A People for His Name

A Parable Concerning Comissioned Messengers

March 27, 2011

During a war, a large group of soldiers under a lieutenant goes AWOL. All those soldiers who went AWOL are captured by the enemy and put in a concentration camp with no contact of any kind with the outside world. Many months go by. The king of the country whose soldiers were captured promotes that lieutenant to second in authority over his whole country and devises a plan for rescuing the captured soldiers. He gives the former lieutenant all authority to deal with any of the soldiers that he ends up rescuing.

The former lieutenant gathers some leaders of several rescue squads to go carry out the king’s plan. He gives the leaders specific instructions orally about what to do and what to say in carrying out their mission. The instructions include statements w and x, which include the terms of pardon, and statement y, which is essential information about how to access that pardon and how to make it safely out of the enemy country. He also instructs them to declare statement z to the captive soldiers, which consists of telling them that the king has promoted him to be the head over the whole country.

The leaders of the rescue squads give each of their squad members a written copy of the instructions. The rescue squads go on their mission and discover that the enemy has dispersed the captive soldiers to numerous locations. The leaders are only able to accompany a few of their squad members in carrying out the mission. Most of the rescuers in most of the squads discover that the mission will be much harder than they were expecting. In carrying out the rescue operation, the leaders and the squad members who are with them declare all the statements that they were commissioned to proclaim. All the leaders and the squad members who are with the leaders are killed while carrying out the mission.

Of the squad members who were separated from their squad leaders, some rescuers tell some of the soldiers in a few of the locations w, x, y, and z. Most of them do not tell any of the captives about z. Some do not do so because they were separated from their leaders and wonder exactly what the leaders may have ended up doing. Some do not do so because they simply forget to do so in the heat of the moment. Many do not do so because they never read the written instructions thoroughly. Others, while reading that they were supposed to say z, do not do so because they reason that it is not essential for the rescue of the captives.

Amazingly, some of the captives refuse the terms of rescue completely. Some refuse when they hear statement z, not believing that the former lieutenant is sincere in promising that he will not hold them accountable now that he is the head over all the country. Many of the captives are rescued, including many who did not hear statement z from rescuers who had been separated from their squad leaders.

When they are taken before the king and the lieutenant, what will be the evaluation of those in the rescue squads who did not proclaim statement z? Yes, many of the recipients of the truncated message were still rescued, even though they did not hear z. Was their head, however, given the honor in the mission that he was supposed to have received? If he was not honored as fully as he intended, will he hold them accountable for his not having received the full honor that he wanted to receive through the proclamation of all the statements, including statement z?

“And He commanded us to preach unto the people, and to testify that it is He which was ordained of God to be the Judge of the quick and the dead. To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins” (Acts 10:42-43).

In Discipleship, Evangelism, Parables

"Convenient Food"

March 26, 2011

In his chapter, “Convenient Food,” William Arnot’s comments on Proverbs 23:1-3 about what to do when dining with a ruler challenge us all about an issue that we all need repeated reminders. Although the verses that he comments on pertain directly to that specific situation, the principles apply to all our eating and drinking:

It is of the Lord that hunger is painful, and food gives pleasure; between these two lines of defence the Creator has placed life, with a view to its preservation. If eating had been as painful as it is pleasant to our nature, the disagreeable duty would have been frequently forgotten or neglected, and the world, if peopled at all, would have been peopled by tribes of walking skeletons. The arrangement which provides that the necessary reception of aliment into the system gives pleasure to the senses, is wise and good; it is an ungrateful return for our Maker’s kindness when the creature turns his bounty into licentiousness. The due sustenance of the body is the Creator’s end; the pleasantness of food the means of attaining it. When men prosecute and cultivate that pleasure as an end, they thwart the very purposes of providence. When the pleasure is pursued as an object, it ceases to serve effectually as a means of healthfully maintaining the living frame.
When the appetite is strong, and the food enticing, the danger of sinning and suffering is great,—greater than most of us care to observe, and acknowledge to ourselves. The warning here is strongly expressed, and all its strength is needed. “Put a knife to thy throat,” is in form similar to the injunctions of the Great Teacher, to pluck out the offending right eye, and cut off the offending right hand. “Be not desirous of his dainties, for they are deceitful meat.” They are of a set purpose made deceitful: they are prepared by an artist of skill, whose whole life is devoted to the study. Resisting virtue in the guests must be strong indeed, for the temptation is as powerful as wealth and experience can make it (Studies in Proverbs, 464-65).

