127 Sermon Illustrations on Deliverance

There is a story told of an incident that occurred during the last Indian mutiny. The English were besieged in the city of Lucknow, and were in momentary expectation of perishing at the hands of the fiends that surrounded them. There was a little Scotch lassie in this fort, and, while lying on the ground, she suddenly shouted, her face aglow with joy, "Dinna ye hear them comin'; dinna ye hear them comin'?" "Hear what?" they asked, "Dinna ye hear them comin?" And she sprang to her feet. It was the bagpipes of her native Scotland she heard. It was a native air she heard that was being played by a regiment of her countrymen marching to the relief of those captives, and these deliverers made them free. Oh, my friends, don't you hear Jesus Christ crying to you to-night?

Mr. Spurgeon, a number of years ago, made a parable. He thought he had a right to make one, and he did it. He said: "There was once a tyrant who ordered one of his subjects into his presence, and ordered him to make a chain. The poor blacksmith--that was his occupation--had to go to work and forge the chain. When it was done he brought it into the presence of the tyrant, and he was ordered to take it away and make it twice the length. He brought it again to the tyrant, and again he was ordered to double it. Back he came when he had obeyed the order, and the tyrant looked at it, and then commanded the servants to bind the man hand and foot with the chain he had made and cast him into prison. "And," Mr. Spurgeon said, "that is what the devil does with man." He makes them forge their own chain, and then binds them hand and foot with it, and casts them into outer darkness." My friends, that is just what these drunkards, these gamblers, these blasphemers--that is just what every sinner is doing. But, thank God, we can tell you of a deliverer. The Son of God has power to break everyone of these fetters if you will only come to Him.

In the North there was a minister talking to a man in the inquiry-room. The man says, "My heart is so hard, it seems as if it was chained, and I cannot come." "Ah," says the minister, "come along, chain and all," and he just came to Christ hard-hearted, chain and all, and Christ snapped the fetters, and set him free right there. So come along. If you are bound hand and foot by Satan, it is the work of God to break the fetters; you cannot break them.

A company of Covenanters had been pursued by their persecutors until their strength was exhausted. Reaching a little hill which separated them from their pursuers, their leader said, "Let us pray here; for if the Lord hear not our prayer, and save us, we are all dead men." He then prayed, "Twine them about the hill, O Lord! and cast the lap of thy cloak over pair old Saunders and these pair things." Before he had done speaking, a mist rose up about the hill, and wrapped the devoted little band about like the very cloak of the Lord he had prayed for. In vain, their enemies sought to find them; and, while they were wearying themselves in the effort, an order came which sent them on an errand in a different direction.

— S. S. Times

On the occasion of President Lincoln's visit to Richmond, as soon as his arrival became known, the colored people whom he had delivered from bondage crowded around him in wild enthusiasm. They gazed upon the wonderful man; they shouted, they danced, waved their handkerchiefs and hats; they cheered enthusiastically. Some cried, "Glory, glory!" others, "Thank you, dear Jesus for this!" others, "God bless you, Massa Linkum!" others, "Bless de Lord!" What triumphal entry into Rome ever equalled this entry into Richmond by our delivering President? But, ere long, we shall all gaze on a greater than he, with even greater satisfaction than those redeemed ones experienced.

JOHN BUISSON.—I shall now have a double jail delivery,—one out of my sinful flesh, another from the loathsome dungeon I have long lain in.

Mr. Wesley, father of the Rev. John Wesley, was roused from sleep by the cry of fire from the street; but, little imagining that the fire was in his own house, he opened his bed-room door, and found the place full of smoke, and that the roof was already burned through. Directing his wife and two girls to rise and flee for their lives, he burst open the nursery-door, where the maid was sleeping with five children. She snatched up the youngest, and bade the others follow her, the three eldest did so; but John, who was then six years old, was not awakened, and in the alarm was forgotten. The rest of the family escaped—some through the windows, others by the garden door; and Mrs. Wesley, to use her own expression, "waded through the fire." At this time John, who had not been remembered till that moment, was heard crying in the nursery. The father ran to the stairs, but they were so nearly consumed that they could not bear his weight; and being utterly in despair, he fell upon his knees in the hall, and, in agony, commended the soul of the child to God. John had been awakened by the light; and finding it impossible to escape by the door, climbed up a chest that stood near the window, and he was then seen from the yard. There was no time for procuring a ladder; but one man was hoisted on the shoulders of another, and thus he was taken out. A moment after the roof fell in. When the child was carried out to the house where his parents were, the father cried out, "Come, neighbors, let us kneel down; let us give thanks to God! He has given me all my eight children: let the house go, I am rich enough." Mr. Wesley remembered this providential deliverance through life with the deepest gratitude.

