Abraham faced four crises in his life, each with a beloved member of his family: twice with Sarah, twice with Isaac.
First with Sarah, recorded in Genesis 12:10-20. Abraham, a 75-year-old neophyte in the faith-life, decided to leave a famine in Canaan for Egypt’s fertility. However, Sarah’s beauty, of which Abram—his name at the time—stood in awe, caused him to lie about their marriage. God rescued him by afflicting Egypt’s court with disease. Second, with Sarah in the twelve months between the time God promised her pregnancy and her conception of Isaac. Genesis 20:1-18 records the centenarian Abraham, with 25 year’s experience in the faith-life, still using the old lie about their marriage. With her sexually pure, and awaiting conception, her husband betrayed her into another man’s power. God again intervened, threatening Abimelech with wholesale death of his kingdom if he touched her. If Abraham decided that no fear of God existed in Gerar, why live there? Indeed, where danger threatens the presence of faith in God in any Christian’s life, why have any relationship with the person, the experience, the relationship? End Part I
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“He said to another man,” ‘Follow me.’ “But the man replied,” ‘Lord, first let me go and bury my father.’ “Jesus said to him,” ‘Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God’ Luke 9:59-60.
Society has many spiritually-deprived or dead, people. They care for nothing relating to God, but avidly volunteer for community projects. Such tasks care for physical, economic, political issues, but lack the immediacy of God’s Kingdom even in a secular culture. Remember, Alexander Campbell had it right when saying the only Christian nation in society is the Church. Always has been that way. Always will be. Biblical Christianity needs NO support from culture to survive and thrive. In fact, uniting Christianity with any political party weakens the Gospel while failing to strengthen politics. Remember that Biblical Christianity waged a spiritual campaign against Satan for the first two decades of the first century. Then, with Constantine’s conversion, found an ally of a once-hostile Roman government. Through the contamination of politics and economics, Christianity became Christendom. And while in this day Christendom is in crisis, Biblical Christianity ISN’T, WON’T BE and succeeds whatever support or opposition comes from secular sources. That’s the point of Christ’s reply to the mañana sentiment when facing his call to discipleship: tomorrow or sometime, when other issues are resolved or problems solved. Most people won’t sacrifice their self-interest issues for spiritual obedience. But Jesus calls us to do exactly that, whatever our self-interest. Nothing can be more important than obedience to him. Lesser duties for lesser people. Immediate commitment to Jesus for anyone with spiritual values. If any collision occurs between our allegiance to Christ, and our duty to our relatives, nation, business associates, or employer, all take a secondary place. Christ receives our attention first, before anyone or anything. If we must offend someone, it must be anyone but Christ. We must never be so concerned about offending men that we shred Christ’s gracious invitation to bits. This blogger read Louis L’Amour’s autobiography The Education of a Wandering Man. He’s now in possession of, but hasn’t read a biography of, L’Amour by Robert Phillips. However interesting the latter, can it equal in accuracy and depth of insight the great man’s own profile of himself? Can it reveal character traits he didn’t surface? Or explore faults he naturally ignored?
Having acquaintance with the man’s own story, this writer will find it hard to excel. We’ll see. However, and the point of this blog, the life of Jesus Christ has never been more accurately, or in superior depth, limned than in the Four Gospels. Indeed, as acquaintance with second century Christian authors has demonstrated to the writer, nothing IN THEM equals the scintillating dynamics obvious in every New Testament book. How do we account for all that? Since no one could equal Christ’s story as he lived it while here, how did the Four Evangelists succeed in recording his spell-binding nature? It’s simple, really, with a captivating originality: Jesus Christ sent to the writers the SOMEONE exactly like himself as God the Son, and exactly like God the Father…none other but God the Spirit, as John 14:16-21, 25-28, 15:26-27, 16:5-15 reveal. Jesus could use mortal authors to record his STORY, his LIFE, his MEANING by subjecting them to the direction, depth and accuracy of God the Spirit, the SOMEONE exactly like Jesus. Each writer wrote in his God-gifted style, but each in absolute submission to the Spirit’s inspiration and truth. Amen! A Christian friend recently had a water leak in the wall behind her washing machine. She called a plumber after self-efforts to resolve the problem failed. She watched him carefully as he worked to make the necessary repairs. Then paid the exorbitant $450 bill. She mentioned that by following his every step, she could have achieved the same result. Furthermore, it was the very thing she thought needed to be done.
