Daily Bread - March 2005

March 31, 2005

When we talk about “child evangelism,” what do we mean? Merely persuading children to profess to be Christians? Nominal church members? Go through the rite of baptism? Have their names on a record book? The temptations to life-hypocrisy today are enormous.

Jesus was a child of 12 when He witnessed His first Passover. Like all children, He wondered what the killing of the Passover lamb meant. No one could help Him, not even His mother. But His sinless mind was gradually able to grasp the truth--the blood of billions of Passover lambs could not wash away even one human sin. He sensed the meaning of Psalm 40:6-8, “Lo, I come . . . to do Thy will, O God.” Someone holy, undefiled, must give Himself to be “the Lamb of God.”

Through His young human soul there surged a great desire: “O Father, let Me be the world’s ‘Passover Lamb’!” From that moment, the divine/human Messiah in His childhood grew to be absorbed “in [His] Father’s business” (Luke 2:49). John the Baptist caught Christ’s total consecration at the age of 30 when he cried out, “Behold the Lamb of God!” (John 1:29).

The age of 12 is still very significant. The Holy Spirit today is often forced to by-pass older people because they quickly become full of themselves and stay that way; children are sensitive to the call of heaven to give themselves to the One who gave Himself for them--if only someone can be humble enough to step aside and let Christ be revealed to them.

May God give you and me the grace to reveal Him as He is in His agape love, to children.

March 30, 2005

The suicide bombers are still at work in the Middle East, the insurgents still creating mayhem in Iraq, but now the stories are off the front page and inside. All thoughtful people have pondered another quiet terror troubling our souls: the possibilities of ending up like Terri Schiavo--maybe before even getting old. The life insurance companies have been keeping rather quiet; their money isn’t what we would want most.

But there is a Life Insurance Policy not only offered us but urged upon us, yes, even given to us for the “receiving” (look at the “receive” in Rom. 5:17). The most precious New Covenant is the out and out promise of God that “thou shalt BE a blessing” as well as receive a blessing from Him (Gen. 12:1-3). In other words, to the one who like Abraham “gets out of [his] country, and from [his] father’s house, unto a land that [God] will shew [him],” in other words gets out of “Babylon,” God’s solemn promise is that he/she will always bring happiness to someone else. Giving it will be much more fun that getting it!

A vegetable like existence in immortality is not the goal; to “BE a blessing” requires an active mind and a warm heart plus a knowledge of God as the Giver of Good News for every human soul (Ashley Smith had some for the murderer who burst into her apartment). Abraham believed those New Covenant promises in Genesis 12; now as a child of Abraham, you have inherited them. That means you are a stream of living water or at least a rivulet of it, however tiny; the little fountain deep in your inmost soul will never run dry (see John 7:37-39). And the command of Jesus to His disciples is to you; of those whom He will always send to you, He says, “They need not depart; give YE them to eat” (Matt. 14:16). He will multiply the “bread” in your very hands! But you must eat it first; start studying that Word today.

March 29, 2005

Is anybody tired of disasters? They come fast--several major earthquakes in short order; hurricane disasters; it’s not simply better journalism, these things are increasing.

Because of “the distress of nations,” “men’s hearts are failing them for fear” (Luke 21:26). With modern journalism, we see the “distress of nations” and the fear portrayed in vivid photos that enable us to identify corporately with the millions who suffer. But who thinks of the pain that God must feel? Do we not read that He cares when even a little bird dies (Matt. 10:29)? Jesus has promised to be with us “unto the end of the world” (Matt. 28:20). When we suffer, He suffers; His love binds the human race to Himself. Does He not long for all this pain to come to an end?

We know that Jesus is still alive, He is risen from the dead; and He has not forgotten the human race that He died to redeem. He wants to come the second time in fulfillment of His promise. If we say that HE has delayed His coming, we make ourselves “evil servants” (Matt. 24:48). The truth is that His people have delayed His coming; they are too content with the pleasures of living in the “great economy” Europe, America, and Australia now enjoy. Many are indifferent either to the suffering in the world or the suffering in the heart of God. If it is difficult for us to grasp that kind of identity with Him, that would indicate that we are immature, childish, the little flower girl at the wedding rather than the mature person the Bride is to become (see Rev. 19:6-9).

In order to learn to identify with Christ, begin identifying with Him as He hangs on His cross. Read about it in Psalm 22 and Psalm 69. To read those two chapters with even a beginning of understanding stretches your spiritual muscles. Then “graduate” to identify with Christ in His high priestly ministry today in the Most Holy Apartment; sense His concern for the multitudes of people on this planet and His yearning for His church to cooperate with Him in ministry for them. Sense His disappointment; enter in to His message in Revelation 3:14-21, not to criticize His church, but to sense how He feels.

When you finish a thoughtful study of the Book of Revelation, you will cry out with John, “Even so, come Lord Jesus!” (22:20). Instead of praying self-centered prayers, you will begin praying prayers for Christ to receive HIS reward.

March28, 2005

A thousand times “yes!” Let’s agree that when the Savior of the world died on His cross and proclaimed “It is finished!” He won the great controversy all by Himself.

Yes, yes, He died “instead” of us. Yes, salvation is assured. Yes, He opened the gates of Paradise. Yes, it was all done even before we were born. Yes, yes, we contribute nothing to our own salvation.