15. God, by the shed blood, comes between us and the enemy of our souls. By His presence, if we look to Him, He is ready to come between us and every overcoming circumstance. When outlook is bad, take the uplook.

Though we bring trouble on ourselves by sidestepping God's will, and have to go down to the bottom, if we pray in sincerity, God will speak the word of deliverance

An intense illustration of deliverance, from the Vietnam War.

In June 1967 a Green Beret reconnaissance unit took off for a special mission. Their destination was called "Oscar Eight", a North Vietnamese headquarters complex a few miles inside Laos and a key junction on the Ho Chi Minh trail. A B-52 raid blasted the area and then helicopters inserted the team.

Immediately Communist soldiers came out of deep bunkers and surrounded them. As the Green Berets huddled in a bomb crater a fighter bomber supporting them was shot down. Helicopters were sent in to get the soldiers out, but three of the craft went down in flames. The next one was able to get a few soldiers out. The fighting intensified even more, and a Phantom fighter blew up in an orange fireball.

Sergeant Charles Wilklow waited for his helicopter. He got on with 25 other soldiers and it lifted off the ground. Inside the helicopter he could see bullets punching both sides of the aircraft; then one pilot was shot, and it veered out of control, hit the trees, spun violently, fell 100 feet and broke in half. Enemy fire didn't let up a bit.

Injured and dead soldiers were piled everywhere, but somehow Wilklow scrambled to his feet and shot back at the nearby NVA [North Vietnamese Army]. He watched as one American was shot through the chest. Wilklow took a slug in his right leg and rolled out of the chopper. With shouting NVA all around and unable to walk, the Green Beret began crawling until he collapsed from exhaustion. He had no ammunition so he buried his rifle.

Charles Wilklow, too weak to move, expected to be seized, but the NVA soldiers merely walked over, saw his condition and left him there. They didn't tend his wounds and gave him nothing to drink, sentencing him to death by indifference. Wilklow passed out.

By the time he awoke his army gear had disappeared and he'd been dragged a few yards into a clearing, an orange panel laid out beside him to signal American helicopters to rescue him. North Vietnamese machine guns surrounded the spot, waiting. All day, Wilklow stayed motionless in the tropical sun, resolved to appear dead so no one would fall for the trap. He watched the enemy carry away several American bodies, then mount their heads on stakes like trophies.

On the second day two Caucasians in civilian clothes watched him from a distance. He figured they were Russians. He thirsted mightily, but the NVA offered him no water; he probably would have died that second day but he lapped up water from a muddy puddle. Enemy solders strolled over and urinated in the puddle, chuckled and walked away.

Then there was the Pig, a North Vietnamese private whose nose had been cut off, leaving him just two grotesque holes in his face, like a pig's snout. Such disfigurement was an ancient punishment for lying or thievery; this outcast teased and taunted Wilklow, relishing the chance to lord it over something even lower, a dying American. The Pig's hideous, haunting gaze was there for hours at a time, and Wilklow had nightmares about it.

By the third day, Wilklow was indeed dying. It rained on him for hours and he shivered uncontrollably. The Communists gave him not a crust of bread, not a rag to bind his wounds, and he drank only from the urine-scented puddle.

On the fourth day he squirmed when he saw maggots crawling in his open wound. Shriveled up and shaking, Wilklow barely clung to life; the NVA no longer even bothered watching him. His usefulness was about over; perhaps he'd look convincing one more day and maybe they had one last chance to lure in a helicopter.

That night the last of Wilklow's strength began slipping away, and he knew he was on the verge of death. Like many people facing that abyss, his thoughts went to his family, to his wife and three children. He saw his little nine- year-old daughter Kathy's face; and Charles, seven; but especially he recalled Randy, his three-year-old, and how he'd cried and tugged on him, begging Daddy not to leave them all for something dangerous called Vietnam.

