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  PEACE WITH GOD
  by Billy Graham
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Graham's widely read presentation of the Christian gospel written for the common
person rather than theologians, addressing the universal human hunger for peace
with God. He presents a clear understanding of Christian faith and the way of
salvation through Jesus Christ in accessible language.

  Chapters: 23

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS
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    1. 00.4. Billy Graham
    2. 00.6. Preface
    3. 01. Part One: The Problem
    4. 02.     Chapter One: The Quest
    5. 03.     Chapter Two: The Bible
    6. 04.     Chapter Three: God
    7. 05.     Chapter Four: Sin
    8. 06.     Chapter Five: The Devil
    9. 07.     Chapter Six: After Death—What?
   10. 08. Part Two: The Solution
   11. 09.     Chapter Seven: Why Jesus Came
   12. 10.     Chapter Eight: How and Where to Begin
   13. 11.     Chapter Nine: Repent
   14. 12.     Chapter Ten: Faith
   15. 13.     Chapter Eleven: The New Birth
   16. 14.     Chapter Twelve: How to be Sure
   17. 15. Part Three: The Results
   18. 16.     Chapter Thirteen: Enemies of the Christian
   19. 17.     Chapter Fourteen: Rules of the Christian Life
   20. 18.     Chapter Fifteen: The Christian and the Church
   21. 19.     Chapter Sixteen: Social Obligations of the Christian
   22. 20.     Chapter Seventeen: The Future of the Christian
   23. 21.     Chapter Eighteen: Peace — at Last

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  CHAPTER 1: 00.4. BILLY GRAHAM
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BILLY GRAHAM at the age of forty-four has preached to crowds perhaps as large as
any in the history of Christianity. Certainly the extraordinary success of his
Crusade for God in New York City marks Billy Graham as one of the most
influential religious figures of the century.

Millions hear him every day on the radio and read his syndicated newspaper
column, “My Answer.” His movies—Midcentury Crusade, Oil Town, U.S.A., and Mr.
Texas—have set a new pattern in the field of religious films.

Throughout his meteoric career, Dr. Graham has continually given the credit for
the good he has achieved to the God whom he serves.

Billy Graham’s Peace with God was originally published by Doubleday & Company,
Inc.


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  CHAPTER 2: 00.6. PREFACE
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PREFACE

Many writers of religious books direct themselves to other religious writers or
to theologians. Only on rare occasions do religious books appeal to the masses
of ordinary men and women. This book has been written not for the theologians
and philosophers but for the man in the street. My purpose is to give him a
clear understanding of a new way of life that was presented by an unknown
Galilean two thousand years ago. I have endeavored to present it in the language
of the common man, that “the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err
therein.”

I have tried to avoid those controversial subjects that have so often divided
great segments of the Christian Church from each other—but, on the other hand, I
have not bargained, parleyed, or compromised my concept of the Christian faith.

I am convinced that there is a great hunger of mind and thirst of soul on the
part of the average man for peace with God.

I am aware that this book will be criticized by some and perhaps applauded by
others. The modern-day pharisees who draw their self-righteous robes around them
will not like it; but neither will the modern-day Sadducees who deny the
foundations of our belief—this is purely intentional on my part. We have
pussyfooted long enough in our religion. With the advent of the hydrogen bomb
and the possibility of the cobalt bomb, we must come to grips with the issues of
our day. We must face the realities as they are.

Those of you who are looking for a denomination to join will find no help in
this book. I suggest you try some other shop. My object is not to get you to a
particular denomination or church—but to get you to a saving knowledge of the
Lord Jesus Christ, and to encourage, strengthen, and build up the Christian in
the most holy faith. In one sense, Peace with God has been years in the
preparing. In another sense, it was done in a few hasty and hectic weeks.
Continually there was the burning conviction that the American people needed
just such a book.

Many ideas expressed in this book are not original with me—they have been picked
up here and there across the years. If a quotation has been made and due credit
not given, it is because the source has long since been forgotten and only the
burning, convicting message of it remains.

Peace with God has literally been prepared on our knees. We have felt the
continual presence of God. My daily prayer will be that in this hour of
confusion and crisis, this book will be used to bring you to peace with God.

I am deeply grateful to all those who have counseled with me in the preparing of
Peace with God, and have read the manuscript and made many helpful suggestions.
Special thanks are due to: The Bishop of Barking, Church of England; Dr. Donald
Grey Barnhouse, Dr. Robert O. Ferm, Mr. Mark Lee, Dr. Ralph W. Mitchell, Dr.
Harold John Ockenga, Dr. Cecil Thompson, Dr. John S. Wimbish.

I also wish to thank Luverne Gustavson for her patient typing and retyping of
the manuscript. And I particularly wish to thank my loyal and faithful wife, who
has read and reread the manuscript.


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  CHAPTER 3: 01. PART ONE: THE PROBLEM
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PART ONE: THE PROBLEM


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  CHAPTER 4: 02.     CHAPTER ONE: THE QUEST
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Chapter One THE QUEST And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search
for me with all your heart. —Jeremiah 29:13.

YOU started on the Great Quest the moment you were born. It was many years
perhaps before you realized it, before it became apparent that you were
constantly searching—searching for something you never had— searching for
something that was more important than anything in life. Sometimes you have
tried to forget about it. Sometimes you have attempted to lose yourself in other
things so there could be time and thought for nothing but the business at hand.
Sometimes you may even have felt that you were freed from the need to go on
seeking this nameless thing. At moments you have almost been able to dismiss the
quest completely. But always you have been caught up in it again—always you have
had to come back to your search. At the loneliest moments in your life you have
looked at other men and women and wondered if they too were seeking—seeking
something they couldn’t describe but knew they wanted and needed. Some of them
seemed so much happier and less burdened than you. Some of them seemed to have
found fulfillment in marriage and family living. Others went off to achieve fame
and wealth in other parts of the world. Still others stayed at home and
prospered, and looking at them you may have thought: “These people are not on
the Great Quest. These people have found their way. They knew what they wanted
and have been able to grasp it. It is only I who travel this path that leads to
nowhere. It is only I who go asking, seeking, stumbling along this dark and
despairing road that has no guideposts.” But you are not alone. All mankind is
traveling with you, for all mankind is on this same quest. All humanity is
seeking the answer to the confusion, the moral sickness, the spiritual emptiness
that oppresses the world. All mankind is crying out for guidance, for comfort,
for peace.

We are told that we live in the “age of anxiety.” Historians point out that
there have been few times in all history when man has been subject to so much
fear and uncertainty. All the familiar props seem to have been swept away. We
talk of peace but are confronted by war. We devise elaborate schemes for
security but have not found it. We grasp at every passing straw and even as we
clutch, it disappears. For generations we have been running like frightened
children, up first one blind alley and then another. Each time we have told
ourselves: “This path is the right one, this one will take us where we want to
go.” But each time we have been wrong.

One of the first paths we chose was labeled “political freedom.” Give everyone
political freedom, we said, and the world will become a happy place. Let us
select our own government leaders and we shall have the kind of government that
will make life worth living. So we achieved political freedom, but we did not
achieve our better world. Our daily newspapers give us reports of corruption in
high places, of favoritism, of exploitation, of hypocrisy equal to and sometimes
surpassing the despotism of ancient kings. Political freedom is a precious and
important thing, but it alone cannot give us the kind of world we long for.

There was another very hopeful path marked “education,” and many put their whole
faith in it. Political freedom coupled with education will do the trick, they
said, and we all rushed madly along the educational path. It seemed a bright,
well-lighted, sensible path for a long time, and we traveled it with eager,
expectant feet, but where has it led us? You know the answer. We are the most
informed people in the history of civilization—and yet the most miserable. Our
high school students know more about the physical laws of the universe than the
greatest scientist in the days of Aristotle. But though our heads are crammed
with knowledge, our hearts are empty. The brightest, most inviting path of all
was the one marked “higher standards of living.” Almost everyone felt he could
trust this one to carry him automatically into that better and more joyful
world. This was felt to be the sure route. This was the “press the button and
you re there” route! This was the path that led through the beautiful full-color
magazine advertisements, past all the shining new cars, past the gleaming rows
of electric refrigerators and automatic washing machines, past all the fat
chickens cooking in brand-new copper-bottomed pots. We knew we’d hit the jackpot
this time! The other paths might have been false leads, but this time we had it!

All right, look around you right this minute. At this very moment in history you
see in America a country that has political freedom to an extent that is
undreamed of in many parts of the civilized world. You see the greatest and most
far-reaching public education system that man has ever created, and we are
eulogized at home and abroad for our high standard of living. “The American way
of life” we like to call this fully electrified, fully automatic, chrome-plated
economy of ours—but has it made us happy? Has it brought us the joy and
satisfaction and the reason for living that we were seeking?

No. As we stand here feeling smug and proud that we have accomplished so much
that generations before us only dreamed about; as we span our oceans in hours
instead of months; as we produce miracle drugs that wipe out some of man s most
dread diseases; as we erect buildings that make the Tower of Babel seem an
anthill; as we learn more and more of the mysterious secrets that lie in the
depths of the sea, and peer further and further into outer space, do we lose one
iota of that empty feeling within us? Do all these modern wonders bring us a
sense of fulfillment, do they help to explain why we are here, do they point out
what we are supposed to learn? Or does that awful hollow feeling persist? Does
every further discovery of the magnitude of the universe comfort you or make you
feel more alone and helpless than ever? Does the antidote for human fear and
hatred and corruption lie in some laboratory test tube, or in an astronomers
telescope?

We cannot deny that science has given man many things he thought he wanted. But
this same science has now presented us the most dreaded gift ever bestowed upon
humanity. The life and future of every living being on this planet is affected
by this gift of science. It stands like a somber shadow behind our waking
thoughts. It stalks like a specter of horror through our children’s dreams. We
pretend it isn’t there. We try to pretend that we haven’t received this gift,
that it’s all a joke, and that some morning we’ll wake up and find that the
H-bomb hasn’t really been invented and that the A-bomb has never been made—but
our morning newspaper tells us different.

There are other paths, of course, and many are traveling them this very moment.
There are the paths of fame and fortune, of pleasure and power. None of them
leads anywhere but deeper into the mire. We are ensnared in the web of our own
thinking, trapped so cleverly and so completely that we can no longer see either
the cause or the cure of the disease that is inflicting such deadly pain.

If it is true that “for every illness there is a cure,” then we must make haste
to find it. The sand in civilization’s hourglass is rapidly falling away, and if
there is a path that leads to the light, if there is a way back to spiritual
health, we must not lose an hour!

Many are floundering in this time of crisis and finding that their efforts are
leading them not up but only further down into the pit. Last year the American
people spent one hundred and twenty-five million dollars on fortunetellers
alone! One hundred and twenty-five million dollars given by frantic, frightened
men and women to equally misguided people, to tell them the wrong answers to
their pleading questions!

Last year over sixteen thousand Americans, who couldn’t find even the wrong
answers, took their own lives in preference to wandering any further in this
man-made jungle we call civilization.

So. “Where are we?” you ask. “Where are we now and where are we going?” Let me
tell you where we are and what we are. We are a nation of empty people. Our
heads are crammed full of knowledge, but within our souls is a spiritual vacuum.

We complain that the youth of this country has lost its drive, its push, its
willingness to work and to get ahead. Every day I hear parents say that they
don’t know what’s the matter with their children—they don’t want to make an
effort, they just want everything handed to them. Parents don’t seem to realize
that their well-educated, carefully brought up children are actually empty
inside. They aren’t filled with the spirit that makes work a joy. They aren’t
filled with the determination that makes pushing ahead a pleasure. And why are
they so empty? Because they don’t know where they’ve come from, why they’re
here, or where they’re going!

They are like rows of beautiful new automobiles, perfect in every detail but
with no gasoline in the tanks. The exteriors are fine, but there’s nothing
inside to give them power. And so they just sit and rust—rust with boredom.

America is said to have the highest per capita boredom of any spot on earth! We
know that because we have the greatest variety and greatest number of artificial
amusements of any country. People have become so empty that they can’t even
entertain themselves. They have to pay other people to amuse them, to make them
laugh, to try to make them feel warm and happy and comfortable for a few
minutes, to try to lose that awful, frightening, hollow feeling—that terrible,
dreaded feeling of being lost and alone.

You may think that boredom is a minor matter. Everyone gets bored sometimes,
it’s only natural. But let me tell you something about boredom, and this
dangerous apathy that is creeping over the land and over the minds and hearts of
the people. Man is the only one of God’s creatures who is capable of being
bored. No other living thing except man can ever be bored with itself or its
surroundings. This is very significant, for the Creator never does anything
without a purpose, and if He gave man the capacity for boredom, He did it for a
purpose.

Boredom is one of the sure ways to measure your own inner emptiness! It’s as
accurate as a thermometer for telling just how hollow your inner spirit really
is. The person who is thoroughly bored is living and working in a vacuum. His
inner self is a vacuum, and there is nothing that nature resents more than a
vacuum. It is one of the unfailing rules of this universe that all vacuums must
be filled, and filled immediately.

We do not have to go back to ancient times to see what happens to a nation of
empty people. We need look no further than the recent history of Germany, Italy,
and Russia to see with what deadly speed nature fills up the vacuums that occur
within us. Fascism and Communism can find no place in the heart and soul of a
person who is filled with the Spirit of God, but it floods with the greatest
ease into the minds and hearts of those who are empty and waiting. Nature abhors
a vacuum, but it is up to us as individuals to determine with what our inner
vacuums shall be filled. So that is where we stand today—a nation of empty
people. We have tried to fill ourselves with science and education, with better
living and pleasure, with the many other things we thought we wanted, but we are
still empty. Why are we empty? Because the Creator made us for Himself; and we
shall never find completeness and fullness apart from fellowship with Him.

Jesus told us long ago that “Man shall not live by bread alone” (Luke 4:4), but
we have paid no heed. We have gone on stuffing ourselves with bread of every
description. We have stuffed until we are sick.

We cannot stand the terrible emptiness of ourselves, we cannot look at the
lonely desolate road that lies ahead. We are desperately weary of the hatred and
greed and lust that we know are within us, but we are helpless to be rid of it
and filled with something better.

Time is of the essence. The tools of total annihilation have been placed within
our reach. We cannot scurry up any more false paths, we cannot explore any more
unknown roads, we cannot afford to be trapped in any more blind alleys. We don’t
have that much time! For our generation has accomplished what other generations
only tried to do, or dreamed of doing in their most insane moments of power and
ruthlessness! We have achieved a weapon of total destruction. We are witnessing
the climax of man s madness—the atom cleaved!

How the demons must have laughed as some of the most brilliant men on earth
worked furiously for years to achieve this horror! The atom cleaved! Divide and
conquer! Split apart, destroy, shatter, crush, crumble! He of the cloven hoof
has done his work, and men have been avid to aid him. We see before us Satan’s
masterpiece, his clever counterfeit of the cloven tongues of divine fire. For
this satanic fire and the pentecostal flames both fall from above, both are
cloven, both illuminate, both instantly transform everything they touch—but with
such a difference. The difference of heaven and hell!

We are living in a topsy-turvy world, where all is confusion. But you may be
sure that it is confusion with a plan—Satan’s plan! The Bible tells us that
Satan is the great deceiver and he has devoted himself to the cause of our great
self-deception and to the deceptions that lie between nations all over this
world. He has led us to believe that things were getting better, when they are
really getting worse. The brilliant English scholar, Dr. Henry Bett, says, “The
easygoing optimism of the go’s, when it was almost taken for granted that the
world was automatically progressing toward perfection, is impossible today. The
vague notion that education, and humanitarianism and progress’ were gradually
and inevitably leading to a kind of utopia, has been pretty well disproved by
the events of the past twenty-five years. Things are not as easy as all that.
Satan is not dead. The principalities and powers of darkness are still alive,
and the whole world still lieth in the Evil One.”

We all recognize that the world has changed radically since the beginning of
this century. We are aware of its increased tempo, of the spirit of revolution
that is sweeping away the established landmarks and traditions, of the speed
with which language, fashions, customs, housing, and our ways of living and
thinking are being altered and changed.

Only a few years ago children were delighted at the prospect of a trip to the
wharves to see the great ships come in. Today they are blase about helicopters
and jet planes. We who once marveled at the telegraph, now take the far greater
miracle of television for granted. Not so long ago many of mans physical
diseases were termed hopeless and incurable. Today, we have drugs so effective
that many age-old diseases are becoming rare. We have accomplished much, of that
there is no doubt. But with all this progress, man has not solved the basic
problem of the human race. We can build the highest buildings, the fastest
ships, the longest bridges—but we still can t govern ourselves or live together
in equality and peace!

We may create vast new schools of art and music, we may discover newer and
better vitamins, but there is nothing new about our troubles. They are the same
old ones that man has always had, only they seem magnified and more abundant.
They may come upon us in new ways, they may seem to give sharper pain and deeper
anguish; but fundamentally we are facing the same temptations, the same trials,
the same testings that have always confronted mankind. For ever since that
tragic moment in the Garden of Eden, when man gave up God’s will for his own
will, man has been plagued by the same problems. Their cause is stated in the
first chapter of Genesis. The terrible conditions that produced them are related
in the first chapter of Romans. And the gospel of Jesus Christ gives us their
remedy.

It is man’s depraved and sinful nature that fills him with hate, envy, greed,
and jealousy. The curse of sin is upon his body and he is forever haunted by the
fear of death. His inventive genius has enabled him to change everything but
himself. For man, in spite of the loudly acclaimed “progress” of our times,
remains just as he was in the beginning.

Sin, too, has remained unchanged, although man has done his best to alter it.
We’ve tried to dress it up with other names. We’ve put new labels on the same
old bottle of poison. We’ve tried to whitewash the old barn and pretend it was
another building.

We’ve tried calling sin “errors” or “mistakes” or “poor judgment,” but sin
itself has stayed the same. No matter how we try to salve our conscience, we’ve
known all along that men are still sinners; and the results of sin are still
disease, disappointment, disillusionment, despair, and death.

Sorrow hasn’t changed, either. It began when Adam and Eve looked with broken
hearts upon the lifeless body of their murdered son Abel and knew the crushing
weight of grief. It has gone on, until today sorrow is the universal language of
man. No one escapes it, everyone experiences it. It even seemed to one of Job’s
comforters that it was the aim of life, for he said, “Yet man is born unto
trouble, as the sparks fly upward” (Job 5:7).

Death is also still the same. Men have tried to change its appearance. We have
changed the word “undertaker” to “mortician.” We place bodies in “caskets” now
instead of “coffins.” We have “funeral homes” instead of “undertaking parlors”
and “memorial parks” instead of “cemeteries.” We try to soften the starkness of
the last rites; but regardless of what we call it, or how we rouge the cheeks,
the cold, hard, cruel reality of death has not changed throughout all of man s
history.

These three facts constitute the true story of man: his past is filled with sin;
his present is overflowing with sorrow; and the certainty of death faces him in
the future. The Bible says, “It is appointed unto men once to die” (Hebrews
9:27), and to the average person this seems a stark and hopeless situation.
Hundreds of philosophies and scores of religions have been invented by men in
their efforts to circumvent the Word of God. Modern philosophers and
psychologists are still trying to make it appear that there is some way out
other than the path of Jesus. But man has tried them all and none of them leads
anywhere but down.

Christ came to give us the answers to the three enduring problems of sin,
sorrow, and death. It is Jesus Christ, and He alone, who is also enduring and
unchanging, “the same yesterday, and today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). All
other things may change, but Christ remains unchangeable. In the restless sea of
human passions, Christ stands steadfast and calm, ready to welcome all who will
turn to Him and accept the blessings of safety and peace. For we are living in
an age of grace, in which God promises that whosoever will may come and receive
His Son. But this period of grace will not go on indefinitely. We are even now
living on borrowed time.


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  CHAPTER 5: 03.     CHAPTER TWO: THE BIBLE
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Chapter Two THE BIBLE Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not
pass away. —Matthew 24:35.

TIME is running out. The seconds are ticking away toward midnight. The human
race is about to take the fatal plunge. Which way shall we turn? Is there any
authority left? Is there a path we can follow? Is there any light penetrating
the Stygian darkness? Can we find a codebook that will give us the key to our
dilemmas? Is there any source of authority to which we can turn? Have we just
been placed here by some unknown creator or force without any clue as to where
we came from, why we are here, and where we are going? The answer is, No. We do
have a codebook. We do have a key. We do have authoritative source material. It
is found in the ancient and historic Book we call the Bible. This Book has come
down to us through the ages. It has passed through so many hands, appeared in so
many forms —and survived attack of every kind. Neither barbaric vandalism nor
civilized scholarship has touched it. Neither the burning of fire nor the
laughter of skepticism has accomplished its annihilation. Through the many dark
ages of man, its glorious promises have survived unchanged.

Now, as we approach what appears to be another decisive hour in world history,
let us re-examine this indestructible Book of wisdom and prophecy; let us find
out why this particular volume has endured and been mans unfailing source of
faith and spiritual strength.

There are those who regard the Bible principally as the history of Israel.
Others admit that it sets forth the soundest ethics ever enunciated. But these
things, important as they are, are only incidental to the real theme of the
Bible, which is the story of God’s redemption as it exists in Jesus Christ.
Those who read the Scriptures as magnificent literature, breath-taking poetry or
history, and overlook the story of salvation, miss the Bible’s real meaning and
message.

God caused the Bible to be written for the express purpose of revealing to man
God’s plan for his redemption. God caused this Book to be written that He might
make His everlasting laws clear to His children, and that they might have His
great wisdom to guide them and His great love to comfort them as they make their
way through life. For without the Bible, this world would indeed be a dark and
frightening place, without signpost or beacon. The Bible easily qualifies as the
only book in which God’s revelation is contained. There are many bibles of
different religions; there is the Mohammedan Koran, the Buddhist Canon of Sacred
Scripture, the Zororastrian Zendavesta, and the Brahman Vedas. All of these have
been made accessible to us by reliable translations, and we may judge of their
value. It is soon discovered that all these non-Christian bibles are all
developments in the wrong direction. They all begin with some flashes of true
light, and end in utter darkness. Even the most casual observer soon discovers
that the Bible is radically different. It is the only Book that offers man a
redemption and points the way out of his dilemmas.

Sixteen hundred years were needed to complete the writing of the Bible. It is
the work of more than thirty authors, each of whom acted as a scribe to God.
These men, many of whom lived generations apart, did not set down merely what
they thought or hoped. They acted as channels for God’s dictation; they wrote as
He directed them; and under His divine inspiration they were able to see the
great and enduring truths, and to record them that other men might see and know
them too.

During these sixteen hundred years, the sixty-six books of the Bible were
written by men of different languages, living in different times, and in
different countries; but the message they wrote was one. God spoke to each man
in his own language, in his own time, but His message basically in each case was
the same. When the great scholars gathered together the many ancient manuscripts
written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek, and translated them into a single modern
tongue, they found that God’s promises remain unchanged, His great message to
man had not varied. As we read these ageless words today, we find that the rules
of conduct set forth by the ancient scribes are as fresh and meaningful to this
generation as they were to the people of Jesus’ time.

It is small wonder, then, that the Bible has always been the world’s best
seller! No other book can touch its profound wisdom, its poetic beauty, or the
accuracy of its history and prophecy. Its critics, who claimed it to be filled
with forgery, fiction, and unfilled promises, are finding that the difficulties
lie with themselves, and not the Bible. Greater and more careful scholarship has
shown that apparent contradictions were caused by incorrect translations rather
than divine inconsistencies. It was man and not the Bible that needed
correcting. And yet—in many homes and among so-called educated people—it has
become fashionable to joke about the Bible and to regard it more as a dust
catcher than as the living Word of God. When asked by her minister if she knew
what was in the Bible, one little girl proudly replied that she knew everything
that was in it, and proceeded to list “the picture of her sisters boy friend,
the recipe for mother’s favorite hand lotion, a lock of baby brother s hair, and
the ticket for Pa’s watch!” That was all she knew about the family Bible. Too
many families have used the Bible as a safe storage place for old letters and
pressed flowers, and have overlooked entirely the help and assurance that God
intended this Book to give them. This attitude is changing now, and changing
fast! Life is being stripped of its artificialities, its meaningless trimmings.
The false promises that man has made to man are standing forth now as the
glaring errors they are. As we cast our frightened eyes around for something
that is real and true and enduring, we are turning once more to this ancient
Book that has given consolation, comfort, and salvation to millions in the
centuries past.

Yes, people are “discovering” the Bible again! They are dusting off their old
copies or buying new ones. They are finding the familiar but almost forgotten
phrases ring with a current meaning that makes them seem to have been written
only yesterday. This is because the Bible embodies all the knowledge man needs
to fill the longing of his soul and solve all his problems. It is the blueprint
of the Master Architect, and only by following its directions can we build the
life we are seeking.

Here in America we have another great document that we value and respect. It was
written almost one hundred and fifty years ago by a number of men who labored
long and debated even longer over its many provisions, and finally sent it to
the thirteen federated states for ratification. The men who framed our
Constitution knew they were writing the basic document for a government of free
men; they recognized that men could live as free and independent beings only if
each one knew and understood the law. They were to know their rights, their
privileges, and their limitations. They were to stand as equals before the court
of law and few judges could be unfair; for the judge, too, was bound by the same
law and required to try each case accordingly.

While the rest of the world watched this great human experiment, men found that
if they knew the law and lived according to it, they could, in truth, be free! A
man could know just where he stood. He had his Constitutional rights and he also
had his Constitutional responsibilities. If he neglected one, the other would
suffer—as so many negligent voters who came later were to discover when they
found themselves saddled with governmental restrictions they didn’t like!

Just as America has grown and prospered within the framework of our
Constitution, so Christianity has flourished and spread according to the laws
set forth in the Bible. Just as the Constitution was intended to apply equally
to all men living under it, without special favor or interpretation, so the
Bible stands as the supreme Constitution for all mankind, its laws applying
equally to all who five under its domain, without exception or special
interpretation. As the Constitution is the highest law of the land, so the Bible
is the highest law of God. For it is in the Bible that God sets forth His
spiritual laws. It is in the Bible that God makes His enduring promises. It is
in the Bible that God reveals the plan of redemption for the human race. In the
wonders of nature we see God’s laws in operation. Who has not looked up at the
stars on a cloudless night, and marveled in silent awe at the glory of God’s
handiwork? Who has not felt his heart lifted in the spring of the year, as he
sees all creation bursting with new life and vigor? In the beauty and abundance
around us we see the magnitude of God’s power and the infinite detail of His
planning; but nature tells us nothing of God’s love or God’s grace. We do not
find the promise of our personal salvation in nature.

Conscience tells us in our innermost being of the presence of God and of the
moral difference between good and evil; but this is a fragmentary message, in no
way as distinct and comprehensive as the lessons of the Bible. It is only in its
pages that we find the clear and unmistakable message upon which all true
Christianity is based.

Christianity finds all its doctrines stated in the Bible, and the true Christian
denies no part, nor attempts to add anything to the Word of God. While the
Constitution of the United States may be amended from time to time, no amendment
is ever necessary for the Bible. We truly believe that the men who wrote the
Bible were guided by the Holy Spirit, both in the thoughts they expressed and in
their choice of words. As Peter said, “For the prophecy came not in old time by
the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost”
(2 Peter 1:21).

Paul tells us that “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is
profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all
good works” (2 Timothy 3:16-17). In setting down their forthright messages,
Biblical scribes have never attempted to gloss over the realities of life. The
sins of the great and small are freely admitted, the weaknesses of human nature
are acknowledged, and life in Biblical times is recorded as it was lived. The
startling thing is that the lives and motivations of these people who lived so
long ago have such a modern flavor! As we read, the pages seem like mirrors held
up before our own minds and hearts, reflecting our prides and prejudices, our
own failures and humiliations, our own sins and sorrows.

Truth is timeless. Truth does not differ from one age to another, from one
people to another, from one geographical location to another. Men’s ideas may
differ, men’s customs may change, men’s moral codes may vary, but the great
all-prevailing truth stands for time and eternity. The message of Jesus Christ,
our Savior, is the story of the Bible—it is the story of salvation. Profound
students of the Bible have traced the story of Jesus Christ from the beginning
of the Old Testament, for He is the true theme of the Old as well as the New
Testament.

He appears in Genesis as the Seed of the Woman. In Exodus, He is the Passover
Lamb. In Leviticus, He is the Atoning Sacrifice. In Numbers, He is the Smitten
Rock. In Deuteronomy, He is the Prophet. In Joshua, He is the Captain of the
Lord’s Hosts. In Judges, He is the Deliverer. In Ruth, He is the Heavenly
Kinsman. In the six books of Kings, He is the Promised King. In Nehemiah, He is
the Restorer of the nation. In Esther, He is the Advocate. In Job, He is my
Redeemer. In Psalms, He is my All and in All. In Proverbs, He is my Pattern. In
Ecclesiastes, He is my Goal. In the Song of Solomon, He is my Satisfier. In the
Prophets, He is the Coming Prince of Peace. In the Gospels, He is Christ coming
to seek and to save. In Acts, He is Christ risen. In the Epistles, He is Christ
at the Father’s right hand. In the Revelation, He is Christ returning and
reigning. This is the eternal message of the Bible. It is the story of life,
peace, eternity, and heaven. The Bible has no hidden purpose. It has no need for
special interpretation. It has a single, clear, bold message for every living
being— the message of Christ and His offer of peace with God.

One day upon a mountain near Capernaum Jesus sat with His disciples. They
gathered before Him. Perhaps Peter on one side and John on the other. Jesus may
have looked quietly and tenderly at each of these devoted disciples, looked at
them the way a loving parent looks at the members of his family—loving each
child separately, loving each one for a special reason, loving them in such a
way that each child feels singled out and individually embraced. That is how
Jesus must have loved His disciples. The little group must have become very
reverent under His serene and loving gaze. They must have become very still
within themselves with the feeling that something momentous was about to be
said, something they must remember, something they must be able to transmit to
others all over the world who were not privileged, as they were, to hear these
words from the Master s own lips. For there, on the mountain, standing perhaps
under the silvery gray-green leaves of an olive tree, Jesus preached the
greatest sermon that human ears have ever heard. He explained the essence of
Christian living. When he was through and a holy hush had settled on His
wide-eyed listeners, they “were astonished at His doctrine: for He taught them
as one having authority, and not as the scribes” (Matthew 7:2; Matthew 7:8;
Matthew 7:29).

Indeed He did teach with authority, the authority of God Himself; and the rules
He set forth were God’s own rules, the ones which every Christian with the hope
of salvation in his heart must follow.

If you do not have a Bible in your home, go out and get one now—get the one that
suits you best, get the size that is most comfortable for you to handle, get the
kind of type that is most pleasant for you to read, and then settle down and
find out for yourself why this one Book has endured. Find out for yourself why
it answers every human need, why it supplies the faith and strength that keeps
humanity marching forward.

If you and the Bible have had a long absence from each other, it might be well
for you to renew your acquaintance by reading again the Gospel of John. While
this is considered one of the most profound books in the Bible, it is also the
clearest and most readily understood. It was written for the very purpose of
showing the how and the why of man’s salvation, so that the questions of the
mind as well as the gropings of the heart might be satisfied.

After reading the Book of John, you might acquaint yourself with the Gospel as
taught by Mark, Luke, and Matthew, noting how these men of widely different
personalities and writing styles set forth the eternal story of redemption
through Jesus. You will become aware of the powerful, universal truth that
underlies all gospel teaching and be impressed anew with what Paul meant when he
said, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8).
When you have read each of the Gospels individually, start in at the beginning
of the New Testament and read straight through all the books in order. When you
have done that, you will have developed such a taste for Bible reading, you will
have found it such a fountain of inspiration, such a practical counselor and
guide, such a treasure chest of sound advice, that you will make Bible reading a
part of your daily life. A knowledge of the Bible is essential to a rich and
meaningful life. For the words of this Book have a way of filling in the missing
pieces, of bridging the gaps, of turning the tarnished colors of our life to
jewel-like brilliance. Learn to take your every problem to the Bible. Within its
pages you will find the correct answer. But most of all, the Bible is a
revelation of the nature of God. The philosophers of the centuries have
struggled with the problem of a Supreme Being. Who is He? What is He? Where is
He? If there is such a Person, is He interested in me? If so, how can I know
Him? These and a thousand other questions about God are revealed in this Holy
Book we call the Bible.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 6: 04.     CHAPTER THREE: GOD
========================================================================

Chapter Three

GOD Canst thou by searching find out God? —Job 11:7 WHO is God? What is He like?
How can we be sure He exists? When did He begin? Can we know Him?

Everyone has asked these questions either aloud or to himself, for we cannot
look at the world around us and not wonder about its creation. We are daily
faced with the miracle of life and the mystery of death, of the glory of
flowering trees, the magnificence of the star-filled sky, the magnitude of
mountains and of sea. Who made all this? Who conceived the law of gravity by
which everything is held in its proper place? Who ordered the day and the night
and the regular procession of the seasons? The only possible answer is that all
these things and many more are the work of a Supreme Creator. As a watch must
have a designer, so our precision-like universe has a Great Designer. We call
Him God. His is a name with whom the whole human race is familiar. From earliest
childhood we have breathed His name. The Bible declares that the God we talk
about, the God we sing about, the God “from whom all blessings flow!” is the God
who created this world and placed us in it. But “Who is He?” you ask. “Where is
He?” We all know His name. We call upon Him in our hours of greatest difficulty
and trial. Many of us try to let the thought of Him fill our every waking
moment. Others say they don t believe in Him, that He doesn’t exist. And still
others say, “Explain Him to me and maybe I’ll accept God.”

If that is how you feel, if all your life you have been hearing about God and
talking about God, but waiting for someone to explain God to you before you
could put your faith in Him, and Him alone, let us see just how concrete a
description the Bible can give us. At this crucial point in world history,
everyone should be seeking an answer to the question, “What is God like?”
Everyone should ask it, and everyone should make very sure of the answer.
Everyone should know beyond a shadow of a doubt exactly who God is and what He
is capable of accomplishing.

It is the absence of the knowledge of God and man’s refusal to obey Him that
lies at the root of every problem that besets us. It is mans confusion about
God’s plan that has the world in chaos. It is man’s unwillingness to learn and
to obey God’s laws that has laid such a heavy burden on our soul. So let us
learn all that we can about Him. Where shall we go for this knowledge? Who among
us can tell us the truth? Are we not all finite creatures here together? Has God
designated any one person here on earth to speak with final authority about Him?
No—the one man who could do that lived two thousand years ago, and we crucified
Him! How then, are we to find out?

We can ask the learned scholars, and they may tell us that God is the expression
of everything that is in nature and life, that all living beings are one with
God, that life itself is an expression of His Divine Being. They will tell you
that you can see God in the tiniest drop of water and in the great arch of the
sky above.

Ask a philosopher, and he will tell you that God is the original and immutable
force behind all creation, that He is the Master Dynamo that keeps all the
worlds in motion —that He is the Power without beginning or end. The philosopher
will say that every bit of life and beauty that we see is a manifestation of
this power that flows in an unending current out from the Dynamo and back again.

Ask still further and you may be told that God is absolute, that He is All in
All, and that no one can possibly know any more about Him. There are many
different definitions for God. Every country, every race of people, every
family, every individual has tried to explain the Great Being behind the
universe. Men of all ages have tried to discover the Creator whose work they
saw, but whom they knew not. Which of these varied explanations is right? Which
of these many theories are we to accept? By which of these self-appointed
authorities are we to be guided? As we have already seen in our previous
chapter, God has revealed Himself in the Book we call the Bible. If we believe
that in the Bible we have a revelation of God, then our minds can be completely
satisfied and our hearts completely filled. We can rest assured that we have the
correct answer, that we are on our way to knowing and understanding the true
nature of God.

God reveals Himself in hundreds of ways in the Bible, and if we read the Bible
as carefully and as regularly as we read the daily papers, we would be as
familiar with and as well informed about God as we are about our favorite
player’s batting average during baseball season! As a diamond has many facets,
so there are innumerable aspects of God’s revelation of Himself which would take
volumes to fill. Suffice it to say, with our limited space we can cover four
aspects of God’s revelation of Himself which seem to be the most significant,
and which we should carry with us always.

First: the Bible declares God to be Spirit. Jesus talking to the woman at the
Well of Sychar made this straightforward statement about God: “God is Spirit”
(John 4:24).

