or not you see the sign. Now, on human terms we may be able to get out of a ticket on a technicality, but God’s moral law and standard is written on the hearts of men, and so we will have no case before God even if no one acts as a sign to warn us of our sin. We must not be halted in our proclamation of the problem of sin or the solution of the Savior because we’re called judgmental. Know the truth, that what we do when we alert sinners of their sin and the punishment that will follow is not judging, but it is a merciful alerting to the truth that they already know in their hearts, even if they deny that they know it.

The other thing that we need to know is that this same concept is just as important for those who claim to be Christians as it is for others who make no attempt at a Christian identity. The speed limit sign can, and should, be used on those who profess no faith in Christ as well as those who speak Christianese fluently but do not have the fruit of the new birth in their lives. The apostle John, in his epistle called First John, penned that this letter was written “so that our joy may be made complete” (1 John 1:4), but specifically so that our joy may be complete with the knowledge that we “have eternal life.” (1 John 5:13) In light of this, those of us who claim to be believers can make our way through First John using the various contrasting statements to evaluate our lives and the truth of our claim to faith in Christ.

Many people in western Christendom today, I believe, have been lulled into the false belief that if they prayed the sinner’s prayer as a child (or at one point in their lives) that they are saved without a doubt. I am convinced that not only is this untrue, but it is one of Satan’s biggest lies that so many have believed today. It is as foolish as the Roman false teaching that the act of baptism and the taking of the Eucharist saves the soul. They are both forms of works righteousness – if I do “X”, then I’m on my way to heaven. If someone lives as if they have not been saved as evidenced by reveling in unrepentant sin, there is good cause to doubt the validity of someone’s claim to have been born again.

“5 This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth; 7 but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.

8 If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.” (1 John 1:5-10)

I am convinced that turning a blind eye and a false hope of salvation toward a professing brother who is living in unrepentant sin is not the loving thing for a Christian to do. In the same way that we would approach a self confessed non-Christian, we also must do the same by using the Law as a speed limit sign in an attempt to alert the conscience of the professing believer. A true believer will come to understand the error of his ways, repent of them, and grow in Christ. A false brother may truly get saved, or he may oppose your loving concern for his soul by resisting and debating various things without dealing with the sin.

Whether dealing with a confessed non-Christian or a confessing Christian whose lives give testimony that they are liars, covetous, or idolaters, we are called to glorify God by proclaiming the Truth of Scripture regarding man’s sin, our just deserts in the righteous punishment of a holy God, God’s compassion and love in sending Christ as our propitiation, and the response that is evidence of a truly saved person; repentance from sin and true and lasting faith in Christ alone.

Lord, Grant Repentance to the Sinner

Over the past decade (wow, I can actually use that length of time while talking about my adult life) I have struggled over the doctrinal issues surrounding Calvinism and Arminianism. Almost two years ago, though (at about the same time as the birth of my second son, Noah), I settled this issue. I am a firm believer in the doctrines of grace, more commonly called Calvinism. And it was from this foundational understanding of God’s work in the salvation of man that many different phrases, in discussion and prayer, have seeped into my daily lexicon. One such phrase has been, “May God grant you (whomever) grace and repentance.” God’s gift to the believer is faith (Ephesians 2:8,9) and grace is, by definition, a gifting form God. Working from that understanding, I extrapolated that any repentant heart and action must come from God’s initiating work. Could I have pointed to a Scripture that said this specifically in this way (i.e. you repented because God gave you repentance), not really, but any response to God done correctly by a sinful man must, in my understanding, have it’s root cause in God, not man. Praise be to God for today and John MacArthur’s radio broadcast because he referenced a Scripture, that up until now, I have missed.

“When they heard this, they quieted down and glorified God, saying, "Well then, God has granted to the Gentiles also the repentance that leads to life.” (Acts 11:18)

Repentance is a gift, just like faith is a gift, that God’s working of salvation produces in the believer. Hallelujah! Salvation is all of God, and nothing of my own.

1 John – The Journey Begins

Last week I had the pleasure of teaching the T&T (3rd through 6th grade) Awana clubbers, and boy is it a pleasure to do that. Last year we went through the Ten Commandments for the entire 28 (or so) weeks of the club, and I think did a pretty thorough job of hammering home the reality of God’s standard against sin as well as opening a door for the kids to be able to see just how sinful they are. Well, this year I decided to move from lesson structure on Law and Gospel to Gospel and Growth. Sure, we’ll still include the use of God’s Law in His Word to bring about the knowledge of sin, but the focus this year is on the growth that follows conversion.

With that focus in mind, I have zeroed in on the first epistle of John to guide our lessons. Why? The way that I understand this book is that it was written “so that our joy may be made complete” (1 John 1:4), but specifically so that our joy may be complete with the knowledge that we “have eternal life.” (1 John 5:13) So last night we began our tour through First John using the contrasting statements to evaluate our lives.

Many people in western Christendom today, I believe, have been lulled into the false belief that if they prayed the sinner’s prayer as a child (or at one point in their lives) is almost a magical group of words that must be used to impart eternal life. I am very tired of modern protestant Christendom’s sinner’s prayer battle cry that seems to, so often, lack any real articulation or understanding of what the gospel teaches and demands about the evidence of a changed life…at least with what is communicated to the listener.

And if this is the atmosphere in Christian literature and culture, my fear is that we are raising up and influencing generations of children who will try Jesus, accept Him, pray the prayer, but never really get saved. And all the while they will have the “assurance” that they’re saved based solely upon the one point in time when they prayed the sinner’s prayer. I liken this protestant concept of salvation to the Roman Catholic (or other) concept of baptismal regeneration. Basically stated, in that theology one is born again based upon the fact that a person was baptized as (usually) an infant.

We Baptists tend to shake our heads and wonder how people can be so deceived to think that salvation comes through a ceremony of water baptism, and rightly so, but so many of our Baptist brethren don’t see the same type of error in the popular evangelical protestant theology of the day. I dare say that one can make an argument filled with more Scriptures directly referencing “baptism for the remission of sins” than an argument using Scriptures directly referencing “Ask Jesus into your heart”. As a matter of fact, I don’t know of one that says that this is what we are to do.

Now I have to say two things. First of all, all of the Scriptures that seem to be somewhat in favor of baptismal regeneration or a combination of faith and necessary baptism for salvation do not say that. The Bible is clear that man is saved by faith alone (see Romans 5:1 and Ephesians 2:8,9). Secondly, there is verse that jumps to mind regarding “ask Jesus into your heart,” and it has (for better or worse) been pushed to this level of recognition and used this way by Baptist, or Baptist friendly, preachers.

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.” (Revelation 3:20)

In the spirit of full disclosure, I have not done a fully thorough study of this section of Revelation, so my comments about the above verse will be more moderated for that reason. But, the way that this verse is applied many times by the preacher when he says, “Jesus stands at the door of your heart, and if you pray to accept Him, He will come in and you will be saved.” The problem is that “heart” is not even mentioned here, and the context of the statement in Revelation is dealing with the growingly apostate church of Laodicea. So whether this is a call for true believers to repent of their floundering ways or call unbelievers to salvation is, at this time, unclear to me. But in any case, for preachers to base modern day evangelistic language primarily on this verse is very reckless.