Charles Wilklow was not a religious man, but for the first time in his adult life he prayed - fervently prayed - for God to help him live to see his family again. If only he could find the strength to move. In the darkness, cold rain pelted his face. He felt a twinge of energy somewhere, and though he couldn't stand, he forced himself up on all fours - pain almost consumed him, yet that God-given pain jolted him into consciousness. He moved his good knee forward, dragged his bad one, gingerly at first; then again. He repeated the movements, then faster, again and again, and with each yard hope grew a little. Weak, feverish, several times he had to pause and sometimes passed out, but he always woke up and started again.

The pain kept him going. He fell face-first and slid down a rain-slicked hillside. The pain surged, but Wilklow kept going. He hallucinated that men were watching him; he forced himself back into reality. By sunrise he must have crawled and dragged himself nearly two miles.

The morning several North Vietnamese, eating breakfast from aluminum rice bowls, walked past the little puddle where Wilklow should have been lying. The American wasn't there. Unalarmed they looked beneath some bushes, then noticed scrapes in the soft clay where the American had dragged himself - one shouted, and in an instant the whole camp came alive to a clanging gong. Dozens of NVA dropped their rice bowls and grabbed AK-47 assault rifles, then streamed out after the escapee.

The sun was high when Wilklow heard a plane, crawled into a small opening and miraculously, found a cloth panel the NVA had missed when emptying his pockets; he waved it weakly, rolled over and slipped into feverish sleep. Sometime later, a shadow above him blocked the sun. If they were going to kill him, Wilklow could not resist, could not longer even crawl away.

A face began to take shape - the hideous Pig? No, the face was BLACK, a black American Green Beret whose strong hands carried him to a rescuing helicopter. Eventually, 58 Green Berets were missing in action in Laos and Cambodia - Charles Wilklow was the only one ever to return.

I began life, literally, with nothing. Given up as an infant by my biological mother, an unmarried young woman from the small town of Moose Jaw in Saskatchewan, Canada, I was adopted by a poor, middle-aged couple, John and Mary Linkletter.

My adoptive father was one of the warmest men I've ever known, but he had absolutely no ability as a businessman. A part-time evangelical preacher, he also tried selling insurance, running a small general store and making shoes, all rather unsuccessfully. Eventually we found ourselves living in a charity home run by a local church in San Diego. Then Dad Linkletter felt called by God to become a full-time preacher, and we had even less money. And what we did have was usually shared with whatever neighborhood derelict happened to be looking for a meal.

I graduated from high school early and hit the road as a hobo at the tender age of 16 with the idea of finding my fortune. One of the first things I found, however, was the wrong end of a pistol: my traveling companion and I were held up by a couple of toughs who found us sleeping in a boxcar.

"Put your hands straight out and lie flat!" one of the men ordered. "If this match goes out and I hear anything more I'll shoot." As they searched our pockets and felt around our middles, I wondered if money was all they wanted. I was frightened because I had heard stories of older hobos sexually attacking young boys. Just then, the match went out ... and was hastily relit. We did not move! The thieves found $1.20 on me but missed $10.00 I had sewn into my coat lining. They also took two dollars from my friend, Denver Fox.

The match went out again and I could tell by their hesitation that they were undecided about something. As Denver and I lay there, inches apart in the darkness, I heard the hammer of the pistol click back and a cold chill ran down my back. I knew they were considering killing us. There was little risk for them. The rain hammering down on the outside of the boxcar would drown out any noise. Frozen with terror, I thought of my father and how he would have prayed for me had he known. Suddenly fear left me and peace and calm returned. As if in response to my own restored self-assurance, they moved back toward us. Then I could feel one of the men push something against my arm.

"Here's your thirty cents," he said. "Breakfast money."

Today I can look back on 45 years as a star of two of the longest-running shows in broadcasting history; I can reflect on the success I've had as a businessman, author, and lecturer; and I can be proud of my wonderful family life - 58 years with the same wife, five children, seven grandchildren, and eight great-grandchildren. I mention this not to be boastful but to encourage others who are at the lower rung of the economic ladder. Keep in mind where I started and remember, if I could do it, you can, too! Yes - you can!

