Daily Bread  -  August, 2004

by Robert J. Wieland

Billions of people on earth are deeply prejudiced against Jesus and His faith. That prejudice has been there in their culture going back for hundreds of years. Yet Jesus assured “us,” “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world” (see Matt. 28:20). If His presence has been “with” us these 2000 years, why are such huge portions of the human family alienated from Him, opposed to His gospel?

* Take Japan, as an example. The masses are Buddhist, innately opposed. Take India where the masses are Hindu, also deeply resistant. Take also the billion plus people who are Muslim, whose contempt for Christianity is so well known today. Why? Why could God permit this to happen?

* The answer is there in Daniel chapters 7, 8, and 9 where we read of “the little horn,” the apostate power that would arise out of the ruins of the ancient pagan Roman empire. This “little horn” would be “given” to “make war with the saints, and to overcome them.” This power has pretended to be Christian while in reality alienating multitudes from Christ through gross misrepresentation of His truth.

* The Jesuits are an organization that has taken the name of Jesus, yet has so misrepresented Him that they have been expelled from nation after nation for centuries, creating behind them abhorrence for anything having to do with “Jesus.” They were expelled from Japan in 1587, thus cementing in Buddhism this abhorrence of Christianity. They were expelled from Japan again in 1613, from India and China in 1623, from Abyssinia in 1632. In England’s imperialist rule over India, Christianity (this time Protestant) was likewise in the minds of the people a representation of the religion of “Jesus,” and there were many good missionaries. Yet Ghandi had a real point when he said that all India would bow at the feet of Jesus if His professed people were like Him.

* Jesus said of the book of Daniel: “Whoso readeth, let him understand” (Matt. 24:15). We can’t understand the world in which we live unless we do. This “little horn” story must be understood!

The resurrected Christ commands us, “Go into all the world and proclaim the Glad Tidings to everyone!” (see Matt. 28:19, 20; Mark 16:15). It was a joyous ministry for the apostles as they fanned out over their known world, because the foundations of ancient paganism collapsed before their proclamation of Christ the Son of God and Savior of the world. People everywhere welcomed the precious message. This same joyous work is our ministry that we have today nearly two millennia afterwards.

* But there are great non-Christian religions resistant to the Christian gospel, such as Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism. And, of course, Judaism. They teach non-Christian doctrines, and they seem to have an enormous control over their peoples’ prejudiced thinking. Is this the will of the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? Is the gospel of Christ comparatively impotent as it confronts non-Christian religions? Must the great masses of world population always remain resistant?

* The news behind the news is disclosed in two of the most profound chapters in the Christian Bible (and Jewish Old Testament)--Daniel 8 and 9. A personal devil is at war with a personal Christ; the enemy learned that bloody persecution could not destroy Christ’s church--the gospel was too strong in capturing human hearts. Therefore the enemy devised a massive apostasy or “falling away” from the original purity of the gospel (cf. 2 Thess. 2:3-7 where Daniel 8 and 9 are explained). A distorted, confused caricature of Christianity took over the church, misrepresenting the love of Christ. In Daniel, this imposture is seen as a “little horn” at war with the God of heaven. It alienated the masses from Christ and His plan of salvation, creating this constant resistance to the gospel.

* Revelation 18 describes how this process must and will be reversed before the end so that again a church in full possession of the original pure, true gospel proclaims the “fall of Babylon.” Once more and at last, the honest in heart all over the world will respond.

* But how did “the little horn” work to create resistance in Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism? Maybe more tomorrow.

This weekend millions of Christians around the world will be giving special study to the problem of how to “evangelize” non-Christian people such as Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, and agnostics or atheists. Or pagan materialists and pleasure seekers (they are everywhere).

Mission boards and committees are deeply burdened in their search for better methods. Let’s briefly review what Jesus said we should do:

(1) “‘As you go, . . . heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give’” (Matt. 10:7, 8). Our ministry must include feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, providing housing for the desolate, and of course education for the children and youth. As far as lies in our power of course, helping to secure justice for the downtrodden (as in the Sudan). But we are not to stop by duplicating the work of the Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity, and other humanitarian organizations?

(2) There is something else Jesus said we are to do: “‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized shall be saved . . . .’” “‘[Teach] them to observe all things that I have commanded you’” (Mark 16:15, 16; Matt. 28:19, 10).

(3) Jesus specified what kind of “gospel” we are to proclaim in order to realize success: “‘If I am lifted up from the earth will draw all peoples to Myself.’ This He said, signifying by what death He would die” (John 12).

(4) Certainly that very successful missionary-evangelist, the apostle Paul, did not neglect the humanitarian work we have mentioned above; for sure, he healed the sick and cast out demons. But he understood what happened on Christ’s cross, and how to tell people about it. He “determined not to know anything . . . except Jesus Christ and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:1, 2). Hearts and intellects and souls were stirred--lastingly. Proclaiming the cross of Christ involves much more than the use of images or pictures; the gospel grapples with the horror of hell, and makes clear how the sacrifice of Christ was and is the only answer to it. Its truth delivers the captives of hell. The proclamation of the cross is ineffective unless its truth is made clear with all its dimensions of agape by length, breadth, depth, and height: the Savior of the world died the world’s second death. Nothing will cut through to Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, atheist hearts, except that ultimate revelation of how far the love of Christ went in saving us.

