By John Stallings
What scares Americans most?
In order the answers are:
1. Snakes
2. Public Speaking
3. Heights
4. Being closed in a small space
5. Spiders
6. Needles and getting shots
7. Mice
8. Flying on an airplane
9. Dogs
10. Thunder and lightning
11. Going to the doctor
12. The dark
Fear is the enemy of progress.
Fear stops us in our tracks and causes us to over-think simple solutions. Fear demands that we keep running from everything and keep looking behind us. Fear whispers “what ifs” and frightful scenarios in our ears and we unfortunately respond by trying to construct walls to protect ourselves.
If you want to stay where you are in life and make no progress, befriending fear is the way to go. If you never want to win, hold tight to your fears and you’ll be guaranteed a perpetual second place finish. If you’d rather have the status quo and cling to safety rather than maturity, knowledge and revelation then let fear roam around in your head.
If we keep doing what we’ve always done we’ll keep getting what we’ve always been getting.
FEAR KILLS CHANGE
Fear keeps us from getting what we really want in life. Fear kills change-stops it dead in its tracks. So we go on living a disappointing existence, languishing for change and stay the same until the pain of remaining the same becomes too much for us to bear. Then some people find the faith to break through their seemingly unconquerable fear and take an honest shot at change.
But why are we so afraid of change? It’s an incurably transient world we live in. If we want to start living, we must first understand that happiness isn’t forged in fear. If we want to see true progress in our lives we should welcome change.
Several years ago there was a television show called Wide World of Sports. The opening sequence showed a young man on skies wiping out in the most atrocious tumble I’d ever seen. It was so terrible that many people wondered why they would choose to play the clip over and over for several years. The man looked like an out of control helicopter as he flailed and catapulted, head over heels, arms and legs twisting through the air.
I read an explanation of why this incident happened. The man explained that as he was jumping, the surface had become too fast and if he’d completed the jump he would have landed in a bad place beyond the safe landing area. Had he not literally changed in mid-air, the jump could have been fatal. As it happened, although he was captured on film in an awfully awkward fall that seemed to never end, all he got out of what looked like a fatal mishap was a headache.
This points up one of the realities of life; sometimes we are called upon to make changes, and do it, as this young man did, “on the fly.”
THE RAILROADS
At the turn of the twentieth century the railroad industry was faced with a dilemma. Automobiles and airplanes had come on the scene and were starting to siphon off their business. They weren’t very wise and kept doing business as usual. At one time the railroads almost died out.
Someone had wrongly told the railroad folk they were in the railroad business. They were not. In reality, they were in the people business and didn’t know it. When people started to choose other methods of transportation, the railroads were in trouble. Finally the government had to step in and form Amtrak to keep passenger trains running. Today, the only passenger train ticket a person can buy is a government ticket.
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET
Do you remember the Old Oaken Bucket? Have you seen one lately, other than the one behind dusty glass in the Smithsonian museum in Washington? The Old Oaken bucket was a staple for many years, giving people something to carry water in when water wells were all they had. The sad thing about the Old Oaken Bucket makers was that someone told them they were in the bucket business. They were not. In truth, they were in the people business; or the business of helping people transport water conveniently. When running water became available, the only ones in the bucket business who came out of it O.K were the ones who were visionary enough to buy water utility stocks. The bottom line was- people no longer needed buckets. What happened, pure and simple, is change.
CHANGE IS A CONSTANT IN OUR LIVES
Sometimes folk get so hungry for change they will go to great lengths to make it happen. For instance, intentional body changes, like losing weight. People will go under the knife to accomplish this change. Some get so desperate to change they undergo total body makeovers. Can we say—Joan Rivers?
Yet most of us fear change and don't accept it readily because change often means loss. Being human, we don’t make adjustments easily. However, since life is a journey, how could we not expect to constantly be making changes? A journey is, almost by definition, constant change. We are traveling and moving from one point to another on our trip through life. There will be hills and valleys, deserts and oceans as we advance on our journey. Change is happening from the time we are born to the day of our death. Never to have change would put us in an unhealthy state.
At one time in China tiny feet were so worshipped that in order to keep female’s feet small they’d tightly wrap them with winding cloths. Their feet would indeed remain little and dainty, but when unwrapped they would look ugly and deformed. Growth and change are normal and attractive, while stunted growth is generally extremely unattractive.
When I was a child my father was a Pastor/Evangelist which meant that even under the best of conditions, we moved a lot. If we stayed 2 or 3 years in one place we were surprised but happy. As my dad grew older he would stay longer in Pastorates but that didn’t happen until I was almost grown. What this meant was that my Mom, sister and I had to get used to often changing homes, schools, churches, cities and communities. When I grew older, I’d joke with my father that he would move across the street if he thought he could get a step ahead of the devil.
When I started in evangelism in my early twenties, I began my own travels all over the country and abroad. When you live like that for awhile, though you may enjoy it, you develop a deep yearning for a home and roots. When it’s your calling, you thrive on the travel but still there’s that constant change of congregations, towns and living conditions. Most people can’t live like that for more than a ten year period in their life and then they just start to wear down. Something within them yearns to put down roots. Though it’s very possible for some to get hooked on constant change and never truly be happy in one place; very few are Nomadic and at some point settle down.
LOOKING BACK AT YESTERDAY STUNTS OUR GROWTH AND PROGRESS.
Though life imposes change, still it’s always a little sad to move on because in order to do so, old patterns and ways must be left behind. However, if we refuse to change, we’ll lose ground anyway. Rebelling against change has its own set of unfortunate circumstances. If we don’t remain open to change, we will be haunted by the same old conditions, problems and frustrations.
In order to have a healthy life, we must be on a lifelong quest for self-improvement and hardest of all, self-discipline.
Genesis 19:26 tells the story of Lot’s wife. Abraham and family had been warned to leave Sodom for it would be destroyed, and not to look back as they left. Lot’s wife looked back, and turned into a pillar of salt. Being a salt statue, she was suspended and stuck in a state of frozen development. Likewise, constantly looking back will freeze us in time so that we can’t move forward to the next chapter in our lives. It’s like trying to drive a car always looking in the rear view mirror. It’s fine to occasionally glance at the mirror but doing it constantly would result in our running into a ditch or colliding with something.
In Isaiah 43:18-19 God tells his people, “Remember not the former things neither consider the things of old. Behold I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
In this passage God is warning the people about looking back. He tells them not to remember the former things; to wash them from their minds, and not to even consider them anymore.
In Luke 9:62, Jesus said, “No man having put his hand to the plough and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
Rather a strong warning, wouldn’t you say?
In Philippians 3:13 Paul says, “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and reaching forth unto the things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”
IF ALL THE IMPORTANT THINGS LIE IN OUR PAST, WHY NOT JUST DIE?
After all, why would we want to go forward if the really good things are all behind us? If everything of any consequence or to be desired is already over, what’s the point of living? The answer of course is we’re still here and we know that God has a purpose for our lives. With God’s help every one of us can conquer fear and make powerful changes and move toward better things in life. The power of choice and free will are awesome tools in our possession.
For example, a person who is released from prison after serving their time has a choice. The person can make some changes in attitude, readjust to life on the outside and move on, or refuse to change, continue with same mind -set and end up back in prison. Sadly, a great percentage of people who are released go right back to jail proving that prison isn’t necessarily remedial unless an individual will put forth the effort to change.
THE FIRST CHANGE CAME WHEN WE GAVE OURSELVES TO CHRIST.
The KJV version of Romans 12:1 says, “Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind.” In this passage, Paul didn’t say give God an hour or a day but give him your whole life.
Listen to this translation. “So here’s what I want you to do, take your whole body and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God has for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well adjusted to your culture that you fit in without even thinking. Readily recognize what he wants from you and respond to it. Unlike the culture that always dragging you to its level, God brings out the best in you and develops well formed maturity.”—Message Bible
In the book of Jeremiah, there’s a most beautiful picture of change. God brings the crusty prophet down to the potter’s house to teach him some things about His work, His will, and His ways of bringing them to pass. In Jeremiah 2:13, God had told his people;
“For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the foundation of living waters, and have hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.”
When he sees the potter’s wheel, in chapter 20, Jeremiah instantly understands that this is a picture of stubborn, sinful man in the hands of God being changed and transformed. He sees God taking the clay, spoiling it and changing it into what He wants it to be.
Once you really see what this story implies, you realize it’s one of the most encouraging stories in the Bible. God is showing us that in his hands the worst person or situation we could imagine can be changed and made useable.
There is a wonderful old song we used to sing when I was a boy and it went like this;
Have thine on way Lord, have thine own way, thou art the potter, I am the clay. Mold me and make me after thy will, while I am waiting, yielded and still.”
This is the spirit of the potter’s house experience; to be changed by the potter into a vessel of honor. In Genesis 2:7, we see God reaching down and forming man out of the dust of the earth and breathing into him the breath of life. Certainly the God who formed man in the beginning can take him in his hands and mold him as clay into whatever he chooses him to be.
When it comes to man, God has a plan, God has the power to execute the plan, and He has the patience to complete the work He starts.
Philippians 2:13 says, “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.”
Romans 8:28 says, “For we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”
Lamentations 4:2 says, “The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine Gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter.”