In Discipleship, Quotes

A Parable about Evangelism

March 25, 2011

A man hears about a photography contest that has a huge grand prize. He plans to go to a famous resort area in a third world country to try to photograph something distinctive that would win the prize.

He goes for two weeks and has a great time for the first week. At the end of the first week, he hears some native staff members tell him not to stray too far from the resort area because of reports of an albino lion that many of the natives claim to have seen in the area.

One evening, thinking of the grand prize, he wanders off into the wilderness to see if he can get a picture of the lion. While he is wandering around, suddenly he hears a roar from behind him and is knocked to the ground with such force that he is stunned and becomes semi-conscious.

Meanwhile, some members of the hotel staff who are searching for him come upon the scene with one of them carrying a high-powered flamethrower that could easily drive the lion away. Incredibly, while the lion begins to choke him, the staff members stand a safe distance away and berate him. They yell at him and say that they warned him not to wander off. Instead of using the flamethrower to rescue him, they chide him while the lion continues in its vicious attack.

If this scene were really to have happened, what would we think of the staff members? Yes, the vacationer was foolish and greedily did what he was not supposed to do. Still, how could the staff members do what they did, focusing on his foolishness instead of rescuing him from the lion?

Every lost person is like the foolish vacationer who greedily wandered off and was being devoured by the lion:

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour (1 Pet. 5:8; spoken to believers and shows the vicious nature of the devil; if he is this way towards believers, it surely implies that he is the same towards unbelievers).

But if our gospel be hid, it is hid from them that are lost: in whom the god of this world has blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ should shine unto them (2 Cor. 4:3-4).

To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in Me (Acts 26:18).

In our dealings with lost people, we must not have a mindset or approach that in any way parallels the staff members above. People who are lost are lost in part because they are helplessly in the grip of an evil supernatural being for whom they are no match, as is pictured in the case of the “woman which had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bowed together, and could in no wise lift up herself . . . whom Satan hath bound . . . eighteen years” (Lk. 13:11, 16).

If we think that we are any better than lost people are and are saved because of something in ourselves, we are wrong. God’s mercy is the only reason that we have been delivered from the lion who wants to devour as many souls as possible:

And you hath He quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins: wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. But God, who is rich in mercy . . . hath quickened us (Eph. 2:1-5).

Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son (Col. 1:13).

As the children are partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same; that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage (Heb. 2:14-15).

We know that whosever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one touched him not. And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness. And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding that we may know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life (1 John 5:18-19).

In our dealings with lost people, we should have a right mindset and approach towards them and their horrific plight. We must not strive with them:

And the servant of the Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient, in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth; and that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will (2 Tim. 2:24-26).

In Discipleship, Evangelism, Parables

"The Attributes of God"

March 24, 2011

In his book The Attributes of God: A Journey into the Father’s Heart, A. W. Tozer writes,

A great old theologian once said, “Don’t reject a fact because you don’t know a method.” Don’t say it isn’t so because you don’t know how it’s so. There is much you can’t explain. If you come to me and ask the how of things, I’ll ask you twenty-five questions, one after the other, about yourself—your body, your mind, your hair, your skin, your eyes, your ears. You won’t be able to answer one question. Yet you use all those things even though you don’t understand them. I don’t know how God can suffer. That is a mystery I may never know.
A lot of hymn writers who should have been cutting the grass at the time have written songs instead. One of them says this: “I wonder why, I wonder why He loved me so. I will love and pray that I might know why He loved me so.” You will never know that. There is only one answer to why God loved you: because God is love. And there is only one answer to why God has mercy on you: because God is mercy, and mercy is an attribute of the Deity. Don’t ask God why, but thank Him for the vast wondrous how and fact of it.

As little children, we should receive all that God tells us, whether we can explain it or not. Not being able to understand how something that God says can be so is no reason to doubt, question, or reject what He says. Failure to obey God because we cannot explain why He wants us to do something will keep us from the fullness of His blessings in our lives.

In Discipleship, Quotes

A Parable about Music

March 23, 2011

A team of archaeologists makes a stunning discovery. While excavating a desolate site, they stumble upon a vast collection of documents that employs unfamiliar notation. The archaeologists reason that the collection must be of great importance because of the painstaking efforts that were taken to preserve it.

After months of secretive examination by leading scholars, the documents are finally deciphered as ancient music notation. A whirlwind of secretive activity ensues. A team of leading musicians from around the world is secretly chosen and collaborates for months to examine the documents.