The last point in the subject of this blog. The difference in a professional—meaning a person who achieves the desired outcome in the shortest amount of time—and the person hiring his expertise, exists in the difference between Thinking and Knowing what needs to be done and doing it. The plumber DID and our friend WATCHED. Practical points gleaned. First, whether she could afterwards have followed his skilled steps may be open to question, though possible. But not at the speed he accomplished it. Second, he knew through expertise-gained experience what she only thought should be done. Spiritual points. First, Jesus, the Master Teacher, knew how to pray. The disciples learned HOW by seeing him pray and asking for a lesson Luke 11:1. Which he gave. Which his disciples have followed, finding direction and satisfaction in prayer to God. Second, like our friend with the plumber, the disciples could never have been able to PRAY AS Jesus did in John 17. Only he could pray that way, being privy to the infinity of the Godhead, a point still true. Who, when reading John 17, doesn’t understand the spiritual distance between Jesus and us? Third, consider Simon Peter’s willingness to outdistance the Law by forgiving offenders SEVEN times Matthw 18:21. Only to discover the Master’s goal being unlimited times, Matthew 18:22-35, a matchless parable fortifying his teaching. And so on, Matthew 16:21-23, 26:33-35, two of many more examples. Proving the wisdom of Robert Schuller’s words: when you need an expert, HIRE it, not BE it. Especially in the spiritual realm, where mankind has always instinctively made its own rules. Only to find GOD doesn’t care what our rules are, since he has made HIS OWN, including accepting Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord. No other way exists to enter God’s Presence John 14:6. Therefore, so much for the critics who say the disciples:
That’s another subject. Bye for now. V Historians have no problem ascribing success of the Constitutional Convention to the influence of George Washington and Ben Franklin. The proceedings had often been so fractious that Franklin despaired ever reaching common ground. He later commented that viewing the picture of the sun on the wall behind Washington’s chair made him wonder: did it symbolize a Setting Sun for the colonies? Only with agreement reached did he have confidence it symbolized the Rising Sun of a nation.
The same historians who understand the political influence of human leaders discount the spiritual influence of Jesus. How could the Gospels writers ascribe so much to him? Surely his disciples, in an excess of zeal, overstated his nature. That reveals the same lack of objectivity regarding Jesus that they blindly accept about lives of secular figures. It’s the old satanic lie: only secular history needs to be accurate in detail; sacred history is by faith. Which makes GOD irrelevant. This writer has written four of more volumes called Their Own Best Defense. Each details why the disciples, as men of their age, could ever create the MAN of the AGES Jesus Christ proved to be. And, indeed, knowing themselves incapable of teaching and doing what he achieved, they admit their inability to create him. Not letting the facts get in their way, however, skeptics reduce Jesus to mythical status while elevating his believers to demi-god status. It’s the same prejudice Alexander Graham Bell found from professional inventors. Except Jesus Christ alone could have chosen such a group of misfits as disciples and kept keep them together based on their common faith in him. Just as Jesus Christ alone could appeal to a broadly-based leadership corps in Antioch of Syria and organize them into the spiritual fathers of the first missionary endeavor into Gentile territory Acts 13:1-3. Fini Christ’s blazing spiritual originality had polar-opposite effects on listeners. First, he created the wildest acclaim in those who delighted in the freshness, authority and depth of teaching, Mark 1:27 and Matthew 7:28-29, but two of multiple examples. His words stirred hope in them when heard as flint sparks when struck on stone.
However, two polar-opposite groups had credibility issues with him. The former lay people, the latter clerical. The former because of his birthplace, the latter from his independence. First, the professional religious leaders, like the professional inventors with Bell, considered Jesus a threat. Without a nexus to a renowned rabbi, John 7:15, he possessed an intellectual parity with and a spiritual brilliance far beyond them. THAT to the leaders, meant he had no right to be THAT knowledgeably wise. Second, his Nazarene acquaintances. In his first visit there as Messiah, Luke 4:14-30, he came as an Army of One, with a reputation for good works in Jerusalem. In his second, towards the last of his Great Galilean Ministry, he came as an Army of Thirteen, endowed with a national reputation for teaching and miracles Mark 6:1-6. Neither mattered to the Nazarenes. They found no fault in him BUT…to their disgrace, they detected no excellence, priority or grandeur! End Part II Alexander Graham Bell’s grandfather developed a strategy to cure stuttering. His father wrote books on speech patterns. Bell himself studied the human ear. When he called his associate from another room by an electric pulse through a wire, creating the phone, he revolutionized verbal communication.