(5) But that will be told when . . . we come to Revelation 18.

How can we “save” our children and youth “from this perverse generation” (Acts 2:40)? The floodgates of moral filth have been opened; evil cascades upon them. One Bible chapter suggests two apparently opposite remedies: “Knowing . . . the terror [KJV] of the Lord, we persuade men” (2 Cor. 5:10, 11). The idea seems to be--more fire-and-brimstone preaching/teaching. Does it work? Well, it seems to get them into the baptismal pool, but does “sanctified terrorism” hold these children and youth when temptation “shall come in like a flood” (Isa. 28:19)? They face terrific peer pressure plus the drives of their own sensual nature; will Jonathan Edwards’ preaching hold them when the dams burst?

The same chapter plugs an alternative motivation: “The love [agape] of Christ constraineth us . . .” or motivates us, this to total consecration to the One who died for us and rose again (vss. 14, 15). In fact, Paul devotes much more time to developing this motivation than to his brief mention of “terror” (KJV). He goes so far as to present a Savior who “was made to be sin for us,” in other words, who was forced to be immersed in all the moral filth of the entire human race, who suffered the most awful peer pressure and had to resist the most powerful inner urges as He “resisted unto blood, striving against sin”--all “without sin” (see vss.16-6:1; Heb. 4:15; 12:4). Read it: it’s all “grace much more abounding.” Don’t despise it!

When we read that it’s “the terror of the Lord [that] persuades” us, do we correctly see what Paul said? The word translated “terror” in the KJV is phobos in the Greek; it’s not a New Testament word for raw, mind-numbing, Holocaust terror. The honest truth is that God does not want to terrorize children and youth. He is too wise; He knows that terror cauterizes, hardens hearts. That word means a mingled awe and reverence that solemnizes the heart of a child and youth. A wise author once said, “Share with your children the secret of the cross.” Will it work? Nothing else will!

As we write, the leadership of a very prominent Protestant church is hosting an “International Faith and Science Conference” in Denver. Church scholars are “polarized” in their understanding of Genesis. The story of Galileo is mentioned as possibly illustrating the dilemma church leaders face: (a) Hold to faith in the biblical account of creation of this earth in six literal days and face the onslaughts of scientific ridicule; or (b) abandon that literal faith in the biblical account and embrace the idea of a multi-billion year development of life on planet earth; then watch the church disintegrate around the world as its very foundations of faith crumble.

* But the Galileo story is not truly applicable: the Bible has never taught the flat earth dogma. Galileo never threatened the existence of the Christian church.  But blind acceptance of the claims of evolutionary geology, paleontology, archaeology, and cosmology may prove in the end to be poor science.

* Wise heads recognize that our knowledge of true science is not at present perfect and will never be so in this present life. Evolutionary scientists have reversed themselves too often to be able to demand total confidence. And if the church’s scientific scholars have been fallible in their understandings, so have the church’s theologians been fallible in their understandings of biblical righteousness by faith. If the present “Faith and Science Conference” is “polarized,” church leaders would find that a conference on “righteousness by faith” would be equally polarized.

* In fact, church leadership have come as close to disfellowshipping some modern “Galileos” in righteousness by faith as the Roman hierarchy was with their Galileo.

* Who is God? Is He a personal Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who so loved the world that He gave Him, to redeem us? And is He a personal heavenly Father of anyone who will believe His New Covenant promises of salvation from sin? Such faith cannot be inconsistent with true science, else we “are [again] of all men most miserable.”

Did Jesus teach us that in these last days we will be living in the cosmic Day of Atonement? Did He teach that in Daniel’s “time of the end” (11:35; 12:4) we will live ever more reconciled to God and to His holy law, at-one with His holy character of love [agape]?

* It’s impossible to read what Jesus says in Matthew 24 and Luke 21 and not realize that this is true. We are living in a special time that transcends all “business as usual” philosophy: “When you see all these things, know that it is near, at the very doors. . . . As the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. . . . Watch therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord is coming” (Matt. 24:33-42). “Take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come on you unexpectedly” (Luke 21:34).  God’s people in the time of Moses were permitted to “carouse,” that is, have fun parties, also to drink (moderately); and to seek to become millionaires was legitimate--BUT NOT ON THE DAY OF ATONEMENT. That was a special day of listening to the Lord, of heart-searching,  of yielding to the Holy Spirit, to be “at-one” with Him in heart and character.

* Jesus said that in the great cosmic Day of Atonement “the powers of the heavens will be shaken” (Matt. 24:29). We probably can’t explain that--yet; but even our General Tommy Franks said that if we have another 9/11 we may have to kiss our national Constitution goodbye (or words to that effect). If because of fear we lose our commitment to those American Constitutional principles of civil and religious liberty, our national bark will be tossed on the high seas of national mayhem. Only those who today have learned to live in the great Day of Atonement will then be “able to stand.”