But does all that mean that we His people, being “covered” by this celestial Insurance Policy, now have only to “wait” and “occupy until [He] comes”? (Cf. Luke 19:13; that word “occupy” has come to mean make lots of money, enjoy the world, don’t lose out, have our fun as though there were no solemn Day of Atonement for us to live in). Does Christ’s dying “instead” of us mean that we have no cross to “share” with Him? He dies 100% only “instead” of us? From now on are we simply so many childish digits in the credit column in God’s heavenly computer, and we “wait” for the call of the first resurrection? Or is there some serious business before us about getting ready to meet Jesus at His second coming?

Please note: there are four glorious “Hallelujah Choruses” in Revelation 19:1-7 that say something must happen that at last makes possible that “the Lord God omnipotent reigns”! And that something not having happened yet has delayed His “reign” for many, many years, even though He finished His dying “instead” of us. What finally must happen is that “the Lamb’s wife” “make herself ready” for the intimacy of the “marriage of the Lamb.” What happened on the cross was wonderful indeed, but nobody can (or will) be happy in heaven until those Hallelujah Choruses can be sung, proclaiming a hitherto elusive victory.

March 27, 2005

March 26, 2005

Someone writes asking that we make clear what Young’s LITERAL TRANSLATION of Romans 5:15-19 means, especially his use of the word “constitutes.” It’s in verses 18, 19, instead of the word “made” as in the King James Version. Here’s what Young renders Paul as saying: “So, then, as through one offense to all men it is to condemnation, so also through one declaration of ‘Righteous’ it is to all men to justification of life; for as through the disobedience of the one man [Adam], the many [all men] were CONSTITUTED sinners: so also through the obedience of the One [Christ], shall the many [the same all men] be CONSTITUTED righteous” (Young’s LITERAL, vss 18, 19).

The sin of Adam did not MAKE “all men” to be actual sinners--that would be “original sin.” Adam’s fatherhood has not forced anyone to sin! (It could be that the KJV rendering as “made” has led some to think the Bible does teach original sin; but Young’s “Literal” makes clear that we still have freedom of choice. Thank God!)

But it is true that “all have sinned” (Rom. 3:10), except Christ. But He took upon Himself the DNA descent from Adam, yet He proves that inheriting a sinful nature does not force one necessarily to be a sinner in character. Christ was tempted like as we are tempted, but He said “No!” to every temptation (Heb. 4:15; Titus 2:11, NIV). Adam’s sin CONSTITUTED “all men” under the legal condemnation of sin. Jesus “took” it upon Himself, so He could die.

Likewise, according to Young’s “Literal,” the cross of Christ did not MAKE the same “all men” to be experientially “righteous.” It CONSTITUTED them “righteous” in a legal sense so the Father could send His rain on the just and the unjust alike--so He could treat every person as though he had not sinned. Some call this a “second
probation.” But God means what He says: no one can keep you out of heaven, except your own perverse choice.

March 25, 2005

When I was young, grey-haired pastors would tell me that the most important subject I could think about is my own personal salvation. But is there a more important, greater issue to think about than this self-centered one?

What led Christ to His cross was not such a self-centered motivation. As we ponder Scripture clues here and there we begin to discern that He was tempted as all of us humans are tempted--to seek self-preservation; but a new motivation engrossed His soul. He was concerned not for Himself, but for the preservation of the universe of God which had been challenged by the greatest created being of all eternity--Lucifer, who by rebellion became Satan (Rev. 12:7-10). Satan’s new invention was the motivation of self-seeking. Our first parents yielded to it, and therefore every human being descended from Adam has been naturally self-centered by nature.

The great battle that Jesus fought in Gethsemane and on His cross was “Not as I will, but as You will” (Matt. 26:39). In order to say His amen to that prayer, He had to surrender His own life, yes, His own eternal life. Jesus repeatedly assures us that in His becoming one with us, He took on His soul a “self” as we all have a self to contend with (John 5:30; 6:38; Luke 9:23; Rom. 15:3, etc.). But the love (agape) that He was as God, as the Son of God (1John 4:8), confronted this “self” which He had taken upon Himself, and He denied self and all self-centered motivation. He denied His own human will.

“Easy” for Him? A zillion times, No! He wept blood as He struggled in Gethsemane (Luke 22:44). And as a “most precious” gift, He has given us a new motivation for following Him--not just to get a reward for ourselves in heaven, nor just to save our own little souls, but a new capacity to sense a concern for Him. The success of His great controversy with Satan absorbs us. It’s as a bride feels in her soul a new concern--for the husband who has won her love (Rev. 19:7, 8). This “growth in grace” is “present truth” (2 Peter 3:18).

March 24, 2005

All through Bible history and through the history of Christianity, those who seek to follow Jesus have been opposed, ridiculed, persecuted. Always, the believer who would be faithful must “take up his cross” in order to follow the true Christ (Luke 9:23).

Elijah was opposed by the government of the Israelite nation; the opposition of the king and the queen was so terrible that he was denounced as Public Enemy # One.

The same persecution was seen in King Saul’s bitter hatred of David, the youth whom the Lord had “anointed” to replace him as future king.

Then Jeremiah had to spend his entire lifetime enduring the persecution inflicted on him by the successive kings and leaders of Judah following the death of good king Josiah.