What do you think of when you hear the word spirit? What mental image does it
bring to your mind? Do you think of a wisp of vapor drifting across the sky?
Does spirit mean the sort of thing that frightens children on Halloween? Is
spirit just a formless nothingness to you? Do you think that was what Jesus
meant when He said, “God is Spirit?” To discover what “spirit” really is, and
what Jesus meant when He used that particular word, we must turn again to the
Bible to the scene where Christ after His resurrection says: “Handle Me, and
see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see Me have” (Luke 24:39).
Therefore we can be sure that spirit is without body. It is the exact opposite
of body. Yet it has being and power. This is difficult for us to understand
because we are trying to understand it with finite, body-limited minds. As human
beings deprived of the unlimited vision that God originally intended His
creatures to have, we cannot comprehend the glory and the magnitude of the
Spirit that lies so far outside ourselves. When we hear the word “spirit,” we
immediately try to reduce it to our puny size, to make it fit within the scope
of our small minds. It is like trying to explain the sweep and majesty and
awe-inspiring grandeur of the ocean to a person who has never seen a body of
water larger than a mud puddle! How can such a person envision the boundless
sea? How can such a person, looking into a shallow, murky pool, fathom the
bottomless depths, the mysterious life, the surging power, the ceaseless roll,
the terrible ruthlessness of ocean storm or the all-surpassing beauty of ocean
calm? How could anyone who had looked only into a mud puddle know what you were
talking about? What words could you use to give a convincing picture of the
mighty sea? How could you make him believe that such a wonder really exists?

How infinitely more difficult it is for us to grasp what Jesus meant when He
said: “God is Spirit.” Jesus knew! His mind was not limited as ours are limited.
His eyes were not focused on the mud puddle of life. He knew full well the
borderless reaches of the Spirit, and He came to try to give us some
understanding of its wonders, its comfort, and its peace.

We do know that the spirit is not something that is bound in a body. Spirit is
not wearable as a body. Spirit is not changeable as a body. The Bible declares
that God is such a Spirit—that He is not limited to body; He is not limited to
shape; He is not limited to boundaries or bonds; He is absolutely immeasurable
and undiscernable by eyes that can see only physical things. The Bible tells us
that because He has no such limitations He can be everywhere at once, that He
can hear all, see all, and know all.

We cant do that, and so we try to limit God as we are limited. We try to deny
God the power to do things we can’t do. We try to say that because we cant be
everywhere at once, God can t be, either! We are rather like the person who,
having heard about the ocean, finally makes his way to the beach one day and
going down to the edge of the water, scoops up a few drops and holds them in his
hands.

“Ah,” he exclaims, “at last I have made the ocean mine! I hold the ocean in my
hands, I possess it!” True, he does have a part of the ocean, but at the same
moment other people on a thousand other shores may be reaching down and claiming
a few drops of the ocean for themselves. The world’s millions could come down to
the beach and reach out their hands to be filled with sea water. They could each
take as much as they wanted, as much as they needed—and still the ocean would
remain unchanged. Its mightiness and power would be the same, the life in its
unfathomable depths would continue unaltered, although it had supplied the needs
of every single person standing with outstretched hands along its many shores.
So it is with God. He can be everywhere at once, heeding the prayers of all who
call out in the name of Christ; performing the mighty miracles that keep the
stars in their places and the plants bursting up through the earth and the fish
swimming in the sea. There is no limit to God. There is no limit to His wisdom.
There is no limit to His power. There is no limit to His love. There is no limit
to His mercy.

If you have been trying to limit God—stop it! Don’t try to confine Him or His
works to any single place or sphere. You wouldn’t try to limit the ocean. You
wouldn’t be bold enough to try to change the course of the moon, or to stop the
earth as it turns on its axis! How everlastingly more foolish it is to try to
limit the God who created and controls all these wonders!

I am eternally grateful to my mother for many things, but one of the most
enduring blessings she brought into my life was to teach me at the age of ten
that “God is a Spirit, Infinite, Eternal, and Unchangeable.” That definition of
God has been with me all my life, and when a man knows in his heart that God is
an Infinite, Eternal, and Unchanging Spirit, it helps to overcome the temptation
to limit Him. It helps to overcome all doubt about His ability to accomplish
things that you can t do yourself!

Some who doubt that the Bible is the true Word of God, doubt it because they are
unwilling to ascribe to God anything they cannot themselves achieve. If you have
any uncertainty about the inspiration of the Bible, go back and look at it
again. Look at it in the fight of a person who has been staring at a mud puddle
all his life, and who is confronted for the first time by a view of the ocean!
Perhaps you are only now catching your first glimpse of God’s unlimited power.
Perhaps you are only now beginning to understand Him for what He actually is.
For if God is the Spirit that Jesus declares Him to be, there is no problem of
providence, there is no problem of His sovereignty in the affairs of men, there
is no problem of His inspiration of the men who wrote the Bible. Everything fits
into place once you understand who and what God really is.

Second: the Bible reveals Him as a Person. All through the Bible it says: “God
loves,” “God says,” “God does.” Everything that we attribute to a person is
attributed to God. A person is one who feels, thinks, wishes, desires, and has
all the expressions of personality.

Here on earth we confine personality to the body. Our finite minds cannot
envision personality that is not manifested through flesh and bones. We know
that our own personalities will not always be clothed in the bodies they now
inhabit. We know that at the moment of death our personalities will leave our
bodies and go on to the destinations that await them. We know all this—yet it is
difficult for us to accept it.

What a revelation if we could all realize that personality does not have to be
identified with a physical being. God is not bound by a body, yet He is a
Person. He feels, He thinks, He loves, He forgives, He sympathizes with the
problems and sorrows that we face.

Third: the Bible states that God is not only a Spirit and a Person, but God is a
Holy and Righteous Being. From Genesis to Revelation, God reveals Himself as a
Holy God. He is utterly perfect and absolute in every detail. He is too holy to
touch sinful man, too holy to endure sinful living. He is a Holy and a Perfect
God.

If we could envision the true picture of His majestic righteousness, what a
difference it would make in the way we live as individuals and as nations! If we
could once realize the tremendous gulf that separates unrighteous man from God’s
perfect righteousness, the world could be changed overnight! The Scripture
declares Him to be the Light in whom there is no darkness at all—the one Supreme
Being without flaw or blemish.

Here again is a difficult concept for imperfect man to understand. We, whose
faults and weaknesses are everywhere apparent, can scarcely imagine the
overwhelming holiness of God—but we must recognize it if we are to understand
and benefit from the Bible. The chasm that separates imperfect man from perfect
God is emphasized all through the Scriptures. We see it in the division of the
Tabernacle and the Temple into the Holy and Most Holy places. It is pointed out
in the prescribed offering that must be brought if a sinner would approach God.
It is underscored by a special priesthood to mediate between God and the people.
It was emphasized by the laws concerning impurity in the Book of Leviticus. We
see it in the many feasts of Israel, by the isolation of Israel in Palestine.
The Holiness of God regulates all other principles of God. The Scripture
declares that His throne is established on the basis of His holiness. It is
because God is holy and man is unholy that so wide a rift exists between God and
the unrepentant sinner. The Bible tells us that our iniquities have separated us
from God—separated us so completely that His face is hidden from us and He will
not hear us when we call. For God is too pure to look with approval upon evil.
He is too holy to have any traffic with sin. Before sin entered into the human
race, God and man had fellowship with each other. Now that fellowship is broken,
and all communication between God and man is lost outside of Jesus Christ. It is
only through Jesus Christ that man can ever again re-establish His fellowship
with God.

Man by himself is a sinner, powerless to change his position, powerless to reach
the pure ear of God with his own sinful tongue. Man would have remained forever
lost if God in His infinite mercy had not sent His Son to earth to bridge this
gulf.

It is in God’s holiness that we find the reason for the death of Christ. His
holiness demanded the most exacting penalty for sin, and His love provided Jesus
Christ to pay this penalty and provide man with salvation. Because the God we
worship is a pure God, a holy God, a just and righteous God, He sent us His only
begotten Son to make it possible for us to have access to Him. But if we ignore
the help He has sent, if we fail to obey the laws He has set forth, we cannot
cry out to Him for mercy when the punishment we deserve falls upon us!

Fourth: God is Love. But as with the other attributes of God, many persons who
do not read their Bibles fail to recognize what is meant when the Scriptures
say: “God is love” (John 4:8).

We aren’t always sure ourselves what we mean when we use the term love. That
word has become one of the most widely misused words in our language. We use the
word love to describe the basest as well as the most exalted of human
relationships. We say we “love” to travel; we “love” to eat chocolate cake; we
“love” our new car, or the pattern in the wallpaper in our home. Why, we even
say we “love” our neighbors—but most of us don’t do much more than just say it
and let it go at that! No wonder we don’t have a very clear idea of what the
Bible means when it says: “God is Love.”

Don’t make the mistake of thinking that because God is Love that everything is
going to be sweet, beautiful, and happy and that no one will be punished for his
sins. God’s holiness demands that all sin be punished, but God’s love provides
the plan and way of redemption for sinful man. God’s love provided the cross of
Jesus, by which man can have forgiveness and cleansing. It was the love of God
that sent Jesus Christ to the cross!

Never question God’s great love, for it is as unchangeable a part of God as is
His holiness. No matter how black your sins, God loves you. Were it not for the
love of God, none of us would ever have a chance in the future life. But God is
Love! And His love for us is everlasting! “But God commendeth His love toward
us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). The
promises of God’s love and forgiveness are as real, as sure, as positive as
human words can make them. But like describing the ocean, its total beauty
cannot be understood until it is actually seen. It is the same with God’s love.
Until you actually accept it, until you actually experience it, until you
actually possess true peace with God, no one can describe its wonders to you.

It is not something that you do with your mind. Your finite mind is not capable
of dealing with anything as great as the love of God. Your mind might have
difficulty explaining how a black cow can eat green grass and give white
milk—but you drink the milk and are nourished by it. Your mind can t reason
through all the intricate processes that take place when you plant a small flat
seed that produces a huge vine bearing luscious red and green watermelons—but
you eat them and enjoy them! Your mind can’t explain the electricity that may be
creating the fight by which you are reading at this very moment— but you know
that it’s there and that it is making it possible for you to read!

You have to receive God by faith—by faith in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And
when that happens, there isn’t any room for doubt. You don’t have to question
whether or not God is in your heart, you can know it.

Whenever anyone asks me how I can be so certain about who and what God really
is, I am reminded of the story of the little boy who was out flying a kite. It
was a fine day for kite flying, the wind was brisk and large billowy clouds were
blowing across the sky. The kite went up and up until it was entirely hidden by
the clouds.

“What are you doing?” a man asked the little boy.

“I’m flying a kite,” he replied.

“Flying a kite, are you?” the man said. “How can you be sure? You can’t see your
kite.”

“No,” said the boy, “I can’t see it, but every little while I feel a tug, so I
know for sure that it’s there!”

Don’t take anyone else’s word for God. Find Him for yourself, and then you too
will know by the wonderful, warm tug on your heartstrings that He is there for
sure.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 7: 05.     CHAPTER FOUR: SIN
========================================================================

Chapter Four

SIN For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God. —Romans 3:23

IF GOD is a righteous and loving Being, why then is there so much wickedness,
suffering and sorrow? How did all this hatred come to be? Why have we created
false idols? Why do we worship at the shrines of war and greed and
self-interest? How did the human race, which God made in His own image, sink so
deep into depravity that the Ten Commandments had to be set forth with the
demand that they be kept? Why did God have to send His own Son to save us? How
did God’s creatures become so filled with lust and evil? To understand it, to
see clearly why nation is pitted against nation, why families are divided, why
every newspaper is filled with reports of violent, insane acts of brutality and
hate, we must go back to the very beginning. We must go back to the story of
Adam in the Garden, back to the first chapter of Genesis.

Some people say that this familiar story of creation is only a myth. They say it
is but a simple way to explain an unanswerable question to children. But this is
not so. The Bible tells us exactly what happened in the beginning and why man
has moved steadily along the path of his own destruction ever since. For God
created this world as a perfect whole. He created the beautiful, harmonious
world that man threw away—the perfect world that we are longing to find again,
the world for which we are all searching. In this perfect world God placed a
perfect man. Adam was perfect because nothing that God does can ever be less
than perfect, and upon this perfect man God bestowed the most precious of all
gifts—the gift of freedom. God gave to man the freedom of choice. The first man
was no cave dweller—no jibbering, grunting, growling creature of the forest
trying to subdue the perils of the jungle and the beasts of the field. Adam was
created full-grown with every mental and physical faculty developed. He walked
with God and had fellowship with Him. He was intended to be as a king on earth,
ruling by the will of God.

This, then, was Adam’s position as he stood in the Garden, the perfect man, the
first man, and the only earthly creature to whom God had ever given the
priceless gift of freedom. Adam had total freedom—freedom to choose or to
reject, freedom to obey God’s commands or to go contrary to them, freedom to
make himself happy or miserable. For it is not the mere possession of freedom
that makes life satisfying—it is what we choose to do with our freedom that
determines whether or not we shall find peace with ourselves and with God. This
is the real heart of the problem, for the moment a man is given freedom he is
faced by two paths. Freedom is meaningless if there is only one possible path to
follow. Freedom implies the right to choose, to select, to determine one’s
individual course of action.

We all know men and women who are honest, not so much from free choice, but
because they have no opportunity to be dishonest. We all know people who pride
themselves on being good, when it is actually their surroundings and way of life
that keep them from being bad. We cannot take credit for resisting temptation if
no temptation is placed before us!

God gave Adam no such handicap. He granted him freedom of choice and He gave him
every opportunity to exercise it. Because God could do nothing that was less
than perfect, He provided Adam with the perfect setting in which to prove
whether or not he would serve God. As Adam stood there in the Garden he was
without sin, his innocence was without blemish. The whole universe lay before
him. The as yet unwritten history of the human race stretched like a great sheet
of purest parchment beneath his hand, waiting for him to write the opening
chapter—waiting for him to determine which road future generations would take.

God had completed His work. He had created an earthly garden, rich in everything
that man might need. He had created a perfect man in His own likeness. He had
endowed this man with a mind and a soul, and given him complete freedom to use
his mind and to dispose of his soul as he saw fit. Then, like the wise Parent
that He was, God waited to see what choice this child of His would make. This
was the test! This was the moment when Adam would use his free will to choose
the right path or the wrong path—choose it because he wanted to, and not because
there was only one path open to him!

He made his choice. He suffered the consequences of it, and he set the pattern
that all humanity was to follow.

“Therefore, as by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to
condemnation” (Romans 5:18). For Adam was the fountainhead of the human race. He
sprang like a crystal-clear spring from the ground, and was permitted to choose
whether he would become a river running through pleasant and productive green
pastures, or a muddy torrent forever dashing against rocks and churning between
deep, sunless cliffs—cold and miserable in itself, and unable to bring joy and
fruitfulness to the surrounding land.

God is not to blame for the tragic snarl in which the world has so long found
itself. The fault lies squarely with Adam—Adam who was given his choice and who
chose to listen to the lies of the Tempter rather than to the truth of God! The
history of the human race from that day to this has been the story of mans
futile effort to gain back the position that was lost by Adam’s fall!

“But this is unfair!” you may say. “Why should we suffer today, because the
first man sinned away back in the furthest reaches of time? Why hasn’t mankind
recovered during the intervening years? Why should we go on being punished every
day of our lives?”

Let us turn again to the story of the river—the cold, dark river that runs at
the bottom of the deep, dreary gorge. Why doesn’t this river make its way back
up to the warm, pleasant fields that lie above it? Why doesn’t it leave its
mournful route and become the happy, bubbling stream it was when it burst
spontaneously from the earth?

It doesn’t, because it cant. It has no power within itself to do other than it
has always done. Once it has plunged down the steep banks into darkness, it
cannot lift itself again to the bright, sunny land above. The means by which it
could be lifted exists, the way is at hand, but the river does not understand
how to make use of it. A miracle stands ever ready to bring the river of
humanity out of its misery and to place it once more in the warm valley of
peace, but the river doesn’t see or heed it. It feels that it can do nothing but
continue on its tortuous way until it finally loses itself in the sea of
destruction. The story of the river is the story of man since the time of Adam,
winding, twisting, plunging ever deeper into the frightening darkness. Though we
lift up our voices and cry out for help, still we deliberately choose— as Adam
did—the wrong way. In our despair we turn against God and blame Him for our
dilemma. We question His wisdom and judgment. We find fault with His mercy and
love.

We forget that Adam was the head of the human race, even as in this country our
President is the head of our government. When the President acts, it is really
the American people acting through him. When the President makes a decision,
that decision stands as the decision of the entire people.

Adam stands as the federal head of the human race. When he failed, when he
succumbed to temptation and fell, the generations yet unborn fell with him, for
the Bible states very clearly that the results of Adam’s sin shall be visited
upon every one of his descendants. We know all too well the bitter truth of
those passages in Genesis 3:17-19 which describe the tragedy that Adam’s act
brought upon us all: “Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shalt thou
eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring
forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy
face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast
thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.” And to Eve, God
said: “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou
shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall
rule over thee” (Genesis 3:16). In other words, because of Adam’s original sin,
the ground which once bore only beautiful and nourishing plants now produces
both good and bad alike. Man, who once had but to walk in the Garden and reach
out his hand for food, who had no need for clothing or for shelter, must now
toil all the days of his life to provide these necessities for himself and his
family. Woman, once the most carefree of creatures, is now burdened with sorrow
and pain; and both man and woman are under penalty of spiritual and physical
death.

Sin entered the human race through Adam, and the human race has been trying
without success to get rid of it ever since. The Bible teaches that God warned
Adam before he sinned that if he ate of the tree of knowledge he would surely
die. The Bible also tells us that God instructed Adam and Eve to be fruitful and
to multiply and to replenish the earth. But although they had been created in
the image of God, after the Fall Adam and Eve gave birth to children after their
own likeness and image. Consequently Cain and Abel were infected with the
death-dealing disease of sin, which they inherited from their parents and which
has been passed on to every generation since. We are all sinners by inheritance,
and try as we will, we cannot escape our birthright.

We have resorted to every means to win back the position that Adam lost. We have
tried through education, through philosophy, through religion, through
governments to throw off our yoke of depravity and sin. We have sought to
accomplish with our sin-limited minds the things that God intended man to do
with the clear vision that can come only from on high. Our motives have been
good and some of our attempts have been commendable, but they have all fallen
far, far short of the goal. All our knowledge, all our inventions, all our
developments and ambitious plans move us ahead only a very little before we drop
back again to the point from which we started. For we are still making the same
mistake that Adam made— we are still trying to be king in our own right, and
with our own power, instead of obeying God’s laws.

Before we label God as unjust or unreasonable for permitting sin to envelop the
world, let us look at the situation more carefully. God in His infinite
compassion sent His Son to show us the way out of our difficulties. He sent His
Son to experience the same temptations that were set before Adam and to triumph
over them. Satan tempted Jesus, just as he tempted Adam. Satan offered Jesus
power and glory if He would forsake God, just as he offered it to Adam through
Eve. The great difference was that Jesus Christ resisted the temptation! When
the Devil showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and promised Him all the
glory of them if He would but follow Satan instead of God, our blessed Lord
said: “Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy
God and Him only shalt thou serve” (Matthew 4:10). He completely triumphed over
the Tempter to reveal to all peoples of all succeeding generations His sinless
character. In our weakness and because of our depraved nature we have proved to
be the true sons of Adam and have followed faithfully in his steps. We may curse
Adam but we still imitate him!

There is not a single day that we do not face the same test that was set before
Adam. There is not a day that we do not have a chance to choose between the
Devil’s clever promises and God’s sure Word. Every day we have the opportunity
to move ourselves and others a little closer to that beautiful living Garden
that Adam forfeited.

We long for the day to come when disappointment, disease, and death will
vanish—but there is no possibility of this dream coming true as long as we are
the unregenerate sons of Adam. Something must be done about our sins. In
succeeding chapters we will see that God has done something about this basic
problem of the human race. From the beginning of time until the present moment,
man’s ungodly quest for power, his determination to use his gift of free choice
for his own selfish ends, has brought him to the brink of doom. The rubble and
ruins of many civilizations lie scattered over the earth’s surface—mute
testimony to man’s inability to build a lasting world without God. New rubble,
new misery is being created daily, and yet man plunges on his pernicious way.

God, meanwhile, in His infinite understanding and mercy, has looked on, waiting
with a patience and compassion that passes all understanding. He waits to offer
individual salvation and peace to the ones who will come to His mercy. The same
two paths that God set before Adam still lie before us. We are still free to
choose. We are living in a period of grace while God withholds the punishment we
so justly deserve.

It is the presence of sin that prevents man from being happy. It is because of
sin that man has never been able to obtain the utopia of which he dreams. Every
project, every civilization that he builds ultimately fails and falls into
oblivion because mans works are all wrought in unrighteousness. The ruins around
us at this moment are eloquent witness to the sin that fills the world.

Man seems to have lost sight of the ever-present law of cause and effect that
operates on every level of this universe. The effects are plain enough, but the
deep-seated, all-prevailing cause seems to be less distinct. Perhaps it is the
blight of the modern-day philosophy of “progress” that dims man s vision.
Perhaps it is because man is so enamored of this foolish, man-created theory
that he clings to the belief that the race is advancing slowly but surely toward
ultimate perfection.

Many philosophers will even argue that the present world tragedy is but an
incident in the upward march, and they point to other periods in human history
when the prospect seemed as bleak and the outcome as hopeless. Philosophers
would try to say that the sad conditions through which we are now living are but
the birth pangs of a better day! That men are still children groping and
stumbling along in the kindergarten of existence, still a long, long way from
the mature and sensible beings that they will become centuries hence! But the
Bible makes plain what natural science seems so unwilling to admit—that nature
reveals both a Creator and a corrupter. Man blames the Creator for the work of
the corrupter. Man forgets that our world is not as God made it; it has been
corrupted. God made the world good. Sin despoiled it. God made man innocent, but
sin entered and made him vicious. Every manifestation of evil is the result of
basic sin—sin that has remained unchanged since the moment it first entered the
human race. It may manifest itself in different ways, but fundamentally it is
the same sin that causes an African savage to skulk along a jungle trail
awaiting his victim with spear in hand, and a well-trained, educated pilot to
fly a jet plane over that same jungle ready to bomb an unsuspecting village. The
two men are separated by centuries of culture. One can be said to be much
further “progressed” than the other, one has all the advantages of man-made
civilization; while the other is still in the “primitive” state—and yet, are
they really so different? Are they not both motivated by fear and distrust of
their fellow men? Are both not selfishly bent on achieving their own goals at
any cost to their brothers? Is a bomb any less savage or brutal, or more
civilized than a naked spear? Can we hope to find a solution to our problems so
long as both the most “primitive” and the most “progressed” among us are more
eager to kill than to love our neighbors?

All the sorrow, all the bitterness, all the violence, tragedy, heartache and
shame of man’s history are summed up in that one little word—sin. It isn’t a
popular word, it certainly isn’t a fashionable word any more—but it’s a terribly
true one!

People don’t like to be told they are sinners, even as their parents and
grandparents were sinners before them! Yet the Bible declares, “There is no
difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans
3:22-23). The Bible declares that every person on earth is a sinner in the sight
of God; and whenever I hear anyone take exception to so strong a statement, I am
reminded of the story of the church officer who came to talk to the minister one
day about sin.

He said to the minister, “Doctor, we of the congregation wish you wouldn’t talk
quite so much or so plainly about sin. We feel that if our boys and girls hear
you discuss the subject so much they will all the more easily become sinners.
Why don’t you call it a ‘mistake’ or say that our young people are often guilty
of using ‘poor judgment’—but please don’t talk so openly about sin.” The
minister walked over and took down a bottle of poison from a high shelf and
showed it to his visitor. The bottle was plainly marked in big red letters,
“Poison! Do not touch!” “What would you have me do?” asked the minister. “Do you
feel it would be wise for me to remove this plain label and put on one that read
‘Essence of Peppermint?’ Don’t you see that the milder you make the label, the
more dangerous you make the poison?”

Sin—plain old-fashioned sin, the selfsame sin that caused Adam’s downfall—is
what we are all suffering from today, and it will do us far more harm than good
to try to dress it up with a fancy, more attractive label. We don’t need a new
word for it. What we need is to find out what the word we already have means!
Because, although sin is certainly prevalent in the world today, there are
multitudes of people who are wholly ignorant of its real meaning. It is the
misguided, shortsighted view of sin that stands in the way of conversion for
many men and women.

It is the lack of real understanding of sin that keeps many Christians from
living the true life of Christ. The old spiritual says, “Everybody talkin’ ’bout
heaven, ain’t going there,” and the same thing is true of sin. Everybody who
talks about sin doesn’t have a clear realization of what it means, and it is of
supreme importance that we become familiar with the Biblical point of view on
the doctrine of sin.

We may try to take a light view of sin and to refer to it as “human weakness.”
We may try to call it a trifle, but God calls it a tragedy. We would pass it off
as an accident, but God declares it is an abomination. Man seeks to excuse
himself of sin, but God seeks to convict him of it and to save him from it. Sin
is no amusing toy—it is a terror to be shunned! Learn, then, what constitutes
sin in the eyes of God!

Dr. Richard Beal gives us five words for sin.

First: sin is lawlessness, the transgression of the law of God (1 John 3:4). God
established the boundary line between good and evil, and whenever we overstep
that boundary, whenever we are guilty of intrusion into the forbidden area of
evil, we are breaking the law. Whenever we fail to five up to the Ten
Commandments, whenever we go contrary to the precepts of the Sermon on the
Mount, we have transgressed the law of God and are guilty of sin.

James made it plain that we are all guilty when he said: “But every man is
tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath
conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth
death” (James 1:14-15). It is because we have all broken God’s laws, all
transgressed His commands that we are all classified as sinners.

Second: the Bible describes sin as iniquity. Iniquity is the deviation from
right, whether or not the particular act has been expressly forbidden. Iniquity
has to do with our inner motivations, the very things that we so often try to
keep hidden from the eyes of men and God. They are the wrongs which spring from
our own corrupt nature rather than the evil acts which force of circumstances
sometimes cause us to commit.

Jesus described this inner corruptness when He said: “From within, out of the
heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts,
covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride,
foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man” (Mark
7:21-23).

Third: the Bible explains sin as missing the mark, falling short of the goal
that has been set. God’s goal is Christ. The object and end-purpose of all of
life is to live up to the life of Christ. He came to show us what it is possible
for man to achieve here on earth; and when we fail to follow His example, we
miss the mark and fall short of the divine standard.

Fourth: sin is a form of trespass. It is the intrusion of self-will into the
sphere of divine authority. Sin is not merely a negative thing, it is not just
the absence of love for God. Sin is the making of a positive choice, the
preference of self instead of God. It is the centering of affection in one’s own
being instead of reaching out with all your heart to embrace God. Egoism and
selfishness are the marks of sin as surely as are theft and murder.

Perhaps this is the most subtle and destructive form of sin, for in this form it
is so easy to overlook the label on the bottle of poison. Those who cling to
themselves, those who center their entire attention on their own beings, those
who regard only their own interests and fight to protect only their own
rights—these are sinners as much as the drunkard or harlot.

Jesus said: “What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and
lose his own soul” (Mark 8:36)? Translated into modern terms, could we not say,
“What shall it profit a man to build a vast industrial empire if he is eaten
away by ulcers and can enjoy nothing of life? What shall it profit a dictator
though he conquer a hemisphere if he must live in constant fear of an avenger s
bullet or an assassin’s knife? What shall it profit a parent to bring up
children with harsh domination if he is rejected by them later and left to a
lonely old age?” Verily, the sin of self is a deadly sin indeed.

Fifth: sin is unbelief. Unbelief is a sin because it is an insult to the
truthfulness of God. “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness
within himself. He that believeth not God hath made Him a liar because he
believeth not the record that God gave of His Son” (1 John 5:10).

It is unbelief that shuts the door to heaven and opens it to hell. It is
unbelief that rejects the Word of God and refuses Christ as Savior. It is
unbelief that causes men to turn a deaf ear to the gospel and to deny the
miracles of Christ.

Sin incurs the penalty of death, and no man has the ability in himself to save
himself from sin’s penalty or to cleanse his own heart of its corruption. Angels
and men cannot atone for sin. It is only in Christ that the remedy for sin can
be found. It is only Christ who can save the sinner from the fate that surely
awaits him. “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). “The soul that
sinneth, it shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4). “None of them can by any means redeem his
brother, nor give to God a ransom for him” (Psalms 49:7). “Neither their silver
nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord’s wrath”
(Zephaniah 1:18).

Man’s only salvation from sin stands on a lonely, barren, skull-shaped hill; a
thief hangs on one cross, a murderer on another, and between them, a Man with a
crown of thorns. Blood flows from His hands and feet, it gushes from His side,
it drips above His eyes—while those who stand in comfort before Him sneer and
mock Him. And who is this tortured figure, who is this Man that other men seek
to humiliate and kill? He is the Son of God, the Prince of Peace, heaven’s own
appointed Messenger to the sin-ridden earth. This is He, before whom angels fall
down and veil their faces. And yet He hangs bleeding and forsaken upon the cruel
tree.

What brought Him to this place of horrors? Who inflicted this hideous torture
upon the Man who came to teach us love? You did and I did, for it was for your
sin and my sin that Jesus was nailed to the cross. In this immortal moment the
human race experienced the darkest reaches of sin, it sank to its lowest depths,
it touched its foulest limits. No wonder that the sun could not endure and
veiled its face!

Alas! and did my Savior bleed? And did my Sov’reign die? Would He devote that
sacred head For such a worm as I? But sin overreached itself on the cross. The
blow that crucified Christ became the blow that opened the gates for man to
become free. Sins masterpiece of shame and hate became God’s masterpiece of
mercy and forgiveness. Through the death of the Lamb of God upon the cross, sin
itself was crucified for those who believe in Christ. His death is the
foundation of our hope, the promise of our triumph! Christ bore in His own body
on the tree the sins that shackle us. He died for us and rose again. He proved
the truth of all God’s promises to man; and if you will accept Christ by faith
today, you, too, can break the bonds of sin, and stand secure and free in the
knowledge that through the love of Christ your soul is cleansed of sin and saved
from damnation.


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  CHAPTER 8: 06.     CHAPTER FIVE: THE DEVIL
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Chapter Five

THEDEVIL For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities,
against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against the
spiritual wickedness in high places. —Ephesians 6:12

THERE is a satanic principle involved in all that is happening today. The Bible
describes “that old serpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the
whole world” (Revelation 12:9) and we know him to be at work confusing all
peoples and all nations. His handiwork is to be seen at every turn.

Let us but take hope that “peace in our time” is drawing closer, and almost
overnight misunderstanding, suspicion, and bad faith break out anew and the
patient work of months is undone in a moment. For Satan is determined that the
dark, joyless river of humanity shall continue on its tormented way until the
end of time. He won over Adam in the Garden, and he is convinced that he can
claim the souls of Adam’s descendants for himself.

There is not a thinking person in the world today who has not wondered many
times about the existence of the Devil. That he does exist, there is no doubt.
We see his power and influence everywhere. The question is not is there a Devil,
but how and why did the Devil come to be.

We know from the story of Adam and Eve that the Devil was already present on
earth before God made the first man. Evil already existed, else God would not
have made a tree whose fruit gave the awareness of good and bad. There would
have been no necessity for such a tree, no possibility of it, if evil had not
already been present and man been in need of protection from it.

Here we face the greatest of all mysteries, the most significant of all secrets,
the most unanswerable of all questions. How could God—who is all-powerful,
all-holy and all-loving—have created evil, or permitted the Devil to create it?
Why did Adam have to be tempted? Why didn’t God strike the Devil dead when he
entered the body of the serpent to whisper evil thoughts to Eve? The Bible gives
us a few hints as to what the answer may be. But the Bible also makes it very
clear that man is not supposed to know the full answer until God has allowed the
Devil and all his designs to help work out His own great plan.

Before the fall of Adam, long before Adam even existed, it would appear that
God’s universe was divided into spheres of influence, each of which was under
the supervision and control of an angel or heavenly prince, all of whom were
responsible directly to God. Paul tells us of “thrones, governments, princedoms,
and authorities” in both the visible and the invisible world (Colossians 1:16,
Ephesians 1:21). The Bible makes frequent mention of angels and archangels,
showing that there was established order among them, some being more powerful
than others. The Devil must have been just such a powerful, heavenly prince,
having the earth assigned to him, perhaps, as his special province. Known as
Lucifer, the “light- bearer,” he must have stood very close to God—so close, in
fact, that ambition entered his heart and he determined to be not God’s beloved
prince, but to be placed on an equal footing with God Himself!

It was at that moment that the breach appeared in the cosmos. It was at that
moment that the universe— which had been all good and all harmonious to God’s
will—split, and a portion of it set itself in opposition to God. The Devil
defied God and attempted to set up his own authority. He abandoned his own
position in the government of God and descended into the lower heavens and cried
out that he would be like the Most High God. He had been set by God as the
prince of this world; and God has not yet removed him from that position, though
the righteous basis for that removal has been laid by the death of Christ. Ever
since that moment, the Devil has been contesting God on earth. As a mighty
prince, with hosts of angels at his command, he has set up his kingdom on earth.
His power and position here are the very reasons that the Scriptures came to be
written. Had Satan not defied God and attempted to rival His power and
authority, the story of Adam in the Garden would have been very different. Had
Satan not set himself in opposition to God, there would have been no need to
give mankind the Ten Commandments, there would have been no need for God to send
His Son to the cross.

Jesus and His apostles were well aware of the Devil. Matthew records an actual
conversation between Jesus and the Devil (Matthew 4:1-10). The Devil was very
real to the Pharisees—so real, in fact, that they accused Jesus of being the
Devil himself (Matthew 12:24)! There was no doubt in Jesus’ mind of the
existence of the Devil, nor of the power that he wields here on earth. The
Devil’s strength is clearly demonstrated in the passage from Jude 1:9 which
relates: “Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed
about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but
said, The Lord rebuke thee.”

Modern confusion about the personality of the Devil has resulted in large
measure from the caricatures of him which became popular during the Middle Ages.
To allay their fear of the Devil, people tried to laugh at him, and pictured him
as a foolish, grotesque creature with horns and a long tail. They put a
pitchfork in his hand, and a feeble-minded leer on his face, and then said to
themselves, “Who’s afraid of a ridiculous figure like this?” The truth is that
the Devil is a creature of vastly superior intelligence, a mighty and gifted
spirit of infinite resourcefulness. We forget that the Devil was perhaps the
greatest and most exalted of all God’s angels. He was a sublime figure, who
decided to use his divine endowments for his own aims instead of God’s. His
reasoning is brilliant, his plans ingenious, his logic well nigh irrefutable.
God’s mighty adversary is no bungling creature with horns and tail—he is a
prince of lofty stature, of unlimited craft and cunning, able to take advantage
of every opportunity that presents itself, able to turn every situation to his
own advantage. The Devil is quite capable of bringing forth the false prophet of
which the Bible warns. Upon the wreckage of disbelief and faltering faith the
Devil will set his masterpiece, the counterfeit king. He will create a religion
without a Redeemer. He will build a church without a Christ. He will call for
worship without the Word of God. The Apostle Paul predicted this when he said:
“But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his
subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is Christ.
For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if
ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which
ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him . . . For such are false
apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of
Christ” (2 Corinthians 11:3-4, 2 Corinthians 13).

We know that the anti-Christ will appear and try to ensnare the minds and hearts
of men. The time draws close, the stage is set—confusion, panic, and fear are
abroad. The signs of the false prophet are everywhere at hand, and many may be
the living witnesses of the awesome moment when the final act of this age-old
drama begins. It may well come in our time, for the tempo is speeding up, events
move more swiftly, and on every side we see men and women consciously or
unconsciously choosing up sides—aligning themselves with the Devil or with God.

It will be a battle to the death, in the truest meaning of that word—a battle
that will give no quarter, that will make no allowances or exceptions. The human
phase of this battle started in the Garden of Eden when the Devil seduced
mankind from God, making it possible for there to be billions of warring wills,
every man turning to his own way. “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have
turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on Him the iniquity of
us all” (Isaiah 53:6). It will continue until the end of time, until one or the
other of these two mighty forces—the force of good or evil—triumphs and places
the True King or the false king on the throne. At this moment in history, two
mighty trinities stand face to face: the Trinity of God (the Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost) and the false trinity that Satan would have us worship in its place.
The trinity of evil (the Devil, anti-Christ, and false prophet) is described in
the Book of Revelation: “And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of
the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false
prophet” (Revelation 16:13).