So now we come back to the first epistle from John. This book is loaded with passages that contrast someone who walks in the light with someone who walks in darkness. It is my intention and goal to work our way through this book in the Awana meetings. I hope and pray that the teaching of God’s word in this book will cause those children who have made professions of faith to examine themselves to ensure that they’re in the faith and (cf. 2 Corinthians 13:5; 2 Peter 1:10).

Missing the Point

I’ve been desperately trying to catch up on my podcast archives so I have been listening to Allestair Begg from July, John Piper from March, and John MacArthur from early August. The series that Dr. MacArthur is preaching on deals with what types of people God saves, and it is focused (at least as far as I am now) on the fourth chapter of Luke where Jesus reads from the prophet Isaiah and proclaims that this very Scripture was fulfilled in their hearing. My point with this entry is not to re-state everything from MacArthur’s sermon but to offer an observation and possible correlation to modern Christendom.

As far back as I can remember thinking about various stories in the Bible and those involved in them, I can vividly remember being shocked at the apparent stupidity and ungratefulness of many of the people. Whether it is the idolatry of the Israelites with the golden calf, their lamenting of manna that God provided, or the unfaithfulness on the doorstep of Canaan that led to the wandering in the desert for forty years, every time that I read or hear those stories I got so annoyed because they were being so foolish and ungrateful to God. Along with those thoughts I remember, on many occasions, thinking that if I had been living in any of those times that I would not have worship the calf, complained about the manna, and that I would have been on Joshua and Caleb’s side.

But when I was in college, I began to think about these things again and I began to realize that I was not like Joshua or Caleb, but I was more like the ungrateful and unfaithful Israelites who constantly took God’s previous miraculous works and bountiful provision and counted it as normal and as something to be expected. Just like anything that we receive on a regular or daily basis, we tend to expect it and we become (as a rule) less overtly thankful for it because it has come to be expected and counted as normal occurrence rather than a blessing. What do these thoughts have to do with 4:14-30?

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” – George Santayana¹

The people in Jesus’ day had the privilege to see Christ and hear the perfectly articulated and tempered proclamation of the gospel that was a fulfillment to all that the Scriptures had been anticipating. They had the Perfect Law-Giver and Savior in their midst proclaiming that which the prophets and patriarchs wanted so desperately to see and hear, but yet virtually all of Jesus’ contemporaries missed it entirely while He was living, and even following His death, only a small percentage of national Israel has ever found her Messiah.

The question that comes to mind is how could these people who were so committed to the law and prophets and who were so knowledgeable about the commandments of God and the prophecies of the Messiah miss the very one they were awaiting and expecting? Through years of compromise or simple human vanity, the majority of Jewish people were waiting for a Messiah who was not primarily interested in the forgiving of sins and the salvation of the lost, but they were waiting for the Messiah to be the conquering king who would restore national Israel as a nation and kick out the Romans.

Since Christ has come and we have believed in Him, historically those who confess Christ have seen the folly of their error and have esteemed Christ as the only Begotten of the Father and have hailed Him as such. And we continue to be somewhat bewildered that Christ’s contemporaries could have missed everything that is so apparent to us. I fear that this same folly is as present today as it was back then. It may not take the exact form as it once did, but it is the same humanistic folly.

In Christ’s time, the popular and prominent teachers of the law saw no use for Jesus unless He would overthrow the Romans, and they demonstrated this by suing for His death. Some of those in opposition to Christ were, no doubt, committed disciples to the false religion that they had been instructed in. These same may have had no underlining agenda of personal wealth, fame, or preservation, but they believed that they were doing God’s work by having a false prophet and heretic executed. However, it is also just as likely that many of these religious leaders were more concerned about lining their own pockets, maintaining their own traditions, and holding onto their positions of leadership over and above worshiping and seeking after God, even if it would have been done in a false legalistic system that does not save.

Today many in the most prominent pulpits and ministries are preaching watered down and inclusive gospel messages, if they preach any kind of gospel at all. Teachers today are more focused on health and wealth, growing church ministries, or psycho-analyzing their parishioners rather than on the pure gospel message found in the plain understanding of the text of the Bible itself.

Some of the most frightening waves inside of Christendom are those of the emergent and social gospel movements. The emergent movement (specifically I am referring to those who are emergent in their theology, not in style of worship) seeks to blur all lines of doctrine in endless “conversations” that have no conclusions because all ideas are viewed equally valid. I agree with them, but not in the way that they intend. My views are equally as valid yours – they are both rubbish unless they are the views that are enlightened by the Holy Spirit and unless they come from a correct contextual reading and understanding of the Bible itself.

The social gospel movement removes the focus of the gospel from saving sinners and being justified in the eyes of God and instead puts the focus on social programs like feeding the poor. Feeding the poor and fighting disease is a good gospel work, but it is not the gospel. Feeding the poor and curing them of all sorts of diseases without explicitly preaching the true saving gospel of Jesus Christ is not an act of love, but it is an act of supreme hatred. If I know that God will condemn those who have not repented of their sins and believe in the gospel, but I do not exhort and plead with them to repent and believe, it shows that I don’t truly care for them.

Should Christians work to feed the poor and clothe the naked and heal the sick? Yes. But that should be done (a) because we are commanded to by Christ, (b) because we love those in need, and (c) because it is a testimony to the truth of the gospel. May we not fall into the folly of misplaced religious fervor, whether our main goal is to expel Rome or to feed and clothe those in need, that so easily grips the hearts of men, but let us focus solely on Christ and Him crucified for the salvation of sinners to the glory of God alone.

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¹ The Life of Reason, Volume 1, 1905

Testify about what exactly?Bethel Seminary and Reaching out to Muslims

I receive a quarterly magazine from Bethel Seminary called “Heart & Mind” because I had, at one time, shown interest in attending that institution. I normally don’t pay any attention to it because it is just one more piece of bulk/junk mail to keep me thinking about enrolling there. However, when I brought the latest issue in from my mail box, the cover story “Loving Thy Muslim Neighbor” caught my eye. I will admit that I began reading this article skeptical about what it might say regarding the gospel, but at the same time I really did want to understand a perspective of Bethel Seminary (perhaps not ”the” perspective, but a good enough one to be put in the magazine for their seminary) on presenting the gospel to Muslims.

Much of the article, entitled “With Jesus on the Muslim Road”, was written in a bullet-point style outlining a particular process for bringing the gospel to Muslims. The author, a man named Doug, exhorts Christians, or “Christ-people” as he states, to love them, to go to them, to learn from and try to understand them, to befriend them, to introduce Jesus to them, and finally to lay down our lives for them. I think that these steps sound like a very good way to evangelize lost people of any demographic group, including Muslims.

My concern with this article is not with the broad stroked ideas listed above, but it is with how Doug briefly articulated how we should share Jesus Christ. He wrote, “To share Jesus with Muslims, we do not have to know Islamics or be experts in the Qur'an.” I totally agree with him on this point. It may be helpful to understand their religion and traditions, but it is not absolutely necessary. However, my disagreement could not be stronger with what Doug wrote next.