* But Good News: come to Jesus; He will teach you today.

Christianity is in a contest with the great non-Christian religions of humanity--Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, paganism. Which system of belief can capture the good will and devotion of the human race?

Christianity has the disadvantage of a serious scandal: it is fractured into nearly innumerable sects, philosophies, and denominations. Hence the constant effort to re-unite them all into “one church.” The Roman Church professes to be the best equipped to accomplish this objective; during the Middle Ages it “was given” the supreme power of the state to enforce conformity to its version of “one body, one faith, one baptism” (see Eph. 4:4, 5), even to the point of imprisonment and sentence to martyred death of those who conscientiously dissented.

There are basically two versions of Christianity that center in two views of Christ, the Founder of Christianity. The two contrasting views clash in public contest as far back as the time of ancient Iraq’s Babylon. There was the then-popular idea of divinity “whose dwelling is not with flesh” (Dan. 2:11). This concept of “God” was confronted with the opposing view supported in principle by the prophet Daniel that “the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them” (see Rev. 21:3). Daniel believed the biblical concept of divinity who enters the stream of humanity in the form of an incarnated Savior whose “name [is] Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us” (Matt. 1:23).

So the world has to decide: who is the true Christ? The One who has taken upon His sinless nature our sinful nature, who became truly human, one with us, “in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15), living a righteous life in sinful flesh, saving humanity from sin instead of in it, condemning sin in our sinful flesh (see Rom. 8:3, 4), dying humanity’s “second death” and justifying the fallen human race in Himself? Or is the true christ “the christ” of the great Immaculate Conception dogma that cancels his descent from the fallen Adam, that provides him an “exemption” from the DNA inheritance of “all men,” that excuses him from our temptations in the flesh, that separates him from us?

On this clear-cut distinction hinges the great final issue that will confront humanity.

Consider a string of IF’S:
•    If God is a personal Being who can be described as a loving heavenly Father;
•    If Jesus of Nazareth is the divine Son of God, the world’s Savior;
•    If His sacrifice on His cross is the world’s moment of truth;
•    If the Bible is the inspired word of God, given for the instruction and the uplift of mankind;
•    If God has a plan of salvation that is effective;
•    If there is hope for the world, a light at the end of our cosmic tunnel;
THEN SIN MUST SOMEHOW BE ERADICATED FROM THE VAST UNIVERSE OF GOD. The idea of an eternal conscious  hell as the domicile of lost people (yes, lost angels, too), must mean the plague of sin with its agony, hatred, and suffering must continue forever in God’s vast universe.

* If the above has any significant content of truth, then the biblical doctrine of the Sanctuary (Leviticus, Old Testament; Hebrews, New Testament) must be the answer to the universal problem of sin (which is the source of all the agony that afflicts the world from Abu Ghraib to Zimbabwe). The idea that “God is love” (agape) is totally inconsistent with the idea that sin must be ineradicable from human hearts. The Hebrew Day of Atonement was the one day in the year that prefigured in type the final cleansing of God’s great economy and “the bringing in of everlasting righteousness.” If Jesus Christ ministering as the world’s great High Priest is incapable of developing a people as a corporate body who have “overcome [sin] even as [He] overcame” (Rev, 3:20), then Christianity has nothing to offer a distraught world.

* It’s time that we do some serious thinking about what the gospel means.

Can you find the gospel in the Bible book of Daniel? Or is it all about “beasts” and world empires?

The first chapter packs a powerful gospel punch: here are four young men in university training where their scholarships provide them access to the elitist dining rooms or cafeterias. They will be served the same gourmet bill of fare from the same kitchens that serve royalty.

The delicacies set before them arouse the envy of wealthy Babylonians. The meats come from the fabled outreaches of the empire, and the desserts are super mouthwatering. But Good News saved them from health disaster.

These four young servants of the God of Israel petition the authorities for a simple, low-fat, low-sugar vegetarian diet. With the hearty appetite of all teens, these four “purpose” in their hearts to deny their natural cravings for rich food and choose the simple diet. They will not patronize the McDonalds, Burger Kings, pancake houses, or steak houses of their day. Their goal is not merely to live seven years longer and take more holiday trips; they want to keep their minds clear to comprehend the teaching of the Holy Spirit in an era of solemn significance.

We’re in that kind of era today, on a world scale. It’s great Good News that the same world Savior who blessed Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego will give (not merely offer) you and me the victory over runaway appetite. The Holy Spirit will be your teacher; you won’t be able to transgress without His convicting you of truth: now don’t silence His voice, don’t deny His loving reminders of truth. “Purpose in your heart” to follow the Savior on this great Day of Atonement.

Is it possible that sinners (like all of us are born to be!) can overcome sin and become truly Christ like in character? Can "the righteousness of the law" (perfect obedience, perfect loyalty) ever be achieved in this life? The Bible quite clearly says: "all have sinned, and continue [present tense] to come short" (Rom. 3:23). Our very nature is sinful; and even "saints" can't help showing that they are sinners. Nobody is perfect. So--is perfection of character a possible dream?