Never for a second of your waking or sleeping life are you without these two
powerful forces, never is there a moment when you cannot deliberately choose to
go with one or the other. Always the Devil is standing at your side tempting,
coaxing, threatening, cajoling. And always on your other side stands Jesus, the
all-loving, the all- forgiving, waiting for you to turn to Him and ask His aid,
waiting to give you supernatural power to resist the Evil one. In moments of
your greatest fear and anxiety, in moments when you feel yourself helpless in
the grip of events you cannot control, when despair and disappointment overwhelm
you—in these moments many times it is the devil who is trying to catch you at
your weakest point and push you further along the path that Adam took. In these
perilous moments remember that Christ has not deserted you. He has not left you
defenseless. As He triumphed over Satan in His hour of temptation and trial, so
He has promised that you, too, can have daily victory over the Tempter.
Remember: “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might make
inoperative the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). The same Book that tells us
over and over again of God’s love, warns us constantly of the Devil that would
come between us and God, the Devil who is ever waiting to ensnare men s souls.
“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion,
walketh about, seeking whom he may devour” (1 Peter 5:8). The Bible describes a
personal Devil who controls a host of demon spirits that attempt to dominate and
control all human activity, “The prince of the power of the air, the spirit that
now worketh in the children of disobedience” (Ephesians 2:2). Don’t doubt for a
moment the existence of the Devil! He is very personal and he is very real! And
he is extremely clever! Look again at the front page of today’s newspaper if you
have any question about the personality of the Devil. Switch on your local radio
or television news commentator if you feel you need concrete evidence! Would
sane, thinking men and women behave in this way if they were not in the grip of
evil? Could hearts filled only with God’s love and God’s goodness conceive and
carry out the acts of violence and malice that are reported to us every day?
Could men of education, intelligence, and honest intent gather around a world
conference table and fail so completely to understand each other’s needs and
goals if their thinking was not being deliberately clouded and corrupted?

Whenever I hear an “enlightened” person of our time take issue with the
plausibility of a personal, individualized Devil in command of a host of evil
spirits, I am reminded of this poem by Alfred J. Hough:

Men don’t believe in the Devil now, as their fathers used to do;

They’ve forced the door of the broadest creed to let his majesty through.

There isn’t a print of his cloven foot or fiery dart from his brow To be found
on earth or air today, for the world has voted it so. Who dogs the steps of the
toiling saint and digs the pits for his feet? Who sows the tares in the fields
of time whenever God sows the wheat? The Devil is voted not to be, and of
course, the thing is true; But who is doing the kind of work that the Devil
alone can do?

We are told that he doesn’t go about as a roaring lion now; But whom shall we
hold responsible for the everlasting row To be heard in home, in church and
state, to the earth’s remotest bound, If the Devil by unanimous vote is nowhere
to be found?

Won’t someone step to the front forthwith and make their bow and show How the
frauds and crimes of a single day spring up?

We want to know! The Devil was fairly voted out, and of course, the Devil’s
gone; But simple people would like to know who carries the business on?

Who, indeed, is responsible for the infamy, terror, and agony that we see all
around us? How can we account for the sufferings that we all experience if evil
is not a potent force? Modern education has, in truth, impeded our minds if,
because of allegedly scientific findings, we have lost our belief in the
supernatural powers of Satan.

George Galloway summed up this dubious contribution of current education when he
said: “The theory that there is in the universe a power or principle, personal
or otherwise, in eternal opposition to God is generally discarded by the modern
mind.” The modern mind may discard it, but that doesn’t cause the evil principle
itself to disappear! The great Methodist preacher, Dr. Clovis Chappell, writes,
in his Sermons from the Parables: “It seems that Jesus, along with the saints of
the New Testament, believed that there was an evil personality known as the
Devil . . . Our day has thrown this doctrine aside.” But he is careful to add:
“If we can no longer account for the presence of evil by charging it up to the
Devil, we do not for this reason do away with the fact of evil. Sin is a grim
fact, explain it however we may.”

Sin is certainly a grim fact! It stands like a titanic force, contesting all the
good that men may try to accomplish. It stands like a dark shadow, ever ready to
blot out whatever light may reach us from on high. We all know this. We all see
it. We all are conscious of it in every move we make. Call it what we may, we
know of its very real existence. “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood,
but against principalities, against the powers, against the rulers of the
darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians
6:12).

How do those who deny the Devil and his minions account for the speed with which
evil spreads? How do they explain the endless stumbling blocks that are placed
in the path of the righteous? How can they reason away the fact that destruction
and disaster are but the work of seconds, while construction and rehabilitation
are often agonizingly slow?

Breathe a he into the air, let loose a slanderous tongue —and the words are
carried as by magic to the farthest corners. Speak a truth, perform a generous
and honest act—and unseen powers will be at work at once to try to hide this
tiny ray of light and hope. No one deliberately builds churches to the Devil, no
one constructs pulpits to preach his word. Yet his word is everywhere, and all
too often his word is translated into desperate deeds. If no unseen power is at
work corrupting men’s hearts and distorting men’s thoughts, how can you explain
humanity’s eagerness to listen to the base and vulgar and vile, while it turns a
deaf ear to the good and clean and pure? Would one single person among us ever
pass up a piece of ripe delicious fruit to select a rotten piece that was
crawling with worms and reeking with decay, if we were not driven to this
dreadful choice by a great and sinister power? Yet that is exactly what we all
do over and over again. We constantly pass up the rich and beautiful and
ennobling experiences and seek out the tawdry, the cheap, and the degrading.
These are the works of the Devil, and they flourish on every side!

What we see happening here on earth is but a reflection of the far vaster
struggles between good and evil in the unseen realm. We like to think that our
planet is the center of the universe, and we attach too much importance to
earthly events. Our foolish pride is such that we can only recognize and take
into account that which is apparent to our human eyes. But a struggle of
infinitely greater magnitude is being waged in the world we cannot see! The wise
men of old knew this. They were aware that there is much that the human eye
fails to discern and much to which the human ear is deaf. Modern man likes to
feel that he “created” radio and television, that he made it possible to send
audible sounds and visible images through space. The truth is, of course, that
these waves, unknown to man, have always existed, and that far greater wonders
are in space, of which man may never gain the slightest knowledge. That these
wonders were there, the ancient prophets knew—but even they had but a suggestion
of their magnitude, even they could catch but the faintest echoes of the mighty
battle of the spheres.

One of the many prices Adam paid for listening to the Devil was to lose the
vision of spiritual dimensions. He lost for himself and all of humanity the
capacity for seeing and hearing and understanding anything that was not basely
material. Adam closed himself off from the eternal wonders and splendors of the
unseen world. He lost the power of true prophecy, the ability to look ahead, and
by so doing to better understand and perform the work of the present. He lost
his sense of continuity, of oneness with the universe and with all living
things. He separated himself from God and became an alien being in God’s world.
When Adam did this he became somewhat like a defective television receiver that
is capable of tuning in only one channel instead of many—and that one channel is
distorted and confused!

If we find a television image to be blurred and out of focus, we do not blame
the transmitting station for it. When we cannot get the program that we want, or
when the picture on the screen becomes indistinct, we do not damn the scientists
who devised the tubes that make television possible. We recognize that the fault
lies with the particular set we are using. We do not say that all of television
is a miserable failure because our antenna may be improperly installed, or we
live in a neighborhood where TV reception is poor! But let tragedy or sickness
come to us, let us suffer the consequences of our own sins, and we immediately
blame God for it! We are patient and understanding with our television sets when
they do not give us what we want, but we are quick to rail against God and His
universe when we get a distorted picture of it.

Let someone get the business promotion we wanted, let someone we consider less
deserving succeed where we have failed, and we cry out against God’s injustice.
We demand to know why God permits such inequalities! We lose sight of the fact
that God, like a great master television station, is sending out a perfect image
of love and righteousness all the time, and that the faulty reception lies with
us!

It is the evil and distortion within ourselves that keeps us from seeing and
experiencing God’s perfect world. It is our own sin that blurs the image, that
keeps us from being God’s pure children instead of the children of evil. Paul
spoke for all of us when he said: “For the good that I would I do not, but the
evil which I would not, that I do” (Romans 7:19). Paul recognized the dreaded
enemy, the powerful foe of all mankind, and cried out, “O wretched man that I
am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus
Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with
the flesh the law of sin” (Romans 7:24-25).

Two overwhelming adversaries were clearly apparent to Paul, and he was acutely
aware of being tom between their mighty magnetisms. The power of good was
pulling his mind and heart toward God, while the power of evil was trying to
drag his body down into death and destruction.

You are caught between these same two forces: life and death! Choose God’s way,
and there is life. Choose Satan’s way, and it is death!


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  CHAPTER 9: 07.     CHAPTER SIX: AFTER DEATH—WHAT?
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Chapter Six AFTER DEATH—WHAT?

There is but a step between me and death. —1 Samuel 20:3 IT HAS been said that
all of life is but a preparation for death. The Psalmist said: “What man is he
that liveth, and shall not see death?” (Psalms 89:48.) This is supposed to be a
freethinking age of radical experiment. We have sought to change the world and
the laws which govern it through knowledge, science, invention, discovery,
philosophy, and materialistic thinking. We have tried to enthrone the false gods
of money, fame, and human intelligence; but however we try, the end is always
the same: “It is appointed unto men once to die” (Hebrews 9:27). In the midst of
life, we see death on every hand. The wail of the ambulance, the illuminated
mortuary signs, the graveyards we so frequently pass, and the sight of a hearse
threading its way through traffic, all remind us that the Grim Reaper may call
for us at any moment. None of us can be sure when that exact moment will be, but
we are well aware that it may come at any time.

Dr. John S. Wimbish has put it aptly: “Our lives hang by such brittle threads.
The grave darkly gapes at our feet every step of life’s journey. Death is the
universal adversary. Even kings must succumb to the Grim Reaper’s scythe.
Scientist and surgeon battle valiantly to keep the monster from palace doors,
but the shrouded Monarch of Terrors stealthily steals past the guards and down
the corridors and, in the royal bedchambers, envelops the mighty potentate in
his somber cloak.”

Each year some forty thousand Americans step into their automobiles little
realizing this is to be their last ride. In spite of all the increased safety
measures, another thirty thousand persons are killed in accidents at home, when
all thought of death is far from their minds. For death stalks mankind
relentlessly, and although medical science and safety engineers wage a constant
war against it, in the end, death is always the victor.

Because of this long-fought scientific battle, we now have the advantage of a
few years more of life, but death is still standing at the end of the road, and
the life span of the average person does not far exceed the Biblical three score
years and ten.

Heart diseases still cut down far too many of our citizens in the prime of life.
Cancer still presses its pain into the bodies of thousands. Tuberculosis, blood
diseases, polio, and pneumonia take their toll, although medical research has
greatly decreased their annual number. But however optimistic the statistical
surveys, however much our life span has been increased since 1900, whatever the
figures may show on murder, suicide, and other forms of violent death, the
inevitable fact of death remains unchanged—it is still our ultimate experience
on earth! From the moment a child is born, the fight against death begins. The
mother devotes years of attention to the protection of the life of her child.
She watches the food, the clothes, the environment, the medical checkups and
inoculations, but in spite of her loving care, the child has already begun to
die.

Before many years the tangible signs of weakness will be obvious. The dentist
will check the decay of our teeth. Glasses will be needed to help improve our
fading vision. Skin will wrinkle and sag as time passes, and our shoulders will
droop and our step become slower and less sure. The brittleness of our bones
will increase as our energy lessens, and almost without realizing it we have
begun to move closer to death.

Health insurance and hospitalization will be used to help us cushion the blow.
Life insurance will be purchased to cover our final expenses and obligations,
and we shall suddenly see our whole life as a great and never ending battle with
death. We shall see that we are all running a race in which the most we can hope
for is a little more time, and outwit our opponent as we may, in the end we know
that death will always win!

What a mysterious thing is this enemy of ours—as mysterious as life itself. For
the life that we see so plentifully around us in plants and animals, as well as
in human beings, cannot be reproduced by us, or even explained. Death is also
without explanation, although we are as aware of its presence as we are of life.
How little we like to talk about it, however, or consider its importance! When
life comes, and a child is born, we rejoice. When life goes, and a man dies, we
try to dismiss the thought as quickly as possible. Does it not seem strange,
though, since so much of our energy is directed toward bringing life into the
world, that we should turn our backs so resolutely upon the equally important
fact of the departure of this same life from the earth?

Today there are something like two billion people living on this planet. Almost
all of them will be dead in a hundred years. Their bodies will be without
feeling. But what about their souls—the essential and eternal part of life? Here
is the mystery. What is missing when a man dies? Where does that missing thing
go?

Two years ago a newspaper columnist died in Denver, Colorado. The mourners
listened to his recorded voice at the funeral when he said, “This is my funeral.
I am an atheist and have been for many years. I have the utmost contempt for
theological nonsense. Clergymen are moral cowards. Miracles are the product of
the imagination. If any four reporters were sent to an execution and got their
facts as twisted as the apostles in the Bible report, they would be fired
forthwith. I want no religious songs. This is going to be a perfectly rational
funeral.”

Every age has produced men who in their hatred of God have attempted to heap
ridicule and abuse upon the church, the Scripture, and Jesus Christ. Without
presenting evidence they cry out against the voice of God. History testifies of
the George Bernard Shaws, the Robert Ingersolls, and many other philosophers who
strove, by argument, to destroy the fear of death.

Listen to the anthropologist tell of death in the jungle. There is no
“theological nonsense” there, for they have not heard of Jesus Christ. What of
death there? In some tribes the old are turned into the bush so that the wild
animals might attack them and death need not be faced by the young. In another
tribe the clothes are stripped off and the bodies of the mourners painted with
white. Hour after hour the moans and screams of the women tell the world that a
soul is about to leave a body. Death outside of Christian influence is filled
with horror and despair.

Compare this to the death of the Christian. When Christ came He gave a new
approach to death. Man had always looked upon death as an enemy, but Jesus said
that He had conquered death and taken the very sting out of death. Jesus Christ
was the Master Realist when He urged men to prepare for death, which was certain
to come. Do not worry, said the Lord Jesus, about the death of the body, but
rather concern yourself with the eternal death of the soul. The Bible indicates
that there are actually two deaths: one is physical death and the other is
eternal death. Jesus warned that we are to fear the second death far more than
the first death. He described the second death as hell, which is eternal
separation from God. He indicated that the death of your body is nothing
compared to the conscious everlasting banishment of a soul from God. The last
statements of dying men provide an excellent study for those who are looking for
realism in the face of death. Dr. Wilbur Smith in his outstanding book
Therefore, Stand provides several stories of the closing hours of some famous
non-Christians.

How different is the story of the Christian who has confessed his sin and by
faith received Jesus Christ as his personal Savior. For many years Dr. Effie
Jane Wheeler taught English and literature where I attended college. Dr. Wheeler
was noted for her piety as well as for her knowledge of the subjects she taught.
In May of 1949, on Memorial Day, Dr. Wheeler wrote the following letter to Dr.
Edman, president of the college, her colleagues, and former students:

“I greatly appreciate the moment in chapel that may be given to reading this,
for before you leave for the summer I should like to have you know the truth
about me as I learned it myself only last Friday. My doctor at last has given
what has been his real diagnosis of my illness for weeks—an inoperable case of
cancer. Now if he had been a Christian he wouldn’t have been so dilatory or
shaken, for he would have known, as you and I do, that life or death is equally
welcome when we live in the will and presence of the Lord. If the Lord has
chosen me to go to Him soon, I go gladly. Please do not give a moment’s grief
for me. I do not say a cold goodbye but rather a warm Auf Wiedersehen till I see
you again—in the blessed land where I may be allowed to draw aside a curtain
when you enter. With a heart full of love for every individual of you. [Signed ]
Effie Jane Wheeler.”

Just two weeks after writing this letter, Dr. Wheeler entered the presence of
her Lord and Master, who had kept His promise to take the sting out of death.
The Bible teaches that you are an immortal soul. Your soul is eternal and will
live forever. In other words, the real you—the part of you that thinks, feels,
dreams, aspires; the ego, the personality—will never die. The Bible teaches that
your soul will live forever in one of two places —heaven or hell. If you are not
a Christian and you have never been born again, then the Bible teaches your soul
goes immediately to a place Jesus called Hades, where you will await the
judgment of God.

I am conscious of the fact that the subject of hell is not a very pleasant one.
It is very unpopular, controversial, and misunderstood. In my campaigns across
the country, however, I usually devote one evening to the discussion of this
subject. Following my discussion many letters to the editors of newspapers
appear for days as people argue the pros and cons, for the Bible has almost as
much to say about this subject as any other. In student discussions on many
campuses of America I am continually asked the question, “What about hell? Is
there fire in hell?” and similar questions. As a minister I must deal with it. I
cannot ignore it, even though it makes people uncomfortable and anxious. I grant
that it is the hardest of all teachings of Christianity to receive.

There are those who teach that everybody eventually will be saved, that God is a
God of love and He will never send anyone to hell. They believe that the words
eternal or everlasting do not actually mean forever. However, the same word
which speaks of eternal banishment from God is also used for the eternity of
heaven. Someone has said that “fairness demands that we make the joy of the
righteous and the punishment of the wicked both qualify, as they are the same
Greek word and of the same duration.”

There are others who teach that after death those who have refused to receive
God’s plan of redemption are annihilated, they cease to exist. In searching the
Bible from cover to cover I cannot find one shred of evidence to support this
view. The Bible teaches that whether we are saved or lost, there is conscious
and everlasting existence of the soul and personality.

There are others who teach that after death there is still a possibility of
salvation, that God will offer a second chance. If this is true, the Bible gives
no hint of it because the Bible is continually warning that “now is the accepted
time; behold, now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2).

Scores of passages of Scripture could be quoted to support the fact that the
Bible does teach there is hell for every man who willingly and knowingly rejects
Christ as Lord and Savior:

“I am tormented in this flame” (Luke 16:24).

“Whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire” (Matthew
5:22).

“The Son of Man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His
kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them
into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew
13:41-42). “So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth,
and sever the wicked from among the just, and shall cast them into the furnace
of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 13:49-50). “Then
shall He say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into
everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25:41). “But
He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire” (Matthew 3:12).

“In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not
the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall be punished with everlasting
destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of His power” (2
Thessalonians 1:8-9). “The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God,
which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he
shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels,
and in the presence of the Lamb: and the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for
ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night” (Revelation 14:10-11). “And
death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And
whosoever was not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of
fire” (Revelation 20:14-15).

“But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and
whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolators, and all liars, shall have their part
in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death”
(Revelation 21:8). But I hear someone say, “I don’t believe in hell. My religion
is the Sermon on the Mount.”

Well, let’s listen to a passage from the Sermon on the Mount: “And if thy right
eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee: for it is profitable for
thee that one of thy members should perish, and not that thy whole body should
be cast into hell. And if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it
from thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish,
and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell” (Matthew 5:29-30).

Here we have the distinct teaching of Jesus that there is a hell. In fact, Jesus
told stories and gave illustrations on the subject and warned men time after
time about the folly of living a sinful and hypocritical life here on earth.

There is no doubt that wicked men suffer a certain hell here on earth. The Bible
says, “Be sure your sin will find you out” (Numbers 32:23). Again the Bible
says, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Galatians 6:8).
However, there is evidence all around us to show that some wicked men seem to
prosper and the righteous suffer for their righteousness. The Bible teaches that
there is going to be a time of equalization when justice shall be done. Will a
loving God send a man to hell? The answer is— yes! But He does not send him
willingly. Man condemns himself by his refusal of God’s way of salvation. In
love and mercy, God is offering to men and women a way of escape, a way of
salvation, a hope and anticipation of better things. Man in his blindness,
stupidity, stubbornness, egotism, and love of sinful pleasure refuses God’s
simple method of escaping the pangs of eternal banishment.

Suppose you were sick and called a doctor, who came and gave you a prescription.
But after thinking it over you decided to ignore his advice and to refuse the
medicine. When he returned a few days later he might have found your condition
much worse. Could you blame the doctor, could you hold him responsible? He gave
you the prescription. He prescribed the remedy. But you refused it!

Just so, God prescribes the remedy for the ills of the human race. That remedy
is personal faith and commitment to Jesus Christ. The remedy is to be born
again, as we will discuss in another chapter. If we deliberately refuse it, then
we must suffer the consequence; and we cannot blame God. Is it God’s fault
because we refuse the remedy?

There are others who ask, “What is the nature of hell?” There are four words
that have been translated in our Bible as “hell.” One word is Sheol, which is
translated thirty-one times as “hell” in the Old Testament. It means an “unseen
state.” The words of sorrow, pain, and destruction are used in connection with
it. The second word is Hades, which is translated from the Greek and used ten
times in the New Testament. It means the same as Sheol in the Old Testament.
Judgment and suffering are always connected with it. The third word is Tartarus,
used only once in 2 Peter 2:4, where it says that disobedient angels are cast
into Tartarus. It indicates a place of judgment, such as a prison, dungeon,
where there is intense darkness. The fourth word is Gehenna, used eleven times,
and translated as “hell” in the New Testament. It is the illustration that Jesus
used of the Valley of Hinnon, a place outside Jerusalem where rubbish and debris
were burned continually.

Others ask, “Does the Bible teach literal fire in hell?” There is no doubt that
the Bible many times uses the word fire figuratively. However, God does have a
fire that bums and yet does not consume. When Moses saw the bush of fire, he was
amazed to find that the bush was not consumed. The three Hebrew children were
put in a fiery furnace, but they were not consumed; in fact, not a hair of their
heads was singed. On the other hand, the Bible talks about our tongues’ being
“set on fire of hell” (James 3:6) every time we speak evil about our neighbors.
That does not mean that literal combustion takes place every time we say
something against our neighbors. But whether it be literal or figurative does
not affect its reality. If there is no fire, then God is using symbolic language
to indicate something that could be far worse.

Essentially, hell is separation from God. It is the second death, which is
described as the eternal conscious banishment from the presence of all that is
light, joyous, good, righteous, and happy. The Bible has many fearful
descriptions concerning this awful condition in which the soul will find itself
one minute after death.

It is strange that men will prepare for everything except death. We prepare for
education. We prepare for business. We prepare for our careers. We prepare for
marriage. We prepare for old age. We prepare for everything except the moment we
are to die. And yet the Bible says it is appointed unto all of us once to die.

Death is an occurrence that to each man seems unnatural when related to himself,
but natural when related to others. Death reduces all men to the same rank. It
strips the rich of his millions and the poor man of his rags. It cools avarice
and stills the fires of passion. All would like to ignore death, and yet all
must face it—the prince and the peasant, the fool and the philosopher, the
murderer and the saint alike. Death knows no age limits, no partiality. It is a
thing that all men fear.

Toward the end of his life, Daniel Webster related how once he attended a church
service in a quiet country village. The clergyman was a simplehearted, pious old
man. After the opening exercises he arose and pronounced his text, and then with
the utmost simplicity and earnestness said, “My friends, we can die but once.”

Daniel Webster, commenting on this sermon, later said, “Frigid and weak as these
words might seem, at once they were to me among the most impressive and
awakening I ever heard.”

It is easy to think of others having to keep this appointment with death, but
difficult for us to remember that we, too, must keep this same appointment. When
we see soldiers going to the front or read of a condemned prisoner or visit a
mortally stricken friend, we are conscious of a certain solemnity which gathers
about such persons. Death is appointed for all, and the question of its
occurrence is merely a matter of time. Other appointments in life—the
appointment of business or of pleasure—we can neglect or break and take the
consequence, but here is an appointment that no man can ignore, no man can
break. He can meet it only once, but meet it he must!

If physical death were the only consequence of a life lived apart from God, we
would not have so much to fear, but the Bible warns that there is the second
death, which is the eternal banishment from God.

However, there is a brighter side. As the Bible pronounces hell for the sinner,
it also promises heaven for the saint. The subject of heaven is much easier to
accept than the subject of hell. And yet the Bible teaches both.

If you are moving to a new home, you want to know all about the community to
which you are going. If you are transferring to another city, you want to know
all about the city—its railroads, industries, parks, lakes, schools, etc. And
since we are going to spend eternity someplace, we ought to know something about
it. The information concerning heaven is found in the Bible. It is right that we
should think about it and talk about it. In talking about heaven, earth grows
shabby by comparison. Our sorrows and problems here seem so much less when we
have keen anticipation of the future. In a certain sense the Christian has
heaven here on earth. He has peace of soul, peace of conscience, and peace with
God. In the midst of troubles and difficulties he can smile. He has a spring in
his step, a joy in his soul, a smile on his face. But the Bible also promises
the Christian a heaven in the life hereafter. Someone asked John Quincy Adams at
the age of ninety-four how he felt one morning. He said, “Quite well. Quite
well. But the house I live in is not so good” Even though the house we live in
may be sick and weak, yet we can actually feel strong and sure if we are
Christians. Jesus taught there is a heaven.

There are a number of passages that could be quoted, but the most descriptive is
found in John 14:2 : “In my Fathers house are many rooms. If it were not so, I
would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a
place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am
there ye may be also.” Paul was so certain of heaven that he could say, “We are
confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be
present with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8). How different is the anticipation of
the Christian and that of the agnostic Bob Ingersoll, who said at the grave of
his brother, “Life is a narrow veil between the cold and barren peaks of two
eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the heights. We cry aloud and the
only answer is the echo of our wailing cry.” The Apostle Paul said time after
time, “We know,” “We are confident,” “We are always confident.” The Bible says
that Abraham “looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker
is God.”

Many people say, “Do you believe that heaven is a literal place?” Yes! Jesus
said, “I go to prepare aplace for you.” The Bible teaches that Enoch and Elijah
ascended in a literal body to a literal place that is just as real as Los
Angeles, London, or Algiers!

Many people have asked, “Where is heaven?” We are not told in the Scripture
where heaven is. Some students have tried to take some Scriptures and put them
together and say that heaven is in the north. They quote Psalms 48:2 that says,
“Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the
sides of the north, the city of the great King.” It is interesting to note that
God gave Moses instructions to pour the blood of the sacrifice on the north side
of the altar toward God. The magnetic needle points north. Perhaps the Celestial
City is in the north. We do not know. But no matter where heaven is, it will be
where Christ is. The Bible teaches that this country will be a place of beauty.
It is described in the Bible as “a building of God” —”a city”—”a better
country”—”an inheritance”—”a glory.” You may ask, “Will we know each other in
heaven?” The Bible indicates in a number of places that it will be a time of
grand reunion with those who have gone on before.

Others say, “Do you believe that children will be saved?” Yes. The Bible
indicates that God does not hold a child accountable for his or her sins until
he reaches the age of accountability. There seems to be plenty of indication
that the atonement covers their sin until they reach an age at which they are
responsible for their own right and wrong actions. The Bible also indicates that
heaven will be a place of great understanding and knowledge of things that we
never learned down here.

Sir Isaac Newton, when an old man, said to one who praised his wisdom, “I am as
a child on the seashore picking up a pebble here and a shell there, but the
great ocean of truth still lies before me.” And Thomas Edison once said, “I do
not know one millionth part of one per cent about anything.”

Many of the mysteries of God, the heartaches, trials, disappointments,
tragedies, and the silence of God in the midst of suffering will be revealed
there.

Many people ask, “Well, what will we do in heaven? Just sit down and enjoy the
luxuries of life?” No. The Bible indicates that we will serve God. There will be
work to do for God. We will spend much time praising Him. The Bible says, “And
there shall be no more curse; but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in
it; and His servants shall serve Him” (Revelation 22:3).

It will be a time of joy, service, laughter, singing, and praise to God.

Now the Bible teaches to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
The moment a Christian dies, he goes immediately into the presence of Christ.
There his soul awaits the resurrection, when the soul and body will be rejoined.

Many people ask, “How can the bodies that have decayed and been cremated be
raised?” Scientists have already proved that no chemicals disappear from the
earth. The God who made the body in the first place can bring all the original
chemicals back together again, and the body will be raised to join the soul. But
the new body that we will have will be a glorious body like unto the body of
Christ. It will be an eternal body. It will never know tears, heartache,
tragedy, disease, suffering, or death.

Here we have a picture of two eternal worlds floating out into space. Every son
of Adam will be on one or the other. There is a great deal of mystery
surrounding both of them, but there are enough hints and implications in the
Bible to give us light that one will be a world of tragedy and suffering and the
other will be one of light and glory.

We have now seen the problems of the human race. Superficially, they are
complex; basically, they are simple. We have seen that they could probably be
summed up in one word—sin. We have seen that man’s future is hopeless without
God. But just to analyze our problems and have an intellectual understanding of
God’s plan is not enough. If God is to aid man, then man must meet certain
conditions. In the next few chapters we will survey these conditions.


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  CHAPTER 10: 08. PART TWO: THE SOLUTION
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PART TWO: THE SOLUTION


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  CHAPTER 11: 09.     CHAPTER SEVEN: WHY JESUS CAME
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Chapter Seven

WHY JESUS CAME For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received,
how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that he was
buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures. —1
Corinthians 15:3-4.

WE HAVE seen that the most terrible, the most devastating fact of the universe
is sin. The cause of all trouble, the root of all sorrow, the dread of every man
lies in this one small word—sin. It has reversed the nature of man. It has
destroyed the inner harmony of man’s life. It has robbed him of his nobility. It
has caused man to be caught in the Devil’s trap.

All mental disorders, all sicknesses, all destruction, all wars find their root
in sin. It causes madness in the brain, and poison in the heart. It is described
in the Bible as a dread and prostrating disease that demands a radical cure. It
is a tornado on the loose. It is a volcano gone wild. It is a madman broken
loose from the asylum. It is a gangster on the prowl. It is a roaring Hon
seeking its prey. It is a streak of lightning heading toward the earth. It is a
guillotine cutting off the head. It is a deadly cancer eating its way into the
souls of men. It is a raging torrent that sweeps everything before it.

“Because of sin every stream with human crime is stained, every breeze is
morally corrupted, every day’s light is blackened, every life’s cup tainted with
the bitter, every life’s roadway made dangerous with pitfalls, every life’s
voyage made perilous with treacherous shoals. Sin- destructive of all happiness,
darkening understanding, searing conscience, withering everything, causing all
tears of sorrow and all pangs of agony, promising velvet and giving a shroud,
promising liberty and giving bondage, promising nectar and giving gall,
promising silk and giving the shirt of sackcloth.” For ages men were lost in
spiritual darkness, blinded by the disease of sin, made to grope—searching,
questing, seeking some way out. Man needed someone who could lead him out of the
mental confusion and moral labyrinth, someone who could redeem him from the
Devil’s prison, someone who could unlock the prison doors. Men with hungry
hearts, thirsty minds, and broken spirits stood hopelessly with searching eyes
and listening ears. Meanwhile the Devil gloated over his mighty victory in the
Garden of Eden. From the primitive man in the jungle through the mighty
civilizations of Egypt, Greece, and Rome, bewildered men were all asking the
same question, “How can I get out? How can I be better? What can I do? Which way
can I turn? How can I get rid of this terrible disease? How can I stop this
onrushing torrent? How can I get out of the mesh in which I find myself? If
there is a way, how can I find it?”

We have already seen that the Bible teaches that God was a God of love. He
wanted to do something for man. He wanted to save man. He wanted to free man
from the curse of sin. How could He do it? God was a just God. He was righteous,
and holy. He had warned man from the beginning that if he obeyed the Devil and
disobeyed God, he would die physically and spiritually. Man deliberately
disobeyed God. Man had to die or God would have been a liar, for God could not
break His word. His very nature would not allow Him to he. His word had to be
kept. Therefore, when man deliberately disobeyed Him, he was banished from the
presence of God. He deliberately chose to go the Devil’s way. God could not
freely forgive man’s sin, or God would have found Himself in the impossible
position of lying, because He had said, “In the day that thou eatest thereof,
thou shalt surely die” (Genesis 2:17).

There had to be some other way, for man was helplessly lost and hopelessly
involved. Man’s very nature was inverted. He opposed God. Many even denied that
God existed, so blinded were they by the disease from which they suffered. But
even in the Garden of Eden, God gave a hint that He was going to do something
about it. He warned the Devil and promised man, “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” (Genesis 3:15). “And thou shalt bruise his
heel”—here was a brilliant flash of light from heaven. Here was a promise. Here
was something that man could hold on to. God was promising that some day a
Redeemer would come, a Deliverer would come. God gave man hope. Down through the
centuries man held on to that one bit of hope! That was not all. There were
other occasions through the thousands of years of history when other flashes of
light came from heaven. All through the Old Testament, God gave man the promise
of salvation if by faith he would believe in the coming Redeemer. Therefore God
began to teach His people that man could only be saved by substitution. Someone
else would have to pay the bill for man’s redemption.

Go back again with me in your imagination to Eden for a moment. God said, “In
the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Man did eat of it. He
died.

Suppose that God had said, “Adam, you must have made a mistake, that was a
slight error on your part. You are forgiven. Please don’t do it again.” God
would have been a liar. He would not have been holy, neither would He have been
just. He was forced by His very nature to keep His word. God’s justice was at
stake. Man had to die spiritually and physically. His iniquities had separated
him from his God. Thus man had to suffer. He had to pay for his own sins. As we
have seen, Adam was the federal head of the human race. When Adam sinned, we all
sinned. “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin;
and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned” (Romans 5:12). The
burning question became “How can God be just and still justify the sinner?” It
must be remembered that the word justify means the “clearance of the soul from
guilt.” Justification is far more than just forgiveness. Sin must be put away
and made as though it had never been. Man must be restored so that there shall
be no spot or blemish or stain. In other words, man must be taken back to the
position he had before he fell from grace. For centuries men in their blindness
have been trying to get back to Eden—but they have never been able to reach
their goal. They have tried many paths, but they have all failed. Education is
necessary, but education will not bring a man back to God. False religions are
an opiate which keep men from present misery while on their way to future glory,
but they will never bring man to the place of his goal. The United Nations may
be a practical necessity in a world of men of war, and we are thankful for every
step that can be taken in the field of international relations that can settle
disputes without recourse to war; but if the United Nations could bring lasting
peace, man could say to God, “We do not need You any more. We have brought peace
on earth and have organized humanity in righteousness.” All of these schemes are
patchwork remedies that the world must use while waiting for the Great
Physician. Back in history we know that the first attempt of united man ended
with the confusion of tongues at the Tower of Babel. Men have failed on every
other occasion when they have tried to work without God, and they must be doomed
to such failures. The question remains “How can God be just—that is, true to
Himself in nature and true to Himself in holiness, and yet justify the sinner?”
Because each man had to bear his own sins, all mankind was excluded from
helping, since each was contaminated with the same disease. The only solution
was for an innocent party to volunteer to die physically and spiritually as a
substitution before God. This innocent party would have to take man’s judgment,
penalty, and death. But where was such an individual? Certainly there was none
on earth, for the Bible says, “All have sinned” (Romans 3:23). There was only
one possibility. God’s own Son was the only personality in the universe who had
the capacity to bear in His own body the sins of the world. Certainly Gabriel
might possibly have come and died for one person, but only God’s Son was
infinite and thus able to die for all. The Bible teaches that God is actually
three Persons. This is a mystery that we will never be able to understand. The
Bible does not teach that there are three Gods —but that there is one God. This
one God, however, is expressed in three Persons. There is God the Father, God
the Son, and God the Spirit. The Second Person of this Trinity is God’s Son,
Jesus Christ. He is co-equal with God the Father. He was not a Son of God but
the Son of God. He is the Eternal Son of God—the Second Person of the Holy
Trinity, God manifested in the flesh, the living Savior. The Bible teaches that
Jesus Christ had no beginning. He was never created. The Bible teaches that the
heavens were created by Him. All the myriads of stars and flaming suns were
created by Him. The earth was flung from His flaming finger tip. The birth of
Jesus Christ that we celebrate at Christmas time was not His beginning. His
origin is shrouded in that same mystery that baffles us when we inquire into the
beginning of God. The Bible only tells us, “In the beginning was the Word, and
the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). The Bible teaches us,
“Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by
Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible
and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or
powers: all things were created by Him, and for Him: And He is before all
things, and by Him all things consist” (Colossians 1:15-17). That last phrase
indicates that He holds all things together. In other words, the entire universe
would smash into billions of atoms were it not for the cohesive power of Jesus
Christ. The Bible again says, “And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the
foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of Thine hands: They
shall perish; but Thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment;
And as a vesture shalt Thou fold them up, and they shall be changed: but Thou
art the same, and Thy years shall not fail.” (Hebrews 1:10-12).