At first the official leadership of the nation of Israel was favorable to the message of John the Baptist, but later what they considered objective evidence made them conclude they were forced to criticize, then oppose, then reject, and finally crucify, the Man whom God had sent as their Messiah. It was the popular thing to do--shout “crucify Him!” (John 19:15).

Must we still today “take up [our] cross” in order to be faithful to Him? Yes!

But does that mean that life must be a dreary enduring of sadness and loneliness? No, the promise of Jesus has particular reference to life today. He said: “I am with you always, even unto the end of the world” (Matt. 28:20). As He walked with the three Hebrews in the fiery furnace (Dan. 3:25), so He has pledged Himself to suffer and endure with His faithful disciples today.

And in every confrontation with Satanic falsehood, Jesus wins the victory.

March 23, 2005

Sometimes the most wonderful gift can be wrapped unattractively. That is true of certain “Bible doctrines” that outwardly appear boring or even burdensome, but which are marvelous blessings. One is the Bible doctrine of the Sabbath; in His mercy God asks us to “remember” it, to keep it holy (that’s all, to keep holy what He has already made holy!). And Satan wants to make that blessed “remembrance” to appear burdensome.

Another “doctrine” that appears dry as dust (it used to be that way to me!) is the Two Covenants, an idea that only high-tech theologians wrangle about in their ivory towers. And the Bible Commentaries were no help. It seemed that God was experimenting on Israel, trying this or that method to save them, and since the old covenant was one of His experiments that went bad, He had to think up another method, the new covenant. But that created a REAL problem: if God Himself has not been sure what to do to save us, how can I be sure of anything?

Then the light broke through the clouds, when I read a little book entitled The Glad Tidings, a verse-by-verse study of Galatians. To me it was intensely interesting. God always has had only one way of saving people; He was not experimenting with different ways; the new covenant was always His way; but the people are the ones who tried to invent a different way to get to heaven--they came up with the old covenant idea. The simple, sunlight truth is that God is too wise ever to try to make bargains with sinners (don’t forget, “saints” are sinners by nature), because He knows they can not fulfill their part of the bargain.

His new covenant is not a “contract” wherein both parties, God and the sinner, strike a bargain agreement. It’s always His own simple, straight-forward promise to save the sinner by the sacrifice of Himself; and the sinner’s proper response is not to promise to DO this or that, but to believe, appreciate, God’s promise--just as Abraham believed. And there is where the trouble lies: Abraham’s descendants at Mt. Sinai did not have his faith. So they contrived a different response to God’s new covenant promise: they promised to obey (which promise they broke in a matter of days; Ex. 19:8; 32:1-8).

So, get under the new covenant today! Believe God’s promises to you, and that faith will produce the obedience that has worried you, as it did for Abraham.

March 22, 2005

Sometimes we humans fret endlessly about how to understand a passage of the Bible when attention to the actual original text would clear up our disputes. Robert Young, author of the famous “Concordance,” also gave us a good “Literal Translation of the Bible.” One of the Bible passages that unfortunately splits almost any church or classroom is Romans 5:15-19. The “Literal” version is hard for us to read because it is so stiffly accurate, but it is accurate. Let’s see if it may help us now.

The original language often uses the article “the” where we don’t use it in English. When Paul speaks of “the death,” or “the grace,” or “the gift,” he means universal death, universal grace, or a universal gift--as distinguished from personal, individual death, grace, gift, etc. (In English we could capitalize each word to make it clear.) Thus:

“15. But not as the offence so also is the free [universal] gift; for, if by the offence of the one [Adam, the first head of the human race], the many did die [the universal ‘many’ is everybody], much more did the [universal] grace of God, and the [universal] free gift in grace of the one man Jesus Christ, abound to the many [all men];

“16. And not as through one who did sin is the [universal] free gift, for the [universal] judgment indeed is of one to condemnation, but the [universal] gift is of many offences to a declaration of ‘Righteous.’

“17. For if by the offence of the one [the father of the human race] the [universal] death did reign through the one [Adam], much more those who the abundance of the [universal] grace and of the [universal] free gift of the [Christ’s] righteousness are RECEIVING, [they] shall reign in life through the One [the universal Savior]--Jesus Christ.

“18. So then, as through one offence to all men it is to condemnation, so also through one declaration of ‘Righteous’ it is to all men to justification of life;

“19. For as through the disobedience of the one man [the universal head of our race, Adam] the many [all men] were CONSTITUTED sinners [not MADE sinners]; so also through the obedience of the One [Christ, the new Head of the human race], shall the many [all men] be CONSTITUTED [not MADE] righteous. . . . Where the [universal] sin did abound, the [universal] grace did over-abound.”

Thank you, Robert Young.

March 21, 2005

What is THE top news story for today? Every morning when you log on with your computer, you get a glimpse of what your e-mail server considers the most important or most spectacular news item of the day (or it’s the biggest headline in your morning paper). But back of it all, what does that heavenly Father of us all, the God who says He is “love” (agape), tell us is the great News behind the news? Answer: the central message of the Book of Revelation: “the everlasting gospel” being “proclaimed to every nation, kindred, tongue, and people” (14:6, 7). And what is the purpose of this most highly acclaimed activity? To prepare people for the most climactic event of all history--the second coming of Jesus (vss. 15, 16).