The Bible insists on a Good News answer--YES! God sent His beloved Son into the world on the special mission to "save His people FROM their sins," not IN them (Matt. 1:21). Rom 8:3, 4 says that He was "sent . . . to condemn sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." The word "righteousness" used there means the righteous character of those who "walk after the Spirit." (It's dikaiomata, the imparted righteousness of saints, Rev. 19:8, whereas dikaiosune always is the imputed righteousness of Christ.) Heb. 13:21 says that the Savior will "make you perfect in every good work to do His will." And Rev. 14:1-5 describes a people at the close of time who "are without fault before the throne of God," who "follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth." Not part way, but totally. They will refuse "the mark of the beast" and will receive "the seal of God" (Rev. 13:16, 17; 7:1-4).

Are they fanatics? Extremists? Strait-laced grumpy "saints"? No way! Jesus got in on the perfection debate Himself on the Good News side. He said: "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect" (Matt. 5:48). In saying so, He gives us the key to unlock the perplexity. His context is learning to love like the Father loves, who sends His rain and sunshine on the just and on the unjust, who loves bad people, even His enemies. Jesus' idea of "perfection" is simple: learning to love like that! John learned the idea from Him, for he also says that if you've learned to love like that, you "know God," you're "born of God," He "dwells in" you, you have "His Spirit," and you yourself "dwell in God." Furthermore, you overcome fear (which goes along with sin), and you end up "perfect" (see 1 John 4:7-18).

True, you and I were born totally bereft of such love (agape); but there's a filling station where the Holy Spirit "sheds it abroad in our hearts" (Rom. 5:5). Or to change the metaphor, it's the simple matter of going to school to learn it, "the school of Christ." The "best," proudest person must matriculate through the kindergarten.

This tiny morsel of Bible wisdom sounds like a fairy tale, but there is invaluable blessing in it. It has reference to personal relations between people of differing personalities and convictions. Once the friendly peace and harmony that you enjoy has been broken, how can genuine peace be restored? Here’s the wisdom:

“Curse not the king, no not in thy thought; and curse not the rich in thy bedchamber: for a bird of the air shall carry the voice, that which hath wings shall tell the matter” (Eccl. 10:20).

Don’t literalize it by thinking that real birds will hear you gossip about somebody to your wife or husband in total solitude, and fly off to tell it to the person you don’t want to hear it.

But there’s 100 per cent truth in this statement. Even thinking evil of somebody will cause you to betray your own deepest thoughts in your look or your tone of voice; and letting an unhappy or hateful thought escape your lips in words spoken in secret to the one held in your bosom will most surely escape somehow and poison your personal relations with the person you have spoken about in a negative way.

More efficient than a cell phone, secret evil-talking about someone will make its way. The Bible doesn’t tell just how the transmission occurs; but it is sure.

No matter how evil a person may appear to you to be, if you can’t control your thoughts about him or her, do control your tongue! To say you love somebody and then harbor evil thoughts about him/her is hypocrisy. Do something else in secret or with your closest loved one “in thy bedchamber”: pray for that person.

This is a story I can vouch for, having spent some 24 years in East Africa. In the days when motor roads in Uganda were dirt and narrow, an angry, threatening elephant was blocking the main road from Kampala west to the Mountains of the Moon area. Finally, the Game Warden had to be called, who reluctantly had to shoot the beast.

It was found that it had a painful abscess in a tooth. This is what caused its irrational rage. Often we humans feel driven to anger, to impatience, yes, we do and say things that later we see are irrational. We create unpleasant crises. Like Paul in Romans 7, “I don’t do what I would like to do, what I do is what I don’t want to do” (vss. 15, 16, GNB).

Could that unfortunate elephant teach us something? We have some painful abscess in the heart; we don’t understand ourselves any better than the elephant understood himself. All we know is that something mysterious hurts deep inside. And then we fly off the handle, get impatient with each other, our spouse, or the kids, and get irrational and tear up the road.

The “abscess”? To tell the honest truth, it’s bad heart feelings against God, often buried so deep we don’t know them, like the elephant’s pain. Things go wrong for us, we don’t know why. We’re frustrated, and that’s when we go ballistic and can even make fools of ourselves. We’re out of sorts with God.

He knows that, and He doesn’t blame us any more than He blamed poor Job who had a monstrous “abscess;” but He can do something the Game Warden couldn’t do. He can heal our “abscess.” It’s called, “Be ye reconciled to God.” “God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself.” The reason He can heal us is that He wrestled with the pain of the same “abscess;” on His cross He came VERY close to us when He cried out, “My God, why have You forsaken Me?” But He did not sin!

Neither do you and I have to sin. By His grace He saves us, through faith. LET your hurting heart be healed. Don’t stop His blessed process.