Again Jesus said of Himself, “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.”
He, and He alone, had the power and capacity to bring man back to God. But would
He? If He did, He would have to come to earth. He would have to take the form of
a servant. He would have to be made in the likeness of men. He would have to
humble Himself and become obedient unto death. He would have to grapple with
sin. He would have to meet and overcome Satan, the enemy of man’s soul. He would
have to buy sinners out of the slave market of sin. He would have to loose the
bonds and set the prisoners free by paying a price—that price would be His own
blood. He would have to be despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and
acquainted with grief. He would have to be smitten of God and separated from
God. He would have to be wounded for the transgressions of men and bruised for
their iniquities. He would have to reconcile God and man. He would be the great
Mediator of history. He would have to be a substitute. He would have to die in
the place of sinful man. All this would have to be done, voluntarily.

Thanks be unto God—that is exactly what happened! Looking down over the
battlements of heaven He saw this planet swinging in space—doomed, damned,
crushed, and bound for hell. He saw you and me struggling beneath our load of
sin and bound in the chains and ropes of sin. He made His decision in the
council halls of God. The angelic hosts bowed in humility and awe as heaven’s
Prince of Princes and Lord of Lords, who could speak worlds into space, got into
His jeweled chariot, went through pearly gates, across the steep of the skies,
and on a black Judean night, while the stars sang together and the escorting
angels chanted His praises, stepped out of the chariot, threw off His robes, and
became man!

It was as though I, while walking along a road, stepped on an ant-hill. I might
look down and say to the ants, “I am terribly sorry that I’ve stepped on your
ant-hill. I’ve disrupted your home. Everything is in confusion. I wish I could
tell you that I loved you, that I did not mean to do it, that I would like to
help you.” But you say, “That’s absurd, that’s impossible, ants cannot
understand your language!” That’s just it! How wonderful it would be if I could
only become an ant for a few moments and in their own language tell them of my
love for them!

That, in effect, is what Christ did. He came to reveal God to men. He it is who
told us that God loves us and is interested in our lives. He it is who told us
of the mercy and long-suffering and grace of God. He it is who promised life
everlasting. But more than that, Jesus Christ partook of flesh and blood in
order that He might die (Hebrews 2:14). “He was manifested to take away our
sins” (1 John 3:5). Christ came into this world “to give His life a ransom for
many” (Matthew 20:28). The very purpose of Christ’s coming into the world was
that He might offer up His life as a sacrifice for the sins of men. He came to
die. The shadow of His death hung like a pall over all of His thirty- three
years. The night Jesus was born Satan trembled. He sought to slay Him before He
was born, and tried to slay Him as soon as He was born. When the decree went
forth from Herod ordering the slaughter of all the children, its one purpose was
to make certain of the death of Jesus.

All the days of His life on earth He never once committed a sin. He is the only
man who ever lived that was sinless. He could stand in front of men and say,
“Which of you convinceth me of sin” (John 8:46)? He was hounded by the enemy day
and night, but they never found any sin in Him. He was without spot or blemish.

Jesus lived a humble life. He made Himself of no reputation. He received no
honor of men. He was born in a stable. He was reared in the insignificant
village of Nazareth. He was a carpenter. He gathered around Him a humble group
of fishermen as His followers. He walked among men as a man. He put on no
superior air and sought no worldly preferment. He humbled Himself as no other
man has ever humbled himself.

Jesus taught with such authority that the people of His day said, “Never man
spake like this man” (John 7:46). Every word that He spoke was historically
true. Every word that He spoke was scientifically true. Every word that He spoke
was ethically true. There were no loopholes in the moral conceptions and
statements of Jesus Christ. His ethical vision was wholly correct, correct in
the age in which He lived and correct in every age that has followed it. The
words of this blessed Person were prophetically true. He prophesied many things
that are even yet in the future. Lawyers tried to catch Him with test questions,
but they could never confuse Him. His answers to His opponents were clear and
clean-cut. There were no question marks about His statements, no vaguenesses in
His meaning, no hesitancy in His words. He knew, and therefore spoke with quiet
authority. He spoke with such simplicity that the common people heard Him
gladly. Though His words were profound, yet they were plain. His words were
weighty, but easily understood. They shone with a luster and simplicity of
statement that staggered His enemies. He dealt with the great questions of the
day in such a way that a wayfaring man had no difficulty in following Him. The
Lord Jesus cured the sick, the lame, the halt, and the blind. He healed the
leper and raised the dead. He cast out demons. He quieted the elements. He
stilled the storms. He brought peace, joy, and hope to the thousands to whom He
ministered.

He showed no sign of fear. He was never in a hurry. He met with no accidents. He
moved with perfect coordination and precision. He had supreme poise of bearing.
He did not waver or worry about His work.

He stood before Pilate and quietly said, “Thou couldst have no power at all
against me, except it were given thee from above” (John 19:11). He told the
frightened people that angelic legions were at His command.

He approached His cross with dignity and calmness, with an assurance and a set
purpose that fulfilled the prophecy written about Him eight hundred years
earlier: “He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her
shearers is dumb, so He openeth not His mouth” (Isaiah 53:7).

He moved supremely, gloriously, and with great anticipation toward the mission
that He had come to accomplish. He had come to save sinful men. He had come to
appease the wrath of God. He had come to buy men from the slave market of the
Devil. He had come to defeat the Devil forever. He had come to conquer hell and
the grave. There was only one way that He could do it. There was only one course
set before Him. His death had been prophesied thousands of years before. First,
as we have seen, in Eden’s Garden; and then in sermon, story, and prophecy the
death of Christ was set forth in the ages past. Abraham foresaw His death as the
lamb was slain. The children of Israel symbolized His death in the slaughtered
lamb. Every time blood was shed on a Jewish altar it represented the Lamb of God
who was someday to come and take away sin. David prophesied His death in detail
in more than one prophetic Psalm. Isaiah gave whole chapters to predicting the
details of His death.

Jesus Christ said that He had power to lay down His life when He said, “The good
shepherd giveth his life for the sheep” (John 10:11). He said again, “Even so
must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not
perish” (John 3:14-15). Jesus Christ had faced the possibility of the cross far
back in eternity. During all the ages which preceded His birth, He knew that the
day of His death was hastening on. When He was born of a virgin, He was bora
with the cross darkening His pathway. He had taken on a human body in order that
He might die. From the cradle to the cross, His purpose was to die.

He suffered as no man has ever suffered: “The night watches in Gethsemane,
lighted by the flaming torches, the kiss of the traitor, the arrest, the trial
before the high priest, the hour of waiting, the palace of the Roman governor,
the journey to the palace of Herod, the rough handling by Herod’s brutal
soldiers, the awesome scenes while Pilate tried to save Him as priests and
people clamored for His blood, the scourging, the howling multitudes, the path
from Jerusalem to Golgotha, the nails in His hands, the spike through His feet,
the crown of thorns upon His brow, the sarcastic and mocking cries of the two
thieves on either side, ‘You have saved others, now save yourself.’ “

Sometimes people have asked me why Christ died so quickly, in six hours, on the
cross, while other victims have agonized on the cross for two and three days. He
was weak and exhausted when He came there. He had been scourged, He was
physically depleted. But when Christ died, He died voluntarily. He chose the
exact moment when He expired.

There He hung naked between heaven and earth. They had pulled His beard until
His face bled. They had spat in His face until His face was running with the
spittle of angry men. He voiced neither complaint nor appeal but simply a
statement by which He let us know in two words something of the terrible
physical pain He suffered when he said, “I thirst.” The blood was being
extracted. God demands death, either for the sinner or a substitute. Christ was
the substitute! Gabriel and ten legions of angels hovered on the rim of the
universe, their swords unsheathed. One look from His blessed face and they would
have swept the angry, shouting multitudes into hell. The spikes never held
Him—it was the cords of love that bound tighter than any nails that men could
mold. “But God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). For you! For me! He bore our sins in
His body upon the tree. As someone has said, “Behold Him on the Cross, bending
His sacred head, and gathering into His heart in the awful isolation of
separation from God the issue of the sin of the world, and see how out of that
acceptance of the issue of sin He creates that which He does not require for
Himself that He may distribute to those whose place He has taken.” Standing
overwhelmed in the presence of this suffering, feeling our own inability to
understand or explain, and with a great sense of might and majesty overwhelming
us, we hear the next words that pass His lips, “It is finished.” But the
physical suffering of Jesus Christ was not the real suffering. Many men before
Him had died. Many men had become martyrs. The awful suffering of Jesus Christ
was His spiritual death. He reached the final issue of sin, fathomed the deepest
sorrow, when God turned His back and hid His face so that He cried, “My God, why
hast Thou forsaken me?” Alone in the supreme hour of mankind’s history Christ
uttered these words! Light blazed forth to give us a glimpse of what He was
enduring, but the fight was so blinding, as G. Campbell Morgan says, “that no
eye could bear to gaze.” The words were uttered, as Dr. Morgan has so well
expressed it, “that man may know how much there is that may not be known.”

He who knew no sin was made to be sin on our behalf that we might become the
righteousness of God in Him. On the cross He was made sin. He was God-forsaken.
Because He knew no sin there is a value beyond comprehension in the penalty He
bore, a penalty that He did not need for Himself. If in bearing sin in His own
body He created a value that He did not need for Himself, for whom was the value
created?

How it was accomplished in the depth of the darkness man will never know. I know
only one thing—He bore my sins in His body upon the tree. He stood where I
should have stood. The pains of hell that were my portion were heaped on Him,
and I am able to go to heaven and merit that which is not my own, but is His by
every right. “All the types, the offerings, the shadows, and the symbols of the
Old Testament were now fulfilled. No longer do the priests have to enter once a
year into the Holiest Place. The sacrifice was penal, substitutionary,
redemptive, propitiatory, reconciliatory, efficacious, and ‘as it is appointed
unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to
bear the sins of many.’ “

Now that the ground of redemption has been laid, all the guilty sinner has to do
is believe on the Son, and he can have Peace with God. “For God so loved the
world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). In the cross of
Christ I see three things: First, a description of the depth of mans sin. Do not
blame the people of that day for putting Christ to the cross. You and I are just
as guilty. It was not the people or the Roman soldiers that put Him to the
cross—it was your sins and my sins that made it necessary for Him to volunteer
this death.

Second, in the cross I see the overwhelming love of God. If ever you should
doubt the love of God, take a long, deep look at the cross, for in the cross you
find the expression of God’s love.

Third, in the cross is the only way of salvation. Jesus said, “I am the way, the
truth and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but by Me” (John 14:6). There
is no possibility of being saved from sin and hell, except by identifying
yourself with the Christ of the cross. If there had been any other way to save
you, He would have found it. If reformation, or living a good moral and ethical
life would have saved you, Jesus never would have died. A substitute had to take
your place. Men do not like to talk about it. They do not like to hear about it
because it injures their pride. It takes all self out.

Many people say, “Can I not be saved by living by the Golden Rule? Or following
the precepts of Jesus? Or living the ethical life that Jesus taught?” Even if
you could be saved by living the life that Jesus taught, you still would be a
sinner. You still would fail, because none of you have ever lived the life that
Jesus taught from the time you were born till the time you die. You have failed.
You have transgressed. You have disobeyed. You have sinned. Therefore, what are
you going to do about that sin? There is only one thing to do and that is to
bring it to the cross and find forgiveness.

Years ago King Charles V was loaned a large sum of money by a merchant in
Antwerp. The note came due, but the King was bankrupt and unable to pay. The
merchant gave a great banquet for the King. When all the guests were seated and
before the food was brought in, the merchant had a large platter placed on the
table before him and a fire lighted on it. Then, taking the note out of his
pocket, he held it in the flames until it was burned to ashes. The King threw
his arms around his benefactor and wept.

Just so, we have all been mortgaged to God. The debt was due, but we were unable
to pay. Two thousand years ago God invited the world to the gospel feast, and in
the agonies of the cross, God held your sins and mine until every last vestige
of our guilt was consumed. The Bible says, “Without shedding of blood is no
remission” (Hebrews 9:22). Many people have said to me, “How repulsive! You
don’t mean to tell us that you believe in a slaughterhouse religion!” Others
have wondered, “I do not understand why God demands blood.” Many people have
wondered, “I cannot understand why Christ had to die for me.” Today the idea of
the shed blood of Christ is becoming old-fashioned and out of date in a lot of
preaching, but it is still there. It is in the Bible. It is the very heart of
Christianity. The distinctive feature of Christianity is blood atonement.
Without it we cannot be saved. Blood is actually a symbol of the death of
Christ. The Bible teaches that it first of all redeems. “Forasmuch as ye know
that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your
vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious
blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Peter
1:18-19). Not only are we redeemed from the hands of the Devil, but from the
hands of the law. Christ’s death on the cross brings me out from under the law.
The law condemned me, but Christ satisfied every claim. All the gold and silver
and the precious stones of earth could never have bought me. What they could not
do, the death of Christ did. Redemption means “buying back.” We had been sold
for nothing to the Devil, but Christ redeemed us and brought us back.

Second, it brings us nigh. “But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far
off are made nigh by the blood of Christ” (Ephesians 2:13). When we were “aliens
from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise,
having no hope, and without God in the world,” Jesus Christ brought us nigh unto
God. “There is therefore now no judgment to them which are in Christ Jesus.” The
redeemed sinner will never have to face the judgment of Almighty God. Christ has
already taken his judgment.

Third, it makes peace. “And, having made peace through the blood of His cross,
by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself; by Him, I say, whether they be
things in earth, or things in heaven” (Colossians 1:20). The world will never
know peace until it finds it in the cross of Jesus Christ. You will never know
the peace with God, peace of conscience, peace of mind, and peace of soul until
you stand at the foot of the cross and identify yourself with Christ by faith.
There is the secret of peace. This is peace with God.

Fourth, it justifies. “Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we
shall be saved from wrath through Him” (Romans 5:9). It changes men’s standing
before God. It is a change from guilt and condemnation to pardon and
forgiveness. The forgiven sinner is not like the discharged prisoner who has
served out his term and is discharged but with no further rights of citizenship.
The repentant sinner, pardoned through the blood of Jesus Christ, regains his
full citizenship. “Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is
God that justifieth. Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea
rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also
maketh intercession for us” (Romans 8:33-34).

Fifth, it cleanses. “But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have
fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us
from all sin” (1 John 1:7). The key word in this verse is all. Not part of our
sins, but all of them. Every lie you ever told, every mean, low-down dirty thing
that you ever did, your hypocrisy, your lustful thoughts—all are cleansed by the
death of Christ. The story has often been told that years ago, in London, there
was a large gathering of noted people, and among the invited guests was a famous
preacher of his day, Caesar Milan. A young lady played and sang charmingly and
everyone was delighted. Very graciously, tactfully, and yet boldly the preacher
went up to her after the music had ceased and said, “I thought as I listened to
you tonight, how tremendously the cause of Christ would be benefited if your
talents were dedicated to His cause. You know, young lady, you are as much a
sinner in the sight of God as a drunkard in the ditch or a harlot on scarlet
street. But I’m glad to tell you that the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, can
cleanse from all sin.” The young woman snapped out a rebuke for his presumption,
to which he replied, “Lady, I mean no offense. I pray God’s Spirit will convict
you.”

They all returned to their homes. The young woman retired but could not sleep.
The face of the preacher appeared before her and his words rang through her
mind. At two o’clock in the morning she sprang from her bed, took a pencil and
paper, and with tears dripping from her face, Charlotte Elliott wrote that
famous poem:

Just as I am, without one plea, But that Thy blood was shed for me, And that
Thou bidd’st me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come! I cornel

Just as I am, and waiting not To rid my soul of one dark blot, To Thee, whose
blood can cleanse each spot, O Lamb of God, I come! I come! But this is not the
end. We do not leave Christ hanging on a cross with blood streaming down from
His hands, His side, and His feet. He is taken down and laid carefully away in a
tomb. A big stone is rolled against the entrance of the tomb. Soldiers are set
to guard it. All day Saturday, His followers sit gloomily and sadly in the upper
room. Two have already started toward Emmaus. Fear has gripped them all. Early
on that first Easter morning, Mary, Mary Magdalene, and Salome make their way to
the tomb to anoint the dead body. When they arrive, they are startled to find
the tomb is empty. An angel is standing at the head of the tomb and asks, “Whom
do you seek?” And they reply, “We seek Jesus of Nazareth.” And then the angel
gives the greatest, most glorious news that human ear has ever heard, “He is not
here. He is risen.”

Upon that great fact hangs the entire plan of the redemptive program of God.
Without the resurrection there could be no salvation. Christ predicted His
resurrection many times. He said on one occasion, “For as Jonah was three days
and three nights in the whale’s belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and
three nights in the heart of the earth.” As He predicted, He rose!

There are certain laws of evidence which hold in the establishment of any
historic event. There must be documentation of the event in question made by
reliable contemporary witnesses. There is more evidence that Jesus rose from the
dead than there is that Julius Caesar ever lived or that Alexander the Great
died at the age of thirty-three. It is strange that historians will accept
thousands of facts for which they can produce only shreds of evidence. But in
the face of the overwhelming evidence of the resurrection of Jesus Christ they
cast a skeptical eye and hold intellectual doubts. The trouble with these people
is that they do not want to believe. Their spiritual vision is so blinded and
they are so completely prejudiced that they cannot accept the glorious fact of
the resurrection of Christ on Bible testimony alone. The resurrection meant,
first, that Christ was God of very God. He was what He claimed to be. Christ was
Deity in the flesh.

Second, it meant that God had accepted His atoning work on the cross of Christ,
which was necessary to our salvation. “Who was delivered for our offences, and
was raised again for our justification” (Romans 4:25).

Third, it assures mankind of a righteous judgment. Fourth, it guarantees that
our bodies also will be raised in the end. “But now is Christ risen from the
dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept” (1 Corinthians 15:20). The
Scripture teaches that as Christians, our bodies may go to the grave but they
are going to be raised on the great resurrection morning. Then will death be
swallowed up in victory. As a result of the resurrection of Christ the sting of
death is gone and Christ has the keys of death. He says, “I am He that liveth,
and was dead; and, behold, I am alive forevermore, Amen; and have the keys of
hell and of death” (Revelation 1:18). And Christ promises that “Because I live,
ye shall live also.”

And, fifth, it means that death is abolished. The power of death has been broken
and death’s fear has been removed. Now we can say with the Psalmist, “Yea,
though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil:
for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me” (Psalms 23:4). Paul
looked forward to death with great anticipation as a result of the resurrection
of Christ. He said, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Php
1:21).

Without the resurrection of Christ there could be no hope for the future. The
Bible promises that someday we are going to stand face to face with the
resurrected Christ, and we are going to have bodies like unto His own body.

Face to face with Christ my Savior, Face to face, what will it be? When with
rapture I behold Him, Jesus Christ who died for me.

Face to face shall I behold Him, Far beyond the starry sky;

Face to face in all His glory I shall see Him by and by.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 12: 10.     CHAPTER EIGHT: HOW AND WHERE TO BEGIN
========================================================================

Chapter Eight HOW AND WHERE TO BEGIN

Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into
the kingdom of heaven. —Matthew 18:3

WE NOW recognize that there is a natural principle that pulls us down to the
animal plane, blinding reason, searing conscience, paralyzing will. We stand
condemned by our own deeds.

God is a holy and righteous God. He cannot tolerate sin. Sin separates from God.
It brings the wrath of God upon the human soul. Man has lost his moral,
intellectual, and spiritual sense of God because he has lost God. He will not
find God until he finds the way back to God. The way back to God is not an
intellectual way. It is not a moral way. You cannot think your way back to God
because human thought-life will not co-ordinate with divine thought-life, for
the carnal mind is at enmity with God. You cannot worship your way back to God
because man is a spiritual rebel from God’s presence. You cannot moralize your
way back to God because character is vitiated with sin. The natural question
comes to you—What shall I do? Where shall I start? Where do I begin? What is my
road back to God? There is only one way back to God. Jesus said, “Except ye be
converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of
heaven.” Thus Jesus demanded a conversion. This is how to begin! This is where
it starts! You must be converted!

There are many people who confuse conversion with the keeping of the law. The
law of Moses is set forth in specific terms in the Bible and the purpose of the
law is made very clear. It was not offered at any time as a panacea for the
world’s ills. Rather, it was given as a diagnosis of the world’s ills; it
outlines the reason for our trouble, not the cure. The Bible says, “Now we know
that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law:
that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God”
(Romans 3:19). The law has given a revelation of man’s unrighteousness, and the
Bible says, “By the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His
sight.” (Romans 3:20). It is impossible to be converted by the keeping of the
law. The Bible says, “By the law is the knowledge of sin.” The law is a moral
mirror. It condemns but does not convert. It challenges but does not change. It
points the finger but does not offer mercy. There is no life in the law. There
is only death, for the pronouncement of the law was, “Thou shalt die.”

There are many people who say that their religion is the Sermon on the Mount,
but the man or woman is yet to be born who has ever lived up to the Sermon on
the Mount. The Bible says that all have sinned and come short of His glory.

Examine your own motives before you decide that you are above reproach and
living a life that absolves you from all need of conversion. Look into your own
heart fearlessly and honestly before you say religious conversion is all right
for some but you certainly don’t stand to benefit from it. When I was preaching
in Hollywood, a group of movie people asked me to talk to them about religious
experiences. After my address we had a discussion period and the very first
question that was asked was, “What is conversion?”

Some time later it was my privilege to address a group of political leaders in
Washington. When the discussion period started, the first question again was,
“What is conversion?” In almost every university and college group where I have
led discussions, this same question is invariably asked, “What do you mean by
conversion?”

Probably there are more different answers to this query than to almost any other
pertaining to religion. What is conversion? What is involved in it? How is it
accomplished? What are its effects? Why must you be converted in order to get to
heaven? The idea of conversion is certainly not unusual in our society. Any good
salesman knows that he must convert the prospect to his particular product or
way of thinking. The chief business of advertising is to convert the buying
public from one brand to another. We speak of political leaders being converted
from their original political philosophy and adopting a different one. During
the last war, we heard a great deal about peacetime industries converting to war
production, and most of the oil furnaces in private homes were converted to
coal.

Actually the word conversion means “to turn around,” “to change one’s mind,” “to
turn back,” or “to return.” In the realm of religion it has been variously
explained as “to repent,” “to be regenerated,” “to receive grace,” “to
experience religion,” “to gain assurance.”

I remember one confirmed alcoholic who came to one of the opening meetings of a
campaign and said to me, “Mr. Graham, I’m not sure there’s a word of truth in
what you’re saying, but I’m going to give your Christ a trial, and if He works
even a little bit the way you say He will, I’ll come back and sign up for life!”

Weeks later he told me that he didn’t quite understand it, but every time he
started to take a drink it seemed as though something stopped him. Christ had
given him victory over his vicious habit. He returned to his family, and is now
living his life for Christ. In other words, he turned around, he changed his
direction, he changed his way of thinking—he had been converted!

Conversion can take many different forms. The way it is accomplished depends
largely upon the individual—his temperament, his emotional balance, his
environment, and his previous conditioning and way of life. Conversion may
follow a great crisis in a person’s life; or it could come after all former
values have been swept away, when great disappointment has been experienced,
when one has lost one’s sense of power through material possessions, or lost the
object of one’s affections. A man or woman who has been focusing all attention
on financial gains, business or social prestige, or centering all affection on
some one person experiences a devastating sense of loss when denied the thing
that has given life its meaning. In these tragic moments, as the individual
stands stripped of all his worldly power, when the loved one is gone beyond
recall, he recognizes how terribly and completely alone he really is. In that
moment, the Holy Spirit may cause the worldly bandages to fall from his eyes and
he sees clearly for the first time. He recognizes that God is the only source of
real power, and the only enduring fountainhead of love and companionship. Or
again, conversion may take place at the very height of personal power or
prosperity—when all things are going well and the bountiful mercies of God have
been bestowed generously upon you. The very goodness of God can drive you to a
recognition that you owe all to God; thus, the very goodness of God leads you to
repentance.

Conversion at such a moment can be as sudden and dramatic as the conversion of
pagans who transfer their affection and faith from idols carved of stone and
wood, to the Person of Jesus Christ. Not all conversions come as a sudden,
brilliant flash of soul illumination that we call a crisis conversion. There are
many others that are accomplished only after a long and difficult conflict with
the inner motives of the person. With others, conversion comes as the climactic
moment of a long period of gradual conviction of their need and revelation of
the plan of salvation. This prolonged process results in conscious acceptance of
Christ as personal Savior and in the yielding of life to Him.

We may say, therefore, that conversion can be an instantaneous event, a crisis
in which the person receives a clear revelation of the love of God; or it can be
a gradual unfoldment accompanied by a climactic moment at the time the line is
crossed between darkness and fight, between death and life everlasting.

It does not always happen in exactly this way. My wife, for example, cannot
remember the exact day or hour when she became a Christian, but she is certain
that there was such a moment in her life, a moment when she actually crossed the
fine. Many young people who have grown up in Christian homes and had the benefit
of Christian training are unaware of the time when they committed their lives to
Christ. Others remember very clearly when they made their public confession of
faith. The reports of conversions in the New Testament indicate that most of
them were the dramatic, crisis type. For many years, psychology left conversion
and religious experience alone, but in the last twenty-five years much study has
been made by psychologists concerning the matter of conversion. They have
pointed out that conversion is not only a Christian experience but is also found
in other religions, and that it is not necessarily a religious phenomenon but
also occurs in nonreligious spheres. Students of psychology have agreed that
there are three steps in conversion: First, a sense of perplexity and
uneasiness; second, a climax and turning point; and, third, a relaxation marked
by rest and joy.

Starbuck says that there are two kinds of conversion. He says that one is
accompanied by a violent sense of sin, and the other by a feeling of
incompleteness, a struggle after a larger life and a desire for spiritual
illumination. The value of psychological studies of conversion has been
underestimated. We cannot brush them aside and ignore them. They shed a great
deal of light, but few of them are willing to accept the Biblical conversion as
a supernatural experience.

Actually, Biblical conversion involves three steps—two of them active and one
passive. In active conversion, repentance and faith are involved. Repentance is
conversion viewed from its starting point, the turning from the former life.
Faith indicates the objective point of conversion, the turning to God. The
third, which is passive, we may call the new birth, or regeneration.

Now in order to get to heaven, Jesus said that you must be converted. I didn’t
say it—Jesus said it! This is not mans opinion—this is God’s opinion! Jesus
said, “Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter
into the kingdom of heaven.”

True conversion will involve the total mind, the total affection, and the total
will. There have been thousands of people who have been intellectually converted
to Christ. They believe the entire Bible. They believe all about Jesus, but they
have never been really converted to Him. In the second chapter of John there is
a description of the hundreds of people who were following Jesus early in His
ministry. It says that many of them believed on Him. But Jesus did not commit
Himself to them because He knew the hearts of all men. Why would Jesus not
commit Himself to them? He knew that they believed with their heads and not with
their hearts.

There is a vast difference between intellectual conversion and the total
conversion that saves the soul. To be sure, there must be a change in your
thinking and intellectual acceptance of Christ.

There are thousands of people who have had some form of emotional experience
that they refer to as conversion but who have never been truly converted to
Christ. Christ demands a change in the way you live—and if your life does not
conform to your experience, then you have every reason to doubt your experience!
Certainly there will be a change in the elements that make up emotion when you
come to Christ—hate and love will be involved, because you will begin to hate
sin and love righteousness. Your affections will undergo a revolutionary change.
Your devotion to Him will know no bounds. Your love for Him cannot be described.
But even if you have an intellectual acceptance of Christ, and an emotional
experience—that still is not enough. There must be the conversion of the will!
There must be that determination to obey and follow Christ. Your will must be
bent to the will of God. Self must be nailed to the cross. The only desire you
will have will be to please Him. In conversion as you stand at the foot of the
cross, the Holy Spirit makes you realize that you are a sinner. He directs your
faith to the Christ who died in your place. You must open your heart and let Him
come in. At that precise moment the Holy Spirit performs the miracle of the new
birth. You actually become a new moral creature. There comes the implantation of
the divine nature. You become a partaker of God’s own life. Jesus Christ,
through the Spirit of God, takes up residence in your heart.

Conversion is so simple that the smallest child can be converted, but it is also
so profound that theologians throughout history have pondered the depth of its
meaning. God has made the way of salvation so plain that “the wayfaring men,
though fools, shall not err therein” (Isaiah 35:8). No person will ever be
barred from the kingdom of God because he did not have the capacity to
understand. The rich and the poor, the sophisticated and the simple—all can be
converted. To sum it up, conversion simply means “to change.” When a person is
converted he may continue to love objects which he loved before, but there will
be a change of reasons for loving them. A converted person may forsake former
objects of affection. He may even withdraw from his worldly companions, not
because he despises them, for many of them will be decent and amiable, but
because there is more attraction for him in the fellowship of other Christians
of like mind. The converted person will love what he once hated, and hate what
he once loved. There will even be a change of heart about God. Where he once may
have been careless about God, living in constant fear, dread, and antagonism to
God, he now finds himself in a state of complete reverence, confidence,
obedience, and devotion. There will be a reverential fear of God, a constant
gratitude to God, a dependence upon God, and a new loyalty to Him. Before
conversion there may have been gratification of the flesh. Culture and
intellectual pursuits or the making of money may have been of first and supreme
importance. Now, righteousness and holiness of heart, and living the Christian
life will be placed above all other concerns, for pleasing Christ will be the
only thing of real importance. In other words, conversion means a complete
change in the life of an individual.

I remember so vividly a young New York career girl who came out to Los Angeles
to be married. She and the young man had met when they were both working in a
high-powered New York advertising agency, and their courtship had been conducted
against a background of cocktail parties and night clubs. Filled with ambition
and “on his way up,” he had himself transferred to the California office, with
the understanding that the girl would follow him in six months and they would be
married.

About a week after she had arrived in Los Angeles, expecting to take up a gay
new life, she discovered that the man had fallen in love with a movie starlet
and lacked the courage to write her about it before she left New York!

Here she was, alone in a city where she knew no one- all her plans in ruins, her
pride crushed, and the future stretching ahead, bleak and empty. Her family had
not been religious, and in this hour of extreme need she knew of nowhere to turn
for comfort, advice, or guidance. As she walked along the unfamiliar streets,
trying to overcome her shock and humiliation, she came upon the “canvas
cathedral” in which we were conducting our campaign. She said she was never sure
what made her come inside, but she did, and sat glumly through the entire
service. The next night she came again, and every night for the whole week,
until through the cloud of bitterness and misery that surrounded her, God made
His voice heard, and she came forward to confess her need of salvation. With the
burden of guilt and rejection lifted from her through faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ, she came to see that the love she had lost was but a steppingstone to a
far greater and much richer love. The sense of humiliation that prevented her
from returning to her former New York job vanished, and rather than life being
finished, she found upon her return that it was fuller than ever. Only instead
of wasting her brains and organizational ability on an endless round of cocktail
parties, she became extremely active in her church. The imagination she formerly
devoted to entertaining the “office crowd” now goes into making Bible stories
come alive for the young people. Her training as a fundraiser is now being put
to good use in the service of the Lord, and her minister says her ideas have
been invaluable in increasing regular church attendance. Far from being rejected
and unwanted, she is sought after constantly by her fellow church members. But,
most important of all, her sense of loneliness has vanished, for she knows now
that Jesus Christ is ever by her side, ready to comfort, to guide, and to
protect her.

All this had come as a result of her conversion—her turning away from the bleak,
empty, worldly road she was traveling so unhappily—to her Lord and Savior, Jesus
Christ! She had found peace with God.


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  CHAPTER 13: 11.     CHAPTER NINE: REPENT
========================================================================

Chapter Nine

REPENT

Joy shall he in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, more than over ninety and
nine just persons which need no repentance. —Luke 15:7

WE HAVE now seen that Jesus demanded conversion. We have also seen that the
three elements of conversion are repentance, faith, and regeneration. It may be
debatable in which order these three should come, but it is generally agreed
that they probably happen at the same time. Whether you are conscious or
unconscious of it, in that critical moment of conversion these three take place
simultaneously.

If repentance could be described in one word, I would use the word renounce.
“Renounce what?” you ask. The answer can also be given in one word—”sin.” The
Bible teaches, as we have already seen, that sin is a transgression of the law.
Sin is the absence of all authority and the denial of all obligation to God. Sin
is that evil principle which came into the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve were
tempted and fell. Ever since the disaster in Eden this evil poison has affected
all men so that “all have sinned,” and “there is none righteous, no, not one.”
Sin has destroyed our relationship with God, and as a consequence has disturbed
our relationship with each other, and even with ourselves.

We cannot possibly have peace with God or peace with each other in the world or
even peace within ourselves until something is done about that “abominable thing
which God hates.” Not only are we told that we must renounce the principle of
sin, but we are also to renounce sins—plural. We are to renounce the world, the
flesh, and the Devil. There can be no parleying, bargaining, compromise, or
hesitation. Christ demands absolute renunciation. But here again the principle
of love is involved, because when you fall in love completely and absolutely
with Jesus Christ you will not want to do the things that He hates and abhors.
You will automatically renounce all the sins of your life when you surrender by
faith to Him. Therefore repentance and faith go hand in hand. You cannot have
genuine repentance without saving faith, and you cannot have saving faith
without genuine repentance. The word repentance is sadly missing today from the
average pulpit. It is a very unpopular word. The first sermon Jesus ever
preached was “Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17). This
was God speaking through His Son. Jesus had come with a heart filled with love
and compassion, but He immediately began to press home man s guilt and sins. He
called upon men to acknowledge their guilt and to turn from their ungodliness.
He said repentance must come before He could pour out His love, grace, and mercy
upon men. Jesus refused to gloss over iniquity. He insisted upon self-judgment,
upon a complete right about-face. He insisted upon a new attitude before He
would reveal the love of God. The people came to Jesus one day and told Him of
certain Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the sacrifices as his
Roman legions quelled the Jewish uprising. They reported, too, how the falling
of a tower in Siloam had killed many. In answer Jesus declared, “Suppose ye that
these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans ... I tell you, Nay: but,
except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish” (Luke 13:3). In other words,
Jesus said whether men are taken away by violence, by accident, or by natural
death, their doom is the same unless they have turned to God in repentance.
Until this is done, faith is absolutely impossible. This does not limit the
grace of God, but repentance makes way for the grace of God.

We know that salvation is based entirely upon the grace of God. We have already
seen that sacrifices, ritual, or works of the law have never been able to save a
single soul. The Bible says that no man is justified by the law in the sight of
God. The Bible says, “The just shall live by his faith” (Romans 1:17).
Salvation, forgiveness, and justification are based entirely upon the atoning
work of Christ. However, if the sacrifice of Christ on the cross is to be made
effectual for any individual of any age, that individual must repent of sin and
accept Christ by faith.

Jonah preached repentance in Nineveh until Nineveh repented.

Ezekiel preached repentance when he said, “Therefore I will judge you, O house
of Israel, every one according to his ways, saith the Lord God. Repent, and turn
yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin
(Ezekiel 18:30). The great message of John the Baptist was repentance when he
said, “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2).

Repentance is mentioned seventy times in the New Testament. Jesus said, “Except
ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” The sermon that Peter preached on the
Day of Pentecost was, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of
Jesus Christ for the remission of sins” (Acts 2:38). Paul preached it when he
said that he “testified both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance
toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ” (Acts 20:21). The Bible says
God commands repentance, “And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now
commandeth all men every where to repent” (Acts 17:30). It is a command. It is
an imperative. God says, “Repent! Or perish!” Have you repented? Are you sure of
it?

What did Jesus mean by the word repent? Why does it appear over and over
throughout the Bible? If you look in the modern dictionary you will find that
repent means “to feel sorry for, or to regret.” But the original Greek and
Hebrew words that Jesus spoke meant a great deal more than that. It meant a
great deal more than just regretting and feeling sorry about sin. The Biblical
word repent means “to change, or to turn.” It is a word of power and action. It
is a word that signifies a complete revolution in the individual. When the Bible
calls upon us to repent of sin, it means that we should turn away from sin, that
we should do an about-face and walk in the opposite direction from sin and all
that it implies.