------------------------------

By Art Linkletter

from Chicken Soup for the Soul

Copyright 1993 by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen

Last week in a Sunday school class I was teaching, someone asked about being delivered from depression. I noted that God is surely able to do so. But I tried to give another perspective on this — that pain may actually be a means of blessing. As C.S. Lewis observed, pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a dulled world.

In our culture, we have a tendency to be preoccupied with the alleviation of pain. But there is a danger: we can become so absorbed with “recovery” from pain that we make this a higher priority than knowing Christ or being delivered from sin.

Do we find ourselves more upset with our discomfort than with our lack of Christ-likeness and sin? Our main problem is not pain; alienation from God and idolatry and sin are. Once we realize that God is not obligated to take our pain away (as Paul experienced with his “thorn in the flesh” in 2 Corinthians 12), our relationship with God can be enriched and deepened.

We are living and even hobbling about in a fallen world — in anticipation of the new heavens and earth. Christ offers us hope and grace in the midst of suffering, not always relief from it. Theologian Vernon Grounds eloquently writes:

An individual, quite completely free from tension, anxiety, and

conflict may be only a well-adjusted sinner who is dangerously

maladjusted to God; and it is infinitely better to be a neurotic

saint than a healthy-minded sinner.... Healthy-mindedness may be

a spiritual hazard that keeps an individual from turning to God

precisely because he has no acute sense of God.... Tension,

conflict, and anxiety, even to the point of mental illness, may

be a cross voluntarily carried in God’s service (Vernon Grounds,

“Called to Be Saints – Not Well-Adjusted Sinners,” Christianity

Today [17 Jan. 1986], 28).

Paul reminds us that it is often in our weakness and inadequacy that we are most conscious of Christ’s power resting upon us: “when I am weak, then I am strong” (cp. 2 Corinthians 12:9-10). Having God’s power means that we can please God whatever our circumstances or condition. I think of my grandmother (we called her “Oma”) who, though bedridden, always had such a sweet, gracious demeanor; she never complained. Christ’s power enabled her and enables us to carry out God’s will and purposes — despite our weakness and frailty. Consider the powerful British preacher Charles Spurgeon would be laid up in bed for long stretches of time due to depression, yet he was a remarkable instrument of God. Or think of the noted hymnwriter and friend of John Newton, William Cowper, who battled severe depression as well. Yet God used this man’s gifts to bless the church. Below are a few stanzas from Cowper’s “God Moves in a Mysterious Way” — one of my favorite hymns — that reflect the theme of pain as a possible means of blessing:

Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take;

The clouds ye so much dread

Are big with mercy and shall break

In blessings on your head.

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,

But trust Him for His grace;

Behind a frowning providence

He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast,

Unfolding every hour;

The bud may have a bitter taste,

But sweet will be the flower.

Blind unbelief is sure to err

And scan His work in vain;

God is His own interpreter,

And He will make it plain.

If we allow it, weaknesses and pain may open our eyes to see how much we need God and prompt us to cast ourselves upon his mercy. As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 1:9: “indeed, we had the sentence of death within ourselves in order that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead.”

*

[Original illustration at this number was deleted for being obsolete]

Testimony of George Moran.

I know George pretty well - we were born in the same town of Koizumi, Japan, and went to the same high school in Heidelberg Germany. Both of us were saved around the same time and went to Wheaton College. George, however, almost didn't make it to college - while kayaking on the Nekar River, he came too close to a dam and was capsized. The swirling undertow kept him submerged and disoriented. The air in his lungs was rapidly running out when he called to God for help. An instant later his kayak shot out into the air. He credits God with saving him literally and spiritually on that day.

Sermon for Ethel Abrams and Evelyn Kelsall, "Distinguished Servants."

Psalm 121

=====================

MAY THE LORD KEEP YOU

=====================

I. Uncertainty of modern life. 121:1

II. Is your God big enough? 121:2,4

A. The God of Psalm 121 is the God of creation.

B. He is the God of the nations.

III. Is your God small enough? 121:5

A. Does your God care about YOU?

B. God is a watcher.

C. God sweats the details. Luke 21:18

IV. Does your God hold the future? 121:8

A. God protects us "now and forevermore."

B. If he does, should you be fearful right now?

C. Trust in God puts things in a different perspective.

Sermon in Acts series. Peter's deliverance from prison.