“We do not have to defend Jesus, or have all the answers to every question that may arise. We can go with Jesus, in love, sharing honestly, ready to learn, and bearing witness to all of who He is and what He has done for us. Testimony, we have found, is the strongest witness. Muslims will argue with the "facts" that you present (like whether or not the Bible is trustworthy, Jesus is the Son of God, or that He died on the cross, for example), but we have found that they do not argue with personal experience of the living Christ. On the contrary, they can be deeply touched and drawn to such testimony.”¹

“We do not have to defend Jesus.” The initial statement of this quote is utterly shocking to me. We don’t need to defend or articulate who Jesus is? This scandalous statement is only made more outrageous when Doug articulates that some of the facts that Muslims would argue with are “the Bible is trustworthy, Jesus is the Son of God, or that He died on the cross.” Furthermore when he says that testimony is “the strongest witness”, what in the world are you testifying about? It’s obviously not that Jesus is God, that the Bible is the trustworthy Word of God, or that Jesus is the perfect substitute who satisfied the wrath of God on behalf of those who repent and place their complete trust in Him. If we are not testifying about those things, what on earth do we have to testify about? Anything else that we would communicate or show to Muslims (or any other unsaved person) would basically be good works, and how is that different than what a nice Mormon or a good Buddhist would do? It cannot be that much different if we do not defend Jesus in our testimony.

Also, what is the deal with the elevation of personal testimony? This must be an interpretation from Romans 10:17, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by testifying about Jesus, but not being too particular about His deity, His word, or His sacrifice.” (Romans 10:17 NHV)² Of course that’s not what the Bible says! The Bible says clearly that it is in the Word of God, the Scriptures, where the power for the message is.

“¹³ for ‘WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.’ ¹⁴ How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? ¹⁵ How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, ‘HOW BEAUTIFUL ARE THE FEET OF THOSE WHO BRING GOOD NEWS OF GOOD THINGS!’ ¹⁶ However, they did not all heed the good news; for Isaiah says, ‘LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT?’ ¹⁷ So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” (Romans 10:13-17)

This is so tragic that for whatever reason that some people would be so bold and brazen as to elevate their own personal experience above that of the Scriptures, even at the cost of defending Christ. Remember, personal experience, as well as what our heart tells us, is very fallible, and it cannot be trusted by itself. The Bible tells us that our hearts are “deceitful and sick” (Jeremiah 17:19) or “wicked” (NKJV), and therefore we cannot trust it. Why is Doug promoting a non-divisive (i.e. articulated Christ and the gospel) evangelistic method? I think he answerd that when he wrote,

“I believe that we are called in Jesus to have a positive approach to the Muslim people – sharing Jesus and the Bible and seeking to win them to Christ. We are not called to argue with them, to prove them wrong, or to defeat them. Putting people on the defensive causes them to see us as their enemy, makes them wary of us, and closes their hearts toward us. One can win an argument but lose his opponent, succeeding only in building barriers and pushing people farther away from Jesus. I believe we are called to build bridges, and motivated by love, do everything possible to bring Muslims closer to Christ. Are we up to the challenge?”³

First of all, his initial statement that we need to share “Jesus and the Bible seeking to win them to Christ” is impossible to accomplish if we don’t articulate who and what those things mean. Jesus wasn’t just a prophet like the Muslims believe, and likewise the Bible is not corrupt. But the bigger concern that I had here was with the notion that we can win an idea, lose the person, and push them “farther away from Jesus.” I have heard this phrase used before, but I honestly don’t know what it means? How does one determine the relative closeness to or farness from Christ? How much farther away is an unbeliever from Christ one moment before they die compared to the eternity that follows? While living, there was still the opportunity to be saved, but the reality of the position of that unbeliever’s spirit and heart toward Christ is no different. While living the unbeliever is dead in sin and separated from Christ, and then after death that same person is still separated from Christ, but that reality is fully actualized in all of its terribleness.

How close was Judas to the Savior? He never really believed in Jesus, at least no more than any other unsaved person does? Was he closer to Christ during His ministry than he was when he betrayed Jesus and killed himself? Being friendly to Jesus or to nice Christians and being “close” to salvation seem to be very different ideas. We can’t know who is close to being saved, or even if they will be. “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (John 3:8)

Doug ends his article by using the parable of the lost son, where the lost son returns home to his father, and that we likewise need to, “open our arms to embrace them with a love that sacrifices, draws near, and overcomes all obstacles.”⁴ The problem is that in the parable, the son knew who his father was, he didn’t just know someone who knew his father, and this other person just happened to be nice to him but he didn’t correct the son when he slandered his own father. Christ can and will save people in spite of themselves, and He will save them in spite of those of us who desire to see them saved, but who do not see (not in any practical applicational way) Scripture as authoritative or Christ Himself as being worthy to defend against slander.

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¹ Doug, “With Jesus on the Muslim Road”, Heart & Mind Volume 20 Number 3 (Summer 2007) 16.

² This is my own invention, the New Heretical Version (NHV).

³ Doug, “With Jesus on the Muslim Road”, Heart & Mind Volume 20 Number 3 (Summer 2007) 16.

⁴ Ibid.

Apparently I Am a Bigot…and You Might Be Too

I don’t listen to too much of the political talk anymore, but sometimes flashes of it make it into my listening regiment because of a Christian or moral component that surges to the forefront. One such issue slammed me harder than, I think, many Christians seem to be taking it. To set this issue up, here is a snippet of an article that, I believe, has some very ominous overtones.

During a debate on religion and politics at the New York Public Library with atheist author Christopher Hitchens, Sharpton said, "As for the one Mormon running for office, those that really believe in God will defeat him anyway, so don't worry about that. That's a temporary situation."

On the campaign trail in Iowa Wednesday, Romney fired back, calling Sharpton's comment "terribly misguided."

"It shows that bigotry still exists in some corners," Romney said. "I thought it was a most unfortunate comment to make."

Asked if he thought Sharpton is a bigot, the former Massachusetts governor said, "I don't know Rev. Sharpton. I doubt he is personally such a thing. But the comment was a comment which could be described as a bigoted comment.

"Perhaps he didn't mean it that way, but the way it came out was inappropriate and wrong."¹

Why is this so frightening and ominous? If Al Sharpton is called a bigot because he made a statement that categorized Mormons as people who do not “really believe in God”, what does that signal for the rest of us? Now, I am not a fan of Rev. Sharpton in most cases, but this is the second time that I have agreed with what he said (or inferred). The first time that I agreed with Rev. Sharpton was when he was critical of the prosperity preaching and theology of Creflo Dollar.

“To try and distort Jesus to try and justify your new jet plane or your new Rolls Royce is, to me, an abomination.”²

But regarding his recent comment pertaining to Mormons and Mitt Romney, he may have been intending to make a poke specifically at Republicans and used the only Mormon as his target. So I am not totally sure of what exactly he intended, but the way in which it was said and subsequently received by Mr. Romney was one of bigotry.

Furthermore, even though the Rev. Sharpton has backpedaled in his attempts to “spin” what he said or meant to say in the context of that debate and he seems to no longer agree with what he stated, that doesn’t change the fact that it is true. Even if he might have intended it to be more of a shot at Christians who are also republicans, it came across as a shot at Mormons, and the fact of the matter is that Mormons don’t believe in the true God of the bible at all.

Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines a bigot as “a person obstinately or intolerantly devoted to his or her own opinions and prejudices” and one who especially “regards or treats the members of a group (as a racial or ethnic group) with hatred and intolerance. “³ Now, you can disagree with what I, or the Rev. Sharpton, believe about who does and who does not really believe in the true God. However unless you can prove that myself or Rev. Sharpton display hatred or are involved with an agenda to deny “equal freedom of expression” or we are “unwilling to grant or share social, political, or professional rights” ⁴ to Mormons, the accusation of bigotry is a giant leap in its application.

Do I believe that Mormons worship God? No, I don’t. I would say the same if you asked me if Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Oneness-Pentecostals (“Christians”), Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Scientologists (Christian Science). I would ardently defend my statements because the Word of God basically says that if you don’t believe in Christ and worship Christ, you are not worshipping God. This is not something that Christians have made up in order to be mean; it is something that God has shown to us through His Word.

“Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.” (1 John 2:23)

"All things have been handed over to Me by My Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.” (Matthew 11:27)

“Anyone who goes too far and does not abide in the teaching of Christ, does not have God; the one who abides in the teaching, he has both the Father and the Son.” (2 John 1:9)

Lest you think that I am overreacting in my concern over the “bigot” comment made by Mitt Romney, I came across another use of this term by a different religion. The following dialogue was taken from a BBC Panorama documentary called “Scientology and Me”. In watching it, the primary goal was to ascertain if the Church of Scientology is, as it is referred to in British law, a cult. Here is a summary of what both U.S. and British courts have stated about Scientology,

In 1984, Scientology was described by [British Judge] Mr. Justice Latey as: "both immoral and socially obnoxious...it is corrupt, sinister and dangerous. It is corrupt because it is based on lies and deceit and has as its real objective money and power for Mr. Hubbard, his wife and those close to him at the top". The same year, in Los Angeles, Superior Court Judge Paul G. Breckenridge, Jr., called Scientology: "a vast enterprise to extract the maximum amount of money from its adepts by pseudo-scientific theories ... The organization clearly is schizophrenic and paranoid, and this bizarre combination seems to be a reflection of its founder, L. Ron Hubbard".⁵

That British decision is one of the reasons why Scientology is not considered a religion in Great Britain, and therefore does not receive the various tax (and other) perks of a religion. When John Sweeney, the BBC reporter, asked this question to a very high ranking member of the Church of Scientology, Tommy Davis, the following exchange occurred.

“Some people say [Scientology] is a sinister cult.”

“You have no right whatsoever to say what is and what isn’t a religion. The constitution of the United States of America guarantees one’s right to practice and believe freely in this country, and the definition of religion is very clear, and it’s not defined by John Sweeny. And for you to repeatedly refer to my faith [as a cult] is so derogatory, so offensive, and so bigoted. And the reason you keep repeating it is because you wanted to get a reaction like you are getting right now. Well buddy, you got it. Right here, right now, I’m angry. Real angry.” ⁶

So what is all of the fuss about? In our society, calling someone a bigot is a serious charge that carries with it a detestable (and rightly so) stigma. It has been used to refer to those persons who view people of other racial ancestry or religions affiliation (i.e. Africans, Mexicans, Jews, Gypsies, etc.) as less human or as people deserving a lower class status in the culture. Being a classified as a bigot seems to be one of the quickest ways to be marginalized and demonized. However, if our culture (and subsequently, our legal system) moves the classification of a bigot from one whose views are shown to call for a lower or a sub-human class of people and subsequently to socially discriminate against them over to a definition that includes theological statements about who God is, we are in grave danger in America.

Hate speech laws are already knocking at the door when it comes to preaching the Biblical doctrines of sexuality. Even though no Christian church is calling for the persecution of homosexuals, we have had terms of bigotry and homophobia thrown at us. In no way do we want to make those who practice homosexuality second class citizens with voting, employment, or other citizenship infringements, we are proclaiming God’s Word.

But, if the sentiments of Mitt Romney are heard, receive, and amplified by our anti-Christian (I could say “anti-God” because it would be the same thing) culture, we are not only in danger of legal ramifications for proclaiming and preaching portions of Genesis Leviticus 18, Romans 1, and 1 Corinthians 6 because they refer to the abomination and condemnation of homosexuality, but we would now be in store for the same type of restrictions when preaching passages about the exclusivity of Christ like John 14:6 or 1 John 2:23.

Honestly, I don’t believe that we can stop this trend, but that does not mean that we should give up the fight. It is inevitable that our land will see preaching the gospel of Christ and the preaching for holiness and purity in doctrine as well as holiness and purity in living as intolerant, bigoted, and illegal. That will not stop us from our preaching, but it will make the cost of preaching that much higher. Preaching the gospel in America today may bring ridicule, scorn, and bad looks from those around us. Preaching the gospel in America when hate speech and bigotry legally includes the subjects above will bring legal persecution in the form of taxing our churches, infringements on the publishing of bibles, and jail time for preaching the Word of God.

Now is the time to preach the Word with the freedom that we have. We need to take full advantage of the time and freedoms that we have before they are taken away, and this country becomes even darker and more hostile to the gospel.

May God – the one and only True God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is eternally existent in three Divine Persons and who demands our repentance of our sins and belief in Jesus Christ alone for salvation – give His true children strength, courage, and diligence now, and may He carry those same attributes into and through increased persecution.

May God convict His children of our sinful and lethargic wasting of time and of legally protected opportunities to proclaim the gospel so that we will waste no more time. God, give us mercy and grace to be bold and unashamed.

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¹ http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/05/09/sharpton.romney/index.html (emphasis mine)

² http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_knKUT586nQ

³ http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/bigot

⁴ From Merriam-Webster’s definition of intolerant http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/intolerant

⁵ http://www.spectator.co.uk/stephenpollard/30457/the-cult-of-scientology.thtml

⁶ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0UZ7xeni28

Out of the mouth of babes...

Christmas thought #1: on Santa Claus

On the Wednesday before Christmas we had a candlelight Christmas service at church. We had a lovely time of singing before a message from a visiting pastor. His sermon was addressing the question about what the real meaning of Christmas is, and in it he referenced several different cultural expressions or answers to this question. He referenced Santa Clause, but not by name, and said, “If this guy knows whether or not you’ve been good, he possesses some form of omniscience….” He then made it clear that he is never comfortable ascribing the qualities and attributes of God to mere men or to fictional characters.

This comment about Santa made me think a little bit. At least some of the lore surrounding Santa Claus started because Nicolas, the Bishop of Myrna (lived in the 3rd or 4th century), was thought to have done some deed of gift giving as one of his miracles contributing to his sainthood. Therefore, stories about the true person of Nicholas morphed into his performing various miracles and then into the current stories surrounding Santa Claus.

So, I was thinking about the Christian roots of the myth of Santa Claus, and I had a very interesting revelation. Let’s just say, for argument’s sake, that Santa Claus is real and he is good old (very old) Saint Nicholas. He has been blessed with virtual immortality (so that he could live for almost two millennia) and he even has a current ministry of giving gifts to people. And finally, his measuring rod on whether he gives gifts to little children (or anyone for that matter) is whether they’ve been naughty or nice.

Now, as a Christian, Nicholas has only one standard by which to measure naughtiness, and that is in view of what is good. Again, as a Christian there is only one true good, and that is God. Everyone else has broken God’s laws at some point during the year (during any given day, hour, or minute if you want to really get serious), and therefore no one would be qualified for receiving gifts. In fact, even if Nicholas had his job from the foundation of the world, he could have only given gifts to Adam and Eve before they sinned and then to Christ for his 33 or so years that He was alive.