Finally, all the documents are deciphered and analyzed fully. Upon rendering the music into modern notation and having it played by the world-class musicians in the team, everyone is stunned by the extraordinary beauty, majesty, and grandeur of the music. Practicing for months, they prepare for an international debut for the music that all the major networks in leading countries agree to carry.

They choose to debut only the instrumental music that they discovered. The rest of the music is kept under very tight security.

The worldwide response to the music is phenomenal. Music experts everywhere deem the music to be among the finest music ever produced. Somehow, the source of the instrumental music remains a tightly guarded secret throughout the entire process.

Many leading Christian musicians who hear the music write beautiful lyrics to accompany selections from the collection. Numerous churches worldwide use the music in their worship services.

A year later, in an international press conference, the team who produced the music then makes known its identity. They reveal that this was the music used when Nebuchadnezzar demanded worldwide worship of his image. They then release the rest of the music, which is immediately enthusiastically received all over the world.

Having accepted the music enthusiastically and used it in worship, what do the Christians who did so do now upon learning of the origin of the music? Do they reason that the music itself is still fine to use, in spite of its original ancient use?

Does the fact that the music was specifically used originally for the worship of a man forever taint this instrumental music that was of phenomenal musical quality? If it were known whether the pieces of music in the collection were composed specifically for that occasion or not, would that change anything?

In CCM, Discipleship, Music, Parables Music, Parable

Apostolic Evangelistic Emphases

March 22, 2011

The biblical record of apostolic evangelism reveals key emphases in their evangelistic doctrine and practice. The following table reflects my current understanding about apostolic evangelism by presenting pairs of key truths concerning the content of their evangelistic message.

Apostolic Evangelism
Name of Jesus Christ	Kingdom of God the Father
deity of Jesus as the Christ	agency of Jesus as the Christ
Jesus as the God-sent Savior	Jesus as the God-appointed Judge
crucifixion	resurrection
faith	repentance
profession	baptism
forgiveness of sins	the gift of the Holy Spirit
salvation	judgment

At least in much of what I have observed in evangelism, heard preached in evangelism, and read about evangelism, the elements on the left have tended to be overemphasized. In some of these pairs, the disparity has been quite marked. The elements on the right, however, are vital as well and should not be neglected.

Whenever possible, our evangelism should emphasize fully what the apostles emphasized.

In Evangelism Evangelism

What Jesus Wants the World to Know Through Us

March 21, 2011

John 17 provides a marvelous record of Jesus’ praying to the Father. Jesus explicitly speaks six times of the Father’s sending Him (17:3, 8, 18, 21, 23, 25):

And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.

As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.

That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.

I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me.

O righteous Father, the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me.

He defines eternal life in terms that include knowing that He is the God-sent Christ (17:3). He speaks of His own disciples’ believing (17:8) and knowing (17:25) that the Father sent Him.

Concerning the world, He first parallels His sending His disciples into the world with the Father’s sending Him into the world (17:18). He then adds two explicit statements that make known His praying to the Father that the world would believe (17:21) and know (17:23) that the Father has sent Him and has loved them, as He has loved Jesus (17:23).

In these statements, Jesus teaches that it is through the unity of the believers in the Father and the Son that the world will believe and know that message. His greatest concern, however, is not the unity of the believers as an end in itself; that unity is for the higher purpose of a worldwide proper knowledge of His being sent by the Father and of the Father’s love for the world, even as He has loved Jesus.

Jesus’ prayer to the Father greatly highlights His agency as the God-sent One. For Jesus’ prayer to be answered fully as He desires, our doctrine and practice must make known to the world His agency.

In Interpretation Interpretation

Divine Mercy to Animals

March 20, 2011

The book of Jonah reveals the great mercy of God through its record about Jonah and God’s dealings with him because of his unwillingness to deliver His message to the wicked city of Nineveh. Jonah was unwilling to deliver God’s message because He knew the merciful character of God and did not want the Ninehevites to receive mercy (Jon. 4:1-3). By subjecting Jonah to great affliction, God finally brought him to willingness to deliver that message to them. After Jonah did so, God dealt with him about his ungodly lack of compassion.

In the final scene of the book, God rebukes Jonah for his displeasure at His sparing the Ninevehites. He first points out how Jonah had pity on a plant when it perished, even though he had not labored for it or made it to grow (4:9-10). In the final words of the book, He then rebukes him by saying, “And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?” (Jon. 4:11).

This great verse reveals the heart of God in a wonderful way. Through a rhetorical question that expects a positive answer, God made known that He should spare a vast multitude of people in that wicked city who in some manner did not know which hand was which. To me, this statement provides a basis for believing that babies, small children, and people who are severely mentally handicapped go to heaven when they die.