Acts 12:1-12

=========

RESCUE ME

=========

I. Desperate situations.

A. Executions and imprisonment.

B. Everyone here will face times of desperation.

II. Praying for deliverance.

A. The church prayed fervently. 12:5

B. Prayer comes easiest in desperate situations.

C. Salvation is not just for heaven.

III. Should we expect miracles?

A. Peter was not expecting anything.

B. The church was not really expecting anything.

C. Miracles still happen today.

IV. Ultimate deliverance.

A. Not every prayer is answered dramatically.

B. Death and disease are no defeat for Christians.

C. Are you humble enough to seek God's help?

“I was drunk when I made the decision to trust Christ as my Lord and Savior. But even though I was drunk, the Lord greatly convicted me of my sins....” These are the words of Reynaldo Mendoza of the Philippines, who now serves Jesus Christ with all his heart. His testimony follows:

“Both of my parents were heavy drinkers, and neither of them had a permanent job.... Following in their footsteps, I, too, became a drunkard and lived a very miserable life. Besides being addicted to drink, I was a womanizer and a gambler. My wife, Alice, was also a gambler, and we constantly quarreled.... Both of us neglected our children.

“I robbed people to get money, and then I started using drugs. I was in and out of jail, and yet I did not change. But I had a friend who faithfully witnessed to me. I tried to ignore him, but one day the Lord took our eldest child away from us. I fell into a deep depression and turned to false gods, but there was no change in my life.

“Then a fire swept through the squatter area in which we lived. Not only did we lose our house, but we lost every earthly possession we had.

“My faithful friend, who had become a pastor, came again to me, and again reminded me about the claims of God upon my life. I was also invited to some evangelistic meetings, and after I had attended twice, an AMG pastor, Joey Aguelo, came to my wife and me. He asked about our primary needs. Not long after, he surprised us when he came with materials donated through AMG to help us rebuild our house.

“Pastor Aguelo asked Alice and me if we would like to join a home bible study. We accepted, and through the Bible study I truly came to know the Lord.

(Knowing I was drunk), “my wife thought I didn’t mean what I was saying when I cried out to the Lord and told Him that I wanted Him to change my life. But I will never forget that night. It was June 16, 1993, and from that day to this, the Lord took away my desire for my previous sinful lifestyle. It was only a few months later that my wife joined me in trusting the Lord....

“Right now, the Lord is using me as a member of the church board where we worship, as a Bible study and worship leader, and in evangelism. He has also placed a burning desire in my heart to serve Him in a full-time ministry. I praise and thank the Lord for what He has done in my life!”

Pastor was enslaved by lust and contemplated suicide, but eventually gained a victory over it.

1. Such a small beginning.

2. Willpower didn't work.

3. Finally came adultery.

4. No one guessed.

5. Compartmentalized mind.

6. Paranoia increased.

7. The Elijah syndrome: "I'm only one left, no one else understands, Lord."

8. Collapse led to confession.

9. Breaking strongholds (any destructive system of thinking).

Steps to recovery:

1. Repent: this attacks the "victim" mentality.

2. Change the environment: this attacks the availability of sin.

3. Discover God's love: this attacks fear.

4. Develop godly relationships: this attacks deception.

5. Begin to think long-term: this attacks lust.

6. Discover servanthood: this attacks pride.

7. Expect total deliverance: this attacks failure.

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania (Baptist Press) -- [sermon version at bottom]

“Are we going to shoot them all together or one at a time?” the abductor asked his two associates.

Lined up on their knees with their backs to him were three missionaries of the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board and two missionary children. They had been abducted on Aug. 5, along with their vehicle, two hours earlier just outside a game reserve in central Tanzania. A sixth member of the group was left behind, hiding at the scene of the kidnapping.

“Oh, God, they're going to shoot Sandy,” prayed missionary David Moreland as the gunman grabbed another missionary, Sandy Harrington, from the line and forced her to kneel five feet away.

“I was absolutely terrified,” said Harrington of Newport News, Virginia. “My fear had been escalating throughout the whole ordeal. But even then, there was a calmness in the midst of my terror -- a sense of heaven-wardness. 'If they killed me, I'd be with God,' I thought to myself.”