Is this message getting through to the people of the world, or is it being buried under an overwhelming mass of confusion published by the media, or even by a similar mass of confusion known as “organized religion”?

The answer does not depend on mere human observation, for even the New York Times doesn’t know what is “all the news that’s fit to print.” Jesus said, “The kingdom of God cometh not by observation” (Luke 17:20). In His day, what served as “the media” tried to ignore the greatest News of all time, but the Holy Spirit was working quietly, surely, in what Jesus was doing. So today, the “everlasting gospel” proclaimed by those three angels of Revelation 14 is getting through in different ways.

The best way to know for sure is to consider the character of God Himself--He is “love” (agape); that is, He will not permit the final, cataclysmic events of earth’s history (“the seven last plagues,” Rev. 16) to come, until people have had a reasonable chance to prepare. And that means, they must hear the message of Good News, of His “much more abounding grace.” You can’t believe that “God is love” (agape) if you think He has gone to sleep. You must recognize that every angel in heaven is intensely active, moving upon the hearts of human beings everywhere. God’s “office” in heaven is the central command post of the vast worldwide war between Christ and Satan, as real as the war between them when Jesus was here on earth 2000 years ago. It will not be recognized “by observation,” but it’s the most real newsworthy happening today. Read about it in Revelation 14-19; let the same Holy Spirit that inspired the Book speak to your heart in its pages.

March 20, 2005

There need be no confusion or perplexity about the meaning of justification by faith. It's a simple matter to go to the original language the apostle used when writing his soul-stirring words in Romans: "justification" is the same word he used for "righteousness."

That opens up a world of understanding. When Paul speaks of justification by faith he means righteousness by faith--in other words, right living by faith. Justification by faith is worlds beyond a verbal, legal pronouncement of acquittal from guilt which makes no change in a person's heart and character.

The legal pronouncement was made when Christ cried out at His crucifixion, "It is finished!" He had completed the work the Father had given Him to do (John 17:4). He had earned His title, "The Saviour of the world" (John 4:42), "The Lord [had] laid on Him the iniquity of us all" (Isa. 53:6). He had now proven His role to be the new Head of the human race, the second Adam. He had died the second death of "every man" (Heb. 2:9), paid the final penalty for every sin of humanity.

That is why Christ in a purely legal sense pronounces the "judicial . . . verdict of acquittal" on "all men" (Rom. 5:15-18; compare NEB). But justification by faith is conversion, a change of heart, an experience of reconciliation to God. And since no one can be reconciled to God unless he is also reconciled to God's holy law, justification by faith means a new life of obedience to God’s law, not motivated by fear but by love (agape). Love is the most severe taskmaster in the universe, but in the light of the cross of Christ, the most reasonable because it leads to self being crucified with Christ.

March 18, 2005

TIME magazine has often promoted the Roman Catholic view of Mary the mother of Jesus as a co-redemptrix, an assistant “Savior of the world,” one to whom people should pray, an intermediary between people and Jesus. This is not a biblical view.

But TIME’s feature article for Easter this year explores a rather new Protestant study of the biblical Mary as one qualified to be understood as a teacher, an apostle of the faith of Jesus. She has been neglected as an over-reaction against the idolatrous Roman view.

She appears first in the Bible as one who “believed” in the ultimate sense--no resisting the word of the angel Gabriel, although she must have known well that her public role as an unwed mother would invite scorn. She would submit to the will of God. Long before Jesus took up His cross for us, she took up her cross in believing the word and the call of God. (Luke 1:38, 45).

Next she appears as one who had loved the Bible, for her extemporaneous poem of thanksgiving (46-55) is drenched with biblical allusions. Her Son was to inherit our human nature, the DNA line to the fallen Adam to be unbroken, but His mother was to be one who could teach Him in His infancy to read and believe the Bible. He applied Himself so zealously that He grew as “the word made flesh” (John 1:14). He was her Savior as well as ours.

Mary never preached a sermon that we know was recorded, but she left a brilliant one in its terseness: “Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it” (John 2:5). That’s enough for a good Sabbath message. She had to be a very positive feminine personality.

All biblical evidence points to her as an older woman, a step-mother to at least six children of Joseph from a previous marriage (Matt. 13:55, 56; 12:47). That role certainly required a saint!Mary’s corporate fellowship with her Son dying on His cross as she watched Him in motherly fidelity is evidence that we can identify with Him on His cross--something that the Bible says is “faith.” We are “baptized INTO His death” (Rom. 6:3). It’s time that we understand it maturely!

March 17, 2005

We have long pondered the wonderful time when the earth will be lightened with the glory of the final “most precious message” of the gospel (Rev. 18). We have known that the Bible says it will be a “short work” (Rom. 9:28).

Now we have a little illustration of how “short” may be the way the Lord may choose to work. Alone, 26 year old Ashley Smith near Atlanta found herself suddenly confronted with a wild murderer who made her his captive. Frightened of course, her knowledge of the gospel enabled her to recover her faith in Christ and banish her natural fear. She realized that this crazed man with his gun, Brian Nichols, was still a human being for whom the Lord Jesus had given Himself, as well as He had given Himself for her. She was enabled to sense a concern for him! She talked to him calmly about his soul. Yes, he had brought upon himself now the guilt of multiple murders, but Jesus Christ was still his Savior awaiting Brian’s repentance. She conveyed that truth to the desperate man.

