Proclaiming the Gospel

         Recent events have left a great many people filled with disgust, fear, anxiety and a host of other emotions. I could be writing this on any given number of dates due to recent actions taken by a group of people. I could be writing on December 8, 1941 or I could be writing on September 12, 2001. I could be writing after the first atomic bomb was detonated over a city filled with people. I cold be writing after the sinking of the Titanic. In other words, history is filled with instances of vile deeds that leave us wondering what is going on. One of the local pastors has mentioned that the Gospel is not being preached in our area or in our land or for that matter, not in the world. Oh, we go to church and we have rituals that we follow, but there seems to be a lack of the preaching of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. We are left with a feeling that things need to be changed and everyone has their own idea of how to do it. There probably are about 7 billion different solutions, perhaps an exaggeration of the number, but everyone seems to have their own idea as to how to fix the problem. First Corinthians 15:1-2 says, “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.” 

         The Apostle Paul had the answer back 2,000 years ago as we see here in the letter to the church at Corinth. The Pastor was right when he said that the Gospel is not being preached. This means that a large part of the problem exists because of what is going on in the pulpits of churches around the world. Rituals, traditions, robes, gold, silver, music, incense and repetitive mantras aren't going to change the world but the Gospel will. Even if you are liberal in your counting of Christians around the world, there as still only one third of all the people are believers today That leaves about two thirds of 7.6 billion people who are not believers. Now how on earth are we going to convert that many people in order to eradicate the problems of society. The Apostle did it by speaking to one person at at time for the most part. The church at Thessalonica was begun with the conversion of a woman praying down by the riverside and next a young girl that had been possessed with a demon, and then the jailer at the broken down prison. When I came to this city, there were 144 Baptist churches, around 80 Methodist churches and about 40 Presbyterian churches. There are also about 300,000 people in this valley, many of which go to church but do not hear the gospel message. If there is any doubt as to what that message is, Paul went on to further define the “Gospel” in verses three and four. No one can wave a magic wand and instantly change the lives of 7.6 billion people but you can begin by changing the life on one. That one might be next door or around the corner from where you live. It might be the person who waited on you at a restaurant or the person who took your money at the cleaners or the grocery store. We may want to ask ourselves if we are part of the problem or are we part of the solution. Once a person believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, then comes the time of growth. When will any one of us master Philippians 4:8? When will we be able to love God with all of our hearts and all of our minds? While we may be feeling so inadequate to do the job, we can still begin with our own hearts from where every you and I are in our spiritual walk with God. Then, we can go out with instruction of 1 Peter 3:15, being ready to give an answer for the faith that we have in God and we can share the Gospel as did the Apostles in the primitive church that turned the world upside down in their day. The answer seems too simple but it is still the answer. Only God can change hearts and believe it or not, He has chosen you and me to help do the job of spreading the message of the Gospel to others.   

The Hiding Place

         My sister once told me that what she really wanted in life was to have a small home in Elkins, West Virginia, a cup of hot chocolate and an Irish Setter, all sitting in front of a fireplace on a snowy winter evening. She never came close to achieving any of those things as she eventually passed away in a nursing facility in Peoria, Illinois. We may all have some picture in our minds of our “secret place” or that place where we could find peace and rest in the midst of a busy world that is plagued with war, famine and pestilence. If you were born in Aleppo, Syria, you probably don't even have a chair to sit on. I have mentioned before that when I was young, my secret hiding place was in the center of a very large Lilac bush on our property. In the summer time with all of its leaves, no one could see me inside of the bush. Years later, the bush gave way to just being able to travel home and to relax with the aroma of home cooked beef with Mom's home made noodles. Rest may stir up any number of pictures in your mind. It may be some place in your past, or a special retreat spot, or going home or even in a coffee shop in the middle of the city. Matthew 11:28-29 says, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