But she said to the gunman, “Please don't shoot me.”

“We all grabbed one another's hand,” Moreland said, with tears in his eyes. “I thought I was holding my wife's hand for the last time. We all tensed up, expecting the bullets to hit. I started to pray out loud and committed us to the Lord,” he said. He prayed, “Lord, put your angels around us, but if it's time for us to go, then it's time. Do your will.”

“I truly had a peace that passed all understanding,” Moreland's wife, Millie, said. “We were ready to go. If we died, we died, but at least we were together. We had surrendered everything.” The Morelands are from Monroe, La.

Harrington, too, felt a similar peace. “During the calmness in my terror, I remembered the Bible verse in the book of Romans saying nothing could separate us from the love of Christ -- not even death.” She recalled praying for God's angels to protect them. “We were all kneeling, holding hands and praying out loud.”

At the same time, 10-year-old Joanna Giddens had two thoughts. “Would we be saved or killed? Would they shoot us or would the police find us?” wondered Giddens, daughter of Foreign Mission Board missionaries Ed and Nancy Giddens of Sepulveda, Calif. “I wasn't scared, though, because I knew that with God, everything would be all right. When they lined us up, we held hands, thinking they would shoot us with the machine gun but we prayed for God to protect us with his angels.”

“When I saw the gun, I felt scared at first,” said Harrington's daughter, Christine, age 10, “but I knew I would go to heaven if I was killed, and that was better than being alive ... so, I didn't care.”

Lined up, kneeling, their backs to the gunman, holding hands and praying aloud, the five expected to die. Then one of the abductors leaned down and asked David Moreland a question.

“Are you a 'padre?'” he asked.

Sandy Harrington was confused. She had been torn from the group, then put back with them, told to stand, then forced to kneel. Afraid for her life, she overheard the kidnappers' discussion with Moreland.

“Yes, I'm a 'padre,'” Moreland responded to their question. “I'm a missionary with the Baptist church here in Tanzania.” “The next thing I knew,” Harrington said, “we were all being told to drink this orange liquid they put before us. I was afraid it was poison and didn't know whether to drink it, but David said to drink it, that it was OK.” “When I saw the juice, I felt like shouting,” Moreland said, “because I knew then that they wouldn't shoot us. I had read reports of other hijackings and knew that they drugged people. That's what they were doing.”

The abductors had two one-liter bottles of orange drink and told their captives, “Drink. Drink.” Moreland was given the most -- four glasses. The two girls each were forced to drink a partial glass. The other two were given one glass each. A large cloth was spread before them, and they were told to lie down. “Oh, God, what now?” Moreland prayed, thinking that they still might be killed. But one of the kidnappers said, “Lie down so you can sleep.” The abductors rummaged through the vehicle, then drove off.

“It was a great relief to have them gone,” Harrington said. “After they left, we walked, then I don't remember much until the next day when I heard the plane” (flown by missionary pilot Mike Cannata, who found them). Moreland thought of getting back to the main road as quickly as possible. They walked awhile, then saw their vehicle with their belongings scattered all around it. “I told everyone to get off the road and hide,” Moreland said. He then thought of trying to sneak up on the vehicle. “I took three steps and the full force of the drug hit,” he said. “The next thing I remember was Millie saying, 'David, that's our airplane!'“ That was 18 hours later. They had survived the drug and the threat of attacks by lions and other wild animals that roam the area.

“I flew over and saw them (the victims) all lying on a dirt road,” Cannata said. “The airplane woke them up, and when they saw me, they began to wave.” Much later, Moreland said, “We crossed a line, the five of us, that most people don't cross. I had peace because I knew Jesus Christ and knew that he was my Lord and Savior. I've been someplace in my life that most haven't been, and I'm going to tell them about it. Then I'm going to ask them if they can say the same thing about Jesus that I can say”.

============================

Copyright (c) 1995 Baptist Press RNbp5816mrjB5815b6825

////////////////////// Sermon Version /////////////////////////////

Central Tanzania, Africa. August 5, 1995.

Lined up on their knees were three Southern Baptist missionaries and two of their children. “Are we going to shoot them all together or one at a time?” the kidnapper asked his two helpers. He pointed an AK-47 assault rifle at them.