The murderer was hungry, so she fried some eggs for a breakfast for him. Looking him in the eye as one soul saved by the grace of Christ speaking to another who had been saved by the same sacrifice, she persuaded him to do the right thing, and give himself up. The grace of God enabled her to trust the criminal’s sincerity, which meant her life was saved and so was his. Let us pray that as he spends his life in prison, his soul will be saved.

The front page news story has thrilled the nation. The version of the gospel message that is being touted worldwide in these few days since the story happened is that of Pastor Rick Warren’s book, THE PURPOSE-DRIVEN LIFE. It had gripped Ashley Smith’s heart. By yielding to a conviction of truth that she was able to understand, she became a spokesperson for the gospel as she understood it, gaining suddenly an audience greater than probably all the public evangelists in the world combined.

The lesson for us: let’s study what is “the truth of the gospel” as it is “in Christ,” receiving that agape that “casts out fear,” and thus be ready always to witness for Him (Gal. 2:5; Eph. 4:15; 1 John 4:18).

March 16, 2005

We have all heard the horrifying stories of people with Alzheimer’s saying and doing things that we could not imagine them saying or doing when they were normal and well. A friend of ours when he developed Alzheimer’s threatened to kill his wife and had to be locked up, and yet we knew him always as a genuine Christian. And we all have known of people who when they have a stroke, act in a bizarre, ornery way, when we have known them previously as being gentle Christians. Sometimes when under an anesthetic or drug, decent people have been known to use language that is indecent.

These remarks on “Dial Daily Bread” are not intended to question the sincerity of these people’s conversion to Christianity. But this phenomenon of evil words or acts coming out involuntarily raises the issue of Bible sanctification. Paul prays for us a total sanctification in 1 Thess. 5:23: “The very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

What does Paul mean? Obviously, the initial experience of conversion or of justification by faith, is good in itself; but it must deepen and extend throughout the mind and heart until there is no hidden portion that is left unaffected, uncleansed. This is why sanctification is a daily work of the Holy Spirit, requiring a daily surrender to Him, until every nook or cranny of the heart is exposed to the merciless light that shines from the cross of Christ, and every egocentric motivation is made painfully distinct, so it can be repented of. A person may die with that process of being sanctified “wholly” still uncompleted; and we trust that person’s soul with the Lord’s mercy in the final judgment. But how could any of us “stand” in the final “great day of the Lord” when Jesus returns if there are sinful dark secrets of evil still left in the heart not yet “sanctified wholly”?

Wouldn’t that bring shame on our Savior, like a good Christian threatening to kill his wife, or saying indecent words? Thank God we have a new day, TODAY--a new opportunity to be sanctified!

March 15, 2005

Two thousand years have gone by since Paul proclaimed to the Jews that their Messiah had come in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. Most stubbornly resisted and rejected the message, according to Luke in Acts. If Paul was anything like we are in nature, he would have expected that the Jews most likely to listen favorably would be the “devout women,” the ladies of the congregation who were always helping people with works of mercy. But imagine his surprise and disappointment when he found that among the members of the congregations most bitterly opposed to the Good News about their Messiah having already come were those same “devout and honorable women” (13:50).

There was no need any longer for those agonizing, all night prayer meetings where the people would cry out to the God of Abraham, “Please fulfill the promise made to our fathers, send us our Messiah!” Prayer for the coming of the Messiah had now become obsolete. Now it was time to thank God for already sending Him! In fact, such prayer now became a form of blasphemy because it expressed the sin of unbelief, the refusal to recognize that God had already performed what He had promised.

Today we may pray earnestly for God to send us the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in our latter rain. Sometimes churches have held all night prayer meetings for that blessed gift. Could it be that like the ancient Jews, we have neglected to receive the beginning of that same gift already given, and it went over our heads as the truth went over the heads of the ancient Jews?

March 14, 2005

Something momentous about the truth of justification by faith developed in the latter years of the 19th century. Fresh insights into this glorious truth came through two young ordained ministers who thought through something that apparently no one else had clearly grasped. They simply combined Paul’s idea of justification by faith with the truth that we are now living in the great final cosmic Day of Atonement. The world’s High Priest, Jesus Christ, had begun His last work of fully reconciling alienated human hearts to God.

It was an antitypical work in the Most Holy Apartment of the heavenly sanctuary that fulfilled the type in the ancient high priest’s work when he entered the second apartment of the earthly tabernacle (see Hebrews 9). Now Christ’s objective was not merely preparing people to die and come up in the first resurrection (Rev. 20:6); now His work prepares a people to meet their Lord in person at His second coming (see 1 Thess. 4:16, 17), and be translated. Now every buried root of enmity against God (Rom. 8:7) is to be cleansed. Only when the heart is cleansed can we be in total oneness with the Lord. Only then can it be said in all truth that “here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus” (Rev. 14:12). Christ’s righteousness is not merely legally imputed; now it is fully imparted.

This most precious message had within it the promise of fulfilling the prophecy of the message that must “lighten the earth with glory.” The reason was that it brought to parched human hearts what was in fact long-awaited “showers from heaven of the latter rain.” There was power in that message of justification by faith that delivered from the love of self. Those who believed treated their richest gain as loss and poured contempt on all their pride. This was refreshing to see in ministers. It was the greatest sign of the nearness of the end. But...!