          The people in the time of the New Testament when Christ walked upon the earth were also seeking for a place to rest. The zealots wanted to get rid of any oppressor nation that was over them which at that time was the Roman government. The tax collectors were always bickering with the people about the taxes and so it was not so different than today's world. Then, along comes the Lord Jesus Christ with the most amazing offer. He offered rest to those who were always working and who were under heavy burden day in and day out. Christ offered them rest for their souls and who wouldn't want rest? We are here in the year 2020, which equates to 2,020 years since Christ took on flesh and headed to the cross of Calvary. We open the Word of God and read about the same offer as we see it in Matthew, chapter eleven. The offer is still open to each and every person regardless of their education, station in life, color of their skin or political position, or even where they were born. Many have heard it before but fail to believe in it because it just seems to simple to be true, but it is. You probably have read about it hundreds of times in your lifetime and you may have heard it preached on many times in your church or on the radio or at a tent meeting, or just wherever you might have been. Some talk about their secret closet, or their hiding place or their comfort station. We had a cat for a time that when danger came, she would run into my bedroom and crawl literally under the covers and would not come out until the danger had passed. Well, we can do that but it is not a physical blanket or a cabin in the West Virginia mountains, or sitting on the beach with the sound of the surf but it is safe in the arms of Jesus. He said, He will give us rest. What can be better than that? Praise God today for the safety He provides in our daily storms of life.

Truth

        I attended a course at a hotel once that was conducted by a leading seminary that did a lot of correspondence classes. In the opening remarks, an illustration was given on the importance of correctly interpreting the Scriptures. It started out with a series of statements based on a particular translation of the Bible, using words and phrases from that translation which were all perfectly right and good. In the end, the statement was made that “according to this study, there were deep sea divers present in the Bible. By using phrases that included the words “sea” and “divers” they came to the erroneous conclusion that there were deep sea divers mentioned in the Scriptures. The exercise was given to show how some people can come to wrong conclusions about something or how one can twist definitions and phrases to come up with wrong conclusions. John 1:14 says, “ And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.”

        The Bible has much to say about “truth.” It is mentioned some 237 times in the Bible. One can take a series of true statements and still come up with a false result such as in the case of deep sea divers in the Bible. We are certainly living in an age where it is difficult to come up with the truth when a person speaks to you. Interviews of famous people who are skilled at saying a lot of words are great examples of ending up saying nothing or coming up with a lie rather than the truth. Some people feel that if you say one thing long enough and often enough, people will begin believing it. The question must come up at one point or another if the statement is true. Since there is only One Person Who ever said statements that were true, it must be measured by that Person. The opening chapter of John describes that Person and He is the Lord Jesus Christ. Webster's 1828 dictionary defines truth as “Conformity to fact or reality; exact accordance with that which is, or has been, or shall be. The truth of history constitutes its whole value. We rely on the truth of the scriptural prophecies.” When you begin to look at the world's definition of truth your mind almost seems to be clouded with so many different views as to what the truth actually is. When we look at today's passage, we see that the Lord Jesus Christ is full of “grace and truth.” In a world of changing ethics and definition one must establish how they are going to find what is actually true and what is not true. I recall one old phrase that went, “God said it, I believe it, and that settles it.” If you are bothered about the truth of any given matter, just run it through the filter of God's Word. If it doesn't match up with the Scripture, discard it. Praise God today that we can determine what is true and what is false by comparing it to His Word.

Precise Details

            I dabbled in painting in one period of my life. This was not the paining of rooms in a house but actually on a piece of canvas with either oil colors or acrylics. I would be classed somewhere as a primitive painter or perhaps even “crude” as there was not a lot of detail in the painting. A round green ball with a brown stem would be a tree. Smaller balls of different colors would turn out to be flowers of some unidentified type. One of our grandchildren painted a picture which is the home screen for my computer. It is a tree at the beach. The detail in the sky and the tree or so precise, it looks like a photograph. The tree has hundreds of leaves on it and they are all the right size and full of detail. At one point, there is a yellow leaf as you might find in a real living tree. The horizon is straight, the water looks like the ocean and the sky is just as you would see it on a day looking off the shore of the Atlantic Ocean. I guess I could say that he is a stickler for detail. It is important to have detail in some areas to give the viewer or the reader a picture of what is to come. One could say that God is a stickler for detail. Revelation 21:15-16 says, “And he that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof. And the city lieth foursquare, and the length is as large as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs. The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal.”