Jesus told the parable of the Prodigal Son to dramatize what He meant by the
word repent. When the Prodigal Son repented he didn’t just sit still and feel
sorry about all his sins. He wasn’t passive and limp about it. He didn’t stay
where he was, surrounded by the swine. He got up and left! He turned his feet in
the other direction. He sought out his father and humbled himself before him,
and then he got his reward.

Too many modern Christians have lost sight of what the Bible means when it talks
about repentance. They think that repentance is little more than shaking their
heads over their sins and saying, “My, but I’m sorry I did that!” and then
continuing to live just as they have lived before.

True repentance means “to change, to turn away from, to go in a new direction.”
To be sorry is not enough in repentance. Judas was remorseful and sorry, but he
never repented. Even reformation is not enough. There is no torture that you can
give your body, no trials you can set for your mind that will be pleasing to
Almighty God. Our sins were atoned for by Christ on the cross. There He suffered
sin’s penalty. No suffering that we can undergo will lead us to repentance. When
I speak of repentance I am not speaking of the old-time mourners’ bench. Many
people have taught that in order to repent you must mourn for a stated time in
order to be ready for salvation. One man told me the night he found Christ he
went forward in an old-fashioned camp meeting some years ago. While he was
kneeling at the altar trying to find God, some dear sister came and slapped him
on the back and said, “Hold on, brother! If you want God, you’ll have to hold
on.” A few minutes later a church officer came up and slapped him across the
back and said, “Brother, turn loose!” Then another sister came up a few minutes
later and said, “The night I was converted a big light hit me in the face and
knocked me cold.” He said, “I tried to turn loose and hold on at the same time
while looking for the light. I almost never made it in the confusion!” A very
intelligent Christian leader once told me that at the time he was converted the
demonstration of emotion expected of him by the preacher and congregation almost
kept him from coming to God.

Falsely produced emotionalism in some revival meetings has been a stumbling
block to many a sincere, searching soul. But the type of repentance I’m talking
about is true Biblical repentance, which involves three things: it involves the
intellect, the emotion, and the will.

First, there must be a knowledge of sin. The Bible says, “All have sinned, and
come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). When Isaiah was convicted of his
sins he said, “Woe is me! ... I am a man of unclean lips” (Isaiah 6:5). When Job
was convinced that he was a sinner he said, “I abhor myself” (Job 42:6). When
Peter was convicted of his sins he said, “I am a sinful man” (Luke 5:8). When
Paul was convicted of his sins he called himself “the chief of sinners.”

It is the Holy Spirit that brings about this conviction. Actually, repentance
cannot take place unless first there is a movement of the Holy Spirit in the
heart and mind. The Holy Spirit may use a mothers prayers, a pastors sermon, a
Christian radio program, the sight of a church steeple, or the death of a loved
one to bring about this necessary conviction. However, I have seen men in some
of our meetings stand trembling under conviction and still not repent of their
sins. It is possible to be convicted of sin and know you are a sinner and even
shed tears over your sins, and yet not repent.

Second, the emotions are involved in repentance, just as they are in all genuine
experiences. Paul said there is a godly sorrow that worketh toward repentance.
“Many people abhor all emotion, and some critics are suspicious of any
conversion that does not take place in a refrigerator. There are many dangers in
false emotionalism, produced for its own effect, but that does not rule out true
emotion and depth of feeling.” As Dr. W. E. Sangster, the great British
Methodist preacher, says in his book Let Me Commend, “The man who screams at a
football or baseball game but is distressed when he hears of a sinner weeping at
the cross and murmurs something about the dangers of emotionalism hardly merits
intelligent respect.”

Horace Walpole once accused John Wesley of acting out very ugly emotionalism in
his preaching.

Third, repentance involves the will.

It is only when we come to the will that we find the very heart of repentance.
There must be that determination to forsake sin—to change one’s attitudes toward
self, toward sin, and God; to change one’s feeling; to change one’s will,
disposition, and purpose.

Only the Spirit of God can give you the determination necessary for true
repentance. It means more than the little girl who prayed, “Make me good—not
real good, but good enough so I won’t get whipped.”

We have hundreds of people in America who have their names on church rolls. They
go to church when it is convenient. They give their money to the church and
support its activities. They shake hands with the minister after the service and
tell him what a splendid sermon he preached.

They may talk the language of the Christian and many of them can quote a fair
amount of Scripture, but they have never really experienced true repentance.
They have a sort of “take-it-or-leave-it-alone” attitude toward religion. They
turn to God and pray when they get in a tight place, but the rest of the time
they do not give God very much thought. The Bible teaches that when a person
comes to Christ a change takes place that is reflected in everything he does.

There is not one verse of Scripture that indicates you can be a Christian and
live any kind of a life you want to. When Christ enters into the human heart, He
demands that He be Lord and Master. He demands complete surrender. He demands
control of your intellectual processes. He demands that your body be subject to
Him, and to Him alone. He demands your talents and abilities. He demands all
your work and labor be performed in His name.

Too many of today’s professing Christians would give up going to church before
they would give up getting a new refrigerator. Given a choice between making the
down payment on a new car or contributing to the building of a new Sunday
school, it is easy to guess what the decision of many would be. Thousands of
so-called Christians are putting money and the things that make up our high
standard of living ahead of the teachings of Christ. We can find time for the
movies, baseball games, or prize fights, but we can’t find time for God. We can
save toward a new home or a bigger television set, but we feel we no longer can
afford to tithe. This is idolatry. A change must take place! We point our
fingers at the heathen and at the idol worshipers of old, but the only
difference is that our graven images are made of gleaming chromium and steel and
have thermostats and defrosting devices instead of jeweled eyes! Instead of
gold, their surfaces are covered with easy-to-clean lifetime porcelain, but we
worship them just the same, and feel that our lives would be impossible without
them.

Jesus demands Lordship over all such things. He wants you to yield everything
concerning your social life, your family life, your business life to Him. He
must have first place in everything you do or think or say, for when you truly
repent you turn toward God in everything.

We have the warning of Christ that He will not receive us into His kingdom until
we are ready to give up all, until we are ready to turn from all sin in our
lives. Don t try to do it part way. Don’t say, “I’ll give up some of my sins and
hang on to some others. I’ll five part of my life for Jesus and part for my own
desires.” Jesus demands one hundred per cent surrender, and when that is
accomplished He rewards a thousand-fold. But don’t expect Jesus to hand out any
small size five hundred per cent awards for fifty per cent surrenders! God
doesn’t work that way His wonders to perform! He demands a total change, a total
surrender. When you have determined that you are renouncing sin, forsaking sin,
and yielding all to Christ, you have taken another step toward peace with God.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 14: 12.     CHAPTER TEN: FAITH
========================================================================

Chapter Ten

FAITH For by grace are ye saved through faith; and not of yourselves: it is the
gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. —Ephesians 2:8-9

WE ARE now ready to take up the next step in finding peace with God. You are now
ready to forsake your past life and your sins. You are determined that this
change is going to take place in your life. You are no longer headed away from
God, but you are moving toward His love and mercy and protection. You have made
your decision. You have chosen your path. You have repented; you have chosen the
right road, even though it may be a difficult one. You have chosen the road that
Moses took almost thirty-five hundred years ago when he renounced his right to
the throne of Egypt and decided in favor of God! Moses was forty years old when
he made his great decision, when he concluded that faith and truth in company
with agony and hardship were better than wealth and fame and the absence of
God’s love. Few men in history have been called upon to make a more difficult
decision than his.

Moses was a man of education and culture, a man of wealth and prominence. As the
son of Pharaoh’s daughter he was accustomed to every honor, every luxury, and
every privilege. The throne of Egypt, richest, most powerful, most spectacularly
romantic country of its time, was within his grasp.

Yet the Bible records that “By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused
to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter; Choosing rather to suffer affliction
with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season;
Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt: for
he had respect unto the recompense of the reward. By faith he forsook Egypt, not
fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured, as seeing Him who is invisible”
(Hebrews 11:24-27).

Notice, it says that he “refused” and he “forsook”—this is true repentance. And
then it says he did it “by faith”! This is the next step—faith. Moses made this
decision not in a moment of overt emotionalism that some psychologists insist is
necessary for religious experience. He was not motivated by frustration. He was
not a hopeless misfit or an unfulfilled man. Moses was not choosing the path of
God as a compensation for the rewards that he felt life had withheld from him,
nor was he turning to the religious life out of boredom and apathy. He did not
want for interest, entertainment, and amusement.

None of these arguments, or the many others so often advanced as reasons for
seeking life with God, were valid in the case of Moses. He was not forced to run
from the flesh and the Devil. He did it from choice. Moses was certainly neither
weak-minded nor weak-willed. He was not a child clinging to the security of an
established order. He was not a nonentity seeking recognition and prestige. He
was not any of the things that those who mock religion say one must be to feel
the need of salvation. Moses had even more than the dreams to which most men
would aspire; and yet out of his mature judgment in the prime of life he turned
his back on wealth, position, and esteem and chose instead faith in God.

Every time I hear it said that only the hopeless and helpless, only the
maladjusted need the comfort of religion, I think of Moses.

It has been my privilege to talk to hundreds of thousands of men and women
concerning their spiritual problems. I have learned that when men and women of
sound judgment reject Christ as their Lord and Master, they do it not because
they find Christian doctrines intellectually distasteful, but because they seek
to avoid the responsibilities and obligations that the Christian life demands.
It is their faint hearts rather than their brilliant minds that stand between
them and Christ. They are not willing to submit themselves and surrender
everything to Christ.

Moses considered the claims and obligations of religion carefully. He realized
that if he was to embrace God he would have to do it at the sacrifice of the
things that men usually hold most dear. He made no hasty examination. He came to
no half-considered conclusions under sudden impulse or emotional reaction. He
knew how much was at stake and he arrived at his decision with the full use of
his well-trained and superior mental faculties. His final choice was not in the
nature of a temporary experiment. He did not select faith as a tentative
measure. It was a mature conviction with an unalterable purpose, a conviction
not to be shaken by changes of fortune or the trials of long- endured privation.
He carefully burned all the bridges and ships that might have made retreat
possible from his new position. When Moses had his great crisis moment at the
age of forty, he committed himself without reservation for all time and under
all circumstances to God and His commands.

How different was the quality of Moses’ decision from that of the famous
biographer Gamaliel Bradford, who, as he neared the end of his life, said, “I do
not dare read the New Testament for fear of awakening a storm of anxiety and
doubt and dread, of having taken the wrong path, of having been a traitor to the
plain and simple God.”

Moses had no such fear. And neither should you fear if you turn yourself
wholeheartedly to Christ now and forever by faith. Don’t turn to Him saying,
“I’ll try Christianity for a while. If it works I’ll go on with it, but if it
doesn’t I still have time to choose another way of life.” When you come to
Christ, every bridge has to be burned behind you, with no thought of ever
turning back.

Years ago, when the wings of the fierce Roman eagle cast an ominous shadow over
the world, those audacious warriors whom Caesar led sallied forth to conquer
Britain. As the enemy vessels appeared on the horizon, thousands of Englishmen
bravely gathered on the heights to defend their homeland. To their utter
bewilderment, the first thing the Romans did on disembarking was to set fire to
their ships. When the wild flames consumed the craft, the only avenue of retreat
was cut off for the daring invaders. With such an indomitable spirit, how could
they fail to conquer! Little wonder the petty village on the banks of the Tiber
became the Mistress of the world!

Just so, Christ demands absolute surrender and devotion. “And Jesus said unto
him, No man, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the
kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62).

Moses made his soul-shaking choice as he stood at the fork of life’s highway.
His judicial mind weighed all the facts that bore upon his decision. He looked
long and carefully down each road to its termination. He considered all the pros
and cons and only then did he decide to put his trust and faith in God.

First he looked down the broad road, the bright road filled with power and
luxury, filled with gaiety and wine, rich in the things the world counts as
pleasure. It was a familiar road. He knew it well. He had traveled it for forty
years and he knew that it ended in destruction, knew that it could only lead to
hell.

Then Moses looked down the other road, the narrow road, the more difficult road.
He saw the suffering, the affliction, the humiliation, and disappointment. He
saw the hardships and the trials, the sorrows and the pains, but by faith he saw
also the triumphs and the reward of eternal life. A man of lesser judgment, a
man of lesser experience than Moses, might have been tempted to take the first
road. Egypt was then the greatest power on earth. It held command of the fertile
Nile valley, the granary of the world. Its armies were invincible, its colleges
and universities were setting the pattern that other centuries would follow.

Few of us are ever asked to give up as much for God as Moses did. Few of us are
ever shown temptation in such abundance and variety and asked to withstand it.
Few of us have such earthly delights and pleasures spread before our eyes, and
even the Scriptures admit that there is pleasure in sin, if only for a season.
The pleasure is fleeting and leaves no comfort in its wake. In choosing God,
Moses made a great sacrifice, but he also won a great reward. Great fortunes
were rare in Moses’ time, and few men indeed had the opportunity that he had to
become the wealthiest man on earth.

Today, many men can amass great fortunes. In 1923 (when fortune gathering was
this country’s major interest) a group of the world’s most successful financiers
gathered at the Edgewater Beach Hotel in Chicago. Even in the fabulous twenties,
the meeting was an impressive array of wealth and power. Seated at a single
table were the president of the world’s largest independent steel company, the
president of the largest utility company, a great wheat speculator, the
president of the New York Stock Exchange, a member of the cabinet of the
President of the United States, the president of the Bank of International
Settlements, the man who was known as the biggest trader on Wall Street, and
another who headed the world’s most powerful monopoly. Together, these eight men
controlled more wealth than the United States Treasury! Their success stories
were known to every schoolboy. They were the models that other men tried to
copy. They were the financial and industrial giants of America! In 1923 the
widely publicized stories of these men were glamorous and exciting. They fired
the imagination! They kindled envy! They inspired other men to try to be as they
were! But in 1923 their stories were only half told —the closing chapters were
yet to be written. At the time these eight men sat down together at the hotel in
Chicago they were each at the place in their individual fives where Moses had
been when he stood at the crossroads. These men were at the crossroads too, and
two paths stretched out before each of them. Perhaps they were paths they could
not see, paths about which they did not care. Certainly they were paths they
didn’t choose to follow, and today their stories are complete. Today we know
those final chapters. We can review their lives, just as we can review the life
of Moses, and see which seems the wisest and the best.

Charles Schwab, president of the steel company, lived the last years of his life
on borrowed money and died penniless. Arthur Cutten, greatest of the wheat
speculators, died abroad insolvent. Richard Whitney, president of the New York
Stock Exchange, served a term in Sing- Sing Penitentiary. Albert Paul, the
cabinet member, was pardoned from prison so he could die at home. Jesse
Livermore, the “bear” of Wall Street; Leon Frazer, president of the Bank of
International Settlements, and Ivar Kreuger, head of the world’s largest
monopoly, all committed suicide!

These men all had money, power, fame, prestige, intelligence, and education—but
every one of them lacked the one attribute that gives life its real meaning and
purpose. They lacked the one attribute that is essential to the Christian creed
and conduct—the attribute that makes conversion possible, that makes
regeneration real. They refused to believe!

These man had no faith, or if they did have faith, they refused to act upon it.
How different the closing chapters of their fives would have been if they had
been able to count faith in Christ among their treasuries.

Notice it was through faith that Moses renounced the wealth of Egypt. It was his
faith that made him know that even though he might suffer privation and
humiliation all the rest of his life on earth, in the end he would receive the
greatest of rewards—eternal life.

Men like Cutten and Schwab might have thought Moses a fool. They would have
said, “A bird in the hand is worth far more than two in the bush.” They would
have said, “Look, you know what you have in Egypt. You know what a man of your
brains can do to manipulate this wealth and power. Play your cards right and
Egypt will control the world. You can put all the lesser countries out of
business. You can get rid of all the competition and run things your own way.”
That’s what they would have said, because that’s the way they thought, that’s
the way they operated, that’s the way many of them amassed their fortunes. They
would have laughed at a person who said he believed God or had faith in Christ.
They would have said, “Faith isn’t good business. It isn’t smart.” The Bible
teaches that faith is the only approach to God. “For he that cometh to God must
believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him”
(Hebrews 11:6). The Bible also teaches that faith pleases God more than anything
else. “Without faith it is impossible to please Him” (Hebrews 11:6).

People all over the world torture themselves, clothe themselves in strange
garments, disfigure their bodies, deny themselves the necessities of life, spend
much time in prayer and self-sacrifice in an effort to make themselves
acceptable in God’s sight. This may be all well and good, but the greatest thing
we can do to please God is to believe Him.

I might go to a friend and flatter him, but, if after all my flowery phrases I
were to tell him that I did not believe him, every Battering thing I said would
have been in vain. I would have built him up only to let him down. The greatest
way we can please God is to believe His Word. It would seem that Christ was
almost pleading for faith on the part of His hearers when He said, “Believe Me
that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me: or else believe Me for the very
works’ sake. (John 14:11). The Bible declares that faith is absolutely
essential. You ask, “Well, if faith is so important, what is faith? What do you
mean by faith? What is a definition of faith? How can I know if I have proper
faith? How much faith must I have?”

Wait just a minute—not so many questions at a time! I’ll try to answer them as
we go along. The Bible teaches, time and time again, that we can have salvation
only through faith:

“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house” (Acts
16:31).

“But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God,
even to them that believe on His name” (John 1:12).

“And by Him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could
not be justified by the law of Moses” (Acts 13:39).

“But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly,
his faith is counted for righteousness” (Romans 4:5).

“Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord
Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1).

“But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them that believe
to the saving of the soul” (Hebrews 10:39).

“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the
gift of God” (Ephesians 2:8). Are we actually saved by faith? No, we’re saved by
grace through faith. Faith is simply the channel through which God’s grace to us
is received. It is the hand that reaches out and receives the gift of His love.
In Hebrews 11:1, we read, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the
evidence of things not seen.” Weymouth has translated it this way, which makes
it easier to understand, “Now faith is a confident assurance of that for which
we hope, a conviction of the reality of things which we do not see.” Faith
literally means “to give up, surrender, or commit.” Faith is utter confidence.

I have never been to the North Pole, and yet I believe there is a North Pole.
How do I know? I know because somebody told me. I read about it in a history
book, I saw a map in a geography book and I believe the men who wrote those
books. I accept it by faith. The Bible says, “Faith cometh by hearing, and
hearing by the word of God.” (Romans 10:17). We believe what God has to say
about salvation. We accept it without question.

Martin Luther has translated Hebrews 11:27 this way, “For he held on to Him whom
he saw not just as though he saw Him.”

It is not some peculiar, mysterious quality for which we must strive. Jesus said
we must become as little children, and just as little children trust their
parents, so we must trust God.

Suppose I were driving along the road at fifty miles an hour and I came to the
crest of a hill. Would I immediately slam on my brakes, stop my car, get out,
walk up to the top of the hill, and look over to see if the road continues? No,
I wouldn’t do that. I would trust the highway department of the particular state
in which I was driving. I would continue at my normal rate of speed, secure in
the knowledge that the road continued on ahead even though I couldn’t see it. I
would accept it on faith. So it is with saving faith in Christ!

Again, as in repentance, there are three things that are involved in faith.
First, there must be a knowledge of what God has said. That’s why it’s so
important for you to read the Bible. That’s why it’s important for you to know
something of the teaching of the Bible concerning the salvation of the soul.
Just to know that you are a sinner and that Christ died for you is enough
knowledge. Knowing no more than John 3:16 could be enough knowledge. Many have
been converted on less. But on anything as important as this you should be as
well informed as possible and the only place to learn about salvation is in the
Bible!

Many people say, “But I cannot understand much of the Bible, therefore I don’t
try to read it.” That is not the wise attitude. There are many things in the
Bible that I do not understand. My finite mind will never understand all about
the infinite. I do not understand all about television, but I do not refuse to
turn on my television set. I accept it by faith. But God does not ask the
impossible. He does not ask you to take a leap in the dark concerning
conversion. Believing in Christ is based on the best evidence in the world, the
Bible. Even though you do not understand it all, you can accept it at face value
because God said it. One of the first attacks that the Devil makes on man is to
get him to doubt the Word of God. If you begin doubting and putting question
marks over God’s Word, then you’re in trouble. There must be a knowledge that
you are a sinner. You must have the knowledge that Christ died for your sins and
that He rose again for your justification. The death, burial, and resurrection
of Jesus Christ is the very heart of the Gospel. That must be believed and
accepted as a minimum for conversion.

Second, the emotions again are involved. The Bible says, “The fear of the Lord
is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 1:7). Paul said, “The love of Christ
constraineth us” (2 Corinthians 5:14). Desire, love, fear—are all emotions.
Emotion cannot be cut out of life. No intelligent person would think of saying,
“Let’s do away with all emotion.” To remove all personality from deep feeling is
impossible. We cannot imagine life without the warm overtones of feeling.
Suppose we had a family where everyone acted only from a cold sense of duty.
Suppose I asked my wife to marry me after I had explained to her first of all
that I had no feelings for her at all. As Dr. Sangster says, “Carry the same
principle over into religion. Require that the Herald of God announce the offer
of His King, freely to pardon and fully to bless, but firmly forbid that any
transport of joy should accompany either the announcement of the news or its
glad reception, and you ask the impossible.”

There is going to be a tug at the heart. Emotion may vary in religious
experience. Some people are stoical and others are demonstrative, but the
feeling will be there. When Churchill gave his masterful speeches to the British
people during the war, he appealed to logic, but at the same time he made his
audience feel. I remember hearing him one time at Ibrox Park in Glasgow. He
tickled my brain cells, but he made me feel like standing up and shouting and
waving a flag! When you fall in love with Jesus Christ your emotions are bound
to be stirred.

Third, and most important of all, is the will. It’s like three little men—one is
named “Intellect,” the second is named “Emotion,” and the third is named “Will.”
Intellect says that the gospel is logical. Emotion puts pressure upon Will and
says, “I feel love for Christ,” or “I feel fear of judgment.” And then the
middleman, called Will, is the referee. He sits there with his hand on his chin,
in deep thought, trying to make up his mind. It is actually the will that makes
the final and lasting decision. It is possible to have the intellectual
conviction and the emotional feeling and still not be properly converted to
Christ. Faith has legs. “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). I heard
about a man some years ago who was rolling a wheelbarrow back and forth across
Niagara River on a tightrope. Thousands of people were shouting him on. He put a
two-hundred-pound sack of dirt in the wheelbarrow and rolled it over, and then
he rolled it back. Then he turned to the crowd and said, “How many of you
believe that I can roll a man across?”

Everybody shouted! One man in the front row was very excited in his professed
belief. The man pointed to this excited professor and said, “You’re next!”

You couldn’t see that man for dust! He actually didn’t believe it. He said he
believed it, he thought he believed it—but he was not willing to get in the
wheelbarrow.

Just so with Christ. There are many people that say they believe on Him, they
say they follow Him. But they never have gotten into the wheelbarrow. They
actually never have committed and surrendered themselves wholly, one hundred per
cent to Christ.

There are many people who ask, “Well, how much faith does it take?” Jesus said
only the faith as of “a grain of mustard seed.”

Others ask, “What kind of faith?” It is not a matter of any special kind of
faith. There is only one kind, really. It is the object of the faith that
counts. What is the object of your faith? The object of your faith must be
Christ. Not faith in ritual, not faith in sacrifices, not faith in morals, not
faith in yourself—not faith in anything but Christ!

Now the Bible teaches that faith will manifest itself in three ways. It will
manifest itself in doctrine—in what you believe. It will manifest itself in
worship—your communion with God and the fellowship of the church. It will
manifest itself in morality—in the way you live and behave, which we will
discuss in other chapters. The Bible also teaches that faith does not end with
trust in Christ for your salvation. Faith continues. Faith grows. It may be weak
at first, but it will become stronger as you begin to read the Bible, pray, go
to church, and experience God’s faithfulness in your Christian life. After you
have repented of sins and accepted Him by faith, then you must trust Him to keep
you, strengthen you, enable you, sustain you. You will learn more and more how
to rely on Christ for every need, in meeting every circumstance, and every
trial. You will learn to say with Paul, “I am crucified with Christ;
nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I
now five in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and
gave Himself for me” (Galatians 2:20). When you have saving faith in Jesus
Christ, you have taken an additional step toward having peace with God.


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 15: 13.     CHAPTER ELEVEN: THE NEW BIRTH
========================================================================

Chapter Eleven THE NEW BIRTH Except a man be horn again, he cannot see the
kingdom of God. —John 3:3

IF I could come and have a heart-to-heart chat with you in your living room, you
probably would turn to me and confess, “I am perplexed, confused, and mixed up.
I have transgressed God’s laws. I have lived contrary to His commandments. I
thought I could get along without God’s help. I have tried to make up my own
rules and I’ve failed. The bitter lessons that I’ve learned have come through
suffering and tragic experience. What wouldn’t I give to be born again! What
wouldn’t I give to be able to go back and start all over—what a different road
I’d travel if I could!”

If those words strike a familiar chord in your heart, if they echo the thoughts
that have been moving through your mind, I want to tell you some glorious news.
Jesus said you can be born anew! You can have the fresh and better start for
which you’ve prayed. You can lose your despised and sinful self and step forth a
new person, a clean and peaceful being from whom sin has been washed away. No
matter how soiled your past, no matter how snarled your present, no matter how
hopeless your future seems to be—there is a way out. There is a sure, safe,
everlasting way out—but there is only one! You have only one choice to make. You
have only one path to follow, other than the torturous, unrewarding path you’ve
been treading.

You can go on being miserable, discontented, frightened, unhappy, and disgusted
with yourself and your life; or you can decide right now that you want to be
born again. You can decide right now to wipe out your sinful past and make a new
start, a fresh start, a right start. You can decide now to become the person
that Jesus promised you could be. The next logical question that you may ask is,
“How can I have this rebirth? How can I be born again? How can I start afresh?”
This is the question that Nicodemus asked Jesus that night two thousand years
ago under an Oriental sky. Being born again, however, means a great deal more
than just a fresh start, or turning over a new leaf, or reforming. As we have
already seen, the Bible teaches that you were born the first time into the
physical world but your spiritual nature was born in sin. The Bible declares
that you are “dead in trespasses and sins” (Ephesians 2:1). The Bible teaches
that there is nothing in your dead and sinful nature that can originate life.
Being dead in sin, you cannot produce a life of righteousness. Many people are
trying to produce a good, holy and righteous life without being born again, but
they can do naught but fail. A corpse cannot generate life. The Bible teaches
that “sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death” (James 1:15). All of us
are dead spiritually. Your old nature cannot serve God. The Bible says, “The
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God . . . neither can he
know them” (1 Corinthians 2:14). In our natural state we are actually at enmity
with God. We are not subject to the laws of God, neither indeed can we be,
according to Romans 8:7. The Bible also teaches that our old nature is totally
corrupt. From its head to its feet “there is no soundness in it”; it is full of
“wounds, and bruises, and putrifying sores” (Isaiah 1:6). Its heart is deceitful
above all things and desperately wicked. It is corrupt, according to deceitful
lust. The Bible also teaches that our old nature is a self-nature. It is
incapable of being renovated. The Bible teaches that when we are born again, we
put off the old man— we do not patch him up. The old self is to be crucified,
not cultivated. Jesus said the cleansing of the outside of the cup and the
platter leaves the inside just as foul as before. The Bible also teaches that
unless we have experienced this new birth we cannot get into the kingdom of
heaven. Jesus even made it stronger. He said, “Ye must be born again” (John 3:7)
There is nothing indefinite, nothing optional about that. He who would enter the
kingdom of God must be born again.

Salvation is not just repairing the original self. It is a new self created of
God in righteousness and true holiness. Regeneration is not even a change of
nature, or a change of heart. Being born again is not a change—it is a
regeneration, a new generation. It is a second birth. “Ye must be born again.”

There is nothing about the old nature that God will accept. There is no
soundness in it. The old nature is too weak to follow Christ. Paul said, “Ye
cannot do the things that ye would” (Galatians 5:17). They that are in the flesh
cannot serve God. “Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and
bitter? Can the fig tree, my brethren, bear olive berries?” asked James (James
3:11-12). The old man is described in Romans as “Their throat is an open
sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under
their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift
to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: . . . There is no fear
of God before their eyes.” (Romans 3:13-18).

How are you going to reform or patch up or change such throats and tongues and
lips and feet and eyes as these? It is impossible. Jesus, knowing that it was
impossible to change, patch up, and reform, said you must have a total new
birth, “Ye must be born again.” Jesus said, “That which is born of the flesh is
flesh.” On another occasion the Bible says, “Can the Ethiopian change his skin,
or the leopard change his spots” (Jeremiah 13:23)? Again in Romans the Bible
says, “They that are in the flesh cannot please God.” “In me (that is, my flesh)
dwelleth no good thing” (Romans 7:18). Again the Bible says, “Without holiness
no man shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). The life that comes from the new
birth cannot be obtained by natural development or self-effort. Man does not
have by nature this holiness that God requires for heaven. In the new birth
alone is the beginning of such a life to be found. In order to live the life of
God we must have the nature of God. The whole matter of receiving new life is
like a coin. A coin has heads and tails. The receiving of new life has a divine
side and a human side. We have seen the human side in our chapter on conversion,
we have seen what you must do. Now let’s see what God does. Being born again is
altogether a work of the Holy Spirit. There is nothing that you can do to obtain
this new birth. The Bible says, “But as many as received Him, to them gave He
power to become the sons of God, even to them that believed on His name: Which
were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man,
but of God” (John 1:12-13). In other words, you cannot be born of blood; that
means you cannot inherit the new birth.

You cannot inherit Christianity. You might have had a Christian father and
mother, but that does not necessarily produce a Christian child. You could be
born in a garage, but that doesn’t make you an automobile.

You cannot be born of the will of the flesh, the Scripture says. In other words,
there is nothing you can do about it. You are dead. A dead man has no life to do
anything. Nor can you be born of the will of man. This new birth cannot be
produced by human devices or schemes. Many people think they are automatically
born again when they join a church or go through some religious ritual or make
some New Year’s resolution or give a large gift to an outstanding charitable
institution. All of these are fine and right, but they do not produce the new
birth.

Jesus told us we must be born again. The infinitive to be is passive. It shows
that it is something that must be done for us. No man can “born” himself. He
must be born. The new birth is wholly foreign to our will. In other words, the
new birth is a divine work—we are born of God.

Nicodemus could not understand how he could be born the second time. In
perplexity he asked twice, “How?”

Even though the new birth seems mysterious, that does not make it untrue. We may
not understand the how of electricity, but we know that it lights our homes,
runs our television and radio sets. We do not understand how the sheep grows
wool, the cow grows hair, or the fowl grows feathers—but we know they do. We do
not understand many mysteries, but we accept by faith the fact that at the
moment we repent of sin and turn by faith to Jesus Christ we are born again.

It is the infusion of divine life into the human soul. It is the implantation or
impartation of divine nature into the human soul whereby we become the children
of God. We receive the breath of God. Christ through the Holy Spirit takes up
residence in our hearts. We are attached to God for eternity. That means that if
you have been born again you will live as long as God lives, because you are now
sharing His very life. When you are born again several results follow: First, it
will increase your vision and understanding. The Bible says, “God, who commanded
the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians
4:6). Again the Bible says, “The eyes of your understanding being enlightened”
(Ephesians 1:18). Things that you used to laugh at as foolishness you now accept
by faith. Your whole mental process is changed. God becomes the hub of your
intellectual thinking. He becomes the center. The ego has been dethroned.

Second, your heart undergoes a revolution. The Bible says, “A new spirit will I
put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I
will give you an heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26). God says, “A new heart will I
give you” (Jeremiah 31:33). Your affections have undergone a radical change.
Your new nature loves God and the things that are pertaining to God. You love
the finest and highest things in life. You reject the lower and baser. You have
immediately a new appreciation for the social problems around you. Your heart
beats with compassion for those who are less fortunate.

Third, your will undergoes a tremendous change. Your determinations are
different. Your motives are changed. The Bible says, “Now the God of Peace . . .
make you perfect in every good work to do His will, working in you that which is
wellpleasing in His sight” (Hebrews 13:20-21). This new nature that you receive
from God is bent to the will of God. You will want to do only His will. You are
utterly and completely devoted to Him. There is a new self-determination,
inclination, disposition, a new principle of living, new choices. You seek to
glorify God. You seek fellowship with other Christians in the church. You love
the Bible. You love to spend time in prayer with God. Your whole disposition is
changed. Whereas your life once was filled with unbelief, the root and
foundation of all sin, and you once doubted God, you now believe Him, you now
have utmost confidence and faith in God and His Word.

There may have been a time when pride was the very center of your life. You had
ambitious thoughts of your self, your powers, desires, and aims; but now that
will begin to change. There may have been a time when there was hatred in your
life. Envy, discontent, and malice filled your thoughts toward others. That,
too, will change.

There was a time when you could easily tell a He. There were falsehoods and
hypocrisies in many of your thoughts, words, and deeds. That is now all changed.
There was a time when you gave in to the lust of the flesh. That is now changed.
You have been born again. You may stumble into some of these traps that the
Devil puts out for you, but immediately you will be sorry, confess your sins,
and ask forgiveness, because you have been born again. Your very nature has
changed.

There is an old story that tells about the pig and the lamb. The farmer brought
the pig into the house. He gave him a bath, polished his hoofs, put some Chanel
No. 5 on him, put a ribbon around his neck, and put him in the living room. The
pig looked fine. He almost seemed to be acceptable to society and to friends
that might come in, he was so fresh and clean. He made a very nice and
companionable pet for a few minutes. But as soon as the door was opened, the pig
left the living room and jumped into the first mud puddle that he could find.
Why? Because he was still a pig at heart. His nature had not been changed. He
had been changed outwardly but not inwardly.

Take a lamb, on the other hand. Put a lamb in a living room and then turn him
out into the yard, and he will try his best to avoid all mud puddles. Why?
Because his nature is that of a lamb.

You can take a man—dress him up, put him in the front row in church, and he
almost looks like a saint. He may fool even his best friends for a while, but
then put him in his office the next day, or put him at home or put him in the
club on Saturday night, and you will see his true nature come out again. Why
does he act that way? Because his nature has not been changed. He has not been
born again.

Now the moment you receive the new birth, the moment you are born again, the
moment you receive this divine impartation of a new nature, you are justified in
the sight of God. By being justified is meant “just-as-if-I’d” never sinned.
Justification is that act of God whereby He declares an ungodly man to be
perfect while he is still ungodly. God places you before Him as though you had
never committed a sin. As Paul says, “Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God’s elect? It is God that justifieth” (Romans 8:33). Your sins have been
forgiven. God has buried them in the depths of the sea and placed them behind
His back of forgetfulness. Every sin is completely wiped out. You stand before
God as a debtor, and you have received your discharge, you have become
reconciled to God. You were actually an enemy of God before. The Bible says,
“And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ,
and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation (Romans 5:18). But more than
all of that, you have been adopted into the family of God. You are now a child
of God. “Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ
to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will” (Ephesians 1:5). You are
now a member of the royal family of heaven. You have royal blood in your veins.
You are a child of the King. There is a new sparkle in your eye.

There is a spring in your step. There is a smile on your face. Even your friends
notice the change that has taken place in your life. You have now been born
again.

Certain changes will take place once you have been born again. First, there will
be a different attitude toward sin. You will learn to hate sin as God hates it.
You will detest it and abhor it.

Down in Houston, Texas, a man was born again in one of our meetings. He owned a
liquor store. The next morning he had a sign on the front of his door saying,
“Out of business.”

I heard about a man some time ago who had been born again in an evangelistic
service. He was known as the city drunk. He was called “Old John.” Somebody
spoke to him the next morning on the street and said, “Good morning, Old John.”

He said, “Who are you talking to? My name is not Old John. I’m new John.” A
complete revolution had taken place in his life.

Second, you will know that you have been born again because you will want to
obey God. “And hereby we do know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments”
(1 John 2:3).

Third, you will be separated from the world. The Bible says, “Love not the
world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the
love of the Father is not in him” (1 John 2:15).

Fourth, there will be a new love in your heart for other people. The Bible says,
“We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren”
(1 John 3:14).

Fifth, we will not practice sin. The Bible says, “We know that whosoever is born
of God sinneth not” (1 John 5:18). We will not engage in sinful practices. In
Texas they tell a story about a man who used to hitch his horse every morning in
front of the saloon. One morning the saloonkeeper came out and found that the
horse was hitched in front of the Methodist Church. He saw the man walking down
the street and called out, “Say, why is your horse hitched in front of the
Methodist Church this morning?” The man turned around and said, “Well, last
night I was converted in the revival meeting, and I’ve changed hitching posts.”