In John 3 we’re introduced to Nicodemus. He was a leader of the Jews and obviously a man of high standing. He came to Jesus by night because he didn’t want to be seen visiting this controversial man in daylight hours. But at least he came. At least he was curious to see if this man had answers for a life that was obviously not very fulfilling. Jesus immediately speaks to Nicodemus about changing. He talks to him about a change so radical that it even has a special name, The New Birth. This hit Nicodemus like a ton of bricks and he likened it to going back into the womb and being born again. Unquestionably the new Birth is a transforming experience.
Perhaps the most outstanding examples of this in the Bible is the experience of Saul of Tarsus who was changed on the road to Damascus. His change was so dramatic that it’s what we call a phenomenal conversion. One minute he was going about his life’s work of oppressing Christians and the very next he was crying out to God to tell him what was His assignment for him. It would be somewhat like the late Ted Kennedy, the embodiment of a liberal political animal waking up one morning and being a conservative who would be more extreme than Rush Limbaugh. We’re talking change now.
OUR WORLD IS IN A CONSTANT STATE OF CHANGE.
In 1943, a man by the name of Thomas Watson was the president of the IBM Corporation. He actually said, “I could never see a worldwide need for more than five computers.” Can you imagine a smart business man saying that? The reason for this profoundly ignorant statement was, he didn’t comprehend how much in the state of flux the world is in.
A new innovative city bus program will soon be used in our town, Orlando , Florida. In a city famous for traffic jams, our city officials hope to create a better way to move people around. Here’s how it will work. Using a computer at home, at work or at special places around the town, a rider would order a bus trip. The request would be dispatched by computer to a bus driver who would then pick up the rider at a particular stop within 12 minutes and go to the stop closest to the destination. Sounds good doesn’t it? Obviously the on-demand service has already been tried successfully in other cities.
My point is that we are living in a time of diverse change and all of us will have to adapt to it or live in the past, [if that will even be possible.] Change is one of most uncomfortable things we do but life is constantly demanding it of us. Keep in mind that I’m not speaking of the Obama version of hope and change.
The network news media is now wrestling with the reality of the changing world where people no longer have to wait until six o’clock at night to find out what’s happening in the world. We now have 24 hour cable news not to mention the internet.
Churches have also been faced with the necessity of change. Because of changes in the work place and lifestyles, old traditional ways have been supplanted with new ideas and concepts. Certainly the Gospel hasn’t changed but the way it’s piped to people has. Nowadays, a person can turn on satellite television and get preaching and teaching 24 hours a day. Many churches are going to Sunday morning only with cell groups meeting in different parts of their cities through the week. It’s not intrinsically bad or good -it just is. Having said all this, it would be extremely unwise, not to mention unscriptural for us to forsake assembling together corporately.
Change is inevitable. At this moment your body is going through all sorts of changes. Your brain is changing. The Universe, including the earth, is changing. How the world does business and everything about our economies is changing. I remember when I traveled on the west coast in the early sixties; we didn’t telephone home to Florida but once a month because it was too expensive. Now we call with a cell phone from airplanes, ships and trains, half way around the world without hesitation. It’s hard for me to believe as I look back that things have changed so much in so short a time.
We all have a choice. We can embrace the change that’s coming anyway, or allow fear to influence us to hide from it. But unlike the poor people in the Indian Ocean when the Tsunami struck, we have been advised. We’ve been given a heads-up to what the future will be like. Either we prepare and cooperate with change by adapting and benefiting from it, or sadly, we’ll just be swept away.
Markets change from bull to bear; weather changes, sometimes on a dime. The seasons change several times a year. Of course that’s cyclical in nature. Technology changes and when it does -things never go back the way they were. Jobs change, management changes, people change, everything in life changes. If we look back, we’ll see that we’ve weathered many changes already in our lives. We may have resisted some change but you can probably look back and say, “thank God that changed and look at the great things that came of it.”
THE GREATEST CHANGES ARE JUST AHEAD.
Jesus is coming back to the earth soon to take his church away. Seven years later we’ll come back to earth with him at which time He’ll fumigate the place and rule and reign forever.
Listen to 1 CORINTHIANS 15: 51,
“BEHOLD I SHOW YOU A MYSTERY; WE SHALL NOT ALL SLEEP BUT WE SHALL ALL BE CHANGED, IN A MOMENT, IN A TWINKLING OF AN EYE, AT THE LAST TRUMP: FOR THE TRUMPET SHALL SOUND, AND THE DEAD SHALL BE RAISED INCORRUPTIBLE, AND WE SHALL BE CHANGED.
FOR THIS CORRUPTIBLE MUST PUT ON INCORRUPTION AND THIS MORTAL MUST OUT ON IMMORTALITY.”
SO WHEN THIS CORRUPTIBLE SHALL HAVE OUT ON INCORRUPTION, AND THIS MORTAL SHALL HAVE PUT ON IMMORTALITY, THEN SHALL BE BROUGHT TO PASS THE SAYING THAT IS WRITTEN, OH DEATH WHERE IS THY STING? OH GRAVE WHERE IS THY VICTORY?
This will be the change that will sweep us into his presence for all eternity.
Blessings,
John
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
Three Danger Zones
By John Stallings
The Rolling Stone’s song “I can’t get no satisfaction” has been voted the number one Rock N Roll song of all time.
Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, from what he wrote in his books could have easily related to the words of that song. Solomon reached a place where he felt life had no meaning. He hit a low point and was so disappointed with life he thought it was all vanity or meaningless.
Solomon is my kind of writer. In Ecclesiastes, he hangs the key to the whole book right on the front door, “Vanity of vanities [or meaningless] saith the preacher, vanity of vanity: all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labor which he taketh under the sun?”
Just in case we missed it, he hangs the same key on the back door [12:8] “vanity/meaningless.” Other writers have even used the words “absurd” or “absurdity” to express meaninglessness. If you read Ecclesiastes, you will see that Solomon was writing to the whole world. His message has a universal, missionary appeal. We should have a keen listening ear.
We know much about the famous names in the Bible like Jesus, Moses, Elijah and David and a host of other renowned Bible heroes. But all most folk seem to remember about Solomon is that he wrote the book of Proverbs and several other books in the Bible. Let’s unpack Solomon’s luggage a little bit here and reacquaint ourselves with him.
Solomon sat on his Dad’s throne but unlike his dad king David he didn’t have to go out and kill a giant. As a matter of fact he never fought any big battles. Solomon grew up a little pampered but he was a good king in the beginning. He made Jerusalem shine like a diamond glistening between the shimmering blue waves of the Mediterranean and the glimmering salty waters of the Dead Sea.
At first, Solomon’s reign was Israel’s Camelot. Jerusalem was a crown jewel in Solomon’s day. Silver and gold were almost as common as dust. No wars were going on and everybody was safe, blessed with money and plenty to eat. The times were good. God was blessing the whole nation. It kind of sounds like America doesn’t it? God has blessed us tremendously but we are in need of a national revival.
The first thing Solomon did was put his enemies to death and bring Pharaoh’s daughter to the city of David and marry her. Not long after that God asked Solomon in a dream to ask of Him whatever he wanted and the request would be granted. Isn’t God good? God is so good to His people. Some people feel that we as the people of God are supposed to be poor and downtrodden and walk around like we’ve been baptized in pickle juice. But the Bible says in Psalm 144: 15, “Happy are the people whose God is the Lord.”
If you could have your fondest wish fulfilled what would it be? Would you wish for riches, a long life, good health or spiritual understanding? Since Solomon asked God for wisdom, God told him He’d make him fabulously wealthy also.
Ask what I should give you! We’ve heard that opening line before haven’t we? A man finds a bottle and a genie comes out and gives him three wishes.
I heard about three men who were stranded on an island when a bottle washes up on shore. When they uncorked the bottle a genie came out and granted them three wishes. The first man wishes to go to Paris and he suddenly goes to Paris and stands in front of the Eiffel Tower. The second man wishes to go to Hollywood and suddenly finds himself on a movie set. The third man, now alone on the island looks around and says, “I wish my friends were back.”
Scholars agree that Ecclesiastes was written in the sunset years of Solomon’s life. He obviously had a hankering for beautiful women because he had 700 wives and 300 concubines, which means three hundred more wives. Solomon got many of these women from other nations and they brought their foreign Gods and idols with them. This man collected women the way some men collect antique cars. It was his hobby. Every day Solomon was surrounded by 1,000 stunningly beautiful women and he didn’t get junk. They had a demoralizing effect on Solomon because he constructed many alters to their Gods to try to please them. These women had the power to undo Solomon’s connection to God. These sensual sweethearts spoiled his spirituality. If you read 1 Kings 11:9 the fact is made crystal clear that God didn’t approve of the way Solomon did business.
Yes, Solomon tried laughter, leisure, licentiousness, labor, lucre, and lovely ladies. He tried it all. And he got bored. He wasn’t a “happy camper.” The problem was that-Solomon lost God. It all started with marrying the wrong woman- a heathen woman who worshipped false idols. This rubbed off on Solomon and for all his vaunted wisdom he turned out to be one of the most profligate and promiscuous kings who ever ruled over Israel. Probably quite imperceptibly at first Solomon got an infection because he gave sin a foothold in his life. This infection ultimately killed him spiritually.