The gunman grabbed missionary Sandy Harrington from the line and forced her to kneel five feet away. She was absolutely terrified, and her fear had been escalating throughout the whole ordeal. But even then, there was a calmness in the midst of her terror -- a sense of heaven-wardness. “If they killed me, I'll be with God,' she thought to herself. But she said to the gunman, “Please don't shoot me.”

They all grabbed one another's hands and tensed up, expecting the bullets to hit. One of them prayed, “Lord, put your angels around us, but if it's time for us to go, then it's time. Do your will.” He felt that everything was surrendered to God.

Sandy Harrington felt a similar peace. She remembered the Bible verse in the book of Romans saying nothing could separate them from the love of Christ -- not even death.” Her 10-year-old daughter said, “When I saw the gun, I felt scared at first. But I knew I would go to heaven if I was killed, and that was better than being alive ... so, I didn't care.”

Lined up, kneeling, their backs to the gunman, holding hands and praying aloud, the five expected to die. Then one of the abductors leaned down and asked one of the men a question. “Are you a pastor?” “Yes, I'm a pastor, a Baptist missionary.” The kidnapper forced them all to take a drugged liquid. When they woke up, their car was gone but they were alive.

After the ordeal was over, one of the missionaries said, “We crossed a line, the five of us, that most people don't cross. I had peace because I knew Jesus Christ and knew that he was my Lord and Savior. I've been someplace in my life that most haven't been, and I'm going to tell them about it. Then I'm going to ask them if they can say the same thing about Jesus that I can say.”

I was preoccupied with studying when my secretary called to me. She said a young man wanted to talk to the “priest.” I had been trying to clear my desk so that I could go home and spend some time with my family, but I invited him to come into my office. He wanted the door closed. He cautiously scrutinized my office and asked, “Will you keep our conversation confidential?”

I assured him that I would. He immediately had my attention! I wondered what the next few minutes would bring. His presence distressed me. He was in obvious tension and struggle. He told me his name was Jerry Zilac. He told me his pregnant wife was sitting in the car. She was expecting twins in a couple of weeks, and he did not know what to do. He pleadingly asked, “Can you help me?”

The young man was obviously in great distress. I assured him that I would try to help. He began telling me an amazing story of his last two years. He had been in the military, and his wife was having emotional and mental difficulties. She was pregnant and about to deliver their first child. He applied for a medical discharge from the army. Military paperwork moved much slower than her pregnancy. Eventually he felt that neither he nor his wife could take the pressure any longer. In despair he just walked off the base to go help his wife in this crucial time. He chose to leave the army, to go AWOL — Absent With Out Leave!

He gently assisted his wife through the birth of the child but had to be careful where they went so that the Army would not find him and arrest him for being AWOL. He then explained how over the past two years they had crisscrossed the country working under assumed names and fictitious Social Security numbers. I now began to wonder if his name really was “Jerry” — or if that were just another assumed name. He told how they lived much of the time in their car. He explained how renting an apartment was quite difficult, because he feared the army would find him.

Now he was facing another major trauma! He had come to me, a total stranger, for some advice. What should he do? His wife was again on the verge of a nervous breakdown. He was confident that she would need hospitalization for the birth of twins. He was also confident that she could not make it without him present to give her emotional support. They could not contact their family. One set of parents had rejected them, and the other would probably turn them in to the army. He was tired of running. They desperately needed money. He needed a job. They needed an apartment. Most resources were closed to them because of his being AWOL. To turn himself in would mean prison! His wife was having plenty of difficulty taking care of a two-year- old. The thought of two new babies was almost enough to land her in a psychiatric ward. But to continue to remain AWOL was becoming more and more difficult.

What should he do? Turning himself into the army meant inevitable prison time. If his wife entered a mental ward, what would happen to his children? And she desperately needed hospitalization for the birth of the twins.

I tried to enter into the emotional trauma of his situation. That was difficult. I had never been in such a complicated situation. I explained to Jerry the importance of having a clear conscience and that eventually he would have to deal with his choice to leave the army without permission. He seemed to have the various alternatives correctly analyzed. What would God want him to do? I could not tell him what to do. He had to make that decision himself. But I could pray for him. I urged him to turn his life over to the Lord Jesus Christ. That was his greatest need. He was very open to the gospel and prayed and invited the Lord Jesus Christ into his life.