So, basically, Santa Claus has had the biggest cake job in the history of the world. He has never had to deliver one present because no one, absolutely no one, can make it through one year and meet the standard by which any Christian measures good and bad. That standard is God’s Law, the 10 Commandments. Christ summed up the entire Law and the prophets in two commandments: (a) to love God your heart, soul, mind and strength, and (b) to love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:37-39).

Realistically, there is no Santa Claus, but God does judge who’s been naughty and nice by the same standard. And if you’ve been naughty, you don’t get a lump of coal in a sock, you get eternal damnation. All humanity is under this curse and judgment. And it is only by seeing yourself in the light of this unmerciful standard of judgment that we can be in a place where we can trust in the only true and merciful Savior, who is Christ the Lord. Trying to change your life and cease from offending God will not help you. For it is only by God’s saving and renewing power that we can truly turn from our sins and live for Him. You cannot turn from sins without placing your faith in Christ, and you cannot place your faith in Christ without turning from your sins.

Tony the Vegan

I sometimes wonder which one is harder: whether working in a secular place of business or working in a church or para-church organization. One thing that I am pretty sure about is that, most likely, the grass always seems greener on the other side.

Many people have nicknames, and almost no one picked it for themselves. Some are inside jokes, some are abbreviations (i.e. EJ), and some are just random. Well, the name Tony the Vegan came about in a very different way, I guess. You see, when I come home from my job, I like to tell my wife about the day’s goings on: what certain people said or did, who got fired or promoted, and other various things. Well, for some reason, whenever I’d talk about a really nice co-worker named Tony, my wife (or other people) would look puzzled and weren’t sure exactly who I was referring to even though there were various stories that included or focused on my interactions with Tony in the past. So, I decided during one of my re-explanations of who Tony was to call him “Tony the Vegan” because his name is Tony and he is a Vegan. Since then, whenever I tell a story that includes Tony in it, people know exactly who I am referring to and they can call to their memory various things about him that I have relayed in the past.

Tony and I have worked together for around 2 years, and Tony is one of those guys that just doesn’t seem to fit into any specific paradigm of people. In the past I had tried to communicate the message of the gospel to him, and I don’t know if I ever did it effectively. I tried so many times to steer a conversation to eternity and to Christ, but it always fell short, mostly because we were working with limited amounts of time. Also I felt that he was simply humoring me (which he may have been, and I’m not upset about that). On one such occasion where I was trying to use anything, any window that would allow me to angle a conversation to Christ and spiritual things was when Tony was getting ready to make some popcorn. I noticed that the plastic wrapping had a curious sticker on it, and I wanted to have it. I asked if I could have it and he, looking puzzled, agreed. I then opened up my bible that I had with me and told him that he had just given me a profound bookmark to use in my bible. Humorous? Yes. Did we have a small conversation about the bible and eternity? Yes. But it still didn’t get too far.

Tony took a different job soon after and I tried to salvage my failed attempts by letting Lee Strobel do some talking for me when I lent him A Case for Christ and A Case for Faith. He, being a book guy, seemed genuinely interested to learn a little about Christianity from a biblical, protestant, and fundamental standpoint. Before I lost contact with him for a while, he gave me the books back and thanked me for letting him borrow them.

After that, I didn’t have any contact with Tony for almost a year. In the interim time, I had learned better ways to bring up and articulate the message of the gospel than I practiced before (thank you Ray, Kirk, and Todd). I always had the right ingredients (repentance, faith, Christ alone, etc), but it was the revelation of how to use the Law in normal conversation that really opened some doors for me. Now that we’re working in the same office again, I have tried two different approaches with him, but both have had the lack of clarity that I was aiming for, and that was due to the lack of time and my faulty articualtion of the gospel in that time.

The first thing I tried was related to some conversation about a fire (we may have had a fire drill or something, I don’t know). I asked him what characteristics he thinks that a fireman would need in order to allow him do do his job well. He said that the fireman should be strong, fit, and brave (not afraid of the fire). I then asked him that if a person was unaware that the building was on fire or that person was in denial of the severity of the situation, should the fireman be a little more aggressive in trying to convince the individual of the danger? Should the fireman try to persuade him or her to see the solution (i.e. get out of the building)? He agreed that the fireman should make all attempts to save the person from the fire. Having run out of time, I then told Tony that I’d be back to tell him why I asked those questions. Well, I dropped the ball and never made the opportunity to bring it up again soon enough.

The next time that I made an opportunity occurred was when I was on break (bible in hand) and I stopped by his desk to say something (totally unrelated to evangelism, actually) and he asked if I was carrying “the Book” or something to that effect. He then said something about how nice it is (or something), and I saw an opening and took it. I said that it is a great book, and it is good to know that I have peace with God. “But,” I said, “the bible calls you a child of wrath, and God isn’t happy with children of wrath – nor will judgment day be favorable to them.” He then looked a little perturbed, nervous, concerned, or something, and I told him that I’d show him what Bible verse I was referring to when I came back (he was busy and I had to do something quick). But before I could show him the passage, he had already found it (Ephesians 2:3) and he was concerned at the severity of the statement.

So, to my dear friend Tony (or anyone else for that matter):

The bible is clear that God is angry, and that all liars (not to mention murderers, drunkards, fornicators, etc) will have their part in the lake of fire (Revelation 21:8). The just punishment of sin committed against a holy God is the torment in the lake of “unquenchable fire” and where the “worm does not die” (Mark 9:43,48) where it is eternal and “the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever; they have no rest day and night,” (Revelation 14:10). This is a place reserved for all of those people “name was not found written in the book of life” (Revelation 20:15).

That is why the good news of the gospel (gospel means “good news”) is such good news. Tony talked about the qualifications for a fire fighter, and one of them was that a good fire fighter would do all that he could to get the people out of a burning building, even if the people inside didn’t know or believe that it was on fire. That is what I am trying to do. It is not because I delight in making people feel uncomfortable, uneasy, or that I like to make people dislike me because of what I believe. I do it because God has chosen this, the foolishness of preaching His message of salvation, as the means by which people can know (a) that they are terribly guilty before Almighty God, (b) that God must punish them, and (c) that if they trust in the perfect life, sacrificial death, and supernatural resurrection of Jesus Christ and repent (turn away or forsake) of their sins, then Christ’s perfect righteousness will be credited to them before God, and you will inherit eternal life with your Savior.

My bookmark says “Follow Directions to avoid SCORCHING” and it is true that if we obey what God has said in the Bible, we will not endure eternal punishment. However, don’t look to God to avoid hell (some sarcastically call it “fire insurance”), but turn to God because He is so kind that He will save you from hell. The difference is huge. One person will believe God until the fear wears off and never appreciate the grace of God whereas the other one will bask in the grace of a forgiving God and be amazed that God would save a sinful wretch.

He saved this sinful wretch. He saved a murdering blasphemer named Paul. He can save you.