Professional inventors dismissed his efforts. He couldn’t succeed they claimed, because he had no background in electricity. And Western Union refused to buy his invention for $100,000. Life History of the United States, Vol. 7, p. 40 His story has spiritual applications. First, sounds, words, talk and speech remain the means that humans alone have when communicating orders, ideas, impressions and convictions. Sorry only that we spend so much time with idle chatter. Some of us complain of an information overload when writing lessons or preparing messages. Then we remember what a fellow student told this writer. He had worked hard developing a message for a preaching engagement. He preached so well that the people wanted him to speak that night. Terrified at his lack of depth, he spent all Sunday afternoon scraping bits of information gleaned and remembered from classes. He regretted the lack of depth. He had sufficient information for one pump at the well—which then went dry. (Thanks to Don Wortman for this story.) To this day, many preachers needlessly fill the air with what Bro. Charles Mills called “sweet air.” The moral is: complain only if we have to struggle to find ideas to preach. And complain if we preach only from an overflow of information in our minds. God’s people deserve the depths of a preacher’s thoughts, not merely froth from the top. End Part I Liberals have screamed for years demanding the separation of church and state. As a result, Christianity’s public presence has been stilled.
However, leading the way in hypocrisy, the Minneapolis, Minnesota City Council has voted itself a de facto supporter of Islam—a religion foreign to western culture. They can blast their calls to worship five times a day. Even though the Council had to amend the city’s noise ordinance which previously prevented such displays. San Diego U-T, 4/15/2023 Their secular, political, anti-Christian bias shows flagrantly. In the most public way they endorse the religious practices of Islam while demanding that Christians keep all their proclamations of Jesus in their sanctuaries. The dynamics may be different in this situation, but the principle is the same. Pardon the repetition, but a public, secular political organization has offered a defacto approval of a religion that fills the air with calls to prayer—when they won’t allow prayer in Jesus’ name in their Council meetings. The Council may say the “call” is part of their religion. THAT’S their problem, not ours. And we won’t make it ours by allowing them a right denied every Christ-centered church! They don’t control life here as they do in their home countries. SO…when in America, do as Americans do. In this case, don’t allow for any religion a privilege you don’t grant all! This all results from the liberal stupidity that allows and encourages immigrants from everywhere to maintain their identity, customs and religions they deny American-born citizens. Indeed, Moslems who demand the right to blast the silence demanded of everyone “just because it’s their custom” ignore and betray what has always been the rule for immigrants: when you come here, you live by our customs and rules. We don’t adapt to yours! Since liberals have refused Christians the right to any public display of faith in Christ, no other religion should have the right to such privileges. Remember, liberals: Christianity isn’t allowed in most Moslem lands. What Moslems do there, because Islam is the national faith, they cannot repeat in America, with its multiplicity of religions—no matter how liberal government here is. God wanted Jesus to enter the tomb for several reasons in fact, one of which has received too little attention.
First, while undercover operatives LEARN the secrets they’re to steal, Jesus KNEW all that death held for humanity, and KNEW it held no power over him. Indeed, the Glorified Christ assured his servant John, “I hold the keys of death and hades” Revelation 1:18. Second, secreting his Son for the few hours in the grave proved to be the ONLY TIME Jesus spent AWAY from his public ministry. Third, while Isaiah predicted Christ’s assumption of all human infirmities, diseases and sins, 53:4, 6, Matthew 8:17, that left but one experience he lacked in being LIKE us…the one experience humanity has always feared most by having NO answer to it. Hebrews 2:9-18, especially 9, 14-18 addresses that experience. Had God willed, Jesus could have miraculously descended from the cross after paying the penalty for human sin, which he achieved particularly in the 3-hour span preceding his death. What a phenomenon he would have been! And how universally he would have been hailed and worshipped. And it would have left him one experience shy of being perfectly like humanity. Since…keep that word in mind…SINCE humanity, alone of God’s creation, FEARS death, Jesus perfectly identified with us by DYING. He came as Savior to forgive, so his sacrifice forgave the sins of the world. His death proved that he also understood what it meant to him to die. And his resurrection proved that death had no power over him, and therefore, has none over us if we follow Christ! In summary:
THEN…PRAISE GOD…UP FROM THE GRAVE HE AROSE! Fini Jesus lectured the men arresting him in Gethsemane…”Every day I sat in the Temple courts teaching, and you did not arrest me” Matthew 26:55. His chains rattling, Paul defended his preaching to King Agrippa, “I am convinced that none of this has escaped his attention, because it was not done in a corner” Acts 26:25.
God wanted Jesus in the tomb the way nations put spies into the intelligence networks of other nation2—but for an entirely different reason…. End Part II |
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