______________

[We normally don’t promote books or other products in “Dial Daily Bread,” but I thought you might like to know that this story about the elephant with a toothache has been adapted for children in a new book by Robert J. Wieland, “The Lion That Ran Away: Children’s Stories From Africa . . . and Other Places.”  Glad Tidings Publishers is running an introductory special: first copy $9.95 (regular price $12.95), additional copies $6.95. The large-format book (9 x 8-1/2 in.) has a beautiful full-color cover, and contains 40 stories (120 pp.). Call GTP at (269) 473-1888 if you wish to order.--Carol Kawamoto for “Dial Daily Bread.”]

Who do you think you are? Are you one of the ninety-nine sheep that never went astray? You had good parents, went to church all your life, never robbed a bank, never been in prison, you’ve been a good person all your life? And like the Pharisee in the parable in Luke 18:10-14, you are humble enough, grateful enough, good enough, decent enough, upright enough, to thank God that you are not like other people who do get lost, especially like the down-and-outs who have done all sorts of bad things and been alienated from God all or most of their lives?

Yes, I’m mixing up my parables here--that’s as bad as mixing metaphors--but how about another parable, the lost son, the prodigal son? Who are you? Are you the dutiful son who never wasted your life, never had to feed the pigs, never left home?

Now please don’t misunderstand me. I am NOT recommending that you do all these bad things. But my question is this: do you know how to sympathize, to empathize is a better word, with the people who have done all these bad things, who have wasted their lives, lost the joy of fellowship with God and with the saints, and have wandered in darkness in the dark world?

Jesus has special sympathy for people who have wasted their lives and whose hearts are filled with remorse. They are the special objects of His compassion. In fact, they are the ones He came to save. The poor publican who beat upon his breast and wouldn’t even lift his eyes to heaven, who prayed, “God be merciful to me a sinner!” he is the one who went home justified. Straightened out, put right with God.

Why does Jesus have such special sympathy for such people? There is only one possible answer: because He repented on their behalf; He took their nature; He was tempted like they are tempted; He is their High Priest (Heb. 2:14-18). And now He invites you to share His love and sympathy for all the sinners in the world, for all the prodigal sons feeding the pigs, for all the publicans who cry out for mercy. And when you begin to share His compassion, the joy of your own life has only begun.

It happened suddenly just last night—an example of how error from “Babylon” can twist, distort, confuse the gospel so that its “power” is nullified. We were in a group of young people studying the Bible. One was reading the text from a contemporary version of the Bible that by its title makes a special claim to being “clear.” The topic was what Jesus says, “My yoke is easy, and My burden is light” (Matt. 11:28-30). The illustrative text was 2 Corinthians 5:14 for which the common version that has blessed us for centuries says, “The love of Christ constraineth us.” In other words, this powerful motivating “love” has its origin in Christ, a gift from Him.

* But this confused modern version makes it say that our love for Christ constrains or motivates us! Thus in a subtle way “the truth of the gospel” is perverted into self-righteousness--it’s now “our love” from us that is so powerful. It was lethal error so subtle that it almost threw us.

* Lukewarmness is a spiritual disease that afflicts God’s professed people worldwide. Like arsenic, a very small dose can paralyze spiritually. “The gospel” that Paul was “not ashamed” of was not mixed with any error from “Babylon” (Rom. 1:16). Being unmitigated, undiluted “truth,” it “turned the world upside down” (Acts 17:6). We long to see that again!

* In these last days, God’s urgent call is, “Come out of her, My people” (Rev. 18:1-4). We may physically remove ourselves from a community where error is taught instead of truth and think we’ve “come out of Babylon.” But we may still have “Babylon” (“confusion”) entrenched in our thinking and promulgated in our teaching of “the [supposed] gospel” due to a prevailing corporate pride (“thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing,” 3:17). We become blind, numb.

* This tiny example of “clear” confusion last night is multiplied many times over among millions of sincere people who don’t realize that what they naively assume is “righteousness by faith” is often borrowed from a popular Christianity deeply rooted in apostasy from the truth. This infiltration of soul-defiling confusion can be the most subtly clever that has plagued God’s people in all time.

Good News: we are promised that our heavenly Father will empty heaven of every angel to help even one honest soul who is alert enough to “hunger and thirst after righteousness” (cf. Matt. 5:6). Let that one be you.

Could it be that there is a method of evangelism that we have “in a great degree” overlooked? Truly successful “evangelism” requires two criteria:

(a) Propagation of an “evangelistic” message by every method available, including TV and state of the art electronic productions.

(b) But the message itself must be correct, faithful to biblical revelation. Paul says that he is “not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth” (Rom. 1:16). The “power” is built-in within the message itself; “the truth of the gospel” is so dynamic that it is virtually self-propagating if it is freed of the confusion that Babylon’s “wine” produces. Jesus’s dictum is true: “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32). Perhaps we haven’t realized how true those words are! The Lord said that if we can break through the clouds of confusion from “Babylon” that envelop His cross, we shall see great success in genuine, lasting soul-winning: “I, if I be lifted up, will draw all unto Me,” He promised.