The writer’s messages come through loud and clear in Ecclesiastes. One of them is-
THE WORLD AROUND US DOESN’T CHANGE THE WORLD WITHIN US.
In this little book, Solomon uses the term “life under the Sun” 29 times. He uses the phrase “chasing after the wind” 9 times and the word “time” 28 times.
Solomon seems to be greatly impacted with the fact that there just isn’t enough time and that he’s running out of time. If you’re over 50, you’ll be able to relate to that fact. If you’re over 65, you are getting this book in a profound way. By this time, we’ve learned along with Solomon, - there just isn’t any time.
The book of Ecclesiastes suggests to us three periods of time that I’m calling-Three Danger Zones. First are;
1. THE TEEN YEARS
Solomon tells us in 12;1-3—Remember now thy creator in the days of thy youth while the evil days come not nor the years draw night when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them.
The teen years are a real Danger Zone. Have you ever really considered the profoundly dramatic change a child goes through when they jump from adolescence to a teenager? As a child, everything was so simple. The child is playing in a sand-box and almost overnight they’re overtaken by puberty. Do you remember how overwhelming that experience was? With some of us we got a new voice about that time.
Now, not only is the newly-crowned teenager catapulted into a world of sexual awareness- the big questions of life start. Who am I? What am I doing here? What’s the meaning of life if there is one? They start to see the suffering, unfairness and injustices of the world. Teenagers will get in the streets and march over causes they’ve barely had time to know even exist.
To point out the obvious, it’s during the teen years that many times kids get into trouble. Some of them get into the “Goth” scene and wear all black clothing. Many young people get so confused that they take on a Gothic character to hide behind just so they can deal with daily life.
Teens typically feel they’re the first to discover the problems that have plagued mankind for centuries. Of course suicide is always something that parents have to be concerned about because suicide is the second cause of death among teenagers.
The next Danger Zone is;
2. MIDDLE AGE
If we make it through the teen years, we usually have smooth sailing for a number of years. During those years most people raise their children, if they have any. Then when middle age rolls around, the same old “meaninglessness” comes back to torment us again.
I’ve always thought it sort of funny to speak of middle age because we have to know how long a person’s life will be to know when middle age comes. Many men and women have what’s called a mid-life crisis.
Some have an easy transition through mid-life and others go nuts-o. The middle age years are often called the “so what” years. It’s during mid-life that people have affairs and many tear their lives all to pieces. As a general rule, if a married couple can make it through their middle years they won’t divorce. In mid-life there’s an instant replay of the craziness that plagued us as teenagers.
Jerry Lee Lewis had a song out several years ago called “Middle age crazy.” Old Jerry was pretty much right on target. Mid-life is when we start buying the CD and DVD disks that Time-Life offers on T.V. We can’t understand why the old songs we loved aren’t played on the radio anymore.
Many folk, especially women, I think, start having plastic surgery in middle age. I heard about one man whom the doctor told; “I can’t lift your face but I can lower your body.”
The story is told of a lady who was having quite a lot of plastic surgery done and during the process she prayed and asked God to let her live a very long life. God assured her that she could count on a life full of years. She continued to have more and more work done and after about the 15th surgery when she was released from the clinic, she was crossing the street and a car hit her, killing her instantly. When she got to heaven she asked God why he didn’t keep His promise to her of a long life. According to the story, God said, “I certainly had every intention of giving you a long life, the reason the car hit you was-I didn’t recognize you.”
Solomon tells us that he denied himself no pleasure but when he summed it all up, it was just a cosmic-joke. No pleasure at all. He learned the great mysteries of life but that just served to depress him more. He undertook great projects like building the Temple and building his own magnificent home but that wasn’t fulfilling either. In 2:17 Solomon actually said-I hate life.”
Again the truth comes through that-life around us can’t change the inner landscape of our lives. Solomon tells us that it’s all folly if we leave God out of our lives.
Adolph Menzel was a painter who lived in the 18th century. He undertook to paint a masterpiece featuring King Frederick the Great. The painting was to be of the King surrounded by beautiful scenery with a background of mountains and flowers. Menzel, wanting to get the scenery painted first, made a charcoal outline of where the King’s personage would be, intending to put that in last. Menzel inadvertently died before he could finish the painting so all that was visible was the surrounding trappings. The king was left out.
If we’re not careful, you and I can make this mistake. Well intentioned as we may be, we can, not really meaning to, leave God out of our lives, like Menzel, intending to come back to Him before we’re finished. This is a major part of what Solomon is saying to us. Remember God!
Certainly Solomon knew better than what he did throughout much of his life. But you and I do the same thing. We do things that we know in our heart isn’t right but somehow we just do them anyway. The last danger zone;
3. THE SENIOR YEARS
Some people say they won’t to ‘grow old gracefully,” and others plan to “fight it all the way.”
In the senior years the enemy comes to us again. Now we’re starting to get philosophical about our lives. After all, we were told as young people that we should get the best education possible and excel at some skill or in some profession. Now, in our sunset years, we’re told to retire. The person who’ll take our place will be maybe 25 years old and they’ll only have to pay him/her half what we were paid.
In our senior years we ask; what did I accomplish? Did my contribution make a difference? The thing that will make a difference in our senior years is do we have the inner spiritual resources to cope.
I read somewhere that studies have shown that older people tend to be less likely to experience persistent negative emotional states and have a greater capacity to experience poignancy.
I think that’s true because as a young man I traveled over much of the world and can remember being so tired I was hardly able to take in the unbelievable sights I was seeing. I walked through the catacombs in Rome and was so exhausted I could scarcely take in the importance of it. Today, I can see some of the places I’ve been to personally on TV and sit and marvel almost to the point of tears at the beauty my eyes behold.
Research finds that with aging comes deeper ways of relating to self, others and society and even the universe. These finding showed that:
*Older people tend to grow in their capacity for self-confrontation.
* Older people tend to move from self-centeredness to altruism.
* Older people tend to think of childhood more positively.
*Older people tend to find solitude less threatening.
* Older people tend to find more joy in social contact.
* Older people tend to have a renewed interest in nature.
MOCKING BIRDS
This might seem almost silly but it’s true. The other day I went out to the mailbox and as I walked I heard the most startling sound. I looked up in a small tree on our property and sitting at the very top like the star on a Christmas tree was a bird chirping out the most unbelievable sounds I’ve heard in a long time. I stood for a moment or two at rapt attention as the bird sang.
It was almost as if the bird was saying, “Look what I can do. I was just waiting for you to come out so I could audition for you.” To be frank, I wasn’t sure what kind of bird it was but this little guy was chirping away like his life depended on it, almost like a musician quickly going through his repertoire. I don’t know why I was so impressed but I was. This bird went through all sorts of sounds, swinging from sounds like a squirrel barking, to someone whistling for their dog. It was all over in less than a minute but I was so impressed I came back into the house and looked this bird up on Google.
It turns out that it was indeed a Mocking Bird, which explained why he knew so many sounds. They actually mock other birds and I suppose any noise that impresses them. I learned that these birds keep adding new sounds until the day they die. Isn’t that amazing? I may have learned some of this in school but had forgotten. More likely I just wasn’t paying attention. Now I listen for the mocking Bird’s song and wonder why it took me so long to see and hear the sounds all around me.
It’s not that growing older has left me with nothing to do-there don’t seem to be enough hours in a day, but at this point in my life, as the above study suggests, I have a “renewed interest in nature.”
IN OLD AGE, OUR PURPOSE MUST BE HIGHER THAN OUR POSSESSIONS.
Solomon should have been more solemn don’t you think? In him we see the restlessness of the young and the peevishness of the old. He had a steady diet of wicked women, food, frolic, and fame. Life has a way of decaying right under a person if they don’t take great care. Solomon’s downfall came in old age and its clear Solomon was led over “fool’s hill” by all the wicked influences in his life. As I’ve looked again at Solomon’s life, I’ve wondered if Elvis, Michael Jackson and Tiger Woods would have turned out differently if they’d read Solomon’s writings and taken them seriously.
It would be great if when a person grew old they’d be exempt from the decaying influences of sin but there’s no guarantee of smooth sailing into our sunset years. Rocky roads still await senior saints.
Do you think we’ll meet Solomon in heaven? Just a question. Listen to 1 Kings 11:4;
As Solomon grew old his wives turned his heart after other Gods and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely as David his father had done.
Ashtoreth was a sex goddess and sanctioned every sexual activity. Molech worship included child sacrifice. Solomon was into all of that. Heathen genes mixed with Hebrew genes and “all bets are off.”
Solomon’s son Rehoboam led Israel into deep sin and under him the kingdom was divided into ten tribes and the two tribes. War and bloodshed came and never left. It all started with Solomon.
DANGER
Friend, you and I can’t afford to slip into sin, no matter what stage of life we find ourselves in. If we do, generations who follow us will suffer for it. Hosea 8:7 says; They sow the wind and reap the whirlwind.
God wants you and me to have integrity. He wants us on our knees and He wants us feeding on His Word. If your father was immoral or maybe a drunkard, you can break that cycle. You can break it through the blood of Jesus Christ.
We can avoid each and every one of the danger zones but we can do it only through Him.
Blessings,
John
The Rolling Stone’s song “I can’t get no satisfaction” has been voted the number one Rock N Roll song of all time.
Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, from what he wrote in his books could have easily related to the words of that song. Solomon reached a place where he felt life had no meaning. He hit a low point and was so disappointed with life he thought it was all vanity or meaningless.
Solomon is my kind of writer. In Ecclesiastes, he hangs the key to the whole book right on the front door, “Vanity of vanities [or meaningless] saith the preacher, vanity of vanity: all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labor which he taketh under the sun?”
Just in case we missed it, he hangs the same key on the back door [12:8] “vanity/meaningless.” Other writers have even used the words “absurd” or “absurdity” to express meaninglessness. If you read Ecclesiastes, you will see that Solomon was writing to the whole world. His message has a universal, missionary appeal. We should have a keen listening ear.
We know much about the famous names in the Bible like Jesus, Moses, Elijah and David and a host of other renowned Bible heroes. But all most folk seem to remember about Solomon is that he wrote the book of Proverbs and several other books in the Bible. Let’s unpack Solomon’s luggage a little bit here and reacquaint ourselves with him.
Solomon sat on his Dad’s throne but unlike his dad king David he didn’t have to go out and kill a giant. As a matter of fact he never fought any big battles. Solomon grew up a little pampered but he was a good king in the beginning. He made Jerusalem shine like a diamond glistening between the shimmering blue waves of the Mediterranean and the glimmering salty waters of the Dead Sea.
At first, Solomon’s reign was Israel’s Camelot. Jerusalem was a crown jewel in Solomon’s day. Silver and gold were almost as common as dust. No wars were going on and everybody was safe, blessed with money and plenty to eat. The times were good. God was blessing the whole nation. It kind of sounds like America doesn’t it? God has blessed us tremendously but we are in need of a national revival.
The first thing Solomon did was put his enemies to death and bring Pharaoh’s daughter to the city of David and marry her. Not long after that God asked Solomon in a dream to ask of Him whatever he wanted and the request would be granted. Isn’t God good? God is so good to His people. Some people feel that we as the people of God are supposed to be poor and downtrodden and walk around like we’ve been baptized in pickle juice. But the Bible says in Psalm 144: 15, “Happy are the people whose God is the Lord.”
If you could have your fondest wish fulfilled what would it be? Would you wish for riches, a long life, good health or spiritual understanding? Since Solomon asked God for wisdom, God told him He’d make him fabulously wealthy also.
Ask what I should give you! We’ve heard that opening line before haven’t we? A man finds a bottle and a genie comes out and gives him three wishes.
I heard about three men who were stranded on an island when a bottle washes up on shore. When they uncorked the bottle a genie came out and granted them three wishes. The first man wishes to go to Paris and he suddenly goes to Paris and stands in front of the Eiffel Tower. The second man wishes to go to Hollywood and suddenly finds himself on a movie set. The third man, now alone on the island looks around and says, “I wish my friends were back.”
Scholars agree that Ecclesiastes was written in the sunset years of Solomon’s life. He obviously had a hankering for beautiful women because he had 700 wives and 300 concubines, which means three hundred more wives. Solomon got many of these women from other nations and they brought their foreign Gods and idols with them. This man collected women the way some men collect antique cars. It was his hobby. Every day Solomon was surrounded by 1,000 stunningly beautiful women and he didn’t get junk. They had a demoralizing effect on Solomon because he constructed many alters to their Gods to try to please them. These women had the power to undo Solomon’s connection to God. These sensual sweethearts spoiled his spirituality. If you read 1 Kings 11:9 the fact is made crystal clear that God didn’t approve of the way Solomon did business.
Yes, Solomon tried laughter, leisure, licentiousness, labor, lucre, and lovely ladies. He tried it all. And he got bored. He wasn’t a “happy camper.” The problem was that-Solomon lost God. It all started with marrying the wrong woman- a heathen woman who worshipped false idols. This rubbed off on Solomon and for all his vaunted wisdom he turned out to be one of the most profligate and promiscuous kings who ever ruled over Israel. Probably quite imperceptibly at first Solomon got an infection because he gave sin a foothold in his life. This infection ultimately killed him spiritually.
The writer’s messages come through loud and clear in Ecclesiastes. One of them is-
THE WORLD AROUND US DOESN’T CHANGE THE WORLD WITHIN US.
In this little book, Solomon uses the term “life under the Sun” 29 times. He uses the phrase “chasing after the wind” 9 times and the word “time” 28 times.
Solomon seems to be greatly impacted with the fact that there just isn’t enough time and that he’s running out of time. If you’re over 50, you’ll be able to relate to that fact. If you’re over 65, you are getting this book in a profound way. By this time, we’ve learned along with Solomon, - there just isn’t any time.
The book of Ecclesiastes suggests to us three periods of time that I’m calling-Three Danger Zones. First are;
1. THE TEEN YEARS
Solomon tells us in 12;1-3—Remember now thy creator in the days of thy youth while the evil days come not nor the years draw night when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them.
The teen years are a real Danger Zone. Have you ever really considered the profoundly dramatic change a child goes through when they jump from adolescence to a teenager? As a child, everything was so simple. The child is playing in a sand-box and almost overnight they’re overtaken by puberty. Do you remember how overwhelming that experience was? With some of us we got a new voice about that time.
Now, not only is the newly-crowned teenager catapulted into a world of sexual awareness- the big questions of life start. Who am I? What am I doing here? What’s the meaning of life if there is one? They start to see the suffering, unfairness and injustices of the world. Teenagers will get in the streets and march over causes they’ve barely had time to know even exist.
To point out the obvious, it’s during the teen years that many times kids get into trouble. Some of them get into the “Goth” scene and wear all black clothing. Many young people get so confused that they take on a Gothic character to hide behind just so they can deal with daily life.
Teens typically feel they’re the first to discover the problems that have plagued mankind for centuries. Of course suicide is always something that parents have to be concerned about because suicide is the second cause of death among teenagers.
The next Danger Zone is;
2. MIDDLE AGE
If we make it through the teen years, we usually have smooth sailing for a number of years. During those years most people raise their children, if they have any. Then when middle age rolls around, the same old “meaninglessness” comes back to torment us again.
I’ve always thought it sort of funny to speak of middle age because we have to know how long a person’s life will be to know when middle age comes. Many men and women have what’s called a mid-life crisis.
Some have an easy transition through mid-life and others go nuts-o. The middle age years are often called the “so what” years. It’s during mid-life that people have affairs and many tear their lives all to pieces. As a general rule, if a married couple can make it through their middle years they won’t divorce. In mid-life there’s an instant replay of the craziness that plagued us as teenagers.
Jerry Lee Lewis had a song out several years ago called “Middle age crazy.” Old Jerry was pretty much right on target. Mid-life is when we start buying the CD and DVD disks that Time-Life offers on T.V. We can’t understand why the old songs we loved aren’t played on the radio anymore.
Many folk, especially women, I think, start having plastic surgery in middle age. I heard about one man whom the doctor told; “I can’t lift your face but I can lower your body.”
The story is told of a lady who was having quite a lot of plastic surgery done and during the process she prayed and asked God to let her live a very long life. God assured her that she could count on a life full of years. She continued to have more and more work done and after about the 15th surgery when she was released from the clinic, she was crossing the street and a car hit her, killing her instantly. When she got to heaven she asked God why he didn’t keep His promise to her of a long life. According to the story, God said, “I certainly had every intention of giving you a long life, the reason the car hit you was-I didn’t recognize you.”
Solomon tells us that he denied himself no pleasure but when he summed it all up, it was just a cosmic-joke. No pleasure at all. He learned the great mysteries of life but that just served to depress him more. He undertook great projects like building the Temple and building his own magnificent home but that wasn’t fulfilling either. In 2:17 Solomon actually said-I hate life.”
Again the truth comes through that-life around us can’t change the inner landscape of our lives. Solomon tells us that it’s all folly if we leave God out of our lives.
Adolph Menzel was a painter who lived in the 18th century. He undertook to paint a masterpiece featuring King Frederick the Great. The painting was to be of the King surrounded by beautiful scenery with a background of mountains and flowers. Menzel, wanting to get the scenery painted first, made a charcoal outline of where the King’s personage would be, intending to put that in last. Menzel inadvertently died before he could finish the painting so all that was visible was the surrounding trappings. The king was left out.
If we’re not careful, you and I can make this mistake. Well intentioned as we may be, we can, not really meaning to, leave God out of our lives, like Menzel, intending to come back to Him before we’re finished. This is a major part of what Solomon is saying to us. Remember God!
Certainly Solomon knew better than what he did throughout much of his life. But you and I do the same thing. We do things that we know in our heart isn’t right but somehow we just do them anyway. The last danger zone;
3. THE SENIOR YEARS
Some people say they won’t to ‘grow old gracefully,” and others plan to “fight it all the way.”
In the senior years the enemy comes to us again. Now we’re starting to get philosophical about our lives. After all, we were told as young people that we should get the best education possible and excel at some skill or in some profession. Now, in our sunset years, we’re told to retire. The person who’ll take our place will be maybe 25 years old and they’ll only have to pay him/her half what we were paid.
In our senior years we ask; what did I accomplish? Did my contribution make a difference? The thing that will make a difference in our senior years is do we have the inner spiritual resources to cope.
I read somewhere that studies have shown that older people tend to be less likely to experience persistent negative emotional states and have a greater capacity to experience poignancy.