Bullhorn Guysthe battle over how to evangelize

Recently (mid September), there was video that was uploaded to the Internet that was critical of street preaching. The specific targets were men who stand in a public area, grab a bullhorn, and preach about the coming of judgment. The video was aptly called “Bullhorn Guy”. Rob Bell, an emergent-style pastor, is the individual who is on screen to make his case as to why he doesn’t think that Jesus approves of bullhorn guys and their message of God judging people and sending them to hell. He then starts talking about how he thinks that evangelism should be done.

Well, not long after this video was posted on the Internet, another ministry made a response video (in pseudo-parody fashion) to give another idea, or to defend bullhorn guys. After setting up the video (so that there is no mistaking what the motivation for it was), the individual on screen in this video is Todd Friel, a classic fundamentalist preacher/apologist and host of Way of the Master Radio, who mocks the idea of “lifestyle” evangelism (i.e. that someone off the street will come up to you and ask, “Please tell me about the hope that lies within you!” when you have been saying or doing nothing explicitly to draw attention to yourself or your message) and then argues that true love is shown by telling people the whole message of the gospel. The bad, then the good.

Watch them both, and see who clearly gets the gospel across to people and by doing so, who is more loving. Regardless of the reception of the hearer (whether they receive Christ, reject Him, or are ambivalent), which makes the gospel clear?

Click here to watch Rob Bells’ Nooma video “Bullhorn Guy”


Click here to watch Todd Friel and the Way of the Master response to Bullhorn Guy

“all people everywhere should repent” (Acts 17:30)

It is undeniable that the Bible speaks clearly about the issue of repentance. Other than a correct understanding of what that is or what it means, the burning question in many people’s hearts is a simple, “Why should I repent?” Consequently the answer to this question comes easily when someone understands the full message of the gospel.

Before I even get into this discussion, I must try to articulate the friction that is present when Christians talk about repentance. If you put the wrong emphasis on it, repentance then becomes a means of salvation by works which is unbiblical. If you put no emphasis on repentance with the desire to avoid the incorrect emphasis we just saw, the message is that the life of a believer is no indicator of the validity of the claim of being saved (i.e. I can live like the devil because I am saved by grace). Both of these sides miss the correct understanding of what the New Testament is saying.

Repentance and faith are two responses to the grace of God in salvation that go hand in hand. I do not believe that one can truly occur without the other. To really get the point of why someone should repent, I need to paint the picture a bit first so that the actions will have their proper context.

The Bible is clear that all men, if judged by their own actions and merits, are wicked and evil in the sight of God and “even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood.” (Genesis 8:21) And no good deed that we do is even reckoned as a good deed in God’s eyes, “For all of us have become like one who is unclean, And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; And all of us wither like a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.” (Isaiah 64:6). Also, not only are we unrighteous and evil, but Paul emphasizes this by quoting the Psalms when he wrote, “as it is written, "THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;” (Romans 3:10,11).

God sees every thought, word, and deed that we have as being wretched and, in the language of Isaiah 64:6, only as pure and clean as a used menstrual cloth. This is not even dealing with what we, as men and women, would consider less than righteous or bad things that we do. J.C. Ryle, the first Anglican Bishop of Liverpool, provided this illustration on humanities perspective on our own sinfulness:

“We, on the other hand—poor blind creatures, here today and gone tomorrow, born in sin, surrounded by sinners, living in a constant atmosphere of weakness, infirmity and imperfection—can form none but the most inadequate conceptions of the hideousness of evil. We have no line to fathom it and no measure by which to gauge it. The blind man can see no difference between a masterpiece of Titian or Raphael and the queen’s head on a village signboard. The deaf man cannot distinguish between a penny whistle and a cathedral organ. The very animals whose smell is most offensive to us have no idea that they are offensive and are not offensive to one another. Fallen men and women, I believe, can have no just idea what a vile thing sin is in the sight of that God whose handiwork is absolutely perfect—perfect whether we look through telescope or microscope;”¹

Establishing the fact that all humanity is wicked, and that includes every individual from the lowest to the highest, is the first and hardest truth for anyone to see and accept. It is not much easier (if it is in fact easier at all) for a person to see and accept that our status as unrighteous sinners is so offensive a holy God that He, also being totally just and totally righteous, should punish all humanity in an eternal hell where, in the words of Jesus Himself, it is described as “unquenchable fire” (Mark 9:43) and a place “where THEIR WORM DOES NOT DIE, AND THE FIRE IS NOT QUENCHED.” (v. 48)

That was both the bad news and the truth. The good news is that Jesus Christ, God Himself, came to earth as one of us (John 1:1,14) where He lived a perfect life but He was crucified, died because of the sinfulness of mankind, and was resurrected to life again. God made Jesus Christ, the perfect and sinless God-Man, to suffer the just penalty of God’s wrath on behalf of all of those who would truly believe in Him. This was done so that these same undeserving, unrighteous, and wretched sinners would be given the righteousness that is Christ’s in order to be acceptable before God and inherit eternal life (see 2 Corinthians 5:21).

The bible makes it explicitly clear that men are saved by God’s grace alone. We are not saved, justified, or born again by any action or pious religious ceremony. Salvation must be received in this way (by grace alone) because we are like dead men in sin (Ephesians 2:1,5; Colossians 2:13), and dead men can’t do anything. In His divine providence, God has shown that our only acceptable human response to this gracious offer is to have faith (Romans 5:1; Ephesians 2:8,9; Titus 3:5) that is shown by repentance (Matthew 7:16; John 15:5,6; James 3:8-12; ). This means that our thoughts, words, and deeds are now (by the grace of God) are no longer sinful by design or apathy, but are formed with the goal of honoring God.²

Why repent? Because no expressed faith has any validity before men or God if it is not proven by the actions of that same person (see James 2) If you live like the devil, no matter what you know in your head about God, then your actions and intentions of your heart testify to where your love and devotion truly are, and it is not with God. Furthermore, not only is repentance a biblical mandate and it must be present in a truly saved person, but it makes complete and total sense.

Imagine that you are married to a faithful and loving wife. However, you have been a cheating on her and now your brother has confronted you and has shown you how awful that is, and he has persuaded you to make it right with her. You then go up to her and say, “I’ve been cheating on you, and I’m sorry about that. Please forgive me.” She is gracious; she is more gracious than any other wife would ever be, and she says that she will forgive you and love you. However, within the next day or two you go back to the same woman that you were committing adultery with and continue that sordid affair. If this is the case, how truthful was your apology? Not truthful at all! You have shown that you are not sorrowful over the sins against your wife by your willingness to continue doing them.

It is the same way with God. If we say with our mouths that we are sinners and are in need of forgiveness and request the blood of Christ to be applied to our sins but yet we are unwilling to forsake the very things that so alienated us from God in the first place and required the death of God on the cross to pay their penalty, then we do not value the forgiveness of Christ and have shown that we did not, in fact, ever receive it.

Why repent? Because if you truly understand the penalty that you justly deserve, and you then look at the selfless and self sacrificial offering of Christ so that if you truly place your faith in him you wouldn’t have to suffer that eternal punishment, then your response is an overwhelming sense of gratitude and indebtedness. You can then say, with Paul, that you are a slave of Christ because you were bought by such a great price. Then, your only desire is to please your master who has redeemed you.

Place your faith in Christ and repent of your sins, otherwise you will incur the just punishment of a holy God forever and ever.