Interestingly, God does not stop with his statement about the people that He wanted to spare in Nineveh. His final words reveal that He held that He also should have spared the abundant cattle that were in the city.

Why did God inform Jonah of this fact? He apparently wanted to make known to Jonah (and to us) that His great mercy extended even to animals that would have perished.

Jonah’s message brought about the repentance of the Ninehevites (Lk. 11:32), a repentance that resulted in the sparing of many helpless people and animals. Christ has commissioned His people to proclaim repentance and remission of sins to all nations (Lk. 24:47). We know that He commissioned that message because God desires that no one would perish (2 Pet. 3:9). From what we know about God’s dealings with the Ninehevites, should we understand that Christ also intends that the proper reception by all nations of His commissioned message would be a means of providing divine mercy in some manner to many animals?

In Interpretation Interpretation

The Oldest and Most Persistent Doctrinal Denial

March 19, 2011

Derek Kidner’s comments on the first doctrinal denial bring out truth that all generations of believers must make continual efforts to keep before God’s people:

After the query, the flat contradiction: Ye shall not surely die (AV, RV). It is the serpent’s word against God’s, and the first doctrine to be denied is judgment. If modern denials of it are very differently motivated, they are equally at odds with revelation: Jesus fully affirmed the doctrine (e.g. Matt. 7:13-27). (Genesis in TOTC, 72-73)

Ever since physical death first occurred, denial of death altogether has no longer been possible. Denial of eternal death, however, abounds and will do so until the Lord finally destroys the evil supernatural source of all such denials of the doctrine of judgment.

The doctrine of eternal judgment is a foundational truth of the doctrine of Christ (Heb. 6:1-2). Countering the attacks on this foundational truth has been one of the reasons that Jesus has commanded the preaching and testifying to all that He is the One appointed by God as the Judge of the living and the dead (Acts 10:42; cf. Mk. 16:16). Proclaiming that message faithfully perpetuates the message that God Himself announced in His first declaration of judgment after the Fall of man:

And the Lord God said unto the serpent, ‘Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life: And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise His heel (Gen 3:14-15).

By obeying Acts 10:42, we imitate God in announcing to all what He has ordained will surely happen one day through the woman’s Seed. Doing so, we do our part in countering the oldest and most persistent doctrinal denial.

In Discipleship, Quotes

The Good News for All!

March 18, 2011

God has put a conscience in every man that condemns him when he sins. He knows our secrets and one day will judge them. Our hearts condemn us. We all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. He has weighed us in His balances and found us wanting. We all know that we are worthy of death, the wages of our sin.

Death is not some impersonal, automatic consequence of our sinfulness that mechanistically takes place in a godless universe. Death is the work of God as Judge. Physical death is the separation of the spirit from the body. The second death, eternal death in the lake of fire, awaits all who die in their sins because they refuse to repent and turn toward God, doing works fitting for repentance.

All our lifetimes, we fear death. Because it is appointed to man once to die, and then the judgment, we all are in desperate need of good news.

The good news is that God the Father anointed the man Jesus of Nazareth, who was also the Son of God, with the Holy Spirit and with power. As the Anointed One, the Christ, He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil; for God was with Him. He is the Christ who died for our sins, was buried, rose again on the third day, and was seen by many trustworthy witnesses.

Christ died and rose again so that He might be the Lord, the Judge who has authority over all who are dead and alive. Having been raised by the Father, He now sits in heaven at the right hand of the Father, who has set Him as the King.

He is the Son appointed by God as the Judge of the living and the dead. He has authority in heaven and earth to forgive the sins of everyone who believes in His name. One day, the Son will judge the secrets of men and condemn unrepentant sinners to eternal punishment.

The Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son in order that all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honors not the Son honors not the Father who has sent Him. Truly, truly, Jesus says to all, “He who hears my word and believes on Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and will not come into condemnation, but is passed from death to life.”

These things Jesus says that you might be saved. With the Son of God on your side, no one else will ever be able to condemn you.

To be blessed, you must serve the Father with fear and rejoice with trembling. You must also submit to and trust His Son. He has the keys of death and hell. He who believes and is baptized will be saved, but he who believes not will be damned.

God made His Son, who never sinned, sin for you that you might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Jesus will save you from your sins if you will repent toward God and believe that God has raised Him from the dead.

Confess that Jesus is the Lord and He will give you the gift of eternal life. Call on the name of the Lord and be reconciled to God today!

In Evangelism, Gospel Evangelism

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