I think that’s true because as a young man I traveled over much of the world and can remember being so tired I was hardly able to take in the unbelievable sights I was seeing. I walked through the catacombs in Rome and was so exhausted I could scarcely take in the importance of it. Today, I can see some of the places I’ve been to personally on TV and sit and marvel almost to the point of tears at the beauty my eyes behold.
Research finds that with aging comes deeper ways of relating to self, others and society and even the universe. These finding showed that:
*Older people tend to grow in their capacity for self-confrontation.
* Older people tend to move from self-centeredness to altruism.
* Older people tend to think of childhood more positively.
*Older people tend to find solitude less threatening.
* Older people tend to find more joy in social contact.
* Older people tend to have a renewed interest in nature.
MOCKING BIRDS
This might seem almost silly but it’s true. The other day I went out to the mailbox and as I walked I heard the most startling sound. I looked up in a small tree on our property and sitting at the very top like the star on a Christmas tree was a bird chirping out the most unbelievable sounds I’ve heard in a long time. I stood for a moment or two at rapt attention as the bird sang.
It was almost as if the bird was saying, “Look what I can do. I was just waiting for you to come out so I could audition for you.” To be frank, I wasn’t sure what kind of bird it was but this little guy was chirping away like his life depended on it, almost like a musician quickly going through his repertoire. I don’t know why I was so impressed but I was. This bird went through all sorts of sounds, swinging from sounds like a squirrel barking, to someone whistling for their dog. It was all over in less than a minute but I was so impressed I came back into the house and looked this bird up on Google.
It turns out that it was indeed a Mocking Bird, which explained why he knew so many sounds. They actually mock other birds and I suppose any noise that impresses them. I learned that these birds keep adding new sounds until the day they die. Isn’t that amazing? I may have learned some of this in school but had forgotten. More likely I just wasn’t paying attention. Now I listen for the mocking Bird’s song and wonder why it took me so long to see and hear the sounds all around me.
It’s not that growing older has left me with nothing to do-there don’t seem to be enough hours in a day, but at this point in my life, as the above study suggests, I have a “renewed interest in nature.”
IN OLD AGE, OUR PURPOSE MUST BE HIGHER THAN OUR POSSESSIONS.
Solomon should have been more solemn don’t you think? In him we see the restlessness of the young and the peevishness of the old. He had a steady diet of wicked women, food, frolic, and fame. Life has a way of decaying right under a person if they don’t take great care. Solomon’s downfall came in old age and its clear Solomon was led over “fool’s hill” by all the wicked influences in his life. As I’ve looked again at Solomon’s life, I’ve wondered if Elvis, Michael Jackson and Tiger Woods would have turned out differently if they’d read Solomon’s writings and taken them seriously.
It would be great if when a person grew old they’d be exempt from the decaying influences of sin but there’s no guarantee of smooth sailing into our sunset years. Rocky roads still await senior saints.
Do you think we’ll meet Solomon in heaven? Just a question. Listen to 1 Kings 11:4;
As Solomon grew old his wives turned his heart after other Gods and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely as David his father had done.
Ashtoreth was a sex goddess and sanctioned every sexual activity. Molech worship included child sacrifice. Solomon was into all of that. Heathen genes mixed with Hebrew genes and “all bets are off.”
Solomon’s son Rehoboam led Israel into deep sin and under him the kingdom was divided into ten tribes and the two tribes. War and bloodshed came and never left. It all started with Solomon.
DANGER
Friend, you and I can’t afford to slip into sin, no matter what stage of life we find ourselves in. If we do, generations who follow us will suffer for it. Hosea 8:7 says; They sow the wind and reap the whirlwind.
God wants you and me to have integrity. He wants us on our knees and He wants us feeding on His Word. If your father was immoral or maybe a drunkard, you can break that cycle. You can break it through the blood of Jesus Christ.
We can avoid each and every one of the danger zones but we can do it only through Him.
Blessings,
John
Sunday, June 13, 2010
"Analyze This"
By John Stallings
I recall a scene from the movie “Analyze this” where Billy Crystal plays a psychiatrist who against his better judgment takes on Mafia crime boss [Robert DeNiro’s character] as a client. We learn that DeNiro can’t control his emotions and starts to cry at odd moments.
There’s a scene when one of DeNiro’s henchmen comes to fetch Billy at a very inconvenient moment and Billy balks on him, saying “What, you think you can call me any time day or night?” The gofer let’s Billy know he’s part of the family now and “when the boss needs you, you come.” It so happened that the boss was on the verge of having another nervous breakdown. When Billy starts to protest again, the gopher cuts him off and says, “It is what it is.” Funny line. So it’s Billy to the rescue.
The thrust of this message will be to analyze some of difficult areas in the Bible that often confuse people. Some folk love to be confused. They wander around “in the misty moonlight” as it were, always hung up on some spiritual calculus. Some preachers will take a simple passage of scripture & so mystify it no one can understand what they’re talking about. I guess you could say that’s their “preaching style.” I bite my fingernails when I listen to these men.
As for me I’m just the opposite. I’m a simple kind of man so I like to take those things that seem shrouded in mystery and break them down, if possible making them easier to understand.
I’ve learned that when we find one of these areas that tend to confuse us, a good rule of the thumb is, take a deep breath, look at the problem or area of confusion and apply this rule –to borrow a phrase-“It is what it is." We might not like some of answers we get, still, it’s the Word of God and - "it is what it is."
Some people think that all sin can be forgiven. There’s a problem with that if we parse the Word of God in total honesty. So lets analyze; -SINS THAT ARE FORGIVEN -AND SINS THAT CAN’T BE FORGIVEN.
In Matthew 12:31 Jesus said--…every sin & blasphemy will be forgiven man but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.
The first part of that verse is certainly good news is it not? God is willing to forgive all sin and even some blasphemies. What a wonderful promise that is.
Recently a mother placed her small baby in a microwave oven & killed It. “That’s unforgivable,” we might say, but God would say, “No. If she’ll humble herself & ask for pardon, I’ll forgive freely.”
A mother in South Carolina placed her three children in a car & rolled the car into a lake drowning them all. Some might say, “That’s unthinkable. Anyone who’d do that deserves no mercy.” But God would say, “My grace is sufficient for that woman. If she’ll repent, I’ll forgive her.”
A doctor in England a few years ago threw acid in the eyes of his wife because she cheated on him. He slashed her face with a knife telling her, “No man will ever look at you again.” We might think that sin beyond mercy but God would find it totally forgivable.
Though O.J Simpson was found innocent, many people still believe he practically decapitated his wife & another man. We might look at that sin & have no feelings of sympathy for O.J, but God would forgive him if he’d killed a dozen people; if he confessed & asked forgiveness.
There are people who’ll kidnap a pregnant woman, slash open her belly & steal her baby leaving her to die. There are also people who will drug their victim, place them in a bathtub filled with ice & when the person wakes up they find the tub filled with bloody water & realize one of their kidneys was stolen.
God sees all these sins as horrible & certainly expects individuals to pay for their crimes according to the laws of man. However, in the spiritual sense –All manner of sin & blasphemy shall be forgiven unto man…..
BUT THERE'S NO FORGIVENESS FOR BLASPHEMING THE HOLY SPIRIT
In the second part of Matthew 12:31 Jesus says--… but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.
In Matthew 12:22-24 the Scribes & Pharisees were attributing the work of the Holy Spirit to Satan. Then they brought Him a demon possessed man who was blind & mute & Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk & see. All the people were astonished & said, could this be the Son of David? But when the Pharisees heard this they said, it is only by Beelzebub, the prince of demons that this fellow drives out demons.
The Pharisees attributed the works of Jesus to the devil himself. The sin was committed in full view of a demonstration of God’s power. Luke 4:18 says that Jesus went forth in the power of the Holy Spirit. Consequently the rejection of Jesus by the scribes & Pharisees constituted a rejection of the Holy Spirit’s witness of Jesus as the Messiah.
It was for this reason that Jesus said,--all sin & blasphemy shall be forgiven but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit shall not be forgiven men…whosoever speaks against the Holy Spirit it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come.
If the question of blaspheming the Holy Spirit has ever personally troubled you, here’s a little test;
# Do you know when you do wrong?
# Do you feel conviction after committing a sin?
# Do you feel sorry over such an offense?
# Do you feel the Spirit drawing you to repentance?
# Do you have a desire to worship & serve the lord?
# Do you ever consider God?
Christians can sin, but they have a hard time doing it. If God has closed the books on a person & written them off, they would be hardhearted; they’d have turned against Jesus, reviled Him & become so depraved that they could gladly consign the works of Christ to Satan.
This sin cannot be committed accidentally & it’s unlikely a person who does it would feel bad about doing it. It really boils down to this; it’s not what God does or is going to do to a person, it’s what the person does to their self. They would much rather continue to slander God & His name than to repent. In so doing they have shut off the only way to grace—Jesus Christ & His Holy Spirit. In shutting Him off, they shut off His conviction, drawing power, and His work of nudging them to repentance. Next,
TAKING THE MARK OF THE BEAST DURING THE GREAT TRIBULATION IS UNFORGIVABLE.