March 13, 2005

The Bible specializes in Good News which is “the power of God unto salvation” (Rom. 1:16). There is power in the word itself, as there is in the seed that sprouts. Those who wait for the second coming of Christ will demonstrate that power so fully that their message will “lighten the earth with glory.” The message itself, not their personalities nor any goodness in themselves, will call believers to “come out of Babylon, My people,” and honest-hearted people will respond to the “voice” from heaven (see Rev. 18:1-4). Nothing will be able to hold them back from stepping out boldly to honor Christ in the closing work of the gospel.

The message will be proclaimed not just by one or two super-gurus, but by a multitude of voices all over the earth. God can use people trained in literary institutions provided self is humbled and crucified with Christ so their ministry draws listeners to Jesus and not to themselves, but often self has gotten in the way and marred the picture. Baal worship has delayed the finishing of God’s work in the earth--the worship of self disguised as the worship of Christ. In the last great work as the truth is proclaimed powerfully, God will use humble people who are called from “the plow” as Elisha was called (1 Kings 19:19).

What will bring about this great development? The Bible is clear: the experience of justification by faith, which is the same as the experience of righteousness by faith. The faith itself will “work by love,” the love of Christ (Gal. 5:6), not our own love. There will be no self-righteousness in this wonderful work that lightens the earth with glory. When self is laid aside, gets out of the way, the cross of Christ can be uplifted clearly, because self will be “crucified with Him.” Then He will “draw all unto [Himself]” (John 12:32).

March 12, 2005

God has inspired His holy word, the Bible, for “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God” (2 Tim. 3:16). But He has not made the Bible difficult to understand! He has promised, “Turn you at My reproof, . . . I will make known My words unto you” (Prov. 1:23).

One of those “words” that He “will make known” unto us is “justification.” Ask Him to! The root idea is to make something that was crooked become straight. On the sixth day of creation week God ended that work; when sin entered planet earth, He turned His infinite power into re-creating sinful human hearts. Justification by faith is the sinner receiving this mighty power of re-creation, that is, the new birth. The sinner’s faith is awakened by his “beholding” the love of Christ revealed in His cross, just as the stricken Israelite bitten by poisonous snakes was healed by beholding, looking at, the brass serpent lifted on the pole.

You watch a hero or heroine in a movie; now spend your time more wisely by “watching” Jesus Christ. “Eat” the Bible story of the cross; turn off your radio, TV, everything; just kneel and patiently, in prayer, read about Jesus straight from Scripture. Wait before Him. God wants to hear a sincere, honest, unhurried prayer. I know; I am as unworthy as anyone, but I know He responds. He loves you as much as He loves me! I have never heard the literal voice of God, but I want to encourage those people who also must confess they haven’t either; the Holy Spirit imparts spiritual life through the word, the Bible. He wants your faith to be established on the solid rock of Bible truth, not on dreams or impressions or “voices.”

Will the one who is “justified by faith” live in obedience to God’s word? Yes, obedience is the direct fruit of the experience of justification by faith. It has now become your joy.

March 11, 2005

Have you ever been close to losing your life, either from sickness or an accident? And you have realized that your life has been an undeserved bonus?

The faith of Jesus in God’s plan of justification teaches that lesson in its truest dimension: “The love [agape] of Christ constrains us; because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died” (2 Cor. 5:14). It’s so obvious that you wonder you didn’t see it long ago:

(1) Christ died for the world, for everyone (1 Cor. 15:3). That’s true.

(2) It’s equivalent to saying that if He had not “died for all,” then all would themselves have had to die.

(3) In other words, death would have been the inevitable end of everyone, “all,” because “the wages of sin is death” (Rom. 6:23). Sin kills; the poison sting is in the sin itself. The end has always been wrapped up in the sinning. It’s not an arbitrary, malicious condemnation on the part of God.

(4) That “death” is what Jesus described in our beloved text of John 3:16--to “perish.” As 2 + 2 = 4, the logic is inescapable: if “One” “perished” in place of all perishing, then He saved “all” from perishing, and “all” can see themselves in a new light: they have escaped that terrible fate because of how He “perished” for them.

(5) The death that Jesus died is the “perishing” kind--what the Bible says is “the second death” (Rev. 2:11; 20:14). You came within a hair’s breadth of suffering it yourself, except that Christ “perished” in it for you. That’s the death He died.

(6) Now you are “constrained” to deny self and to live only for Him. Now “easy” to be saved and “hard” to be lost make sense--all because of that “love” (agape).

March 10, 2005

Justification is the best good news anyone will ever hear, for it is the proclamation from God Himself that sets you free from condemnation forever. It’s the news that you walk out of prison (imagine you’ve been on Death Row in your state prison, and you are at last vindicated or acquitted! You’d be quite happy, wouldn’t you? Now, be happier “in Christ”!)

Some are perplexed by what they assume is a contradiction in Romans 5. In verse 1 we read that we are “justified by faith,” that is, by the believing that we do here and now today, experientially. It seems to say that nothing happens until we believe, and that the initiative is up to us. But in verse 9 we read that we are “justified by [Christ’s] blood,” and that blood was something that happened and was shed 2000 years ago when He died on His cross.