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¹Holiness: It's Nature, Hinderance, Difficulties, & Roots by J.C. Ryle p. 7

² I cannot stress enough that the works are not the means or the reason why a person receives the righteousness of Christ, but it is only the result of – the fruit of – having already received forgiveness of Christ and being made new (2 Corinthians 5:17; Ephesians 4:24; Colossians 3:10)or born again (John 3:8). Being baptized, taking communion, being a pastor, a deacon, or going to church are not actions that contribute in any way to the attaining or maintaining of your salvation.

...without the law

On a recent edition of Way of the Master Radio I was reintroduced to a conflict with how we, as Christians, should evangelize. I am completely aware that there is a conflict between the biblical understanding of the Christian life following conversion and an unbiblical one. Namely, the Bible says that if someone is born again that it is God’s will that they be sanctified (1 Thessalonians 4:4). However, there is a segment, and it’s not a small one either, of Christians who believe and preach a gospel which makes no mandate of a changed life through sanctification. Basically this view says that you can be saved by Christ through faith, but you can live like the devil having no real fruit resulting from salvation. I try to deal with this false presentation of the gospel in some of my previous articles (“Is Turning from Sin Legalism?”, "If you is what you was, you ain't", “Do you have the Son?”, and “Repentance and Faith: two necessary sides of the same saving coin”) and clear up the confusion and bad teaching.

There is a ministry located in New Jersey called Loving Grace Ministries that produces a radio show called “Let’s Talk About Jesus” where the host was recently presented with a question about the necessity of using the law in evangelism. I listened to two episodes of this radio show (both dealing with this issue, as a matter of fact) and it seems that the host has a genuine and true faith in Christ but for some reason doesn’t understand the need for the law.¹ I want to deal with what he promoted as the way to evangelize, but I don’t want to get into the specific comments or objections thrown up by the host, and let me tell you why. First of all the host was not aware with the evangelism training in question (Way of the Master) and so he was forced to go off of the characterizations made by the caller to his show about her pastor and the evangelism ministry of Way of the Master. So, I want to give the benefit of the doubt to the host during the first radio program because he seemed to have been reacting to what was said (or misrepresented) about using the law in evangelism as opposed to the actual structure of the Way of the Master evangelism training and the biblical case for it. Secondly, he didn’t seem to have researched this issue between his two programs, so the second show was much the same. He made it plain that he believes that regardless of the situation, all things are made clear in Christ and that if we just preach Christ and the cross then all things will be presented fine and they will be made clear in the head of the hearer.

I wholeheartedly agree that the cross needs to be central to any evangelistic endeavor and that in the Person of Christ Jesus, all things in salvation become clear. The problem is that I don’t believe that it is possible to truly preach the cross without dealing with sin and therefore, dealing with the law is necessary.

If I preach the cross and if I preach Jesus, the question will come up as to why Jesus had to die on the cross. The biblical answer is that He died to pay the penalty for the sin of all of those who would believe.² The next question that must be dealt with is, “What is sin?” Or, better yet, “How do we know what sin is?”

What is sin?

Generally speaking, it is possible that James generally summed up sin when he said, “Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.” (James 4:17) I think that this verse is a good starting point when facing an objection to using the law in evangelism. If someone has been shown any revelation of God (all humanity has) and we don’t always do it, that person is sinning. Adam and Eve knew what they could and couldn’t eat, so when they ate what was not good or what they were allowed to eat, it was sin that resulted in our current fallen condition. Even though murder was not mentioned before in the scriptures, Cain surely knew that killing his brother was not the right or good thing to do, but he did it anyway and God cursed him for it.³ I think that these examples show us the principle that is stated in James, but the question still remains, how do I know what is right or good and what sin is?

Another way for us to identify sin comes from the apostle John, “Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness.” (1 John 3:4) This clarifies the picture a little further: sin is lawlessness. If sin is lawlessness, then we need to know what law (civil, ceremonial, etc) we will be judged by. It is no shock that the Law referred to by the biblical writers (especially in the context of sin) is the Law of Moses, or the 10 commandments. This is made clearer in Romans 3:20 “for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin.” Also, later in Romans, Paul writes, “What shall we say then? Is the Law sin? May it never be! On the contrary, I would not have come to know sin except through the Law; for I would not have known about coveting if the Law had not said, "YOU SHALL NOT COVET." (Romans 7:7)

However, I think one of the most compelling portions of scripture regarding the use of the law in preparing someone’s heart for grace is found in Galatians 3:19-29. The law didn’t “create” sin, but it exposed us to what our sin was and how God viewed it, “Why the Law then? It was added because of transgressions,” (Galatians 3:19). Furthermore, Paul then declares “Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.” (Galatians 3:24,25) The law was given in such a way that the Jews knew, and Christ expounded this, that no one could keep the law. James emphatically states that we are all guilty before God when he wrote, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.” (James 2:10)

How can you really explain the cross without explaining what sin is and what the just penalty of it is? You cannot, it doesn’t make sense. In one sense, if you remove the understanding of the Law of God from the New Testament, it doesn’t make any sense. There would be no real understanding God’s holiness, justice, or of man’s sin and therefore the sacrifice of Christ would be so ambiguous that it would lose much (if not all) of its understood meaning.

Do I think that we need to preach Christ, the cross, and the resurrection in evangelism? Absolutely. There is no other way to be saved! But, we dare not speak vaguely about the cross or skirt the issue of the sinfulness of sin that required the death of Christ when we are telling anyone about the hope that is found only in Christ Jesus.

In conclusion, I do not see how it is possible to present the true gospel without dealing specifically with why the gospel exists. It is called “good news” because correctly understanding the law and justice of God is bad news for all sinful people, and that is everyone (Romans 3:23). The heart of the good news of Jesus Christ is in His sacrificial substitutionary death on the cross where Christ, “who knew no sin” was made “to be sin for us so that we could become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Corinthians 5:21 NKJV) We would cut out the very thing that shows our opposition to God and the fact that we are by nature His enemies, or children of wrath, because of our sin. Only with this clear understanding can a person truly value the sacrifice of our savior.⁴

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¹ The episodes in question were the 8/15/2006 and 8/16/2006 editions of “Let’s Talk About Jesus” hosted by Wayne Monbleau.

² Also, consequently, it was this same sacrifice by Christ that actually saved all O.T. saints. The Old Covenantal system was built upon “types” and “shadows” of the sacrifice of Christ. We are saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, just like Abraham was saved by faith even though he didn’t know Christ in His fullness of revelation as we do now.

³ The entirety of exactly what God did or did not reveal to Adam and Eve (and subsequent people prior to Moses’ time) is not exactly clear, but we can be sure that some revelations were passed down that were later expounded on and clarified in the written word of God.

⁴ On that same note, though, over time our knowledge of our own sinfulness increases as we are sanctified. So the things that we don’t now clearly see as sin will be revealed as just that as we grow closer to Christ.

Repentance and Faith: two necessary sides of the same saving coin

I was listening to some different pastors preaching about true salvation and the life-changing ripples that necessarily flow out from it. It rekindled my desire to affirm what the Bible says as opposed to what many people think and many churches teach.

Perhaps one of the reasons that sin is taken so lightly today and there is so little brokenness among God's people is that this truth is not taught in the church. Instead people are taught that your assurance of salvation has no relation to whether you obey God or not. We are taught that saving faith is such a weak and powerless thing that it cannot guarantee any changes in life, and therefore to look for those changes as the evidence of saving faith is wrong.