That’s what it means to be born again. That’s what it means to be converted. It
means that you change hitching posts.


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  CHAPTER 16: 14.     CHAPTER TWELVE: HOW TO BE SURE
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Chapter Twelve

HOW TO BE SURE

These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God;
that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name
of the Son of God. —1 John 5:13

EVERY week I receive scores of letters from those who say they have doubts and
uncertainties concerning the Christian life. Many come from genuine Christians
who seem to have none of the joy of Christian faith, or the assurance, because
they have failed to understand a basic truth of Christian experience.

Now let’s use this chapter to sum up what has happened to us. We have seen what
it means to repent, to have faith, and to be born again. Now, how can I be
certain, how can I be sure that all of this has happened to me? Many people with
whom I talk have repented and have believed and have been born again, but they
often lack the assurance of their conversion. Now let’s go over a few things
that we’ve learned. First of all, becoming a Christian can be a crisis
experience in your life, or it can be a process with a climactic moment of which
you may or may not be conscious.

Now do not misunderstand me, you do not become a Christian as a result of a
process of education. Some years ago a great preacher said, “We must so educate
and train our youth in the Christian way of life that they will never know when
they were not Christians.” Much of the philosophy of religious education has
been based upon this premise, and perhaps many have missed the essence of
Christian experience because religious training took its place. At the turn of
the century, Professor Starbuck, a leading thinker in the field of psychology,
observed that Christian workers generally were recruited from the ranks of those
who had had a vital experience of conversion. He also observed that those who
had a clear concept of what it means to be converted were mainly those who had
come out of rural areas where in the early days they had had either little or no
carefully planned religious training. This is not a criticism of religious
training, but it may be taken as a criticism of a false and improper use of
religious training that becomes a substitute for the experience of the new
birth. To one of the most religious men of His times, Jesus said, “Except a man
be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3). Nicodemus could not
substitute his profound knowledge of religion for spiritual rebirth, and we have
not progressed beyond this point in our generation. The ugly larva in its cocoon
spends much time in almost unnoticeable growth and change. But no matter how
slow that growth may be, the moment comes when it passes through a crisis and
emerges a beautiful butterfly. The weeks of silent growth are important, but
they cannot take the place of that experience when the old and the ugly are left
behind and the new and the beautiful come into being.

It is true that thousands of Christians do not know the exact day or hour that
they came to know Christ. Their faith and life testify that consciously or
unconsciously they have been converted to Christ. Whether they can remember it
or not, there was a moment when they did cross over the line from death to life.

Probably everyone has had doubts and uncertainties at times in his religious
experience. When Moses went up on Mount Sinai to receive the tables of the law
from the hand of God, he was lost for some time to the sight of the Hebrews who
stood anxiously waiting his return. They finally became doubtful and said among
themselves, “As for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of
Egypt, we wot not what is become of him.” Their apostasy was a result of their
doubting and uncertainty. This dreadful uncertainty that haunts the souls of
multitudes grows out of misunderstanding of what constitutes true religious
experience. Many do not seem to understand the nature of Christian experience,
while others have been misinformed and are seeking something for which we are
not warranted by Scripture to expect.

More than three hundred times the word faith is mentioned in the New Testament
with reference to mans salvation, and many more times is it implied. The writer
of the Book of Hebrews said, “He that cometh to God must believe that He is, and
that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.” And again he said that
“Without faith it is impossible to please Him” (Hebrews 11:6).

It is because we have confused faith with feeling that many experience the
difficulty and uncertainty that is so common among professing Christians today.

Faith always implies an object—that is, when we believe, we must believe
something. That something I call the fact. Let me give you, then, three words,
three words that must always be kept in the same order and never rearranged. Let
me give you these three words that will point the way, for you, out of
uncertainty to a confident Christian life. These three words are fact, faith,
and feeling. They come in this order and the order is essential. If you confuse
them, eliminate one, or add one, you will end up in the mire of despair and
continue to grope about in semidarkness, without the joy and confidence of one
who can say, “I know Him in whom I have believed” (2 Timothy 1:12).

If you are saved from sin at all, you are saved through a personal faith in the
gospel of Christ as defined in the Scriptures. Though it may at first seem
dogmatic and narrow to you, the fact remains that there is no other way. The
Bible says, “I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how
that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was
buried, and that He arose again the third day according to the Scriptures” (1
Corinthians 15:3-4). The Bible says that we are saved when our faith is in this
objective fact. The work of Christ is a fact, His cross is a fact, His tomb is a
fact, and His resurrection is a fact.

It is impossible to believe anything into existence. The gospel did not come
into being because men believed it. The tomb was not emptied of its deposit that
first Easter because some faithful persons believed it. The fact always preceded
the faith. We are psychologically incapable of believing without an object of
our faith. The Bible does not call upon you to believe something that is not
credible, but to believe in the fact of history that in reality transcends all
history. The Bible calls upon you to believe that this work of Christ, done for
sin and for sinners, is effective in all who will risk their souls with Him.
Trusting in Him for your eternal salvation is trusting in a fact.

Faith is second in this order of three words. Faith is rationally impossible
where there is nothing to believe. Faith must have an object. The object of
Christian faith is Christ. Faith means more than an intellectual assent to the
claims of Christ. Faith involves the will. It is volitional. Faith demands
action. If we actually believe, then we will live. Faith without works is dead.
Faith actually means surrender and commitment to the claims of Christ. It means
an acknowledgment of sin and a turning to Christ. We do not know Christ through
the five physical senses, but we know Him through the sixth sense that God has
given every man—which is the ability to believe.

Feeling is the last of the three words, and it must remain last in your
thinking. I believe that much religious unrest and uncertainty is caused by
earnest, honest seekers after salvation who have a predetermined idea that they
must be in some kind of an emotional state before they can experience
conversion.

Those who are seeking salvation as it is presented through the Scriptures will
want to know what kind of an experience the Bible leads you to expect. I speak
to those who have gone often to an altar, or to an inquiry room, or perhaps have
knelt beside a radio or television set when an invitation has been given to
receive Christ. You have heard the message, you have known that you were a
sinner in need of the Savior, you have recognized that your life is a spiritual
wreck, you have tried every man-made scheme for self-improvement and for
reformation but they all failed. In your lost and hopeless condition you looked
to Christ for salvation. You believed that He could and would save you. You have
often read His invitation to sinners when He said, “Come unto Me, all ye that
labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). You have
read the promise that says, “Him that cometh unto Me, I will in no wise cast
out.” You have read how He said, “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and
drink” (John 7:37). In reading carefully through the New Testament to see just
what kind of an experience you can expect, I find that the New Testament sets
forth only one. There is just one experience for which you can look—only one
feeling you can expect—and that is the experience of faith. Believing is an
experience as real as any experience, yet many are looking for something
more—some dramatic sensation that will bring a physical thrill, while others
look for some spectacular manifestation. Many have been told to look for such
sensations, but the Bible says that a man is “justified by faith” and not by
feeling. A man is saved by trusting in the finished work of Christ on the cross
and not saved by physical excitement or religious ecstasy. But you may say to
me, “What about feeling? Is there no place in saving faith for any feeling?”
Certainly there is room for feeling in saving faith, but we are not saved by it.
Whatever feeling there may be is only the result of saving faith, but it in
itself is not what does the saving! When I understand something of Christ’s love
for me as a sinner, I respond with a love for Christ—and love has feeling. But
love for Christ is a love that is above the sensual accompaniments of human
love. It is a love that is free from all self. The Bible says, “Perfect love
casteth out fear” (1 John 4:18). And those who love Christ have that confidence
in Him that raises them above all fear. When I understand that Christ in His
death gained a decisive victory over death and over sin, then I lose the fear of
death. The Bible says that “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” (Hebrews 2:14-15). Surely this also is a feeling. Fear is a
kind of feeling, and to overcome fear with boldness and confidence in the very
face of death is feeling and experience. But again I say, it is not the feeling
of boldness and confidence that saves us, but it is our faith that saves us, and
boldness and confidence result from our having trusted in Christ. To have a
guilty conscience is an experience. Psychologists may define it as a guilt
complex, and may seek to rationalize away the sense of guilt; but once this has
been awakened through the application of the law of God, no explanation will
quiet the insistent voice of conscience. Many a criminal has finally given
himself over to the authorities because the accusations of a guilty conscience
were worse than prison bars. The Bible teaches that Christ cleanses the
conscience. The Bible says, “For if the blood of bulls and of goats and the
ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctifieth to the purifying of the
flesh: How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit
offered Himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to
serve the living God” (Hebrews 9:13-14). To have a guilty conscience cleansed,
and to be free from its constant accusation is an experience, but it is not the
cleansing of the conscience that saves you; it is faith in Christ that saves,
and a cleansed conscience is the result of having come into the right
relationship with God.

Joy is a feeling. Inward peace is a feeling. Love for others is a feeling.
Concern for the lost is a feeling.

Finally, someone may say, “I believe the historic facts of the gospel, but still
I am not saved.” Perhaps so, for the faith that saves has one distinguishing
quality—saving faith is a faith that produces obedience, it is a faith that
brings about a way of life. Some have quite successfully imitated this way of
life for a time, but for those who trust Christ for salvation, that faith brings
about in them a desire to live out that inward experience of faith. It is a
power that results in godly living and surrender.

Let that intellectual faith, that historical faith that you may now have, yield
itself to Christ in full surrender, earnestly desiring His salvation, and upon
the authority of the Word of God you become a child of God. “But as many as
received Him, to them gave He the right to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on His Name” (John 1:12).


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  CHAPTER 17: 15. PART THREE: THE RESULTS
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PART THREE: THE RESULTS


========================================================================
  CHAPTER 18: 16.     CHAPTER THIRTEEN: ENEMIES OF THE CHRISTIAN
========================================================================

Chapter Thirteen ENEMIES OF THE CHRISTIAN For we wrestle not against flesh and
blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of
darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. —Ephesians
6:12

NOW that you have made your decision—now that you have been born again—now that
you have been converted —now that you have been justified—now that you are a
child of God—what next? Is that all there is to it? Just one moment of decision
and then it is all over? “Do I have any more responsibilities,” you ask?

Ah, yes, you have just begun the Christian life. You have just been born into a
new world—the spiritual world. Everything is brand new. You are actually a
spiritual baby. You need tenderness, love, care, nurture. You need to be fed.
You need protection. That is one of the reasons why Christ established the
church. You could not possibly live the Christian life alone. You must have help
and fellowship.

Possibly you have already found that you have enemies. These are dangerous,
vicious enemies that will use any method to defeat you in your Christian life.
Within minutes after you made your decision you found these enemies already at
work: either you were tempted to commit some sin, or you had a moment of
depression and discouragement. To be sure, everything is exciting and thrilling
just after you have made your decision for Christ! But it is also natural to
have doubts, problems, questions, temptations, discouragements, and even
difficulties. The Bible teaches that you have three enemies that will be warring
against you as long as you live. You must be prepared. They must be warded off.

First, lets look at these enemies whom we must face. Let’s unmask them and see
what they are, and who they are, and how they operate.

First—the Devil. We have already seen that the Devil is a mighty person who
opposes God and tempts God’s people. We have found that even though he was
beaten at the Cross by Christ he still has power to influence men for evil. The
Bible calls him “the wicked one” (Matthew 13:19) “the devil” (Luke 4:33), “a
murderer” (John 8:44), “a liar, and the father of lies” (John 8:44), “an
adversary” (1 Peter 5:8), who seeks to devour, “that old serpent” and “accuser
of our brethren” (Revelation 12:9-10). The moment you made your decision for
Christ he suffered a tremendous defeat. He is as mad as “hops” now. From now on
he is going to tempt you and try to lead you into sin. Don’t be alarmed. He
cannot rob you of your salvation, and he need not rob you of your assurance and
victory. He will do everything in his power to sow seeds of doubt in your mind
as to whether your conversion is a reality or not. You cannot argue with him for
he is the greatest debater of all time. The moment of test has come with the
first temptation. Remember to refuse any reliance upon your feelings; they will
change like a weather vane in a whirlwind. His next approach probably will be to
make you feel proud and important—to make you confident of your own powers,
ambitions, desires, and aims. On another occasion he will put hatred in your
heart. He will tempt you to say unkind and ungenerous things about others. He
will put envy, discontent, and malice in your heart. Then on another occasion he
will tempt you to he, and you could easily find yourself being a hypocrite.
Lying is one of the worst of all sins and can be committed by a thought, word,
or deed. Anything that is intended to deceive another person is lying. The Devil
will do his best to make a liar of you. He also will try to get you to work for
him to tempt others to sin—to try to lead other Christian friends astray. If you
are not careful you will find yourself actually in the employ of the Devil. He
is powerful, slick, crafty, wily, and subtle. He is called the “god of this
world” (2 Corinthians 4:4), “the prince of this world” (John 12:31), “the prince
and power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2). You say “How can I overcome him? What can
I do? Which way can I turn? Is there any escape?”

“There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is
faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will
with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it”
(1 Corinthians 10:13).

God says in this verse that He has made a way of escape. Now remember this:
temptation of the Devil is not a sign that your life is not right with God. It
is actually a sign that you are right with God. Temptation is not sin. Also
remember that God never tempts His own children. He never causes His children to
doubt. All doubts and temptations come from the Devil. Remember also that Satan
can only tempt. He can never compel you to yield to the temptation. Remember
also that Satan has already been conquered by Christ. His power is made
inoperative in the life of a fully trusting and yielded Christian who is
completely dependent upon God.

Now the Bible says that we are to “resist the devil and he will flee” from us
(James 4:7). But before that, God says “Submit yourselves ... to God.” If you
have fully submitted, one hundred per cent yielded and surrendered yourself to
Christ, then you can “resist the devil,” and the Bible promises he will flee
from you. The Devil will tremble when you pray. He will be defeated when you
quote or read a passage of Scripture to him, and will run like a scalded dog
when you resist him. You can keep the Devil on the run twenty-four hours a day
in the power of Christ. Your second enemy is the world. The world means the
cosmos, this world system. The world has a tendency to lead us into sin—evil
companions, pleasures, fashions, opinions, and aims of the world.

You will find in your born-again experience that your pleasures have been lifted
into an entirely new and glorious realm. Many non-Christians have accused the
Christian life as being a set of rules, taboos, vetoes, and prohibitions. This
is another lie of the Devil. It is not a series of “don’ts,” but a series of
“dos.” You become so busy in the work of Christ and so completely satisfied with
the things of Christ that you do not have time for the things of the world.

Suppose someone should offer me a plateful of crumbs after I had eaten a T-bone
steak. I would say “No, thank you, I am already satisfied.”

Young Christian, that is the secret. You are so filled with the things of
Christ, so enamored of the things of God, that you do not have time for sinful
pleasures of this world.

Worldliness, however, has been vastly misunderstood on the part of thousands of
Christians. It needs a little clarification. It is probably one of the greatest
difficulties that meets a young and inexperienced Christian.

Dr. Griffith Thomas has said, “There are certain elements of daily life which
are not sinful in themselves, but which have a tendency to lead to sin if they
are abused. Abuse literally means extreme use, and in many instances overuse of
things lawful becomes sin. Pleasure is lawful in use but unlawful in its
overuse. Ambition is an essential part of true character, but it must be fixed
on lawful objects and exercised in proper proportion. Our daily occupation,
reading, dress, friendships and other similar phases of life are all legitimate
and necessary, but can easily become illegitimate, unnecessary and harmful.
Thought about the necessities of life is absolutely essential, but this can
easily degenerate into anxiety, and then as Christ reminds us in the parable,
the cares of this life choke the spiritual seed in the heart. Making of money is
necessary for daily living, but money-making is apt to degenerate into
money-loving and then the deceitfulness of riches enters into and spoils our
spiritual life. Worldliness is thus not confined to any particular rank, walk,
or circumstance of life so that we cannot separate this class from that and call
one worldly and the other unworldly . . . One spiritual and the other
unspiritual. Worldliness is a spirit, an atmosphere, an influence permeating the
whole of life and human society, and it needs to be guarded against constantly
and strenuously.” The Bible says “Love not the world, neither the things that
are in the world” (1 John 2:15). The Bible also warns that the world and the
“lust thereof” shall pass away, “but he that doeth the will of God” shall abide
forever (1 John 2:17).

However, under certain conditions these can become perplexing problems in our
modern-day living. Many young people come and ask me, “Is this wrong?” or “Is
that wrong?” “Is this sinful?” or “Is that sinful?” One simple question,
earnestly and prayerfully asked, will settle about ninety per cent of your
problems along this line. Just ask this question to yourself every time, “What
would Christ have me to do?” Another question you can ask is, “Can I ask His
blessing upon this particular thing for me?” “What would Christ think about my
amusements, recreation, books, companions, and television programs?” We cannot
compromise or bargain here. There must be an out-and-out stand for Christ.

It does not mean that in society we are snobs or have a superiority complex,
lest we be in danger of spiritual pride—which would be far worse than any
worldliness. But today there are so many professing Christians who are walking
hand in hand with the world that you cannot tell the difference between the
Christian and the sinner. This should never be. The Christian should stand out
like a sparkling diamond against a rough background. He should be more wholesome
than anyone else. He should be poised, cultured, courteous, gracious, but firm
in the things that he does and does not do. He should laugh and be radiant, but
he should refuse to allow the world to pull him down to its level. The Bible
says that “whosoever is not of faith is sin” (Romans 14:23), and the Bible again
says that he that doubteth is condemned if he does it. In other words, we are
never to do anything of which we are not perfectly clear and certain. If you
have a doubt about that particular thing that is bothering you, as to whether it
is worldly or not, the best policy is “don t do it.” The third enemy that you
will face immediately is the lust of the flesh. The flesh is that evil tendency
of your inward self. Even after you are converted, sometimes your old, sinful
cravings will return. You become startled and wonder where they come from. The
Bible teaches that the old nature, with all its corruption, is still there and
that these evil temptations come from nowhere else. In other words, “a traitor
is living within.” “That wretched bent toward sin is ever present to drag you
down.” War has been declared! You now have two natures in conflict, and each one
is striving for the victory. The Bible teaches “the flesh lusteth against the
Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh” (Galatians 5:17). It is the battle of
the self-life and the Christ-life. This old nature cannot please God. It cannot
be converted, or even patched up. Thank God, when Jesus died He took you with
Him, and the old nature can be made inoperative and you can “reckon ye also
yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin” (Romans 6:11). This is done by faith.

However, you must distinguish very carefully again between use and abuse—between
that which is lawful and that which is unlawful. Some of these things that will
be cropping up may be sinful lusts, or they may not be. As Dr. Thomas says, “The
original meaning of the word lust is ‘strong desire’ and not necessarily a
sinful desire, since there are certain desires of our physical nature- such as
hunger and thirst—which we have in common with the animal world and which, in
themselves, are natural and not sinful. It is only their abuse that is evil.
Hunger is a natural lust. Gluttony is a sinful lust. Thirst is a natural lust.
Intemperance is a sinful lust. Sloth is a sinful lust. Marriage is according to
the will of God and the dictates of human nature, physical, mental and social.
Adultery is a sin and is opposed to the will of God and to all that is pure in
body, mind and heart. But there are other lusts of the flesh which are sensually
and inherently sinful. Such as, for instance, the desire to gratify at all cost
our hatred and revenge. We must, therefore, distinguish carefully between the
lust which is simply a strong desire, and the same lust as a sinful desire. Sins
of the flesh are in some respects the most terrible of all because they
represent the yearnings of the nature to do evil. Neither the Devil nor the
world, nor even our own evil heart can compel us to sin. It must be by our
consent and will and it is at this point that our evil nature comes in with its
awful power and possibility of evil.”

Paul said he had no confidence in the flesh. On another occasion he said, “I
make no provision for the flesh” (Romans 13:14). On another occasion he said, “I
keep my body under” (1 Corinthians 9:27). We are so to completely yield and
surrender ourselves to God that we can, by faith, reckon the old nature dead
indeed unto sin.

These then, are our three foes: the Devil, the world, and the flesh. Our
attitude toward them as Christians can be summed up in one word—renounce. There
can be no bargaining, compromise, or hesitation. Absolute renunciation is the
only possible course to a Christian seeking complete victory. In relation to the
Devil, we resist him only as we submit ourselves to God. In relation to the
world, the Bible says, “This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our
faith” (1 John 5:4). In relation to the flesh, the Bible says, “Walk in the
Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16). Here
is glorious news to you who have already been fighting these battles and
temptations. You are not asked to fight the battle alone. The Bible says in
Romans 8:13 that you, by the Spirit, shall put to death the deeds of the body.
Remember, Jesus promised that He would never leave us, or forsake us. Remember
Jesus promised us that after He left the earth He would send Another—the Third
Person of the Trinity—the Holy Spirit, who is called a Comforter (which actually
means “one that helps alongside”) that He may abide with us forever (John
14:16). Jesus said, “I am not going to leave you alone. I will come to you. I
will come to you in the person of the Holy Spirit.” The Holy Spirit is the most
powerful Being in the world today. The time of the Old Testament was an age of
God the Father. During the time that Jesus was on earth it was an age of God the
Son. Now we are living, since Pentecost, in the age of God the Holy Spirit. The
Bible says that the moment you accepted Christ as Savior the Holy Spirit took up
residence in your heart. Your body is now “the temple of the Holy Ghost which is
in you” (1 Corinthians 6:19). Paul even warned that if any man hath not the
Spirit of Christ he is none of His.

You say, “But I don’t feel anything down in my heart. I don’t feel the Spirit of
God in me.”

Disregard feelings. You’re not saved by feeling, and you may or may not feel the
Spirit. Accept Him by faith as a fact. He lives within you right now to help you
live the Christian life. He is living in you in order to magnify, glorify, and
exalt Christ in you so that you can live a happy, victorious, radiant,
Christ-honoring life. The Bible commands “Be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians
5:18). If you are filled with the Spirit, then you are going to produce the
fruit of the Spirit, which is “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness,
goodness, faith, meekness, temperance” (Galatians 5:22-23). To be filled with
the Spirit is not optional. It is a command to be obeyed—a duty to be done.

How do you know that you are filled? And how can you be filled? Is it some
emotional experience through which you must pass? No. When you are fully
cleansed of every known sin and completely yielded and surrendered to Christ,
then you can accept by faith that you are filled with the Spirit of God. That
means that He can have all of you. There is nothing else in your heart except
Him. Consecration actually is surrender—total, absolute, unconditional,
irreversible surrender. “I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of
God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God,
which is your reasonable service” (Romans 12:1).

It is only the consecrated, Spirit-filled Christian who can have victory over
the world, the flesh, and the Devil. It is the Holy Spirit who will do the
fighting for you. “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against
principalities, against powers, against the rulers of darkness” (Ephesians
6:12). This is a spiritual warfare. You cannot fight against these three enemies
with normal weapons. Only as we become channels and let the Holy Spirit do the
fighting through us are we going to get complete victory. Don’t hold back
anything from Christ. Let Him be completely the Lord and Master of your life. He
said, “Ye call me Master and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am” (John 13:13). A
little child playing one day with a very valuable vase put his hand into it and
could not withdraw it. His father, too, tried his best, but all in vain. They
were thinking of breaking the vase when the father said, “Now, my son, make one
more try. Open your hand and hold your fingers out straight as you see me doing,
and then pull.” To their astonishment the little fellow said, “Oh, no, father. I
couldn’t put my fingers out like that, because if I did I would drop my penny.”

Smile, if you will—but thousands of us are like that little boy, so busy holding
on to the world’s worthless penny that we cannot accept liberation. I beg you to
drop the little copper in your heart. Surrender! Let go, and let God have His
way in your life.

Now, after you have given yourself completely to Christ in consecration,
remember that God has accepted what you have presented. Here we exercise faith
again. “Him that cometh unto Me I will in no wise cast out.” You have come to
Him; now He has received you. As a result of a fully yielded, consecrated,
Spirit-filled life you will have courage and boldness that you have never known
before. The Spirit-filled man knows only the fear of God, but he has no other
fear. All other fears will immediately leave. He will have supernatural courage
and boldness to take his stand for Christ. If you go through the book of Acts
you will find the word boldness used many times by the Spirit-filled apostles.
Not only will you have boldness, but you will produce the fruit of the Spirit.
Now remember that these fruits of the Spirit are of the Spirit. You cannot
produce them yourself. They are supernatural fruit that will characterize your
life from day to day and they must be supernaturally produced. There will be
love. The great commandment that Jesus left us was that “ye love one another as
I have loved you” (John 15:12). You will love your fellow man with a
supernatural love, regardless of race, creed, or political affiliation.
Bitterness, strife, and envy will cease and brotherly love will prevail.

There will be joy. One of the characteristics of the Christian is inward joy. No
matter what the circumstances, there will be a joyful heart and a radiant face.
So many Christians go around with droopy faces that give no outshining glory to
God. Upon meeting a Christian it is easy to tell whether or not he is a
victorious, spiritual, yielded Christian. A true Christian should be relaxed and
radiant, capable of illuminating and not depressing his surroundings. The Bible
says, “For the joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10).

There will be peace. Paul said, “Troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we
are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but
not destroyed” (2 Corinthians 4:8-9). We could go through all the rest of the
supernatural list—longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and
temperance and see how all of this fruit flourishes in the lives of those who
are truly yielded and Spirit-filled. The victory is yours. Claim it! It is your
birthright. You have no reason ever to suffer even one defeat. You can live
“high, wide and handsome.” The best is yours. Life can be one grand, glorious
exciting adventure. You will want to live every minute of it so much that you
may regret having to go to bed at night—and you will certainly welcome getting
up each morning to live another day for Christ. For every day will be wonderful
and thrilling— filled with opportunities to be of service, filled with moments
to spend with God, filled with the knowledge that you are safe forevermore with
Jesus!


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  CHAPTER 19: 17.     CHAPTER FOURTEEN: RULES OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE
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Chapter Fourteen RULES OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE And as ye would that men should do
to you, do ye also to them likewise. —Luke 6:31

WHETHER you are playing a game, driving a car, or baking a cake, there are
certain rules that must be followed if you are to succeed. The Bible teaches
that the Christian life is one of constant growth. When you are born again, you
are born into the spiritual world. You become a baby in God’s family. It is
God’s purpose that you will grow into full stature and become mature in Christ.
It would be against the law of God and nature if you were to remain a baby and
thus become a spiritual dwarf. In 2 Peter 3:18, the Bible says that we are to
grow. This implies steady development, constant enlargement, increasing wisdom.
In order to grow properly certain rules must be observed for good spiritual
health. First: you should read your Bible daily. Your spiritual life needs food.
What kind of food? Spiritual food. Where do you find this spiritual food? In the
Bible, the Word of God. The Bible reveals Christ, who is the Bread of Life for
your hungry soul, and the water of life for your thirsty heart. If you fail to
partake of daily spiritual nourishment, you will starve and lose your spiritual
vitality. The Bible says, “Desire the sincere milk of the Word, that ye may grow
thereby” (1 Peter 2:2). Read it, study it, meditate on it, memorize it.
Ninety-five per cent of the difficulties you will experience as a Christian can
be traced to a lack of Bible study and reading. Do not be content to skim
through a chapter merely to satisfy your conscience. Hide the Word of God in
your heart. A little portion well digested is of greater spiritual value to your
soul than a lengthy portion scanned hurriedly. Do not be discouraged because you
cannot understand it all. Read simple portions of the Bible first. You do not
feed a baby beefsteak the first day—you give it milk.

I would suggest that you start by reading the Gospel of John. As you read, the
Holy Spirit will enlighten the passages for you. He will illuminate the
difficult words and make obscure meanings clear. Even though you cannot remember
all you have read, or understand it all, go on reading. The very practice of
reading in itself will have a purifying effect upon your mind and heart. Let
nothing take the place of this daily exercise.

Second: learn the secret of prayer. You now have a Heavenly Father. He hears and
answers prayer. Jesus said, “Ask anything in My name and I will do it.” (John
14:14). Again He said, “All things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer believing
ye shall receive.”3 Every man whose life has counted for the church or for the
kingdom of God has been a man of prayer. You cannot afford to be too busy to
pray. A prayerless Christian is a powerless Christian. Christ spent hours in
prayer. He sometimes spent the night on a mountain top in solitary communion
with God the Father. If He had to pray, how much more do we need to pray! Your
prayers may falter at first. You may be awkward and inarticulate. But the Holy
Spirit who lives within you will help you and teach you. Every prayer that you
pray will be answered. Sometimes the answer may be “No,” and sometimes it is
“Wait,” but nevertheless it will be answered. Your petitions should always be
conditioned by “Thy will be done.” “Delight thyself also in the Lord and He
shall give thee the desires of thine heart” (Psalms 37:6). But the delighting of
oneself in Him precedes the fulfillment of our desires. God will always do what
is best for His children.

Remember that you can pray any time, anywhere. Washing dishes, digging ditches,
working in the office, in the shop, on the athletic field—you can pray and God
will answer! Have a systematic method of prayer. Prayer combined with Bible
study makes for a complete and glorious Christian life. The Bible says, “Pray
without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). If you have special prayer periods that
you set aside during the day, your unconscious life will be saturated with
prayer between the prayer periods. It is not enough for you to get out of bed in
the morning and just bow your knee and repent a few sentences. There should be
stated periods in which you slip apart with God. The Devil will fight you every
step of the way. He will cause the baby to cry, the telephone to ring, someone
to knock at the door—there will be many interruptions, but keep at it! Don’t be
discouraged. Soon you will find that these periods of prayer are the greatest
delight of your life. You will look forward to them with more anticipation than
to anything else. Without constant, daily, systematic prayer your life will seem
barren, discouraging, and fruitless. Without constant prayer you never can know
that inner peace that God wants to give you.

Third: rely constantly on the Holy Spirit. Remember that Christ dwells in you
through the Holy Spirit. Your body is now the dwelling place of the Third Person
of the Trinity. Do not ask Him to help you as you would a servant. Ask Him to
come in and do it all. Ask Him to take over in your life. Tell Him how weak,
helpless, unstable, and unreliable you are. Stand aside and let Him take over in
all the choices and decisions of your life.

It is impossible for you to hold out in your Christian life—but He can hold you.
It is very difficult for Him to hold you if you are struggling, fighting, and
striving. Just relax and rest in the Lord. Let go all those inner tensions and
complexes. Rely completely on Him. Do not fret and worry about important
decisions—let Him make them for you. Do not worry about tomorrow—He is the God
of tomorrow, He sees the end from the beginning. Do not worry about the
necessities of life—He is there to supply and provide. A true victorious
Christian will be free from worries, inner conflicts, and tensions. In perfect
reliance on the Holy Spirit, you will find that many of your physical and mental
ailments will disappear.

Fourth: attend church regularly. John Wesley once said, “The Bible knows nothing
of solitary religion.” Christianity is a religion of fellowship. Following
Christ means love, righteousness, service; and these can only be achieved and
expressed through social relations. These social relationships are to be found
in the church. The church is Christ’s organization upon earth. It is a place
where we worship God, learn His Word, and fellowship with other Christians. The
Bible calls the church “a holy nation,” “God’s own people,” “the household of
God,” “a holy temple in the Lord,” “a dwelling place of God in the Spirit,” “the
body of Christ.” These are all figures of speech, symbols, or pictures used to
indicate the spiritual reality of the church.

Nothing can take the place of church attendance. If you are a true follower of
Christ you will scorn such flimsy excuses as the weather being too hot or too
cold, rain or snow, as unworthy of a true follower of Christ. There are many
people who say that they can stay at home on Sunday morning and worship God in
their own minds. The person who does only this fails to give God the complete
worship to which He has a right, for God is the Creator of our bodies, no less
than of our minds and souls; therefore both the mind and the body should
participate in rendering to God a complete act of worship.

There are many who say they can stay at home and listen to a sermon on the radio
and that that takes the place of church service. That is not enough. You do not
go to church to hear a sermon. You go to church to worship God and to serve Him
in the fellowship of other Christians. You cannot be a successful and happy
Christian without being faithful in church. In the church you will find your
place of service. We are saved to serve. The happy Christian is the busy
Christian.

Fifth: be a witnessing Christian. If you are faithfully practicing the four
preceding rules this one will take care of itself—just as it follows naturally
that if a cup is being filled continually it is bound to overflow.

You are now a duly appointed and commissioned ambassador of the King of Kings.
You are to let your flag fly high over your embassy. Suppose our ambassador to
Russia should order the American flag pulled down because it is not popular in
Russia—we would soon call him home! He would not deserve to represent the United
States.

If you are not willing to let your flag fly in the home, in the office, in the
shop, on the campus—then you are not worthy to be an ambassador for Christ! You
are to take your stand and let all those round about you know that you are a
Christian. You are to bear witness for Christ.

We witness in two ways: by life and by word—neither by itself is enough. God’s
purpose for you and me after we have been converted is that we be witnesses to
His saving grace and power. You are to be a commando for Christ. You are to be a
minute-man for Him.

Christ said, “Whoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess
also before my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 10:32). Acts 28:23 presents a
thrilling scene. Paul, held in bonds at Rome, persuaded men concerning Jesus,
from morning to evening. Concerning each of us it should be said every day,
“Behold a sower went forth to sow.”

Very little originality is permitted a Western Union messenger boy. His sole
obligation is to carry the message he receives from the office to the person to
whom it is addressed. He may not like to carry that message. It may contain bad
news or distressing news for the person to whom he carries it. He cannot stop on
the way, open the envelope, and change the wording of the telegram. His duty is
to take the message.

We young Christians have the Word of God. Our Great Commander has said, “Go, and
take this message to a dying world.” Some are neglecting it. Some are tearing up
the message and substituting one of their own. Some are taking out a part of it.
Some are telling the people that the Lord does not mean what He says. Others are
saying that He really did not write the message but that it was written by
ordinary men who are mistaken about the meaning of it.

Let us remember that the Apostle Paul exhorted the Christians centuries ago to
teach only the Word. Remember we are sowing seed. Some indeed may fall on beaten
paths and some among thorns, but it is our business to keep on sowing. We are
not to stop sowing because some of the soil looks unpromising.

We are holding a light. We are to let it shine! Though it may seem but a
twinkling candle in a world of blackness, it is our business to let it shine.

We are blowing a trumpet. In the din and noise of battle the sound of our little
trumpet may seem to be lost, but we must keep sounding the alarm to those who
are in danger.

We are kindling a fire. In this cold world full of hatred and selfishness our
little blaze may seem to be unavailing, but we must keep our fire burning.

We are striking with a hammer. The blows may seem only to jar our hands as we
strike, but we are to keep on hammering.

We are using a sword. The first or second thrust of our sword may be evaded and
all of our efforts at striking deep into the enemy may seem hopeless, but we are
to keep wielding our sword—it is the “sword of the Spirit.”

We have bread for a hungry world. The people may seem to be so busy feeding on
other things that they will not accept the Bread of Life, but we must keep on
giving it, offering it to the souls of men.

We have water for famishing people. We must keep standing and crying out, “Ho,
every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters.”

We must persevere. We must never give up. Keep using the Word!

Jesus said that much of your seed will find good soil and spring up and bear
fruit. The fire in your heart and on your lips will kindle a sacred flame in
some cold hearts and woo them to Christ. The hammer will break some hard hearts
and make them contrite and yield to God. The sword will pierce the armor of sin
and cut away the self-satisfaction and the pride, and open hearts to the Spirit
of God. Some hungry men and women will take the Bread of Life, and some
famishing souls will find the water of life. Be a soul winner! The most
thrilling experience known to man is to win another to Jesus Christ. It has been
my privilege to win thousands to a saving knowledge of Christ. I never cease to
thrill at seeing a man put his hand out and say, “I accept your Christ.” This is
worth more than all the money in all the world. There is no happiness, no
experience, no romantic adventure comparable to the thrill of winning another
person to Christ. Be a soul winner! Be a witness! The Bible says, “He that
winneth souls is wise” (Proverbs 11:30). “And they that be wise shall shine as
the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the
stars for ever and ever” (Daniel 12:3).

“Ye are the salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13). Salt makes one thirsty. Does your
life make others thirsty for the water of life?