       When God gives instructions they contain a lot of detail such as when Moses got the instructions on how to build the tabernacle. Every board and socket were described along with the exact type of material that was to be used in the process of construction. The Book of Revelation is a book of detail as far as our final destination is concerned. The Apostle John received the words that described many pictures that are completely new to us. The above passage gives us a glimpse of the New Jerusalem. The size is greater than we could ever imagine in our own minds. A modern day comparison would make each side, 12,000 furlongs, or 1500 miles long. That is roughly the distance from New York City to Daytona, Florida. That's just one side and then it goes that far on each of the other sides as well as the height. Yes, God is a stickler for detail and He has given us a picture of what is to come and goes on further to describe just who is going to be there with Him. Revelation 21:27 ends with the words that describe the inhabitants, “...they which are written in the Lamb's book of life.” The final question for us is whether or not our names are written in the Lamb's book of life. Have you believed on Him as your Lord and Savior? Praise God today for what in store for believers in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Perfectionist

         I am not a perfectionist. I am not even close to being a perfectionist. As a kid, I used to make model airplanes out of wooden kits. The rough shape was there but needed a lot of sanding. I hated sanding so went to step two and three which were gluing and painting. The trailing edge of the wings was almost a quarter inch thick and the fuselage was rough with splinters of balsa hanging from them. I like to take shortcuts on things that needed to be done in order to get to the things I wanted to do. I don't like to be sloppy but if a thread is hanging here or there, it really doesn't bother me that much. You see, I'm not a perfectionist. The loose thread bothers my wife and probably others who see it and who desire to attack me with a pair of scissors to remove the “Irish Pennant” (a term I learned while in boot camp.” I can get along in life okay in most things except one area and that is connected to the Great Perfectionist” God Himself. James 2:10 says, “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.”

        Most people must not be perfectionists either because they seem to say, “I hope the good outweighs the bad and I get into heaven based on that assumption. People seem to know that God doesn't like sin and they know they do bad things, or sins, but hope that the good things will be more than the bad things on a scale and you end up in heaven. Unfortunately, the Bible doesn't say that. God's hatred of sin comes right down to “one sin.” If you do just one sin, and it doesn't matter which sin it is, you are guilty of the whole punishment. The one sin then makes you reap the consequences of the whole law. Even if you lived the life of “goody two shoes” but committed only one act of disobedience towards God, you would be declared “guilty.” You see, God is a Perfectionist. God knew that we would have trouble getting into heaven so He provided a Savior for us to make it possible for us to enter Glory and receive all of the benefits even if it was for only one sin or a hundred sins committed an hour for the past 100 years. You see, there are sins of commission, the things that you do that are wrong and the the sins of omission, the sins for things you should have been doing but failed to do. There are probably must as many or maybe even more sins of omission than there are sins of commission. Either way, you are a goner because of the fact of just even one sin in your life and we all know that isn't the case. We desperately needed to have a Savior and God gave us One in the Lord Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son. John 3:16 tells us that. You may be what you think is a perfectionist when it comes to your life here on earth with not a single hair out of place and perfectly matched outfits from head to toe but you are still guilty of sin according to Romans 3:23. Someday, things will be perfect if you have trusted the Lord Jesus Christ to be your personal Savior. Praise God that only He can make us perfect.