Revelation 13:16-18 notes, He also forced everyone small & great rich & poor free & slave to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead so that no-one could buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name. This calls for wisdom. If anyone has insight, let him calculate the number of the beast, for it is man’s number. His number is 666.
Revelation 14:9-11 says,--If anyone worships the beast & his image & receives his mark on the forehead or on the hand he too will drink of the wine of God’s fury which will be poured full strength into the cup of His wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels & of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment rises for ever & ever. There is no rest day or night for those who worship the beast & his image or for anyone who receives the mark of his name.
Revival will flourish during The Great Tribulation & many will be saved, but they will have to seal their testimony with their blood. People will be told to worship the beast & if they don’t comply they’ll be beheaded. As the verses above tell us, there’s no forgiveness for anyone who takes the mark of the beast.
Exodus 20:3-5 tells us,--You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to worship them…..
People won’t be able to buy or sell during the tribulation without the mark of the beast - 666. There’s no good news to talk about during this time because without the mark there will be no food, no shelter, no medical care etc. Worse, if the mark is taken, the individual will face the eternal judgment of an angry God.
Salvation will still be available but only through martyrdom. Next;
NO FORGIVENESS FOR UNBELIEF
In a Christian’s life there are times when our faith grows weak. James tells us that if we have wavering faith—“Let not that man think he shall receive anything from God.-James 1:7
A Christian who has saving faith, from time to time can experience wavering faith. This isn’t good but it does happen. But when it comes to salvation, -- to believe on The Lord Jesus Christ is the only basis for salvation. Christ didn’t die for the sin of unbelief nor is it covered in the atonement.
Listen to 1 John 5:10—He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God- hath made Him a liar; because he believeth not in the record that God gave of His Son.
John 3:36 says……he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.
Roman 10:9 says……if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus Christ and shalt believe in thine heart that God has raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Listen to Jesus in John 16:8-9….And when He has come He will reprove the world of sin & righteousness & of judgment. Of sin, because they believe not on me……Here we have the words of Jesus saying unbelief is sin.
Hebrews 2: 12 says---Take heed brethren lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God.
God won’t override unbelief & save an individual on “credit.” Unbelief must be flipped & turned to belief in order for a person to be saved. “Little faith” would still be enough to allow the person to call on the name of the Lord, but unbelief would never do it, so there is no path to salvation for the person who through unbelief refuses to make that call.—Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. John 3:16
There is no provision made for one who doesn’t call on the Lord during their lifetime, & death, without receiving Christ is irrevocable doom.
THE SIN OF APOSTASY IS NOT FORGIVEN
Following is what I believe to be one of the clearest descriptions found in the New Testament of what it means to be a Christian, --but ironically it’s wrapped in a serious warning. Hebrews 6:4-6 says;
It is impossible for-- those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, Who have tasted the goodness of the word of God & the powers of the coming age,-- if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again & subjecting Him to public disgrace.
In that passage there are five distinct expressions which elsewhere in the Bible are used to describe TRUE BELIEVERS…..The person has;
# “Been enlightened”—[This indicates they have received the truth of God’s Word in their lives.] # “Tasted the heavenly gift” [often a reference to receiving the free gift of eternal life.]
# have shared in the Holy Spirit—[who except Christians shares in the Holy Spirit?]
# have tasted the goodness of the word of God
# & the powers of the coming age-- [Sinners aren’t spoken of here. These are blessings associated with salvation, & the resurrection.]
The writer bends over backward to show that the folk he’s referring to are born-again Christians. And yet these people fall away & lose out with God to such an extent that --it is impossible for them to be brought back to repentance. That puts some “pepper in the gumbo” does it not? This is a very troubling passage.
Most of us know of individuals who for one reason or another have left the faith. They may not have actually denied the faith, but are certainly not practicing the faith.
Is this another incidence of a situation where people cannot be returned to repentance? Can a person have shared the Holy Spirit & then be lost? Are these good folk really lost? Is this really a description of a former saved person? Why can’t they find Christ once again? Why are they hopelessly lost eternally?
ANSWER; -- THESE PEOPLE COMMIT A SIN KNOWN AS APOSTASY—THEY ARE THEREFORE APOSTATES!
We know this is true because-They are crucifying the Son of God all over again & subjecting him to public disgrace.
They once confessed that Jesus was Lord & Messiah & that the crucifixion was unjust. Now in rejecting the faith their actions testify that the crucifixion was correct after all-Jesus was a blasphemer & not Messiah. If they had been there two thousand years ago they too would have cried, -Crucify Him, crucify Him. Such a witness exposes Jesus to public disgrace.
One of the sins of the end time is the sin of apostasy; people rejecting the true faith of Jesus Christ & embracing error.
1 Timothy 4:1 says, But the spirit explicitly says that in the later times some will fall away from the faith… A person can’t fall away from the faith or depart from it if they were never in it.
70% to 80% of those who are in cults today were at one time a part of classical Christianity. Nonetheless they fell into grave error & ultimately rejected the faith that they once held dear.
DELIBERATE SIN IS UNFORGIVABLE
Hebrews 10:26-30 [Living Bible]—If anyone sins deliberately by rejecting the Savior after knowing the truth of forgiveness, this is not covered by Christ’s death; there is no way to get rid of it. There will be nothing to look forward to but the terrible punishment of God’s awful anger, which will consume all His enemies. A man who refuses to obey the laws given by Moses was killed without mercy if there were two or three witnesses to his sin. Think how much more terrible the punishment will be for those who have trampled underfoot the Son of God & treated His cleansing blood as though it were common & unhallowed & insulted & outraged the Holy Spirit who brings God’s mercy to His people. For we know Him who said,--Justice belongs to me; I will repay them; who also said,--the lord Himself will handle these cases.
Verse 26 now from the NIV, --If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left…
If we’re completely honest we will all have to admit that none of us is perfect & have committed sin. It may not be a frequent or flagrant sin, but none of us has lived a perfect life, or Jesus wouldn’t have had to die on the cross.
We all do things, maybe we didn’t set out to do them, but we end up in some deed or activity we know is wrong yet we go against our conscience & do it anyway. We get angry, blow our cool, lie to get out of a jam, we speed, this kind of stuff. Now which kind of sin is the verse above talking about? Is it the accidental & unknowing sins or the other kind, the deliberate sins?
I believe the passage speaks of deliberate sin; sin people choose-- sin that is willful & premeditated, --sin that the individual knows is sin in the eyes of God when they commit it. It is a state of willful, known sin that a person embraces with no thought of giving it up. This is the sin spoken of in Hebrews 6:4-6 where apostates –trample underfoot the Son of God. They have also treated the blood covenant as something common &--insulted the spirit of grace.
These folk had known Christ as their personal savior & had-received the knowledge of the truth. For such people there is no forgiveness, no remaining sacrifice for sin. What remains is the judgment of God.
DOES THE NAME SAM KINISON RING A BELL?
Sam serves as a vivid illustration of an apostate. Sam was born in 1953 in Yakima Washington & became one of the loudest & rudest comedians of the 20th century. Sam grew up in Peoria, Illinois & he & his brothers followed in their father’s footsteps by touring the Bible Belt as evangelists.
Sam became one of the great stand-up comedians of the 1980’s & later his life became the classic image of drugs, sex & rock-n-roll. Hard-partying & hard-drinking became a major part of his act.
Here are a few “Kinisonisms” as they are called.
# I used to be a preacher & people think I changed overnight. I didn’t. It wasn’t like I woke up one morning & said, “Hey, forget the Bible, where’s the party?” It was a little more gradual than that. It took a lot of women to disillusion me.”
# People are going, -- hey aren’t you afraid to tell jokes like that? Don’t you get a small chill that runs through your blood when you tell a joke like that? Aren’t you afraid of going to hell? No, I’m not worried about hell. Because I WAS MARRIED FOR TWO YEARS! HELL WOULD BE LIKE CLUB MED!”
# I’ve lived a carnal life. My view of life is “If you’re going to miss heaven, why miss it by two inches? Miss it! I don’t have to go through the thing of paying for it in the next world. I know I’m—in the next life.”
On April 10th, 1992, on the way to a sold-out gig in Laughlin, Nevada, Sam’s Pontiac Trans-Am was struck head-on by a pick-up truck driven by a 17-year old driver. Sam who wasn’t wearing a seat belt died on the scene. A 27 year old female riding with him was knocked unconscious but suffered only minor injuries.
I’ve heard through several sources that Sam, while he was lying on the side of the road dying, was having a conversation with someone not visible to anyone but him. He was resisting death & making it clear to whoever he spoke to that he just couldn’t go. But finally he gave up & said, “Oh, well, yes I guess I’ll just have to go.”
There’s a photo going around of Sam & a group of women making mockery of the Lord’s Last Supper. I’ve heard it also hangs on the wall of a bar/restaurant owned by Sam’s brother Bill. Bill used to preach with Sam & is committed to keeping his memory alive.
I’ve read that Sam’s gravestone reads; - “In another time & place he would have been called a prophet.”
Could a person like Sam find Christ? Theoretically yes, if he would truly turn to the Lord. But Sam was an apostate & he wouldn’t turn to the Lord. He had;
# “been enlightened”
# tasted the heavenly gift”
# “had shared in the Holy Spirit”
# “Tasted the goodness of the word of God”
# “& the powers of the coming age.”
Sadly, none of that was good enough for Sam. He wanted more. He wanted booze, women, & song. He wanted fame & fortune. He wanted to worship another God besides the One True God—he wanted to worship the god of self.