When we are “justified by faith,” there are seven blessings we experience according to Romans 5:

(1) “we have peace with God,”

(2) “we have access . . . into this grace wherein we stand,”

(3) we “rejoice,”

(4) “we glory in tribulations,”

(5) we are no longer “ashamed,”

(6) “the love [agape] of God is shed abroad in our hearts,”

(7) “the Holy Spirit . . . is given unto us.”

Now the big question: are all these blessings the result of OUR doing something? Do we trigger all this? Have we taken this initiative? Or is all this the consequence of something that Christ accomplished on His cross, and now at last we have heard of it and we believe it?

It is ONE justification, accomplished totally by the Savior of the world. But appreciated, believed, experienced, by the repentant sinner, who lets it change his heart and his life. At last he lets the Holy Spirit change him; he stops resisting Him. Let that blessed one be you and me!

March 9, 2005

All during this week, around the world millions of Christians are focusing attention on the biblical idea of “justification.” What the Bible teaches is clear as sunlight, but “the little horn” of Daniel’s prophecies has sought to confuse this truth. It had been God’s intention that “the faith of Jesus” should lighten the earth with glory. But the great “falling away” (apostasy) that Paul predicted in 2 Thessalonians 2 (based on Daniel!) was the work of “the man of sin” (vss. 3-7). He has stirred up debate and confusion about “justification.” These have darkened this glorious truth for many sincere people. (Maybe you, too!).

The New English Bible aptly defines that big word “justification” as simply God’s “verdict of acquittal” (Rom. 5:16, NEB). Our enemy, Satan, condemns us in God’s law court; he himself is shut out of heaven, and charges that we should be, too. But God steps in and vindicates, “acquits” us, as though we had never sinned. Now He can send His rain and sunshine on all alike as though we were innocent. He gives “all men” this “free gift . . . unto justification of life” (vs. 18, KJV; Matt. 5:45). But how can the Father pronounce this “acquittal” that Satan hates? Is it fair? Muslims say, “No!” But what’s the Bible answer?

The Son of God has become “the second Adam,” the new corporate Head of our human race, has taken all our guilt in upon Himself (“the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all,” Isa. 53:6), accepted our condemnation, died our second death both “for us” and “as us,” and thus has “acquitted” us. We are “justified by His blood,” says Paul (Rom. 5:9), which was shed at the cross of Jesus. Six times Paul says the “acquittal” is a “gift” given to “all men.” “Many” reject the “gift,” throw it away, “sell the birthright.” But if you clasp it to your heart, cherish it, keep it, appreciate it, that is, “believe”--you cannot be lost.

March 8, 2005

March 7, 2005

There are about a billion Muslims who are turned off by what many of them regard as two obstacles against their becoming Christians: (1) the Crusades of the 11th to 13th centuries demonstrate openly for all time that “Christianity” is a cruel and unjust religion (they say); and (2) the doctrine that one man’s righteousness can substitute morally for another man’s unrighteousness. In fact, their theologians connect the Crusades to that doctrine of vicarious moral substitution. It’s unjust, and unfair, they say.

We know first: the Crusades were not true, biblical Christianity. Second, could the doctrine of a vicarious substitution be explained to Muslims more clearly? Does the Bible also teach the truth of a shared substitution?

In His first lesson on the cross Jesus told us, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him . . . take up his cross, and follow Me. . . . Whoever loses his life for My sake will find it” (Matt. 16:24, 25). Paul understood this idea of shared substitution: “I am crucified with Christ” (Gal. 2:20). “As many of us as were baptized into Christ were baptized into His death. . . . We were buried with Him through baptism into death. . . . We have been united together in the likeness of His death. . . . Our old man [the love of self] was crucified with Him. . . . If we died with Christ we believe we shall also live with Him” (Rom. 6:3-8--but not otherwise!). If “our” Crusaders had understood this, world history would have been different! Praying for the Muslims is good, but not good enough: we must tell them the gospel clearly, truthfully.

March 6, 2005

One of the tabloids in our supermarket has lurid pictures of a monstrous meteor that it says is fated to strike the world soon. The article contains a pre-written prayer by a Roman Catholic priest or if you prefer, one written by the Rev. Billy Graham, for God to protect you when it strikes. The expensive price of the tabloid becomes cheap if either prayer turns out to be effective.

If our “soul-winning” ministry is likewise based on a fear motivation, Jesus asks a pointed question: “What do ye more than others?” The other side of that motivation coin is hope for a reward we get for making sacrifices to follow Jesus. He asks, “Do not even the publicans the same?” (Matt. 5:47, 46). If a thinly disguised love of self is the reason for our Christianity, how is it practically better than Buddhism or Hinduism? If skillfully manipulated, preaching an egocentric motivation may result in large accessions in church membership, but is this appropriate for the great Day of Atonement in which we live--this “time of the end” that Daniel emphasizes (8:14; 11:35, 12:4)?

In His work as our great High Priest, the Son of God is seeking to separate our character from an Old to a New Covenant motivation. The appropriate one is not so much our love for Christ as a growing heart appreciation of His love for us. It alone “casts out fear” (1 John 4:18). When we “survey the wondrous cross on which the Prince of glory died,” His love (agape) expels from the heart our native self-centeredness (2 Cor. 5:14, 15).

March 5, 2005

A thoughtful person writes: please explain the contrast between Calvinism and Arminianism. What practical effect does it have on our daily happiness?