The Passport

           I was born in Michigan City, Indiana and the first name of the doctor that delivered me that day was, “Daniel.” That is where I got my first name. I was named after Dr. Daniel Bernoski. Throughout the rest of my life I was known by a small number of people. One day, we decided to leave the country and spend some time in missionary work and I needed to get a passport. The passport was going to be the proof that I was an American, a member of the United States of America. My wife, myself and our son all got our passports and made sure that we had them in a safe place. They would be stamped when we reached Madrid, Spain and would show that we had entered that country on such and such a date and time. We then went to the American embassy in Madrid to register as citizens of the U. S. A. I began speaking to the official in my broken Spanish and he looked at me and said, “You can speak English here.” They were from the same country. We always kept trace of our passports as it was the proof that we needed to get back to where we came from. Philippians 3:20 says, “For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ:”

       The word “conversation” here is quite often defined as “citizenship.” The word that is used in this verse is the only reference in the entire New Testament. It is unique in that sense. It shows were our homeland is. While I had a passport for the U. S. A., I don't need one for heaven because God still knows who I am. Only a few people knew me when I boarded the plane for Europe and only they could vouch for my identity and homeland. So, I needed to have a passport. Now, I am a citizen of a different place and I don't need a paper passport with stamps and signatures because God is able to remember all those who are His. If we needed to have something to identify us we can look at the fact that we have been sealed with the Holy Spirit and God knows each and every one who are citizens of heaven. I still possess the paper copy of the little booklet known as my “passport” with its official seal on the cover and the words, “United States of America.” It has expired but I still keep it in my top drawer of keepsakes from my past. There is no expiration date on my passport for heaven as the names all appear in the Lamb's Book of Life. Yes, we have dual citizenship at this point in our lives. Paul went on to say to the Corinthians that we are presently “ambassador's for Christ.” An ambassador represents his king wherever he goes and we are representatives of the Lord Jesus Christ wherever we go. What a privilege we have. How are you doing in your position as ambassadors for the Lord Jesus Christ where you live? Praise God today for the responsibility that he has given to each and every believer.

Serous or not so Serous?

         “Okay, I am serious now!” Such would be the words of some of the people that I have met in my life who were constantly joking about things in life. They are always ready with a pun or making fun of something even to the point of being crude or vulgar. All of a sudden, they desire to say something that is important and no one listens to them because they don't know if they are really serious or not. So, the speaker has to enlighten his or her audience by saying, “Now, I am serious.” If Bob Hope says, “The end is coming,” you stand there waiting for the punch line. If the Apostle Paul says, “the end is coming,” you tend to get ready for it. Ephesians 5:4 says, “Neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor jesting, which are not convenient: but rather giving of thanks.”

        My wife often reminds me that my “dry humor” is simply due to the fact that I am a “Hoosier,” that is, from the state of Indiana. I may have ended up being more known for my dry humor than my seriousness. Once you make a person laugh, you tend to keep on doing it. People often end up making verbal caricatures of people which can turn very quickly to something vulgar and quickly goes from poking fun at someone to really being hurtful. Don Rickles was known for tearing down someone else or as someone has said, his insult comedy. This type of speaking however, is frowned upon by God. It has no favorable purpose. Paul gave us a lot of teaching especially in the final three chapters of the Book of Ephesians and one of the lessons is how we talk. I am often reminded of what I call the “Praise Sandwich.” It begins with a praise of how good you are, then shifts to “you really are a mess in this area,” and then finishes with another “praise.” You may have had a number of them yourself during your own days in the church or even at work. The teaching of the Apostle Paul in this section doesn't stop with the vulgar or jesting speech but then goes on to give us instruction on what to do. He states, “...but giving of thanks.” My Father often remarked, “If you can't say something good about a person, don't say anything at all.” Of course, we can say something good and that involves giving thanks for the person with whom we are speaking. Let's face it, if you have to preface your statement with, “Now, I am serious,” you are in trouble. It is better for us to learn the lesson of Ephesians 5:4 in the beginning and not be known as a “jester” or a vulgar person. Praise God for His Word and the application of it into our lives.