Sixth: let love be the ruling principle of your life. Jesus said to those who
followed Him, “By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have
love one to another.” In another part of the Bible we find the same thing stated
by John, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and every one
that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God,
for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that
God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.
Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to
be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:7-10). Of all the gifts God offers
His children, love is the greatest. Of all the fruits of the Holy Spirit, love
is the first. The Bible declares that we who follow Christ should be just as
much in love with each other as God was in love with us when He sent His Son to
die on the cross. The Bible says that the moment we come to Christ He gives us
supernatural love, and that that love is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy
Spirit. The greatest demonstration of the fact that we are Christians is that we
love one another. If you learn this secret of God early in your Christian
experience, you will have gone a long way toward a mature, happy Christian life.

Seventh: be an obedient Christian. Let Christ have first place in all the
choices of your life. Make Him Lord and Master. Let Him pilot your ship. Eighth:
learn how to meet temptation. As we have already learned, temptation is natural.
Temptation is not sin. It is yielding that is sin. God never brings temptation
to you. He allows it to test you. It is the work of the Devil. Recognize it as
such. One way to meet temptation is to quote a verse of Scripture at the
Tempter—he will always run, for he cannot stand the Word of God. When Jesus was
tempted in the wilderness, the only resource that He had was the Word of God. He
said three times, “It is written.”

You say to the Devil, “Thus saith the Lord,” and he will flee. At the same time
let Christ through the Holy Spirit do the fighting for you. Like the little
girl—she said, “Every time I hear the Devil knock, I send Jesus to the door.”
Everyone has temptations but some folks entertain them. They seem to enjoy being
tempted. Chase a mouse with a broom and you will notice that he isn’t eying the
broom. He is looking for a hole. Get your eyes off the temptation and onto
Christ!

I once asked an army officer which he would rather have on the field of
battle—courage or obedience. He flashed right back, “Obedience!”

God would rather have your obedience than anything else. In order to be obedient
you must know His commands. That is another reason for the necessity of studying
and reading the Bible. The Bible is your compass and rule book. Obey what God
tells you.

Ninth: be a wholesome Christian.

It has been well said that “Some Christians are so heavenly minded they are no
earthly good.”

Certainly the Bible teaches separation from sin, but the Bible says nowhere that
we are to be unwholesomely peculiar and unnatural. You are to be radiant. You
should be chivalrous, courteous, clean of body, pure of mind, poised, and
gracious. Silly flirtations, unhealthy gossip, shady conversations, suggestive
amusements should be avoided like rattlesnakes. Your appearance should be neat,
clean, attractive, and as much as possible in style, with good taste. Extremes
should be avoided in all directions. You should strive to be the ideal gentleman
or the ideal lady. Your life and appearance should commend the gospel and make
it attractive to others. As Dr. Barnhouse has adequately said, “Men may not read
the gospel in sealskin, or the gospel in morocco, or the gospel in cloth covers;
but they can t get away from the gospel in shoe leather.”

Tenth: live above your circumstances. God made you as you are! He placed you
where you are! So you can best serve and glorify Him just as you are, where you
are. Some people are always looking on the other side of the fence because they
think the grass is greener. They spend so much time wishing things were
different, and thinking up alibis for why they are not, that they overlook all
the advantages and opportunities that are open to them right where they are. Be
as the Apostle Paul when he said, “But none of these things move me” (Acts
20:24). Paul said he had learned how to abound and how to be abased. He had
learned to be every inch a Christian even in prison. Don’t let your
circumstances get you down. Learn to live comfortably and graciously within
them.

These rules and suggestions may seem simple—but keep them—they work. I have seen
them tested in the lives of thousands. I have tested them in my own life.
Properly and faithfully kept, they will give you peace of soul, happiness, peace
of mind, and pleasure, and you will have learned the secret of living life with
satisfaction.


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  CHAPTER 20: 18.     CHAPTER FIFTEEN: THE CHRISTIAN AND THE CHURCH
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Chapter Fifteen THE CHRISTIAN AND THE CHURCH In whom ye also are builded
together for an habitation of God through the Spirit. —Ephesians 2:22

MAN is a social animal, gregarious by nature, and finds his greatest sense of
security and satisfaction in the company of others who share his interests and
attitudes. Of all the many groups into which humans have collected themselves,
of all the many tribes, clans, organizations, and societies throughout history,
none has been so powerful, so far-reaching, or more universal than the church.
In primitive times, men gathered together for mutual protection, and at a far
later date they learned to join together for mutual benefit and pleasure. With
more advanced civilization, secret societies came into being, to give their
members a sense of being “set apart” and therefore distinguished from
non-members. Special oaths, rituals, and codes were established and given great
significance.

Racial and national groups were established with membership restricted to those
of similar place of origin, or with allegiance to a common flag. Country clubs,
college fraternities, lodges, literary societies, political parties, military
organizations—all of these, from the most select “gentlemen’s club” to the high
school “gang,” represent mans need to find comfort and reassurance in the
company of others who approve of his way of life, because their own way of life
is similar.

Nowhere, however, has man found this comfort, this reassurance, this peace to
the extent that he has found it in the church, for all other groups are
obviously man-inspired. They draw artificial boundaries and set up only the
illusion of protection; while the church provides a living, vibrant organism
that draws its power from within itself, instead of relying upon outside sources
to give it meaning and vitality. The word church is an English translation of
the Greek word ecclesia, which means “the called-out ones,” or an assembly of
people. Although church soon became a distinctively Christian word, it has a
pre-Christian history. Throughout the Greek world the word church was the
designation of the regular assembly of the whole body of citizens in a free
city-state. A group of the citizens would be called out by the herald for the
discussion and decision of public business. This same word church was also used
in the Old Testament and is translated in English as “congregation” or
“community” of Israel in which members were designated as the called-out people
of God. Thus we find Stephen in the Book of Acts using it when he describes
Moses as “he that was in the church in the wilderness.” In the first century,
therefore, the world church would suggest to the Greek a self-governing,
democratic society; to the Jew, a theocratic society whose members were the
subjects of God. The word church as applied to the Christian society was first
used by Jesus Himself when He told Peter, “Upon this rock I will build my
church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18).
Thus Jesus Christ Himself founded the church. He is the great cornerstone upon
which the church is built. He is the foundation of all Christian experience, and
the church is founded upon Him. “For other foundation can no man lay than that
is laid, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 3:11). Jesus proclaimed Himself
to be the founder of the church, the builder of the church, and the church
belongs to Him and to Him alone. He has promised to live with, and in, all those
who are members of His church. Here is not only an organization but an organism
which is completely unlike anything else that the world has ever known: God
Himself living with, and in, ordinary men and women who are members of His
church. The New Testament teaches that while there is actually only one church
there can be any number of local churches formed into various denominations and
societies or councils. These local churches and denominational groups may be
divided along national and theological lines, or according to the temperament of
their members. However, the New Testament teaches that even though there may be
many cleavages and divisions within the structure of the church, yet we have
only “one Lord.” As the hymn puts it, “The church’s one foundation is Jesus
Christ her Lord.”

Jesus Christ is the head of this great universal church. From Him must spring
all the activities and teachings of the church, for He is the fountainhead of
all Christian religious experience. In this day of electronics it is easy to
draw a comparison with a far-flung telephone system in which there is one
central station toward which all wires converge and from which all connections
are made. In a railroad system there is always one central office from which
orders governing the operations of all trains originate. In the army, one
commanding general issues orders to the many groups under his jurisdiction. His
various subordinates may interpret his orders in slightly different ways, but
his orders still remain the basis for their conduct. In relation to the church,
Jesus Christ stands in the position of the commanding general. It is upon His
orders that the church has its existence, its very power comes directly from
Him, and it is up to every church group to follow His commands as closely as
possible. Just as the commanding general expects to have his orders carried out
faithfully, so does Jesus expect every branch of the church to abide by His
teachings to the fullest. The church has been widely criticized for many
intramural squabbles, much hair-splitting and apparent lack of unity. These,
however, are superficial things; these are the conflicts that come from the
slightly varying interpretations of the general’s orders and in no way reflect
upon the wisdom of the general or his absolute authority in issuing his orders!

Study the underlying beliefs of the various denominations and you will find that
basically and historically they are almost identical. They may differ widely in
ritual, they may seem to lock horns over theological technicalities; but
fundamentally they all recognize Jesus Christ as God incarnate, who died upon
the cross and rose again that man might have salvation—and that is the
all-important fact to all humanity.

Now that you have accepted Christ as your Savior and put your trust and
confidence in Him, you have already become a member of the great universal
church. You are a member of the household of faith. You are a part of the body
of Christ. Now you are called upon to obey Christ, and if you obey Christ, you
will follow His example of joining with others in the worship of God. “Not
forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is”
(Hebrews 10:25).

It has been said, “In practical terms this membership of the body of Christ must
actually mean membership of some local manifestation of His body in the church.”

It is true that we are not talking about the great universal church now but the
local church, the one in your own community, of whose many imperfections and
shortcomings you may be well aware. But we must remember that perfection does
not exist among human beings, and the institutions they create to the greater
glory of God are filled with these selfsame flaws. Jesus is the only perfect Man
who ever lived. The rest of us are at best but repentant sinners, try as we may
to follow His magnificent example; and the church is but turning a blind eye
toward itself when it claims infallibility or perfection for itself or any of
its members. When Jesus founded the church, He intended His followers to join it
and remain faithful to it. Today, if you are among the forty-one per cent of the
population of this country who have no formal church affiliation, you may stand
in bewilderment before the number whose membership is open to you. In selecting
one you may well have a natural tendency to return to the church of your
childhood, or you may feel you want to make a choice based on your more
spiritually mature judgment. A church affiliation is not something to be entered
into lightly, for if the church is to be of the greatest service to you, and
even more important, if it is to give you the greatest possible opportunity to
be of service to others, you must prayerfully select the one where you feel you
can be the most service to God.

Whenever anyone points a critical finger and demands to know why there have to
be so many different churches all serving the same God, I am always tempted to
point out how many different styles of hats have to be designed for both
American men and women. We all belong to the same human race, but we all have
enough physical differences to make it impossible for us to wear the same style
of hat with equal satisfaction.

Some people find it easier to draw closer to God in magnificent buildings and
with some form of ritual. Others find they can seek God only in stark
simplicity. Some people find themselves in sympathy with one kind of service,
others feel more at home in a different atmosphere. The important thing is not
how we do it, but the sincerity and depth of purpose with which we do it, and we
should each find and join the church in which as individuals we can best
accomplish this.

Certainly you would not take up your lifetime abode in a house without first
finding out something about it. Yet all too many Christians join a church
without quite knowing why, and then, finding it does not meet their needs, drift
on and on, trying them all for a little while, but coming to secure anchor in
none. Such drifting serves neither the Lord nor themselves.

Churches have different backgrounds, different traditions, different customs,
different emphases; and each Christian should select his church because he is
convinced that within its particular structure he will find the greatest
opportunities for spiritual growth, the greatest satisfactions for his human
needs, and the greatest chance to be of helpful service to those around him. Do
not make the mistake of attaching yourself to a particular minister rather than
to the body of the church itself. The ministry may change—it is healthy and
stimulating that it should—but the tenets of the church remain the same, and it
is to the church and its Christ that you owe allegiance. A stable church is
built up when the members of the congregation recognize that it is their mutual
love of Jesus Christ and the sincere desire to follow in His steps that hold
them together. The true Christian does not go to church because it’s
fashionable, because it gives him standing in the community, because it publicly
stamps him as a just and righteous person. The true Christian doesn’t even go to
church because it eases his soul and brings him peace, although that is
certainly one of the rich rewards of church membership. The true Christian goes
to church not only for what he gets out of it, but also for what he can put into
it. He goes to add his prayers to those of others, he goes to add his voice to
the other voices raised in praise of the Lord, he goes to add his strength in
beseeching the Lord’s blessing, he goes to add his weight of testimony to the
possibility of salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ. He goes to join with
others in the worship of God, in the contemplation of His boundless mercy and
love. The purpose of this Christian society called the “church” is, First: to
glorify God by our worship. We do not go to church just to hear a sermon. We go
to church to worship God. We are to worship Him in spirit and in truth. The
symbols, the songs, the messages of worship are there to help us glorify God in
the act of worship. The chief end of man is to glorify God. We glorify Him more
by our worship than by any other possible means. Christian activity, soul
winning, Bible reading, and a thousand and one good activities of the church
cannot take the place of worship. Worship is absolutely necessary if we are to
live a happy Christian life. God wants our worship and praise more than any
other thing.

Second: the church is for fellowship. Probably the greatest foretaste of heaven
here on earth is the fellowship that Christians have one with another. If you
are a true Christian, you will look forward with keen anticipation to your next
contact with other Christians. In the early days most of the social life of the
community centered around the church. That does not mean that church buildings
are to be turned into playhouses, poolrooms, or bowling alleys. Every activity
of the church should be carried on under the direction of Christ to glorify God,
but we as Christians need each other. We need each others prayers and help. We
have a responsibility toward each other.

Paul likens the church to the body. The hand has its obligation toward the lips,
the eye must work in unison with the ear, the feet must act in harmony with the
hand, every member of the body must bear its own burden; but it also must
co-operate in bearing the burdens of every other member of the body.

Christianity is a religion of fellowship. Following Christ means love,
righteousness, service, and these can be achieved and expressed through social
relations. That social relationship is to be found in the church. It is through
fellowship that we strengthen each other. Jesus said, “Where two or three are
gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst” (Matthew 18:20). Jesus
was teaching our need of praying and worshiping together as a social group.

Third: the church is for the strengthening of faith. Through joint prayers,
testimonies, and the preaching and the teaching of the various organizations of
the church, your faith will be strengthened. The church will build you up in the
most holy faith by re-emphasizing the points that we have already covered in
“The Rules for the Christian Life.”

Fourth: the church is a medium of service. We are saved to serve. There are a
thousand and one tasks to be done for Christ. This work can best be accomplished
through the fellowship of a local church. A virile Christianity has never
existed apart from the church. The church is the organization of Christ upon
earth. The church, with all of its imperfections, failures, and divisions is
still the church. No other organization will ever take its place.

Fifth: the church should be the means of channeling your funds for Christian
work. The Bible teaches tithing. A tithe is one tenth of your net income. That
one tenth of your income belongs to the Lord. In addition to your tithe, you
should give as the Lord has prospered you. Giving is a Christian grace that
should be woven into the fabric of our daily lives until it becomes a part no
longer distinguishable from the rest. Generosity should motivate us in all
things.

Christ said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). He knew
how giving warms the heart and satisfies the soul. He coveted for you that
particular blessing. Selfishness is caused by fear—and a Christian should stand
forth unafraid. Jesus stood always with hands that were open— not with hands
that were clenched tight with selfishness and greed.

Giving cannot be measured in dollars and cents, it cannot be measured in boxes
of old clothes. Sometimes the greatest gift is the gift of friendship and
neighborliness. A kind word, a friendly greeting, an evening spent with someone
who is lonely can reap rich harvest for the kingdom of God. It is impossible for
you to become a soul winner unless you are prepared to give something of
yourself. Not only your money, but your time, your talents— everything is to be
given to the service of Christ. The giving of your offering which is above the
tithe should not be limited by set rules or organized methods. It should be
governed by the need that is brought to your attention. It might be a neighbor,
the newsboy who brings the daily paper, or someone in far-off Africa or South
America. Our giving is the expression of our love for God. We give back to Him
in return for the great love that He has bestowed on us, and in that way we
spread His love abroad.

There is an art to giving. It is possible to enrich a life with a cup of cold
water, or to impoverish a life by giving money without love. Here again the test
lies with the giver, for a gift that is given to cause another to be indebted to
us is given with far more malice than love. There is no blessing in the gift
that is given to show power or domination over another. There is no blessing in
a gift that is given grudgingly, or for the calculated effect it will have upon
those who witness or are aware of the giving.

We must give willingly, out of a generous desire to bring help and comfort—not
with the thought of how the gift may work to our own benefit. We must give
kindly and wisely lest our gift bring a hurt instead of a benediction. There is
a true and lasting joy in giving, a joy of which the selfish and the miserly
have no conception, a joy that is denied to the mean and greedy of heart. This
is the real joy of sacrifice, a feeling in no way connected with what some like
to consider noble self-pity.

Whether our gift be to the Community Chest, the Salvation Army, or a pint of
blood to the Red Cross, it should all be given in the name of Jesus Christ. The
people to whom it is given should know that you are giving it in the name of
Christ. We have too many gifts that are given on a materialistic and
secularistic basis today. The gift of a Christian should be a special gift. The
letter accompanying the financial gift to the social or charitable organization
should say, “I am giving this in the name of Jesus Christ, my blessed Lord.”
This provides a testimony to those who are handling the funds. Therefore you are
killing two birds with one stone—you are providing the financial gift and at the
same time spreading the gospel of good news. Be careful that you do not become
guilty of the sin of robbing God. The Bible says, “Bring ye all the tithes into
the storehouse, that there may be meat in Mine house, and prove Me now herewith,
saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour
you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it” (Malachi
3:10).

Dr. Louis Evans has said, “The gospel is free, but it costs money to provide the
pails in which to carry the water of salvation.” The act of giving is just as
much an act of worship as praying or singing. The United States Government now
allows us to give twenty per cent of our income free of tax. It is deductible
from our income tax, and yet it is estimated that less than ten per cent of the
American people take advantage of this. Corporations are allowed to give five
per cent and yet only about fifteen per cent of them are taking advantage of
this provision of the government. We should be ashamed of ourselves. The entire
world could be evangelized over night if Christian people would give as the Lord
has prospered them. Be a generous giver, and God has promised that He will
return it to you a hundred-fold. Jesus promises one hundred per cent return on
your investment. Do you know any bank or financial institution that will give
you one hundred per cent increase on the money invested? God says prove me now,
see what I’ll do. Give until it hurts and see what God will give you in return.

Sixth: the church is for the spreading of the gospel. The church is commanded to
“Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel,” and to baptize those who
believe. The basic and primary mission of the church is to proclaim Christ to
the lost. The world today is sending forth its S.O.S., asking the church to come
to its help. The world is being overwhelmed by social, moral, and economic
problems. Its people are going down, swept under the waves of crime and shame.
The world needs Christ. The mission of the church is to throw the life line to
the perishing sinners everywhere.

Jesus said, “Ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you:
and ye shall be witnesses” (Acts 1:8). With the power of the Holy Spirit we can
join hands with other Christians to win people to Christ. Sixty-five per cent of
the world has yet to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. In this generation we have
failed miserably to spread the gospel to a needy world. There are still over a
thousand languages and dialects into which the Bible has not been translated.
The early church had no Bibles, no seminaries, no printing presses, no
literature, no educational institutions, no radio, no television, no
automobiles, no airplanes; and yet within one generation the gospel had been
spread to most of the known world. The secret of the spread of this gospel was
the power of the Holy Spirit.

Today in the face of vastly improved methods of communication the power of the
Holy Spirit is being neglected. We are trying to do things in our own strength,
and as a result we are failing. Millions of Americans are pagan, idolatrous.
They are worshiping at the shrines of secularism, materialism, and sinful
pleasure; and all the time the church hears the command of Christ to “Go.” The
hour is getting late! The world is rushing madly on its way toward destruction!
The only hope for a war-mad world is the gospel of Jesus Christ. The only feet
that Christ has are your feet. The only hands that He has are your hands. The
only tongue that He has is your tongue. Use every talent, facility, and method
possible to win men to Christ. This is the great mission of the church. Our
methods may vary. We may use visitation evangelism, educational evangelism,
preaching missions, industrial evangelism, cell evangelism, radio-television
evangelism, movie evangelism, or so-called mass evangelism. Whatever it may be,
let us use it to win other people to Christ. But to get a person committed to
make a decision for Christ is not enough. We must get him into the fellowship of
the church so that he may grow in grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is evangelism at its best—an evangelism that demands total commitment with
a follow-up program that gets the individual into the various activities of the
church.

Finally: it is through the church that our humanitarianism finds its widest
expression. We are in truth our brothers’ keepers, and one has only to visit
some of the non-Christian countries to be impressed with the fact that it is
this teaching above all others, perhaps, that sets the followers of Christ apart
from those who know Him not. The story of the Good Samaritan was told by Jesus
to etch His humanitarian commands forever in our minds, and no Christian worthy
of the name can ignore the needs of others simply because his own welfare is not
affected. In some eastern countries it is not uncommon to see human suffering,
human justice, and human needs ignored. A child may sit starving on the street
in full view of passing throngs, yet because the child is no one’s immediate
responsibility, no one will feel called upon to do anything until the child is
dead and the body must be removed. Such indifference to human misery is
intolerable to a Christian. In ministering to the hungry, to the naked, to the
sick, and to the imprisoned and enslaved, we should remember always that Jesus
Himself told us that in turning a deaf ear to human suffering wherever we find
it, in being indifferent to human wrongs and callous to human injustice, we are
in truth turning a deaf ear to Him. “Verily, I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did
it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me” (Matthew 25:45).

We have but to look about us at the many hospitals, homes for orphans, aged, and
helplessly poverty-stricken, which have been organized by churches, to recognize
how powerfully this teaching has taken hold. We revere nursing and social
service as one of the highest calling; but in some parts of the world, where the
teachings of Jesus Christ have not yet penetrated, only the lowest of social
outcasts are permitted to minister to the sick.

Church members should feel a sense of outrage at lax public health measures,
even though their own families may not be endangered. United church action can
and frequently does become an important instrument in correcting abuses of civil
power and in raising community standards. Whether it is a campaign for more
honest law enforcement or better garbage disposal, the cause of humanity at
large is being served, and constructive service is one of the first duties of
the church just as it is for every sincere member of it. The example of the Good
Samaritan, who offered a helping hand first, without asking, “What am I going to
get out of this?” should be every true Christian s measure of service to his
brothers. As we said at the beginning of this chapter, man is by nature a social
animal. He does his best work, accomplishes his mightiest deeds, develops his
best self- discipline in the company of others. Anyone who has ever undertaken
to lose weight by exercise is well aware of how much more faithful he is about
doing the exercises when he does them in a group than by himself!

Because we are human, because we are imperfect and wayward children, we need the
support of each other to help keep us on die right track. The long road is less
lonely when it is shared by companions who are seeking the same destination; die
heavy burdens are lighter when they are lifted in the company of others who are
carrying equal loads. It is within the church that this fellowship is found. It
is within the church that each Christian soul finds a spiritual home and a focal
point for all human activities. Jesus knew well how much we human beings need to
work and live and find relaxation and recreation within a group. The church is
that group to which He bids everyone become a part.


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  CHAPTER 21: 19.     CHAPTER SIXTEEN: SOCIAL OBLIGATIONS OF THE CHRISTIAN
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Chapter Sixteen SOCIAL OBLIGATIONS OF THE CHRISTIAN And as ye would that men
should do to you, do ye also to them likewise. —Luke 6:31

SINCE you have made your decision for Christ and have begun studying the Bible,
you find yourself confronted with various social obligations and problems. You
have made your peace with God. You are no longer at war and at enmity with God.
Sin has been forgiven. You have new horizons for your thinking—new perspectives
for your life. The whole world has changed. You now begin to see others through
the eyes of Jesus. Old ideas and ideals have changed. Prejudices that you once
held are beginning to slip away. Selfishness that was once characteristic of you
in many areas of your life has now gone.

Many people have refused the Christian life because it has been presented to
them in its negative rather than in its positive aspect. They say that Christian
conduct is against everything that is pleasant and profitable. They say
Christians are like the woman who complained that everything worth doing in this
life is either immoral, illegal, or fattening!

Contrary to worldly belief, being a true Christian does not mean the forfeiting
of all real pleasure. It is only sinful pleasure that springs from a love of
self, rather than the love of God, or the kind of pleasure that entails a great
outlay of money. The full acceptance of Christ and the determination to be
guided by God’s will draws you almost immediately to the source of the only true
pleasure —which is fellowship with Christ. To you who have not been born again
this may seem a far cry from pleasure, but those who have actually experienced
daily fellowship with Christ know that it surpasses all worldly activities.

Even as the Psalmist says, “They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness
of Thy house; and Thou shalt make them drink of the river of Thy pleasures”
(Psalms 36:8). God has also said, “No good thing will He withhold from them that
walk uprightly” (Psalms 84:11). Paul said that “God hath given us all things
richly to enjoy.” The fact that we have daily fellowship with Christ should
enable us to live realistically. Christ’s way of life does not require that a
man renounce any legitimate interests or ambitions. Though the Scriptures may
teach that Christ may return at any time, the Scripture also exhorts us to carry
on business as usual until He comes. For example, there was nothing wrong about
the eating, drinking, marrying, and giving in marriage in Noah’s day except that
those activities were perverted to sinful abuses. Nor was there anything wrong
about the buying, selling, planning, and building in Lot’s day except that they
were carried on by sinful methods. What seems to have been fundamentally wrong
in the days of Noah and Lot was that men made these the sole interest of their
lives. They thought of nothing but their personal pleasures, their personal
property, and the material profits they were amassing. They became so absorbed
in the things of this life that they had no time for God. This was displeasing
to God and He visited the offenders with judgment. As someone has said, “The
Bible was not written to encourage people to take an interest in the affairs of
this life. It assumes that they already have more than their share of interest
of that. The Bible aims to encourage man to see his worldly affairs in the light
of the greater importance and value of spiritual things.” The Bible teaches that
we are to perform our daily tasks and that we are to take pride in performing
them well. We were put here on earth and given certain work to do, and those who
claim that they are Christians are taught not only to labor but to labor to the
best of their ability. The Bible speaks approvingly of Bezaleel as a worker in
metals, stone, and wood. Jacob and his sons were shepherds. Joseph was a prime
minister. Daniel was a statesman. Both Joseph and Jesus were carpenters, and
some of the disciples were fishermen. We are told of the Ethiopian eunuch who
was treasurer under Candace; of Lydia, the seller of purple; of Paul, Priscilla,
and Aquila who were tentmakers; and Luke, the physician. The Christian ideal
certainly does not demand that man renounce all interest in the affairs of this
life; but rather that he seek God’s guidance in performing his daily work to the
best of his ability, and that he keep both his work and his ambitions in
subordination to the Lord at all times. Thus we find that Christ offers positive
help in our daily living here on earth. He helps in our work and in our
pleasure.

He also helps in facing the social problems that confront us and it is here that
we may become confused. For it is in our daily tasks and in the way we face the
social problems around us that the world will see Christ in us. As Dr. L. Nelson
Bell says in the Southern Presbyterian Journal, “If you are in church on Sunday
the people who see you there may presume that you are a Christian. But what
about the people with whom you come in contact during the week on the street, in
your office, in your store, and the multiple places where you make these
inevitable daily contacts? Orthodox Christian profession has its place.
Attendance at, and active participation in, the program and activities of the
church are an inescapable part of Christian living. But as we all know, the
business of making a living, the responsibilities of a home, the daily routine
all combine to test the reality of our Christian experience and faith. In these
daily contacts what do others see? Can our week-day associates tell that we are
Christians? Do casual acquaintances see anything in us to suggest that we are
different from those who do not know Christ? Certainly one of the real tests of
Christian character is to be found in the lives we live from day to day.

“The reality of our Christian profession is shown in many ways: the things we
say, as well as the things we do not say; the things we do, as well as the
things we do not do. For while Christianity is not primarily a matter of
externals, nevertheless it does find expression in conversation, habits,
recreation, emphasis, and ambitions to be noted in our daily life. Does our
conversation honor Christ? Are our habits those of which He approves? Are our
sources of recreation those in which His presence can be a part? Do we bow our
heads in a word of thanks when eating in a public place? Can people tell from
the emphasis we attach to material things whether we have set our affection on
things above, or whether we are primarily attached to this world? Do people see
in us an ambition for place and position out of accord with that of a Christian?
We should ask ourselves these and many other questions, for in such things men
judge whether we are Christians or not.”

What is our attitude toward the race question? What is our attitude toward sex?
What is our attitude toward the labor-management problems? What is our attitude
toward tolerance? All of these are very real and practical questions that must
be answered, interpreted, and lived before our fellow men. The guiding principle
of our relation to the world about us should be, “And as ye would that men
should do to you, do ye also to them likewise” (Luke 6:31).

Many people have criticized the so-called “social gospel,” but Jesus taught that
we are to take regeneration in one hand and a cup of cold water in the other.
Christians, above all others, should be concerned with social problems and
social injustices. Down through the centuries the church has contributed more
than any other single agency in lifting social standards to new heights Child
labor has been outlawed. Slavery has been abolished The status of woman has been
lifted to heights unparalleled in history, and many other reforms have taken
place as a result of the influence of the teachings of Jesus Christ. The
Christian is to take his place in society with moral courage to stand up for
that which is right, just, and honorable.

First: the Christian should be a good citizen. The Bible teaches that the
Christian should be law-abiding. The Bible also teaches loyalty to country. A
loyalty and love of country does not mean that we cannot criticize certain
unjust laws that may discriminate against special groups. The Bible says that
God is no respecter of persons. All should have equal opportunities. The
government of God is to be our model. The Bible also teaches that we are to
co-operate with the government. Jesus was asked, “Is it lawful to give tribute?”
Jesus set the example forever by paying taxes. It takes money to run a
government and to maintain law and order. The tax dodger is a civic parasite and
an actual thief. No true Christian will be a tax dodger. Jesus said, we are to
“render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s” (Mark 12:17). We ought to be
more than taxpayers. To be simply law- abiding is not enough. We ought to seek
and work for the good of our country. Sometimes we may be called upon to die for
it. We are to do it gladly—as unto God. We are to be conscientious in our work
as good citizens.

We should be philanthropic and give to charitable organizations that are doing
good for the betterment of mankind. We should enter in to various activities
such as the Community Chest, the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, and other good,
constructive, and helping-hand organizations. Christians should be interested in
orphanages, hospitals, asylums, prisons, and all social institutions. Jesus
said, “Love thy neighbor as thyself” (Matthew 22:39). Think of a country without
any philanthropic enterprises whatever! No one would want to live in it. We want
to live where neighborly love prevails. We are to take our place in the
community. Those in positions of responsibility are entitled to respect,
support, and co-operation. “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers.
For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God”
(Romans 13:1).

Second: Christians should be “given to hospitality.” (1 Timothy 3:2). The Bible
teaches that our homes should be open to all and that those who come in and out
of our homes should sense the presence of Christ. That which God has given to us
should be shared with others. In doing so God will bless and prosper our homes.

Third: we should have the Christian attitude toward sex. Nowhere does the Bible
teach that sex in itself is a sin, although many interpreters of the Bible would
try to make it appear so. The Bible teaches that the wrong use of sex is sinful.
For sex, the act by which all life on this earth is created, should be the most
wonderful, the most meaningful, the most satisfying of human experiences.

Man, with his vile, self-destructive nature, however, has taken what was
intended to be the most glorious and complete act of love between two people,
and made of it something low and cheap and filthy. Sex, stripped of mutual love,
respect, and the sincere desire to give joy and fulfillment to the other person,
becomes simply an animal act, about which the Bible warns us in no uncertain
terms!

It is significant that the Bible is one of the world’s most outspoken books on
the subject of sex. It adopts no “hush-hush” attitude, it does not try to gloss
over sex in either its right or wrong aspects. The sly, secret, embarrassed,
“let’s-pretend-it-doesn’t-exist” attitude about sex is purely man-made. In
trying to overcome the mysterious, “let’s-not-talk about-it” approach to sex,
our present civilization has put far too much emphasis on the mechanics of it,
and far too little insistence on the spiritual atmosphere in which this
overwhelming expression of human love must have its origin. Our divorce courts
bear tragic testimony to the inability of men and women to achieve this lasting
and ever more beautiful relationship without a firm foundation of spiritual
values.

Sex is a part of life that we cannot abolish, even if we would, for without it
all life would cease. Used rightly it can bring heaven into the home. Used
wrongly it can make it a hell. Use it wisely and it will become a wonderful
servant. Use it wrongly and it will be a terrible taskmaster.

Christians feel a sense of outrage, a sense of violation, when they see sex
emblazoned in newspaper headlines, exploited in advertisements, and used as a
cheap lure outside theaters. They blush for their fellow men that they can be so
stupid, so gross, so indecent as to defile and distort the act by which all
God-given life is bestowed.

Fourth: it follows naturally that those who take a Christian view of sex will
take a Christian view of marriage. Before you enter into a marriage, consider
the real spiritual implications that make an earthly marriage binding in heaven.
Little by little as we grow toward maturity, we learn to love, first our parents
and our friends and later the one person who is to share our life. We have
already seen how difficult this process is, for it is hate and not love that
comes naturally to the unregenerate sinner.

Many have the terrible misfortune of selecting their mates while they are still
in the toils of the world, the flesh, and the Devil, and while the man or woman
they select is also still in a state of complete sin. Is it any wonder then that
so many marriages contracted by two spiritually ignorant souls, incapable of
real and lasting love, end up in the divorce courts, making orphans of some
seven hundred and fifty thousand children each year?

Marriage is a holy bond because it permits two people to help each other work
out their spiritual destinies. God declared marriage to be good because He knew
that man needed a helpmate and woman needed a protector. He demands that
husbands and wives never lose sight of the original purpose of marriage. It is
woman’s role to love and help and reassure her husband in every way she can, and
it is man’s role to love and protect and provide for his wife and the children
she bears, so that the home may be filled with God’s peace and harmony.

Marriages that are entered into with a clear understanding of God’s purpose and
God’s laws have no need for divorce courts. Marriages that fall short of this
ideal (and it is appalling how many of them do) should first seek to learn what
God expects of the husband and the wife, and then pray for God’s help and
guidance in following out His commands.

Fifth: we are to take the Christian attitude in labor- management relationships.
The Bible says, “Whatever you do, put your whole heart and soul into it, as into
work done for God, and not merely for men—knowing that your real reward, a
heavenly one, will come from God, since you are actually employed by Christ, and
not just by your earthly master. But the slacker and the thief will be judged by
God himself, Who naturally has no distinction to make between master and man.
Remember, then, you employers, that your responsibility is to be fair and just
towards those whom you employ, never forgetting that you yourselves have a
Heavenly Employer” (Colossians 3:22-25, Phillips translation).

If Christ could prevail in all labor-management relations we would not have any
strikes. There would not be these long drawn-out arguments in which both sides
are unwilling to concede the rights of the other. Management would treat
employees with generosity, and employees would be eager to put in a full day’s
work for their hire —for they would not only be working for their wages, they
would be working for God. The Bible teaches that there is dignity in all types
of honest labor, and the Christian should be the most faithful, the most willing
and efficient worker of all. He should stand out in a factory or shop as one who
wants justice, but one who would not stoop to take unfair advantage. By the same
token, the Christian employer should treat his employees with a respect and
generosity that will become an example for other employers. A man of real
Christian concepts cannot help being concerned about safety precautions, good
working conditions, and the well-being of those in his employ. He will not only
see his workers as “man power,” but also as human beings.

Both management and labor should remember that the improved conditions and
better understanding they now enjoy had their beginnings as the result of a
great spiritual revival. The heritage of labor unions comes from the church and
the mighty Wesleyan revivals of the eighteenth century. Social liberty for the
working classes began when a Christian leader, Lord Shaftesbury, in the face of
bitter family opposition, led a lifelong crusade for better working conditions,
shorter hours, more pay, and fair treatment for the working man. Had it not been
for the spiritual revival of the eighteenth century, the gains that labor has
made might not have been achieved, or might have been delayed until much later
in our history. When some labor leaders talk of outlawing religion, disregarding
God, the Bible, and the church, they should remember how much of what they have
today is due to the power of the gospel of Christ.

Some labor leaders have grown haughty, proud, rich, self-satisfied, and
power-seeking. Many industrialists have done the same. All of them should humble
themselves before God, seek to recognize the needs of each other, their extreme
dependence on each other, and above all, try to apply the Golden Rule in its
most practical and realistic sense.

Sixth: the Christian looks through the eyes of Christ at the race question and
admits that the church has failed in solving this great human problem. We have
let the sports world, the entertainment field, politics, the armed forces,
education and industry outstrip us. The church should have been the pace-setter.
The church should voluntarily be doing what the federal courts are doing by
pressure and compulsion. But in the final analysis the only real solution will
be found at the foot of the cross where we come together in brotherly love. The
closer the people of all races get to Christ and His cross, the closer they will
get to one another. The Bible says, in Christ there is neither Jew nor Gentile,
there is neither male nor female, neither Greek nor barbarian, neither rich nor
poor. The Bible indicates that we are all one in Christ. The ground is level at
the foot of the cross. When Christ opens our spiritual eyes we be hold not
color, nor class, nor condition, but simply human beings with the same longings,
fears, needs, and aspirations as our own. We begin to see people through the
Master s eyes.