Both were great blessings on the pathway of God’s people through the centuries, successive steps out of the 1260 years of papal darkness. Both have been taught up until our present time by dedicated pastors who did the best they could with the ministry of preparing souls for the resurrection.

But in God’s agenda for His church, there is growth in grace and in understanding. We “follow” Jesus--never stand still. He is leading His people to get ready for His second coming. “The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day” (Prov. 4:18). “The everlasting gospel” of Revelation 14:6-15 prepares a people for that time when John saw “a white cloud, and upon the cloud one sat like unto the Son of man, . . . the harvest of the earth is ripe.” The second coming of Christ!

Arminianism tried to correct a misapprehension that grew out of Calvinism. Christ died for everybody and He wants everybody to be saved. Very true! Calvinism had drifted into the idea that some are predestinated to be lost. But Arminianism also said that the sacrifice of Christ does no one any good unless he believes. Sounds good, but “the everlasting gospel” is better news than that. When understood by the church, it delivers from the most perplexing spiritual disease of all time--lukewarmness (Rev. 3:14-21). On His cross Christ actually redeemed the world, died “every man’s” second death, gave him every blessing he has ever had including sunshine and rain and the gift of salvation. None will be lost who does not resist or disbelieve the truth.

March 3, 2005

The great theologians may wrangle over what the prophet Daniel meant, but an ordinary person is impressed with the literal fulfillment of one of his prophecies: “O Daniel, . . . [in] the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased” (12:4). Merge into the traffic on any urban freeway, or visit any electronics mart; consider these intense explosions of travel and scientific “knowledge.” Or visit any bookstore.

All the angels in heaven couldn’t drum it into your consciousness more vividly: we are living in the closing hours of “the time of the end.”

With all this “increase of knowledge,” is it reasonable that we should understand more clearly what happened on the cross when the Son of God died for the world? Should the Holy Spirit impart a greater appreciation of what it means to say, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world”? Would we be less inclined to think someone a fanatic if he is “determined to know nothing among [his congregation] save Jesus Christ and Him crucified”? (Gal. 6:14; 1 Cor. 2:2)? Luther, Calvin, Arminius, the Wesleys, did great for their day; God was with them. But this “time of the end” is the “hour of God’s judgment . . . come,” the world’s grand cosmic Day of Atonement. What is due now is not a proud triumphalism to “glory in the cross,” but a self-humbling appreciation for the agape love seen there. Now is the time to “comprehend” what Christ accomplished on His cross (Rev. 14:6, 7; Eph. 3:14-21).

March 2, 2005

Ask any group of Christians, “Why did Jesus die on His cross?” and they will tell you, “He died as our Substitute.” And that’s 100% true. But what does it mean? How does that truth make any difference in the way we live?

We say, “He died instead of us,” and that’s true; He did. If you had been drafted in the American Civil War of 1861-65, you could hire a substitute to take your place and die instead of you; now you can enjoy life while he suffers and his loved ones mourn. “My substitute has taken my place!” It’s a vicarious substitution. And you can think of the sacrifice of Christ in that same way. He died instead of you.

But is it a childish way of thinking of His cross? Is it basically egocentric?

The Bible goes far deeper: Christ’s sacrifice is also a shared substitution. “I am crucified with Christ,” says Galatians 2:20. “We were baptized into Jesus Christ, . . . baptized into His death, . . . buried with Him by baptism into death, . . . planted together with Him in the likeness of His death, . . . our old man [the love of self] crucified with Him, . . . dead with Christ.” If all this is true, then “we shall also live with Him” (Rom. 6:3-8). But only IF.

One is the kindergarten, flower-girl-at-the-wedding idea of substitution--very, very true; but the other is the bride “growing up unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13), prepared to stand with Him side by side in the “marriage of the Lamb.” It’s a time for divine-human intimacy never before realized by the body of His church.

Apparently the Bridegroom believes the time has come for His people to “grow up.” The long delay must weary Him. Does it weary you?

March 1, 2005

For centuries two great systems of thought have contended for the soul of the Christian Church--Calvinism and Arminianism. Each has viewed what Paul calls “the truth of the gospel” from a different perspective, and for sure, each has been blessed by the Lord for each sees truth that is important to understand when the earth is to be at last lightened with the glory of the final message (Rev. 18:1-4). There are sincere people who are seeking to build a bridge between the two communions of understanding.

If devotees of either regard themselves as “rich and increased with goods, in need of nothing,” they will be like the ancient scribes and Pharisees of whom Jesus said that the kingdom of God had swept over them unawares (Matt. 12:28; Luke 11:20; Rev. 3:17). Only the humble in heart who “hunger and thirst after righteousness” can be “filled.” The history of the ancient people of God has lessons that we must learn.

Paul’s “truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:5, 14) transcends both Calvinism and Arminianism as commonly understood. God has not predestined any to be lost; He has elected “all men” to be saved in that Christ died for “all men,” but any man can reject the gift already given to him. And the idea that although He died for “all,” none reap any benefits from His sacrifice, unless they believe is likewise far short of that “truth of the gospel.” Jesus says that because of the cross of Christ, the Father sends His rain and sunshine on the just and the unjust (Matt. 5:45), and He has “given,” not merely offered, the “birthright” to “every man.” But one can “despise” it and “sell” it. Don’t!

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