Years ago a pastor friend told me the story of a small church that was praying for a young unsaved man in his mid-twenties. He had a wife & three children. The man worked with a group of other men on a construction job.
Revival came to the church & one night the young construction worker committed his life to the Lord.
Word of the man’s conversion reached the other men where he worked & the next day they mocked & made fun of him. At mid-morning they came around & said, “Hey, “preacher,” We heard you got religion last night.” At two o’clock they came around again to chide him saying, “Preacher,” we heard you got religion last night- Are you a holy-roller now?” At four o’clock there was more mockery of the young man, with his fellow workers putting all the pressure on him they could.
As the work day was ending the newly saved young man asked a friend for a piece of chewing tobacco. Then, in plain hearing of his buddies, this young man spit out tobacco & loudly said,--“There’s no more to God, Jesus Christ, or the Holy Spirit than there is to that tobacco I spit on the ground.”
The workers saw they’d really gotten to the young guy & they all laughed & left the construction site to go home. The young man got in his truck & drove around for a while, finally pulling up in front of his house.
He got his double-barrel shotgun off the rack of his truck, got some shells, walked into his home & shot dead his wife & three children & then killed himself.
Few people really knew the back story of this terrible tragedy. My minister friend said, “John, when he spat on the ground & uttered those words of blasphemy, he opened the door to a demonic invasion into his life & it was tragically fatal for him & his precious family.”
Listen to 2 Peter 2:20-22 regarding the terrible fate that awaits unfaithful, backsliding Christians;
If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ & are AGAIN ENTANGLED IN IT & overcome, they are WORSE OFF AT THE END than they were at the beginning.
IT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER FOR THEM NOT TO HAVE KNOWN THE WAY of righteousness, than to have known it & then turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them.
But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, the dog is turned to his vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.
Pretty well spells it out, doesn’t it?
Blessings,
John
I recall a scene from the movie “Analyze this” where Billy Crystal plays a psychiatrist who against his better judgment takes on Mafia crime boss [Robert DeNiro’s character] as a client. We learn that DeNiro can’t control his emotions and starts to cry at odd moments.
There’s a scene when one of DeNiro’s henchmen comes to fetch Billy at a very inconvenient moment and Billy balks on him, saying “What, you think you can call me any time day or night?” The gofer let’s Billy know he’s part of the family now and “when the boss needs you, you come.” It so happened that the boss was on the verge of having another nervous breakdown. When Billy starts to protest again, the gopher cuts him off and says, “It is what it is.” Funny line. So it’s Billy to the rescue.
The thrust of this message will be to analyze some of difficult areas in the Bible that often confuse people. Some folk love to be confused. They wander around “in the misty moonlight” as it were, always hung up on some spiritual calculus. Some preachers will take a simple passage of scripture & so mystify it no one can understand what they’re talking about. I guess you could say that’s their “preaching style.” I bite my fingernails when I listen to these men.
As for me I’m just the opposite. I’m a simple kind of man so I like to take those things that seem shrouded in mystery and break them down, if possible making them easier to understand.
I’ve learned that when we find one of these areas that tend to confuse us, a good rule of the thumb is, take a deep breath, look at the problem or area of confusion and apply this rule –to borrow a phrase-“It is what it is." We might not like some of answers we get, still, it’s the Word of God and - "it is what it is."
Some people think that all sin can be forgiven. There’s a problem with that if we parse the Word of God in total honesty. So lets analyze; -SINS THAT ARE FORGIVEN -AND SINS THAT CAN’T BE FORGIVEN.
In Matthew 12:31 Jesus said--…every sin & blasphemy will be forgiven man but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.
The first part of that verse is certainly good news is it not? God is willing to forgive all sin and even some blasphemies. What a wonderful promise that is.
Recently a mother placed her small baby in a microwave oven & killed It. “That’s unforgivable,” we might say, but God would say, “No. If she’ll humble herself & ask for pardon, I’ll forgive freely.”
A mother in South Carolina placed her three children in a car & rolled the car into a lake drowning them all. Some might say, “That’s unthinkable. Anyone who’d do that deserves no mercy.” But God would say, “My grace is sufficient for that woman. If she’ll repent, I’ll forgive her.”
A doctor in England a few years ago threw acid in the eyes of his wife because she cheated on him. He slashed her face with a knife telling her, “No man will ever look at you again.” We might think that sin beyond mercy but God would find it totally forgivable.
Though O.J Simpson was found innocent, many people still believe he practically decapitated his wife & another man. We might look at that sin & have no feelings of sympathy for O.J, but God would forgive him if he’d killed a dozen people; if he confessed & asked forgiveness.
There are people who’ll kidnap a pregnant woman, slash open her belly & steal her baby leaving her to die. There are also people who will drug their victim, place them in a bathtub filled with ice & when the person wakes up they find the tub filled with bloody water & realize one of their kidneys was stolen.
God sees all these sins as horrible & certainly expects individuals to pay for their crimes according to the laws of man. However, in the spiritual sense –All manner of sin & blasphemy shall be forgiven unto man…..
BUT THERE'S NO FORGIVENESS FOR BLASPHEMING THE HOLY SPIRIT
In the second part of Matthew 12:31 Jesus says--… but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.
In Matthew 12:22-24 the Scribes & Pharisees were attributing the work of the Holy Spirit to Satan. Then they brought Him a demon possessed man who was blind & mute & Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk & see. All the people were astonished & said, could this be the Son of David? But when the Pharisees heard this they said, it is only by Beelzebub, the prince of demons that this fellow drives out demons.
The Pharisees attributed the works of Jesus to the devil himself. The sin was committed in full view of a demonstration of God’s power. Luke 4:18 says that Jesus went forth in the power of the Holy Spirit. Consequently the rejection of Jesus by the scribes & Pharisees constituted a rejection of the Holy Spirit’s witness of Jesus as the Messiah.
It was for this reason that Jesus said,--all sin & blasphemy shall be forgiven but the blasphemy against the Holy Spirit shall not be forgiven men…whosoever speaks against the Holy Spirit it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come.
If the question of blaspheming the Holy Spirit has ever personally troubled you, here’s a little test;
# Do you know when you do wrong?
# Do you feel conviction after committing a sin?
# Do you feel sorry over such an offense?
# Do you feel the Spirit drawing you to repentance?
# Do you have a desire to worship & serve the lord?
# Do you ever consider God?
Christians can sin, but they have a hard time doing it. If God has closed the books on a person & written them off, they would be hardhearted; they’d have turned against Jesus, reviled Him & become so depraved that they could gladly consign the works of Christ to Satan.
This sin cannot be committed accidentally & it’s unlikely a person who does it would feel bad about doing it. It really boils down to this; it’s not what God does or is going to do to a person, it’s what the person does to their self. They would much rather continue to slander God & His name than to repent. In so doing they have shut off the only way to grace—Jesus Christ & His Holy Spirit. In shutting Him off, they shut off His conviction, drawing power, and His work of nudging them to repentance. Next,
TAKING THE MARK OF THE BEAST DURING THE GREAT TRIBULATION IS UNFORGIVABLE.
Revelation 13:16-18 notes, He also forced everyone small & great rich & poor free & slave to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead so that no-one could buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name. This calls for wisdom. If anyone has insight, let him calculate the number of the beast, for it is man’s number. His number is 666.
Revelation 14:9-11 says,--If anyone worships the beast & his image & receives his mark on the forehead or on the hand he too will drink of the wine of God’s fury which will be poured full strength into the cup of His wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels & of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment rises for ever & ever. There is no rest day or night for those who worship the beast & his image or for anyone who receives the mark of his name.
Revival will flourish during The Great Tribulation & many will be saved, but they will have to seal their testimony with their blood. People will be told to worship the beast & if they don’t comply they’ll be beheaded. As the verses above tell us, there’s no forgiveness for anyone who takes the mark of the beast.
Exodus 20:3-5 tells us,--You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to worship them…..
People won’t be able to buy or sell during the tribulation without the mark of the beast - 666. There’s no good news to talk about during this time because without the mark there will be no food, no shelter, no medical care etc. Worse, if the mark is taken, the individual will face the eternal judgment of an angry God.
Salvation will still be available but only through martyrdom. Next;
NO FORGIVENESS FOR UNBELIEF
In a Christian’s life there are times when our faith grows weak. James tells us that if we have wavering faith—“Let not that man think he shall receive anything from God.-James 1:7
A Christian who has saving faith, from time to time can experience wavering faith. This isn’t good but it does happen. But when it comes to salvation, -- to believe on The Lord Jesus Christ is the only basis for salvation. Christ didn’t die for the sin of unbelief nor is it covered in the atonement.
Listen to 1 John 5:10—He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God- hath made Him a liar; because he believeth not in the record that God gave of His Son.
John 3:36 says……he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.
Roman 10:9 says……if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus Christ and shalt believe in thine heart that God has raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Listen to Jesus in John 16:8-9….And when He has come He will reprove the world of sin & righteousness & of judgment. Of sin, because they believe not on me……Here we have the words of Jesus saying unbelief is sin.
Hebrews 2: 12 says---Take heed brethren lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God.