* Consistent with this promise is the prophetic account in Revelation 18--the coming time when the earth is to be “lightened with [the] glory” of the closing message. It will specifically be free of any confusion from “Babylon’s” “righteousness by faith” (vs. 3). Once the final message becomes clear, every honest-hearted human soul will heed the call to “come out of her [Babylon], My people” (vs. 4). It’s the gospel that’s “the power of God unto salvation,” not its accouterments. Once the humblest soul grasps what it means, his inmost soul becomes that “well of living waters” “springing up into everlasting life” refreshing all who come near him (Song of Solomon 4:15; John 4:14; 7:38). The power won’t be in “the training of literary institutions” (though that can glorify God, too); it’s easy to say that it will be the Holy Spirit but that’s a cop-out if we forget that He “is the Spirit of truth,” and if we forget that that truth is “the truth of the gospel” (John 14:17; Gal. 2:5, 14). That’s where “the power” is.

* What stands in our way? Jesus tells us: our “rich and increased with goods” evangelism pride (Rev. 3:17).

Everybody who believes the Bible teaching of the second coming of Jesus must also believe that something great must happen before He CAN come again: “This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness to all nations; and [only] then shall the end come” (Matt. 24:14). It is commonly understood that this means huge expenditures of money in public meetings and TV presentations using state of the art electronic facilities. Wonderful work; deserves our offerings. Huge public meetings have been held for nearly 200 years and yet world population grows faster than the combined efforts of all Protestant churches to reach them with “the gospel.”

* Could it be that the Bible teaches a more effective method of “evangelism,” one that we have “in a great degree” overlooked?

* It could be summed up in one statement Jesus made near the end of His ministry: “In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and drink. He that believeth on Me, as the scripture hath said [Song of Solomon 4:12-15], out of his inmost soul shall flow rivers of living water. . . . This spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive” (John 7:37-39).

* It means that the humblest person who “believes in Jesus,” even the uneducated, will become “a fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams of Lebanon.” Unconsciously, in an unstudied way, he will pour forth the ultimately powerful message. It will be that “the love of Christ constraineth us,” compels, motivates, empowers, makes effective the agent who cannot help but communicate the message--all with one proviso, that he “believe in Jesus.” That’s what Jesus said in John 7.

* It sounds deceptively simple. For two millennia people have “believed in Jesus,” haven’t they? And yet in spite of all our best efforts, the task gets bigger all the time. There must be something about what it means to “believe in Jesus” that we haven’t yet grasped. If that “well of living water” is not flowing out from within our soul as the ultimate evangelism, it’s obvious: we haven’t yet learned to “believe” in the sense that Jesus meant when He spoke on “that last day . . . of the feast.” Maybe more tomorrow.

Robert Wright in the New York Times writes with profound implications on our war with terror: “A Little Respect Would Go Long Way in Terror Fight.” “Hatred of America . . . now imperils national security. Fervent anti-Americanism among Muslims is the wellspring of terrorism. . . . Respect is the perfect entrée to the issue of Muslim hatred.”

* In other words, if we can’t be loved, at least we must build respect. Wright says: “Instilling fear can help instill respect. It’s just that fear isn’t enough. . . . For a nation to be thoroughly respected, the perception of its strength needs to be matched by a perception of its goodness. It helps to be thought of as just, generous, conscientious, mindful of the opinions of others, even a little humble.” Let’s not despise the role of national character in our defense.

* Wright hopes that America can see the link between earned national respect “and the security of their children.” Things like the Abu Ghraib pictures haven’t helped. Our current infatuation with unbridled lust in the sensational Peterson and Kobe Bryant trials pictures us as a nation absorbed with sex. Top military might has through history been incapable to maintain national security when national character has crumbled.

* “Jihad” Islam banging on the gates of Vienna diverted Charles V’s attention from his plan to expunge the empire of Protestantism. Islam has had a profound political impact since the days of Abu Bakr. The hordes of locust-like followers of the Arabian prophet saw nothing in the Christianity of their day that they could respect; but curiously, they did respect the self-denying devotion of small pockets of isolated Christians who sincerely sought to maintain the faith of the first apostles.

* The great city of ancient Babylon fell due to moral lassitude; its military prowess was useless. The Bible says there is a modern “Babylon” whose fall will have great world implications (Revelation 18). To those who reverence God’s word, fear will not be their dominant heart response, but love for righteousness will motivate them. Glorious history is before us (Isa. 30:29, 30)

Some teachings of the Bible are so simple and clear that they are beyond theologians’ “interpretation.” They are rock-bottom truths that even an innocent child can see, for example:

* God is love; He so loves that He has given and He gives His only Son to save us from an eternal hell; He teaches us to love others with the same love wherewith He loves us; a clear and powerful proclamation of that love is what Jesus means by “this gospel of the kingdom” (Matt. 24:14); it will be proclaimed so clearly that it is yet to “lighten the earth with glory” (Rev. 18:1-4); God has true people who as yet don’t understand the message, “other sheep not of this fold,” for whom He is also their “Good Shepherd” as He is ours (John 10:11-16); these people are in “Babylon,” that is, scattered in the confusion of conflicting religions around the world (Rev. 14:8; 18:3); they will hear His voice in the proclamation of that final Good News message (John 10:4); the love of Christ will bind them all in “one body” of believers (Eph. 4:4-7) who will have come “out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Rev. 7:1-4, 14); God so loves these people that He wants to “abide” with them forever, hence the resurrection and translation at the second coming of Jesus.