If that is so, the First Epistle of John is going to have to come out of the Bible. Because no matter how hard they try, the easy gospelers cannot make it mean that. Chapter 3:14 says, "We know (i.e., we have assurance) that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love remains in death." You cannot have assurance of having passed out of death into life if you are an unloving person. Persistence in sin destroys the assurance of salvation.

A whole branch of "evangelical" theology has come into existence to provide assurance of salvation to lukewarm, disobedient people who call themselves Christians. And this book was written to blow that theology out of the water. Sin is serious because it jeopardizes our assurance¹

Perhaps you have never been confronted with this debate, but whether or not you have, I am going to discuss it now because it is of great importance. There is a teaching, and a fairly pervasive one, in evangelical circles that says that as long as you accepted Jesus at one time in your life, you can be assured that you are going to heaven. I heard a conversation between a Lutheran pastor and a Baptist church member where the discussion of confirmation class and infant baptism was addressed. Now, the other issues raised aside, Pastor Tom Brock made a comment that I have adapted into a personal saying of mine.

The saying: The Lutheran heresy is that people get saved through confirmation whereas the Baptist heresy is that people get saved by asking Jesus into their hearts.

Explaining the saying: I use the word “heresy” in a hyperbolic fashion primarily for shock value. Once the conversation is initiated, I can then articulate more clearly what I mean by it. Any good Lutheran church preaches the same saving gospel message as any good Baptist church, but the key here is that they must be “good” churches. The practices of infant baptism and confirmation are traditional² expressions and a format for instructing the people about the gospel. I will say that one thing, and that is that those of us who don’t have this format for youth (or general member) education could possibly take a note of the importance placed upon the deeper things of the Christian faith that are taught in these classes.

Again, the reason that I bring this up is because of the pervasive idea that if I pray to accept Christ, that is all that is needed for salvation. If we take that at face value, then the gospel is boiled down to knowing and saying the magic words! This is ridiculous, of course, but how far off is that from how many churches articulate the saving message of the gospel. Many churches that preach this horrible mockery of the gospel use the language of “accepting Jesus into your heart” or that the reason that Christ came and died was that He loved you. While we do need to rightly put our faith in Christ (one may say “accept” but I don’t think that this is the best term to use) and it is true that Christ does love people, the primary reason that Christ had to die on the cross is not clearly mentioned, and that is sin. In much of evangelicalism when sin is mentioned, and it is not always addressed using the term “sin”, it is danced around instead of being driven home as humanity’s greatest problem and the chasm that separates us from a holy God.

One does not simply mentally agree with the fact that Christ is Lord, and the Bible addresses this fact (even going further) in the letter of James. “You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder.” (James 2:19) I heard a great sermon by a man named Paul Washer where he gave, what I thought to be, a profound metaphor as to the difference between saving faith in Christ and other faith or knowledge of Christ. “You say the most important thing on the face of the earth is to know Jesus Christ. That is not true. The most important thing on the face of the earth is that Jesus Christ knows you. I am not going to get into the white house tomorrow because I walk up the gate and tell everybody, ‘I know George Bush.’ But they will let me in if George Bush comes out and says, ‘I know Paul Washer.’”³

The difference could not be more astounding. If someone hears the message of Jesus and “accepts” the message, they may know who Jesus is, but the only way to be known by Jesus (in the sense of being saved from eternal damnation by Him) is to do what Jesus says. He tells us that we need to repent and believe in the gospel (Mark 1:15).

Many people may kind of understand what this means, but they do not understand what Jesus’ audience did. His Jewish audience reverenced (even if in an incorrect manner) the Law of Moses or the 10 Commandments and they knew that when Jesus or John the Baptist or any of the Apostles told them to repent that they were clearly saying that they needed to repent of the transgression of the law given by God. And that is what sin is – it is a transgression of the law of God, or lawlessness (1 John 3:4). A Greek word used for sin (hamartia) means to miss the mark, and a good way to understand this is not that sin is just a jump that doesn’t quite get you high enough to dunk a basketball, but “sin was not simply missing the right mark, but hitting the wrong mark.”⁴

Once we understand what sin is, and how pervasive and horrible sin is inside of us, then we have need to know that the only just way for God to deal with sin and sinners is to be eternally condemned to hell for the offense against God. Now that someone understands what sin is and how God views sin and then we look at the cross to see what God had to do in order to reconcile a sinful humanity to him, that same person now has the correct frame of reference to approach the cross of Christ and plead for forgiveness at His feet. Once true forgiveness is received and the person is born again, it should now appall this same person to contemplate willingly living a sinful life and this forgiveness should fuel a continuing life of confession of and turning away from sin as we live the rest of our lives.

The false teaching that makes me so angry is the one that separates repentance and faith or that calls repentance legalism (adding something to salvation), and therefore decries this as being heretical. The Bible is very clear that not everyone who claims the name of the Lord will be saved. When speaking about false prophets, Jesus said that false prophets, who can be known by what they do, will be cut down and thrown into the fire. Christ is specifically referring to religious leaders who will lead many astray, but I think that the broader implication is that anyone who holds to and confesses Christ but yet denies Him by how they live will be thrown into the fire. (Matthew 7:19) Continuing, Christ said that if you (having heard this message) do not act upon it (by repenting of sin and putting your trust in Christ), your faith will be shown to have been built upon the sand instead of being built upon the saving rock of Christ, and you will not be saved. (Matthew 7:24-28).

If we claim to be saved and yet our lives are not distinguishable from the world or that our hearts are not distinguishable from the Pharisees, then we lie to ourselves, and we have never been saved by God. (see John 14:15; 1 John 2:3; 5:3) “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth;” (1 John 1:6)

James, in the second chapter of his epistle, is saying this very thing. "For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead." (James 2:26) It is not our works that reconcile us to Christ, but our works are an evidence of the inward work of grace that has truly been done. When giving an analogy, Paul Washer was telling a youth conference that he was late because he was run over by a 30 ton logging truck going 120 miles per hour…and that is why he was late to the meeting. His concluding statement was very powerful, “You would say, ‘Brother Paul it is absolutely absurd…it is impossible, brother Paul, to have an encounter with something as large as a logging truck and not be changed.’ And my question would be to you, ‘What is larger, a logging truck or God?’ How is it that so many people profess to have had an encounter with Jesus Christ and yet are not permanently changed?”⁵

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¹ “Jesus Christ Is an Advocate for Sinners” a sermon by John Piper (2/10/85)

² I mean that this is traditional in the sense of the Lutheran church’s heritage. Whether or not it is historical in the sense of the Christian church since the apostles is seriously questioned and debated.

³ I transcribed (attempted to) Paul Washer from Heart Cry Missionary Society speaking at a youth conference. I heard this on the Monday, July 3, 2006 Way of the Master Radio program (2nd hour).

⁴ “The Doctrine of Sin” by Lehman Strauss , Litt.D., F.R.G.S. http://www.bible.org/page.asp?page_id=399

⁵ I transcribed (attempted to) Paul Washer from Heart Cry Missionary Society speaking at a youth conference. I heard this on the Monday, July 3, 2006 Way of the Master Radio program (2nd hour).