God won’t override unbelief & save an individual on “credit.” Unbelief must be flipped & turned to belief in order for a person to be saved. “Little faith” would still be enough to allow the person to call on the name of the Lord, but unbelief would never do it, so there is no path to salvation for the person who through unbelief refuses to make that call.—Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. John 3:16
There is no provision made for one who doesn’t call on the Lord during their lifetime, & death, without receiving Christ is irrevocable doom.
THE SIN OF APOSTASY IS NOT FORGIVEN
Following is what I believe to be one of the clearest descriptions found in the New Testament of what it means to be a Christian, --but ironically it’s wrapped in a serious warning. Hebrews 6:4-6 says;
It is impossible for-- those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, Who have tasted the goodness of the word of God & the powers of the coming age,-- if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again & subjecting Him to public disgrace.
In that passage there are five distinct expressions which elsewhere in the Bible are used to describe TRUE BELIEVERS…..The person has;
# “Been enlightened”—[This indicates they have received the truth of God’s Word in their lives.] # “Tasted the heavenly gift” [often a reference to receiving the free gift of eternal life.]
# have shared in the Holy Spirit—[who except Christians shares in the Holy Spirit?]
# have tasted the goodness of the word of God
# & the powers of the coming age-- [Sinners aren’t spoken of here. These are blessings associated with salvation, & the resurrection.]
The writer bends over backward to show that the folk he’s referring to are born-again Christians. And yet these people fall away & lose out with God to such an extent that --it is impossible for them to be brought back to repentance. That puts some “pepper in the gumbo” does it not? This is a very troubling passage.
Most of us know of individuals who for one reason or another have left the faith. They may not have actually denied the faith, but are certainly not practicing the faith.
Is this another incidence of a situation where people cannot be returned to repentance? Can a person have shared the Holy Spirit & then be lost? Are these good folk really lost? Is this really a description of a former saved person? Why can’t they find Christ once again? Why are they hopelessly lost eternally?
ANSWER; -- THESE PEOPLE COMMIT A SIN KNOWN AS APOSTASY—THEY ARE THEREFORE APOSTATES!
We know this is true because-They are crucifying the Son of God all over again & subjecting him to public disgrace.
They once confessed that Jesus was Lord & Messiah & that the crucifixion was unjust. Now in rejecting the faith their actions testify that the crucifixion was correct after all-Jesus was a blasphemer & not Messiah. If they had been there two thousand years ago they too would have cried, -Crucify Him, crucify Him. Such a witness exposes Jesus to public disgrace.
One of the sins of the end time is the sin of apostasy; people rejecting the true faith of Jesus Christ & embracing error.
1 Timothy 4:1 says, But the spirit explicitly says that in the later times some will fall away from the faith… A person can’t fall away from the faith or depart from it if they were never in it.
70% to 80% of those who are in cults today were at one time a part of classical Christianity. Nonetheless they fell into grave error & ultimately rejected the faith that they once held dear.
DELIBERATE SIN IS UNFORGIVABLE
Hebrews 10:26-30 [Living Bible]—If anyone sins deliberately by rejecting the Savior after knowing the truth of forgiveness, this is not covered by Christ’s death; there is no way to get rid of it. There will be nothing to look forward to but the terrible punishment of God’s awful anger, which will consume all His enemies. A man who refuses to obey the laws given by Moses was killed without mercy if there were two or three witnesses to his sin. Think how much more terrible the punishment will be for those who have trampled underfoot the Son of God & treated His cleansing blood as though it were common & unhallowed & insulted & outraged the Holy Spirit who brings God’s mercy to His people. For we know Him who said,--Justice belongs to me; I will repay them; who also said,--the lord Himself will handle these cases.
Verse 26 now from the NIV, --If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left…
If we’re completely honest we will all have to admit that none of us is perfect & have committed sin. It may not be a frequent or flagrant sin, but none of us has lived a perfect life, or Jesus wouldn’t have had to die on the cross.
We all do things, maybe we didn’t set out to do them, but we end up in some deed or activity we know is wrong yet we go against our conscience & do it anyway. We get angry, blow our cool, lie to get out of a jam, we speed, this kind of stuff. Now which kind of sin is the verse above talking about? Is it the accidental & unknowing sins or the other kind, the deliberate sins?
I believe the passage speaks of deliberate sin; sin people choose-- sin that is willful & premeditated, --sin that the individual knows is sin in the eyes of God when they commit it. It is a state of willful, known sin that a person embraces with no thought of giving it up. This is the sin spoken of in Hebrews 6:4-6 where apostates –trample underfoot the Son of God. They have also treated the blood covenant as something common &--insulted the spirit of grace.
These folk had known Christ as their personal savior & had-received the knowledge of the truth. For such people there is no forgiveness, no remaining sacrifice for sin. What remains is the judgment of God.
DOES THE NAME SAM KINISON RING A BELL?
Sam serves as a vivid illustration of an apostate. Sam was born in 1953 in Yakima Washington & became one of the loudest & rudest comedians of the 20th century. Sam grew up in Peoria, Illinois & he & his brothers followed in their father’s footsteps by touring the Bible Belt as evangelists.
Sam became one of the great stand-up comedians of the 1980’s & later his life became the classic image of drugs, sex & rock-n-roll. Hard-partying & hard-drinking became a major part of his act.
Here are a few “Kinisonisms” as they are called.
# I used to be a preacher & people think I changed overnight. I didn’t. It wasn’t like I woke up one morning & said, “Hey, forget the Bible, where’s the party?” It was a little more gradual than that. It took a lot of women to disillusion me.”
# People are going, -- hey aren’t you afraid to tell jokes like that? Don’t you get a small chill that runs through your blood when you tell a joke like that? Aren’t you afraid of going to hell? No, I’m not worried about hell. Because I WAS MARRIED FOR TWO YEARS! HELL WOULD BE LIKE CLUB MED!”
# I’ve lived a carnal life. My view of life is “If you’re going to miss heaven, why miss it by two inches? Miss it! I don’t have to go through the thing of paying for it in the next world. I know I’m—in the next life.”
On April 10th, 1992, on the way to a sold-out gig in Laughlin, Nevada, Sam’s Pontiac Trans-Am was struck head-on by a pick-up truck driven by a 17-year old driver. Sam who wasn’t wearing a seat belt died on the scene. A 27 year old female riding with him was knocked unconscious but suffered only minor injuries.
I’ve heard through several sources that Sam, while he was lying on the side of the road dying, was having a conversation with someone not visible to anyone but him. He was resisting death & making it clear to whoever he spoke to that he just couldn’t go. But finally he gave up & said, “Oh, well, yes I guess I’ll just have to go.”
There’s a photo going around of Sam & a group of women making mockery of the Lord’s Last Supper. I’ve heard it also hangs on the wall of a bar/restaurant owned by Sam’s brother Bill. Bill used to preach with Sam & is committed to keeping his memory alive.
I’ve read that Sam’s gravestone reads; - “In another time & place he would have been called a prophet.”
Could a person like Sam find Christ? Theoretically yes, if he would truly turn to the Lord. But Sam was an apostate & he wouldn’t turn to the Lord. He had;
# “been enlightened”
# tasted the heavenly gift”
# “had shared in the Holy Spirit”
# “Tasted the goodness of the word of God”
# “& the powers of the coming age.”
Sadly, none of that was good enough for Sam. He wanted more. He wanted booze, women, & song. He wanted fame & fortune. He wanted to worship another God besides the One True God—he wanted to worship the god of self.
Years ago a pastor friend told me the story of a small church that was praying for a young unsaved man in his mid-twenties. He had a wife & three children. The man worked with a group of other men on a construction job.
Revival came to the church & one night the young construction worker committed his life to the Lord.
Word of the man’s conversion reached the other men where he worked & the next day they mocked & made fun of him. At mid-morning they came around & said, “Hey, “preacher,” We heard you got religion last night.” At two o’clock they came around again to chide him saying, “Preacher,” we heard you got religion last night- Are you a holy-roller now?” At four o’clock there was more mockery of the young man, with his fellow workers putting all the pressure on him they could.
As the work day was ending the newly saved young man asked a friend for a piece of chewing tobacco. Then, in plain hearing of his buddies, this young man spit out tobacco & loudly said,--“There’s no more to God, Jesus Christ, or the Holy Spirit than there is to that tobacco I spit on the ground.”
The workers saw they’d really gotten to the young guy & they all laughed & left the construction site to go home. The young man got in his truck & drove around for a while, finally pulling up in front of his house.
He got his double-barrel shotgun off the rack of his truck, got some shells, walked into his home & shot dead his wife & three children & then killed himself.
Few people really knew the back story of this terrible tragedy. My minister friend said, “John, when he spat on the ground & uttered those words of blasphemy, he opened the door to a demonic invasion into his life & it was tragically fatal for him & his precious family.”
Listen to 2 Peter 2:20-22 regarding the terrible fate that awaits unfaithful, backsliding Christians;
If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ & are AGAIN ENTANGLED IN IT & overcome, they are WORSE OFF AT THE END than they were at the beginning.
IT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER FOR THEM NOT TO HAVE KNOWN THE WAY of righteousness, than to have known it & then turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them.
But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, the dog is turned to his vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.
Pretty well spells it out, doesn’t it?
Blessings,
John
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