* Muslims as yet don’t understand this, but there are some among them who will perk up when they hear it and will “come out of Babylon” when the message is proclaimed clearly. They will leave the legalism of Islam and will embrace “the truth of the gospel,” “as the truth is in Jesus” (Gal. 2:5, 14; Eph. 4:21; a child can see that we must understand “this gospel” first!).

* Take care of your health; live until Jesus comes; there is great history before us!

Ask anybody and he’ll tell you he’d rather live under the New Covenant than under the Old. But what does that mean? What practical, day-by-day benefit or difference can it be?

* The New Covenant impinges on you directly, personally, individually. It’s the promises that the Lord God made to Abraham and his children to give them everything--the sky if you please: the whole earth for “an everlasting possession,” plus the everlasting life to go along with it, plus the righteousness necessary to inhabit the new earth (2 Peter 3:13). And on top of it all, meanwhile, the happiest life possible here and now while you await the coming of Christ and His new earth.

* All seven of God’s promises to Abraham are yours (Gen. 12:2, 3). And best of them all, the promise to make you to BE a blessing to other people as long as you live and wherever you go (“thou shalt BE a blessing, . . . and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed”). Yes, that’s promised to you.

*It’s the full spectrum of the 23rd Psalm placed as a gift directly at your feet, as though it was written especially for you. Henceforth you “shall not want.” “No good thing will [the Lord] withhold from [you].” Beyond your wildest dreams, “the Lord will give grace and glory” (Psalm 84:11; read the entire psalm, it’s “amiable” news).

* You were born with a natural proclivity to DIS-believe all this Good News (I assume you were born on planet Earth). At best, you were born a descendant of Abraham and Sarah, both of whom spent the greater part of their lives in disbelief of the New Covenant and in submission to the Old Covenant (Abraham took Hagar, and Sarah was bitter all those years until she finally repented and became pregnant with Isaac). Probably you’ve spent years walking in the shadows of doubt. And now it’s the hardest thing you’ve ever done to believe all those promises wholeheartedly. (That’s the only hard thing about being saved eternally--learning to believe like Abraham did.) But thank God you have a new day; you can CHOOSE to believe, and pray with the distraught father of Mark 9, “Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief” (vs. 24). God will never despise that prayer!

Do you ever wonder if the Lord can hear and answer your prayers because you know you are so unworthy? You pray for someone to be healed but the person dies; did you hinder your own prayers being answered? You have all kinds of troubles and heartaches; are you at fault making it impossible for God to deliver you?

Yes, we must honestly face reality: our heavenly Father wants to do so much more for us than He is able to do because we unconsciously hinder Him doing what He wants to do for us.

Last week we got up at 3 in the morning to get ready to drive to the airport for a flight. Why not get up some morning at 3 and go to a quiet, secluded place and have a frank, direct consultation with the heavenly Father Himself? Jesus has given permission, yes authority, to the humblest, most unworthy human being on the planet to come to His Father in prayer! Not to beg “Gimme this, Gimme that!” but to converse with Him, to reason with Him (Isa. 1:18, “Come now, let us reason together!”), to LISTEN to Him! If you don’t know what to say, just kneel there in quietness. The radio, the TV, the DVD’s, are all off. The morning newspaper hasn’t come yet. You’re alone with Him, in quietness.

“Oh, I can’t do that and still have enough energy to go to work!” Well, you could spare one hour, I am sure, especially if you shut everything off the night before and go to bed early. Then after you’ve spent that hour at 3 in the morning, go back to bed and finish your night’s duty of getting the sleep you need. Whatever the time may be--you can make direct contact with the Lord of heaven and earth--through Christ.

If the Bible is a true book, if Christianity is a true religion, if God is faithful, if Jesus Christ is real, He will be entreated of you. He will listen to you, AND HE WILL RESPOND TO YOU--I can tell you yes, that is for sure. “He is faithful.” I can testify. No foolishness, be serious, be fair. “Prove Me now, herewith, saith the Lord of hosts” (Mal. 3:10). He will meet you more than halfway.

The one church which above all others should grasp clearly the Old and New Covenants, knows confusion on the topic. Its most prestigious journal published is entitled MINISTRY. In the June 2004 issue, the editor confesses that a “haze” concerning the two covenants still hangs over its “landscape.” And this is after nearly 2000 years of biblical clarity.

* Granted, the ancient Jews were indeed confused on the covenants, else they would never have crucified their Messiah. But the New Testament apostle Paul clearly explained the idea and its history in Galatians 3 and 4:

* The New Covenant is the promise of God which He made to Abraham in Genesis 12 and 15. (It was a fresh edition of the original promise made to Adam and Eve in Eden and to Noah, and to all who through the ages should cherish the faith of “their father Abraham.”)