Seventh: the Christian attitude should prevail in the matter of economics. Jesus
said a man s life does not consist in the abundance of the things which he
possesses. Money is a good slave but a bad master. Property belongs in the purse
or the bank but not in the heart. Wealth has its place and its power, but it is
not entitled to occupy the throne or sway the scepter. Covetousness puts money
above manhood. It shackles its devotee and makes him its victim. It hardens the
heart and deadens the noble impulses and destroys the vital qualities of life.

Beware of covetousness in every phase and form! All of us should keep ourselves
from it through vigilance, prayer, self-control, and discipline. Life is not a
matter of dollars and cents, houses and lands, earning capacity and financial
achievement. Greed must not be allowed to make man the slave of wealth. When
Jesus was asked to settle an inheritance dispute between two brothers, He
declined with a word of warning and with one of the magnificent parables with
which He so frequently pointed out the earthly applications of heavenly
messages. He told the story of the wealthy landowner, who in the midst of
prosperity, envisioned even greater wealth and made long-range plans which would
fill his life with all the physical comforts and personal glory that he held
most dear. Apparently he was talented, economical, industrious, prudent, honest,
and moral in all his dealings—but he was the victim of ambition and self-
interest, as are so many others.

He measured his success in broad fields and full barns, sorrowful, He gave
practical encouragement. The Christian will be interested in helping build and
develop hospitals, orphanages, old people’s homes, and other charitable
institutions that are trying to help the less fortunate. The Christian will be
interested in doing his part to help share the great wealth of this country with
the needy in other parts of the world. He will be a supporter of any national or
international social agency helping the unfortunate of the world.

Nowhere in the Bible does it teach that we are to withdraw ourselves from
society. Rather, it teaches quite the contrary. We are to join with others who
are working to good purpose to help lift the unfortunate. God needs social
workers, doctors, hospital attendants, nurses, charity workers, and many other
types of people who can help alleviate human suffering. The motto of the Rotary
Club is “Service above self.” The motto of the Kiwanis Club is “We build.” The
motto of the Lions Club is “Liberty, intelligence, our nations safety.” The
motto of the Modern Woodmen is “Love thy neighbor.” All of these ideas
originated in Christianity. Lots of the pagan religions never had a service
club. All these organizations are really by-products of Christianity even when
some of their members are not Christians. The perfume of Christ is in the
fragrance of any and all social service. The ancient world never had a hospital.

Madame Chiang Kai-shek said, “Confucianism worships ancestors but never built an
old folks’ home.” Certainly every Christian should live up to all these mottos.
If we did this world would be a better world in which to live. Certainly the
motto of Jesus Christ was “love and service” —love for Christ, service for
Christ; love for our fellow man, service to our fellow man. Jesus said, “If ye
love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). In other words, “If you love Me,
obey Me! Serve Me!” Christ has a right to test our love for Him by what we are
doing for Him. You cannot love without serving.

Ninth: the Christian has a special obligation to fellow Christians. Fellow
Christians are in a special class. We are to have supernatural love for them.
“We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren.
He that loveth not his brother abideth in death” (1 John 3:14).

We are to love our enemies. We are even to love those who persecute us and say
“all manner of evil against us, falsely.” But the greatest of our human love is
for those other Christians. Jesus said, “This is my commandment, that ye love
one another, as I have loved you” (John 15:12).

We are told to serve one another, “Brethren, through love be servants of one
another.”

Lord, help me to live from day to day In such a self-forgetful way That even
when I kneel to pray My prayers shall be for others.

Help me in all the work I do Ever to be sincere and true, And know that all I do
for Thee Must needs be done for others.

Others, Lord; yes, others.

Let this my motto be.

Let me live for others That I may live like Thee. The Bible says that our
obligation to each other as Christians is such that we should be examples to
each other. Paul said, “Be thou an example of the believers, in word, in
conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12). This
is not a suggestion—but a command I It is not a recommendation, but an
obligation. We are to be model Christians. The Bible also says we are to forgive
one another. “And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one
another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you” (Ephesians 4:32).
Jesus said that if you will not forgive, neither will your Father which is in
heaven forgive your sins. He also said “When ye stand praying, forgive, if you
have ought against any; that your Father also may forgive you” (Mark 11:25).

We are told as Christians not to judge one another, but rather decide never to
put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. The Bible says that
we are to be subject one to another; we are to clothe ourselves with humility
toward each other. We are to be “in honor, preferring one another.” We are to
put others first, and ourselves last. As Christians we are to bear one another’s
burdens. There are burdens which every man must bear for himself for no one can
do it for him, and if he neglects them they will not be borne. There is the
burden of being honest —of obeying God’s Word—of training your children for
God—of making your wife happy. In all such cases one must bear his own burdens.
But there are other burdens that our friends can help us bear, such as sorrow,
misfortune, trials, loneliness, family cares, spiritual difficulties, and
official responsibilities. But we are not to worry about our burdens. We are to
roll them on to God’s shoulders, looking to Him for power to sustain and
strengthen us. However, it is our duty to help our fellow man bear his own
burden. The Bible says as Christians also we are to be liberal with each other.
God says it is our duty as Christians to take care of widows and orphans, and to
help the poor within the Christian society. The Bible says: contribute to the
needs of the saints . . . practice hospitality . . . lodge strangers . . . wash
the saints’ feet . . . relieve the afflicted . . . be not forgetful to entertain
strangers. And Jesus said, “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of
these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. . . . It is more blessed to give
than to receive.” “God loveth a cheerful giver.” All of these are our social
obligations one to another as Christians.

Lastly, Christians ought to be gracious, and this is one of the most difficult
of Christian virtues. The very power of our conviction inclines us toward
feeling that we are right and that all other people are wrong. This is well and
good when our convictions are based upon the “Thou shalts” and the “Thou shalt
nots” of Scripture rather than our own ideas. The many different and frequently
warring factions within the church emphasize the terrible human tendency to
gather into select little groups, built upon profound convictions on trivial
matters, each insisting that they and they alone have the right answer. As the
late Dr. Harry Ironside once said: “Beware lest we mistake our prejudices for
our convictions.” To be sure we must deplore wickedness, evil and wrongdoing,
but our commendable intolerance of sin too often develops into a deplorable
intolerance of sinners.

I was amused and shocked to hear a man of considerable religious background
declare on television not long ago that “you didn’t catch Jesus associating with
questionable people or those whose basic ideas and attitudes were at variance
with what Jesus knew to be honorable and right!”

Such a man should have known that Jesus wasn’t afraid to associate with anyone!
One of the things which the scribes and Pharisees criticized most bitterly was
His willingness to help and talk and exchange ideas with anyone, be they
publicans, thieves, learned professors or prostitutes, rich or poor! Even His
own followers decried some of the people with whom He was seen in public, but
this did not lessen the compassion that Jesus felt for all the members of poor,
blinded, struggling humanity.

Jesus had the most open and all-encompassing mind that this world has ever seen.
His own inner conviction was so strong, so firm, so unswerving that He could
afford to mingle with any group secure in the knowledge that He would not be
contaminated. It is fear that makes us unwilling to listen to another’s point of
view, fear that our own ideas may not be unassailable. Jesus had no such fear,
no such pettiness of viewpoint, no need to fence himself off for His own
protection. He knew the difference between graciousness and compromise and we
would do well to learn of Him. He set for us the most magnificent and glowing
example of truth combined with mercy of all time, and in departing said: “Go ye
and do likewise.”

These are just a few of the scores of things that could be mentioned that are
the social obligations of the Christian. He cannot withdraw himself as a hermit
and live a solitary life. He is a member of society. Therefore, the teachings of
Jesus are full of our attitudes toward our fellow men.

Study the Bible, read it—and then live by it. Only then can you demonstrate to a
confused world the transforming power of the indwelling Christ.


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  CHAPTER 22: 20.     CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: THE FUTURE OF THE CHRISTIAN
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Chapter Seventeen THE FUTURE OF THE CHRISTIAN

1go to prepare a place for you. And if1go and prepare a place for you, 1 will
come again, and receive you unto myself; that where 1 am, there ye may he also.
—John 14:2-3 THE world unites in testifying that we are in an hour of dire
crisis. Many are predicting impending calamities. Some say that the race is
heading toward destruction. Many believe we are on the verge of the eclipse of
civilization itself.

Many of the best-selling books deal with dire predictions of the future.
Editorials in newspapers and magazines are talking about Armageddon, the end of
time and the destruction of civilization. A president in his inaugural says,
“Science has bequeathed to us the ability to destroy ourselves.” Mr. William
Vogt in his book, Road to Survival, says, “The handwriting on the wall of five
continents now tells us that the day of judgment is at hand.” Dr, Richard K.
Ullmann has written: “We live in an age of decision, of choice between right and
wrong, between good and evil, between life and death, such as has never occurred
before. If we choose wrongly, we may be the last generation of mankind.”

Professor Sorokin has said: “We live amidst one of the greatest crises in human
history. Not only war, famine, pestilence, and revolution, but a legion of other
calamities are also rampant over the whole world. All values are unsettled. All
norms are broken. Humanity has become a distorted image of its own noble self.
The crisis is omnipresent and involves almost the whole of culture and society
from top to bottom. It is manifest in the fine arts and science, in philosophy
and religion, in ethics and law. It permeates the forms of social, economic and
political organizations and the entire way of living and thinking. There is
every reason to expect that the disastrous effects of such calamities will fall
upon us in a much more intensive and extensive scale during this catastrophic
age of ours.” As we move through the vast literature created by the atomic and
hydrogen bombs—the books and articles that, on one hand, describe the
experiments in Nevada and Bikini; and, on the other hand, those that attempt to
portray something of the inescapable crisis that is now facing the human race—we
are amazed to find that science is now using Biblical terminology. As Dr. Wilbur
Smith says, “Plato, Seneca, Aristotle and practically none of the great
philosophers ever attempted to delve into the future.” The Bible is the only
Book in the world that has an eschatology. From Genesis to Revelation the Bible
is full of the events that await the climax of history. For the past few years
church leaders have been afraid of fanaticism in the discussion of future
events, but the church is taking a new look at these reams of Holy Scripture
that talk about the future-events’ course of human history. The World Council of
Churches, for its meeting at Evanston in 1954, chose as its theme: “Christ, The
Hope of the World.” The World Council appointed committees to study the
teachings of the Bible in order that the church might present an adequate
picture of God’s revelation concerning the future. At a moment like this men and
women who are untaught in the Bible are prone, as in every preceding critical
hour, to become the dupes of false prophets, spiritualism, palm readers, tea
leaf readers, and other forms of superstitions. Thousands of dollars are being
spent daily by frightened people trying to find some inkling as to what the
future holds. All they have to do is go to the nearest book shop and purchase an
inexpensive Bible and find within its pages the secrets of the future.

There is not one sentence in Mary Baker Eddy’s Science and Health that throws
any light on the future. You can read the Koran from cover to cover and not find
a word concerning the future of mankind. It is the Bible, and the Bible alone,
that casts a penetrating light into the darkness and mystery of the future. The
veil of mystery is lifted, the future is revealed—the Bible predicts that there
is coming an end to this world system as we know it. The Bible declares that the
climax of history will be the coming again of Jesus Christ. The Bible gives
hints that the greatest coronation of all time will take place when Christ is
crowned King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

I am aware of the fact that this is a controversial and often misunderstood
subject. We have had a great many fanatics in past years who have gone about the
country setting dates, and as a result this glorious truth has been obscured.
The magazine Religion in Life carried an article entitled “The Christian
Hope—Its Meaning For Today.” The subject of the future was discussed by three
intellectual leaders. One is Dr. Arnold J. Toynbee, the famous British
historian; another is Dr. Amos N. Wilder, well-known theologian at the
University of Chicago; and the other is Dr. C. S. Lewis, famed English scholar
and professor at Oxford University.

Toynbee sees a world divided into two camps as a result of technological changes
which have made all men neighbors without giving them tolerance, love, and
understanding of one another. The Christian hope, according to Toynbee, is to
fight the leviathan of man-worship, materialism, and collectivism.

Dr. Wilder, on the other hand, doubts if man can find the Christian hope within
history itself. Redemption, he believes, must come from spiritual resources
outside the human race. Man must realize that God’s purposes will eventually be
worked out in the world even if it requires the refining fires of war and
tragedy. Man will some day build a kingdom of God on earth largely through his
own strength and wisdom.

It is not until we come to the statement by Dr. Lewis that we feel that we are
on a Biblical basis for thinking. Lewis accepts God’s Word as the truth. He
frankly declares, “It seems to me impossible to retain in any recognizable form
our belief in the divinity of Christ and the truth of the Christian revelation
while abandoning or deducting the promised and threatened return of Jesus
Christ.”

Dr. Lewis points out three reasons why people scoff at the idea of the return of
Jesus Christ to this earth: first, many professed Christians say it is a false
teaching since the second coming of Jesus Christ did not take place as the early
church predicted. It is true that the early Christians looked for the Lord’s
return in their time, but many prophecies of the Bible were to be fulfilled
before the second coming, says Lewis. Second, the theory of evolution keeps many
people from believing the doctrine of the second coming of Christ. If we believe
man is progressing upward of himself, we will never accept the promise of Christ
that He will return and bring an end to sin and death. Third, he points out the
doctrine that Christ is coming cuts across the plans and dreams of millions of
people. They want to eat, drink, and be merry without interference in their
selfish course of action. This was exactly the reason why the scoffers of Noah’s
time refused to believe in a flood, for they did not wish anything to mar their
selfish plans for the future. The Bible itself predicted that scoffers would
come in the last days with scoffing, following their own passions, and saying,
“Where is the promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all
things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation” (2 Peter 3:4).
The whole point of God’s offer of hope and of God’s warning would have been lost
if, in departing, He had left behind the exact date of His return. It is because
we know not at what hour He will return that we must keep our spiritual houses
in readiness at all times. The great D. L. Moody used to say, “I never preach a
sermon without thinking that possibly the Lord may come before I preach
another.”

Dr. G. Campbell Morgan, the distinguished British clergyman, said, “I never
begin my work in the morning without thinking that perhaps He may interrupt my
work and begin His own. I am not looking for death. I am looking for Him.”

That’s the way a Christian should five his life, in the constant anticipation of
the return of Jesus Christ! If we could live every day as though it might be the
very last one before the final judgment, what a difference it would make here on
earth! But we don’t like to think that way! We don’t like to think that our
carefully made plans, our long-range schemes may be interrupted by the trumpets
of God! Were so engrossed in our own little activities that we can’t bear the
thought of having anything spoil them! Too many people would rather say, “Oh
well, the end of the world hasn’t come yet, so why think about it—it’s probably
a thousand years away!”

It may be! But on the other hand, it may not! I’m not going to predict the end
of the world. Too many well- meaning people have done that and been guilty of
tragic disservice to the Christian cause. Too many religious cranks and fanatics
have held Christian faith up to ridicule by making false predictions.

Students of religious history can recall all too vividly the many times that
self-styled prophets have created mass hysteria. Back in 1843, William Miller
predicted that the end of the world would occur on the night of March 21. At
exactly midnight, he declared, the trumpets would sound, the heavens would roll
up like a great scroll, and Jesus would appear for the second time! Those who
believed William Miller, instead of the Bible, gathered in a great crowd and
waited, and then slipped home in the early morning light, disappointed and
ashamed.

They could have been saved this public embarrassment had they but recalled the
warning that Jesus uttered over and over, “Watch ye therefore: for ye know not
when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the
cockcrowing, or in the morning: Lest coming suddenly He find you sleeping. And
what I say unto you, I say unto all, Watch.” (Mark 13:35-37).

Both false predictions and human unwillingness to admit that life on this earth
may come to a sudden halt, because of supernatural forces quite outside
ourselves, have made many people scoff at the idea of the second coming.

There is still another reason which has lulled too much of the “civilized” world
into an unwarranted feeling of security. It is the erroneous doctrine of
“progress!” According to this teaching, man and all his works are slowly and
painfully making their way upward by their own strength and intelligence. Many
who believe in this theory also claim to believe in the second coming of Christ,
but they say this coming means only the day when man will have purified himself
by his own means! When he will have come to recognize the futility of war, the
stupidity of greed and selfish behavior, the uselessness of prejudice and
intolerance, and clearly understands that he is his brother’s keeper and must
five according to the Golden Rule! This myth—for the theory of inevitable
“progress” is a myth and nothing more—is based on what man hopes is happening
and not on what is really taking place. When such men point to the fact that
modern medicine is now making it possible for us to live longer than our
ancestors, they overlook the fact that death is still our ultimate destiny. At
best, we have only been able to postpone it for a few brief years. When they
point to our vastly improved transportation and communications systems, they try
to ignore the fact that we have used our conquest of the air mainly to carry
death and destruction to our fellow men and not to spread the gospel and
Christian faith. When they boast of our far-flung network of schools and
colleges, they quickly pass over the fact that much of the teaching in these
schools and colleges has led students further from, instead of closer to God.

These men exalt the ingenious minds that have finally solved the mystery of the
atom, while we tremble at the thought of what this, the zenith of mans
cleverness, may have brought upon us all!

These are among the high points of mans “progress.” These are the achievements
from which some men take hope, on which some men pin their faith of a better and
more peaceful world. They seem to take it for granted that “progress” leads
always toward improvement, when in reality it can lead backwards as well as
ahead!

What, then, are the arguments on the other side? What sure proof do we have that
Jesus will return and that we should live our lives in constant readiness for
that glorious day? The Bible is our proof, of course, and in the Scripture the
second coming of Christ is given a most prominent place. Some Bible students
have shown that one out of every thirty verses mentions this doctrine, and for
every one mention of the first coming of Christ there are eight references to
His second coming! In all, there are three hundred and eighteen references to
it. In the Old Testament it is the theme of the prophets, and in the New
Testament whole books (1 and 2 Thessalonians) and entire chapters (Matthew 24;
Mark 13; Luke 21) are devoted to it. The whole Bible emphasizes over and over
the fact that Christ will come back. For example, in Isaiah (Isaiah 66:15) we
are told that “the Lord will come with fire, and with His chariots like a
whirlwind, to render His anger with fury, and His rebuke with flames of fire.”
In Jeremiah, we are told that at the Lord’s coming Jerusalem will be made the
throne of His glory and nations shall be gathered in representation. There shall
be a mighty disarmament conference in Jerusalem, far greater than any the world
has ever seen in Washington or London or Paris!

Ezekiel tells of Jerusalem which is to be restored, a temple which is to be
rebuilt, and a land which is to be reclaimed and filled with prosperity.

Daniel saw Him in visions, coming as the Judge and King of the earth.

Hosea says that in the latter times when the Lord shall return, Israel shall
accept Him as Lord and King.

Joel describes the world’s armies arrayed in the last day against the host of
heaven.

Amos reveals the new throne of David established again in Jerusalem.

Obadiah issues serious warnings in view of the coming again of the Prince of
Princes.

Micah announces the cessation of all wars when swords shall be beaten into
plowshares and spears into pruning-hooks.

Nahum tells of the mountains quaking beneath His feet and the very earth burning
with the presence of Christ.

Habakkuk shows the King measuring the new Kingdom with a measuring rod and all
the hills bowing unto Him.

Zephaniah gives us the new song that He will teach unto Israel and describes the
overthrow of the false Christ.

Haggai tells of the shaking of all things and only the things of God remaining.

Zechariah gives the picture of His feet standing again on the Mount of Olives.
The mountain shall split in twain and the valley of decision shall be formed.

Malachi closes the Old Testament story of the coming Prince by showing Him as a
refiners fire and as a fuller’s soap, and as the rising sun filling the whole
earth with His glory. The Old Testament is brimming with accounts of the second
coming of Christ. In the New Testament the predictions of His coming are even
more vivid and couched in even clearer terms. Matthew likens Christ to a
bridegroom coming to receive his bride.

Mark sees Him as a householder going on a long journey and committing certain
tasks to his servants until his return. To Luke, Jesus is a nobleman going into
a far country to transact certain businesses and leaving his possessions with
his servants in order that they might trade with them until he comes.

John quotes Christ as saying, “I go and prepare a place for you, I will come
again, and receive you unto myself.” In Romans we see Him at His coming placing
all things beneath His feet. In 1 Corinthians, Paul tells of the Lord’s coming
to awaken and raise the dead; 2 Corinthians describes the new house we shall
have when this earthly house is dissolved.

Colossians (Colossians 3:4) says, “When Christ, Who is our life, shall appear,
then shall ye also appear with Him in glory.” In 1 Thessalonians, Paul tells us
to wait for God’s Son from heaven. 2 Thessalonians gives us the glorious picture
of the Lord coming with His saints. In Timothy, we find these words, that the
Lord will reward all those who “love His appearing.”

Titus talks about the “blessed hope.”

Hebrews tells about His coming the second time apart from sin.

James urges his readers to be patient unto the coming of the Lord.

Peter says that the day of the Lord cometh as a thief in the night.

John gives the great promise to all believers, “Now are we the sons of God, and
it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear,
we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.”

Jude says, “Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousands of His saints.” And the
whole Book of Revelation is given over to the teaching of the coming of Jesus
Christ. Not only does the Old Testament tell us to expect the second coming of
Christ, not only is the New Testament filled with the promise of it, but if we
would study the historic documents of our major denominations, we would find
that our founders all believed and accepted it. The most thrilling, glorious
truth in all the world is the second coming of Jesus Christ. It is the sure
promise of the future, when all about us is pessimism and gloom. When people
wail, “What is to become of us, whither are we drifting?” the Bible can give
them a sure, straight answer. The Bible says that the consummation of all things
shall be the coming again of Jesus Christ, and the rewards that await the elect
of God! As to the exact time and date that this glorious event will occur, I
would not defy Providence by hazarding a guess! I know too well that passage in
Acts 1:6-7, when the disciples asked, “Lord, wilt thou at this time restore
again the kingdom to Israel?” And Jesus answered saying, “It is not for you to
know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in His own power.”

It is not important that we know the exact time of His coming. What is important
is that we live our lives in such a way as to be ready for it at any moment!
Jesus said that the angels in heaven did not know, that only God Himself is
aware of the hour and the moment when the mighty blasts shall be heard, the
heavens shall part and Christ and His heavenly host shall appear once more to
human eyes!

Jesus did, however, say that there would be certain trends that might indicate
that the time of his second appearance was drawing near. He said, “And when
these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads: for
your redemption draweth nigh. And He spake to them a parable: Behold the fig
tree, and all the trees; When they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own
selves that summer is now nigh at hand. So likewise ye, when ye see these things
come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand” (Luke 21:28-31).
And what were these trends that Jesus bid us look and watch for? “And there
shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth
distress of nations, with perplexity: the sea and the waves roaring; Men’s
hearts fading them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming
on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.” (Luke 21:25-26.)

Time, as measured by the angels who view all eternity, is far different from the
earthly calendar by which we reckon it. To us who clutch desperately to our
allotted three score years and ten, to us who see the days in relation to our
own particular stay on earth, to us a hundred years, two hundred, five hundred
years seem a long, long time. Such time, however, is but a day to God!

Many scholars who read the Scriptures correctly in the view of current events,
feel that we are living now in the latter days of life on this earth and that we
have entered upon the final era—the last act of the mighty drama that started
all those thousands of years ago in the Garden of Eden!

There are stirrings in the Middle East. Ancient Persia is once again a key
nation because of oil. With the re-establishment of Israel as a separate nation,
a sovereign state with its own currency, its own army, its own identity, the
wheel has made its mighty cycle and is coming to a full turn. It was in that
rich and fertile crescent of the Near East that our civilization had its
beginning. From this restricted area it spread out in all directions. It
encircled the globe. It moved steadily around, pausing sometimes to collect
itself and gather strength, trapped sometimes in the mighty talons of man’s many
dark ages of barbarism, ignorance, godlessness, and fear. Until now at last, and
in our time, it is beginning to return to the scene of its beginning. In
addition, these scholars look about them and see all too clearly the picture
that Jesus painted when He said: “But as the days of Noah were, so shall also
the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days that were before the flood
they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until that day
that Noah entered the ark. And knew not until the flood came and took them all
away; so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be. Then shall two be in the
field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding
at the mill; the one shall be taken and the other left. Watch therefore: for ye
know not what hour your Lord doth come” (Matthew 24:37-42). These scholars point
out (Daniel 12:4) where Daniel refers to the great increase in knowledge of the
last days as another of the trends that indicates the approaching end. “Many
shall run to and fro,” this passage tells us, and we need no prompting to
recognize the tremendous increase in both travel and knowledge that has marked
these past fifty years. Never before in all recorded history have events been so
speeded up, never before has one man-made wonder followed so closely the heels
of others.

Medical men and psychiatrists for the past twenty-five years have been saying
that the human body is not geared for such tension, that it cannot withstand so
much speed and pressure, but we dash forward just the same. Many of the mighty
leaders, whose work has made this drastic speed-up possible, have dropped dead
at their desks, victims of the very Frankenstein monster they created!

We are told that Ezekiel 38, 39 may well be describing Russia and the mighty
power of Communism, in the great armies that shall rise and march against the
Lord in the latter days.

Many intellectuals scoffed at 2 Peter 3:10-12 a few years ago, but the explosion
of the hydrogen bomb and the terrible possibilities of the cobalt bomb have
changed their skepticism to wonderment at the Bible predictions. “But the day of
the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass
away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the
earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing then that
all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in
all holy conversation and godliness. Looking for and hasting unto the coming of
the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the
elements shall melt with fervent heat?”

I would certainly not make the mistake of William Miller, or of so many other
sincere but over-zealous men of God, in setting even an approximate date for the
return of Christ. I do, however, in all seriousness point out that the times in
which we are living differ radically from any that have gone before. The tempo
is increased, events of such magnitude that any one of them would have been the
sensation of the age a short time ago, now come so close together that many pass
almost unnoticed. Moral laxness has become so common and so widely accepted that
little or no effort is made to conceal it. Corruption in high places is almost
taken as the rule rather than the exception!

Above all we are faced with the mighty force of Communism—the greatest, most
well-organized and outspoken foe of Christianity that the church has confronted
since the days of pagan Rome! The anti-Christ, that the prophets warned would
appear in the latter days, may be growing and taking concrete shape before our
very eyes—A bold, brazen, well-armed anti-Christ, who does not stoop to disguise
his identity or masquerade his purpose.

These are apocalyptic trends, marked by the war, famine, pestilence and death
that we know so well are riding around the world at this very moment. Time, as
measured by heavenly bodies, may give us ten years, a hundred years, a thousand
years; but it may also give us only a day, a week, a month. It may well be true
now “that this generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled”
(Matthew 24:34).

Until that Day of Days the attitude of every Christian should be one of watching
and expecting. Jesus said, “Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord
doth come” (Matthew 24:42). Again this thrilling hope should cause a complete
consecration to service on the part of all that believe it. Jesus said, “Occupy
till I come” (Luke 19:13). It is also to be a time of preparation. Jesus said,
“Be ye therefore ready also, for the Son of Man cometh at an hour when ye think
not” (Luke 12:40).

All of history is moving toward that climactic day when all enemies shall have
been put under His feet and Christ shall have been crowned. The Bible says, “Of
the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne
of David, and upon His kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment
and with justice from henceforth even for ever” (Isaiah 9:7). In that day war
and strife shall cease. Sin and want shall be no more. In that day sorrow and
pain will be unknown. In that day the heathen will be converted. In that day no
man shall dwell in ignorance of God. In that day all of nature shall unfold the
splendor and luster that characterized Eden. In that day the very beasts of the
earth will dwell together in amity and peace. In that day the knowledge of the
love of God shall cover the earth. In that day our long and ardent prayer, “Thy
kingdom come,” shall be answered at last.

Jesus shall reign wher’er the sun Doth his successive journies run; His kingdom
stretch from shore to shore, ’Til moons shall wax and wane no more. This is the
hope of the Christian!


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  CHAPTER 23: 21.     CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: PEACE — AT LAST
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Chapter Eighteen PEACE — AT LAST Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind
is stayed on Thee: because he trusted in Thee. —Isaiah 26:3

YOU know now what it means to be at peace with God. You know what it means to be
a Christian. You know the price that has to be paid to get this illusive thing
called peace and happiness. I know men who would write a check for a million
dollars if they could find peace. Millions are searching for it. Every time they
get close to finding the peace that you have found in Christ, Satan steers them
away. He blinds them. He throws up a smoke screen. He bluffs them. And they miss
it! But you have found it! It is yours now forever. You have found the secret of
life.

There are many things you still do not understand. There are many mysteries.
There are many problems that baffle you. But down underneath it all is that
inward relaxation and peace that will lead to confident living. You have found
that there are many advantages to the Christian ideal that challenge any other
philosophical concept. Materialism, Communism, and all the other philosophical
interpretations do not hold a candle to what Christ offers.

Dr. Thiessen in his work on Christian Ethics has listed several advantages which
we will give here: First, there is sonship. The moment you accepted Jesus Christ
as personal Savior you were adopted into the family of God. You are now His
child. You have certain privileges and responsibilities that only royalty can
know. Royal blood is in your veins by adoption. You have become a member of the
family of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

Second, you are an heir. The Bible teaches that when you were born again, your
new position in Christ has made you a joint heir with Christ. You are now heir
to all things.

Third, there is peace. Peace can be experienced only when you have received
divine pardon—when you have been reconciled to God and when you have harmony
within, with your fellow man and especially with God. “There is no peace, saith
my God, to the wicked” (Isaiah 57:21). But through the blood of the cross,
Christ has made peace with God for us and is Himself our peace. If by faith we
accept Him, we are justified by God and can realize the inner serenity that can
come to man through no other means. When Christ enters our heart, we are freed
of that haunting sense of sin. Cleansed of all feeling of contamination and
unfitness, we can lift up our heads secure in the knowledge that we can look
with confidence into the face of our fellow men. “When a man’s ways please the
Lord he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.” Even more important,
we know that we can stand before God in the hour of our death with this same
feeling of peace and security. Communism nor any other philosophy can promise as
much. The fourth great benefit that is derived from a knowledge of Christ is
spiritual life. In his natural state, no man is fully aware of the wrongness of
his past life, but he is aware of the deadness of his soul. Those not acquainted
with theological terms may not express their inner feelings in quite this way,
but they are conscious of them. All natural men wonder at times at their own
indifference to right and wrong. They are disturbed at their own willingness to
compromise in the face of obvious injustices, to settle for the expedient thing
rather than the right thing. Even the most calloused sinner experiences moments
when he wishes he could be good. The most hardened criminals, the most brazen
prostitutes are all aware of the deep, all-but-smothered longings within
themselves to be something better than they are. Unconverted men and women who
try to live a decent life are acutely aware of how far short they fall of their
goal, and the tragedy is that so many of them do not even know that they are
failing because they are dead in sins and trespasses and must be made alive
through Christ before they can live according to spiritual laws.

Jesus said, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it
more abundantly” (John 10:10). And Paul stated, “If any man be in Christ, he is
a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new”
(2 Corinthians 5:17). To be born anew in Christ means to be born to new ideals,
new aspirations, new hopes, and new abilities to achieve these fresh new goals.
Christ as Lord and Master has given you a new life. You have been born again.

Fifth, there is the joy of Christian fellowship that comes from being a
Christian. Loneliness is one of the great terrors, the great tragedies of
mankind. How often we speak of feeling alone in the midst of a great crowd. How
many men and women have experienced a greater sense of loneliness in a huge city
than they have when walking down a country road all by themselves. How often we
long to find someone who can understand and share our innermost feelings,
someone to whom we can talk, who sees life as we see it, who is guided by the
same motives, who judges by the same values. When in the popular phraseology of
the day we talk about finding someone who speaks our language, we are really
repeating the same longing that the Psalmist expressed when he said, “I looked
on my right hand, and beheld, but there was no man that would know me; refuge
failed me; no man cared for my soul” (Psalms 142:4).

You have found Christ to be the one Friend who understands your every thought,
and once fellowship has been established with Him you can never be alone again.
When Christ takes the rightful place in your heart, all sense of separation from
God disappears. Once more you stand in the presence of God. This fellowship is a
joy unspeakable and full of glory. No man-made philosophy can bestow this
glorious benefit.

Sixth, there comes a new strength in following Christ. Man by himself is unable
to attain his own standards, let alone attain the far higher and more exacting
standards of God. The Mosaic laws were laid down as the minimum of behavior
acceptable to God, and you are in yourself too weak to maintain even this
standard unaided. Throughout history man has made resolution after resolution,
hoping he would have the strength to keep them, but knowing in his heart that
the best he could achieve would be a temporary reform and not a permanent
change. This human weakness is so widely recognized that New Year’s resolutions
have become a world-wide joke and mans ability to turn over a new leaf without
the help of God is subject to open scorn. It is only through rebirth in Christ
that man can achieve, not just an alteration in his present way of life, but the
creation of a new personality.

We are all familiar with the transformation that took place in Saul on the road
to Damascus, when Christ entered his heart and changed him from one of His most
destructive enemies to one of His mightiest advocates. Many equally dramatic
changes in human personalities are taking place today, and they are being
brought about by the self-same means that transformed Saul into Paul— birth
again through Jesus Christ!

There is no human philosophy that can achieve such changes or provide such
strength. This mighty strength stands ready to be available at your beck and
call at all times. God said, “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not
dismayed; for I am thy God. I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea,
I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness” (Isaiah 41:10).

Whatever the circumstances, whatever the call, whatever the duty, whatever the
price, whatever the sacrifice — His strength will be your strength in your hour
of need.

Seventh, there are physical benefits that accrue from Christian living. Sin and
the sense of inner unworthiness impair physical and mental well-being. The sense
of physical impurity and physical immorality, the sense of hatred directed
toward our fellow men, the awareness of our own inadequacy and frustration and
our inability to achieve the goals to which we aspire—these are the real reasons
for physical and mental illness. The sense of guilt and sin that natural man
carries within himself renders him unfit for the performance of his duties,
renders him sick in both mind and body. It was no accident that Jesus combined
healing with His preaching and teaching when He was on earth. There is a very
real relationship between the life of the spirit and the health of the body and
mind.

Peace with God and the peace of God in a mans heart and the joy of fellowship
with Christ have in themselves a beneficial effect upon the body and mind and
will lead to the development and preservation of physical and mental power.
Thus, Christ promotes the best interest of the body and mind as well as of the
spirit, in addition to inward peace, the development of spiritual life, the joy
and fellowship with Christ and the new strength that comes with being born
again.

There are certain special privileges that only the true Christian can enjoy
There is, for example, the privilege of having divine wisdom and guidance
continually. The Bible says, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God,
that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him”
(James 1:5).

Also the Christian has a sense of true optimism, the assurance that according to
divine revelation everything will turn out well in the end. The Christian also
has a world view. This world view sets forth God’s purpose and the end toward
which all are proceeding. It assures us that in spite of men’s war upon each
other and in spite of the destructive forces of nature which seem to hold us in
their grip, God is still on the throne and in command of everything. Satan
himself is held back by God’s power and given an opportunity to exercise his
evil influence only as God sees fit and only as long as God sees fit to let him
do it. The Scriptures teach us that God has a definite plan for each period of
history, for every nation and for every individual. The Scripture discloses
God’s plan for the return of Christ when His kingdom shall be established, as we
have already seen. Thus, for the Christian, life has a plan and an assurance
that God will ultimately triumph over all unrighteousness. In summing up the
superiority of the Christian life over all other ways of living we cannot
overlook the advantage that the Christian will have for all eternity. Job said,
“If a man die, shall he live again?” (Job 14:14). He answered his own question
when he said, “For I know that my Redeemer liveth and that He will stand at the
latter day upon the earth” (Job 19:25).

What a prospect! What a future! What a hope! What a life! I would not change
places with the wealthiest and most influential man in the world. I would rather
be a child of the King, a joint-heir with Christ, a member of the Royal Family
of heaven!

I know where I’ve come from, I know why I’m here, I know where I’m going—and I
have peace in my heart. His peace floods my heart and overwhelms my soul! The
storm was raging. The sea was beating against the rocks in huge, dashing waves.
The lightning was flashing, the thunder was roaring, the wind was blowing; but
the little bird was asleep in the crevice of the rock, its head serenely under
its wing, sound asleep. That is peace: to be able to sleep in the storm! In
Christ we are relaxed and at peace in the midst of the confusions,
bewilderments, and perplexities of this life. The storm rages, but our hearts
are at rest. We have found peace—at last!


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Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/graham-billy-peace-with-god/
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