* Abraham’s descendants were to be “the head and not the tail,” the most wonderful nation on earth, the missionary people in whom “shall all families of the earth be blessed” (12:3). All that the Lord asked of them was that they should “believe” His promises as “Abraham believed”—a heart-melting appreciation of the love of God that has redeemed humanity at the cross. Such faith is the kind that is alive, which “works.” It reconciles alienated hearts to God and therefore at the same time reconciles their hearts to His holy law.

* The ten commandments metamorphose into ten precious promises. The seventh, for example, becomes greater than the supposed kill-joy prohibition resented by the Hollywood culture. It becomes an assurance, “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” that is, the divine Savior of the world will save you forever from falling into that hell-hole of illicit sex and adultery. Pure and genuine love will fill your heart forever; a joy greater than the world can give is yours. You will be saved from the misery and anguish that follow sexual laxity. You will understand the “breadth, and length, and depth and height” of the kind of love that is AGAPE (Eph. 3:14-21); you will come alive, sun-crowned, noble, uplifting others every step of your way, growing happier with the years (never vice versa!).

* The holy law of God will cease to be your disciplinarian (“schoolmaster,” Gal. 3:21-24). You will ever “stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made [you] free” (5:1), free as a bird soaring over the mountain tops; your heart will be in harmony with the unfallen creation, at-one with your Creator and Redeemer, in fellowship with all holy beings.

* And that Old Covenant? What is it?

* Something God never asked us for: our own Peter-like promises made to Christ never to deny Him. The promise to God the people made at Sinai was the Old; God’s promise to save us is the New, Covenant.

A lady far away has written of her pain in unanswered prayers. Several loves have failed, and now she sees no prospect of marriage. She reads the divine promise, “Delight thyself also in the Lord; and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart” (Psalm 37:4), but the Lord hasn’t done so, she feels, and she is discouraged. “What’s wrong with me?” she cries. A life of loneliness is not a bright prospect; but the thought that she herself unconsciously drives away a possible life companion who could bring happiness—that’s too painful.

Well, there are millions and probably billions pained by seemingly unanswered prayers, and by loneliness. But the latter is easier to bear than “hope deferred [which] maketh the heart sick” by the thought that God doesn’t care (Prov. 13:12). Living alone is torture if you really are alone, but we must believe it’s fun when you know and believe that the Lord happily lives with you. The wise man added: “when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.”

* To believe and trust that the Lord is giving you what is best for your happiness now and in eternity--that’s the real thing! That can be almost infinitely better than marriage to the wrong person.

* All you really need is to see through the fog to realize that what you have now in your apparent loneliness is actually “the [real] desire of thine heart.” That’s indeed “a tree of life” to you. Your pain comes from not seeing it, or more accurately, not believing it.

* If one does live with someone--husband, wife, roommate, or housemate, one wants to make that person happy. Your happiness is involved in doing so. Jesus has assured you that He is your companion in your otherwise lonely domicile. He has promised to “abide with you forever” (John 14:16). “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen” (Matt. 28:20). Now, make HIM happy living with you!

* We have arrived at that point in human history when the New Covenant is coming into its own. Around the world people are beginning to feel for the triumph of Christ in His “great controversy,” a concern for Him like a bride for the husband whom she loves with all her heart. It transcends Old Covenant concern for own personal salvation. For millennia it has seemed impossible that our little pygmy hearts could ever grow to such maturity; now it’s coming! The Good News is getting better.

Where’s the person who hasn’t at some time or other exploded with what he/she thought was “righteous” indignation? And then came to realize that some “self” was woven in! Rather humbling, isn’t it? In fact, you can get grey with what you think are sanctified years and still make a fool of yourself.

* A prime example is the Twelve, on whose heads had been laid in ordination none other than the Hands that had made the world. On the eve of Christ’s crucifixion they were condemning Mary Magdalene who had been moved by the Holy Spirit Himself to do what she did (Matt. 26:6-10). Thus they made fools of themselves. They exploded with indignation which they thought was of the Lord, when in fact it was of Judas Iscariot’s inspiration (John 12:4).

* They didn’t know what would later be written by an unknown contemporary in his Letter to the Ephesians: “Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you” (5:31, 32). But having been educated in the personal presence of Christ for some three years, should they not have known? Common sense should have taught them. But when you get angry, you are often bereft of it. The disciples, even if righteously angry at Mary’s supposed extravagance, should have been “kind” and “tender-hearted” in rebuking her. They weren’t. Thus they set themselves up for the most stinging rebuke Jesus ever gave them.

* In the previous verse, Paul says that our emotional outbursts “grieve the Holy Spirit of God, whereby [we] are sealed unto the day of redemption.” In other words, there is a grave possibility that we may negatively “seal” our eternal destiny by one of these sudden unsanctified outbursts.

* Time to fall on our knees and beg Mary’s Defender for a new heart that can be cleansed--down into its buried unconscious roots.

* Just remember that the cleansing process may take longer than a day; it’s a discipline that takes time, but is no less certain if you are sincere in asking for it.