As he left, I felt awfully bewildered. No alternative was good for him. He was certainly between the proverbial “rock and a hard spot.” No choice in his life seemed to be very attractive. I had explained that God had power to enable him to endure prison. I explained that God had grace and power for his wife not to have a nervous breakdown. I explained that God had the ability to make the military look sympathetically upon his situation. I knew God had the ability to give him the peace of heart that he needed so intensely and the wisdom and guidance to make it through this maze of confusion. How my soul agonized for this young man. I realized I would probably never see him again. His name was probably fictitious so I would never be able to find him. He had declined my request for a mailing address.

Many of us have been or are presently facing the kind of life situation this man was facing. What can a person do? It is very easy to give simplistic answers. But, I must ask myself, “Is this the kind of answer I would want someone to tell me if I were in that situation?” Sometimes Christians give rather weak answers to complicated problems. However, the Bible provides valuable principles that can give us strong courage to face life’s most difficult situations.

I don’t know if you can imagine my amazement when a few weeks after talking to Jerry Zilac, he walked into my office. His countenance was totally different! The twins were born and were quite healthy. His wife was doing superbly. And the army? They did not comprehend his inquiry. Their records showed he had received a medical discharge the day after he had walked off the military base. They had never considered him AWOL.

Yes, he had created much of his own messy maze. Yet, when he chose to believe that Jesus Christ would make a way out, he discovered freedom. No more fear of being caught. No need for fictitious names and Social Security numbers. No need for fear when renting a place to live.

Wherever you are in life’s mazes, I urge you to choose to believe Christ can make a way out for you! Choose to let him guide you. Wait for the Lord. Be strong and take heart. He is absolutely trustworthy!

Christians fled when they heard the chanting: "There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his Prophet!"

A mob of 200 young people marched toward Oore-ofe Baptist Church in Kaduna, Nigeria, where a Sunday morning worship service was in progress despite threats from Muslim leaders to burn Christian churches that day.

Clutching torches and cans of gasoline, the Muslim marchers stood at the gate of the church compound, crying: "Kill them! Burn down their church! Confiscate their property!"

Pastor Fola Lateju, now alone in the building, decided to face them. Walking to the gate, he told the crowd, "What you are about to do is against the will of God. You will incur his wrath. Go back and tell those who sent you that this is against God's will."

Taken aback, mob leaders paused to talk among themselves. Suddenly they seized the young pastor, drenched him in gasoline and torched his clothing.

Nothing happened.

Turning to a clump of grass, they poured out some of the gasoline and touched the torch to it. The grass exploded in flames.

Wheeling back on Lateju, they drenched him again, but for the second time the torch would not set him ablaze. A third try also failed.

Confusion spread among the Muslims, and Lateju retreated into the churchyard. The crowd followed, pelting him with stones. One attacker struck him with a weapon, and he fell, bleeding profusely from the forehead. The Muslims left without burning the church. Several deacons emerged from hiding and took their injured pastor to a nearby clinic.

God has intervened on several occasions to protect his people in the face of Muslim persecution, says Lateju, who now teaches world religions at the Nigerian Baptist seminary in Ogbomosho.

Northern Nigeria has endured 20 years of religious conflict. Clashes between rival Muslim groups, or attacks on Christians, often have degenerated into rioting and bloodshed, ending only with police or military intervention.

An upsurge in activity by militant Islamic groups -- some reportedly directed by agitators sent from radical Muslim nations -- has raised tensions in Nigeria's once-peaceful religious environment.

Groups like Izalah -- dedicated to "purifying" Islam of innovations -- clash with others like Jamatul Nasir Islam, a more politically minded council of Muslim emirs, imams and scholars. The mix becomes more volatile with the addition of factions like the Maitasine, a bizarre sect obsessed with blood. Their rites reportedly include drinking their enemies' blood -- especially of rival Muslim groups. The Nigerian government has used military action in its efforts to disband the sect.

Besides tensions between Muslims, a surge of growth among Nigerian Christian groups set the stage for more conflict.

Muslims reportedly have tried several strategies to slow Christian growth: blocking land allocations for church buildings; excluding Christians from political office, jobs and schools; shutting off the supply of gasoline or currency to stymie the economy in strong Christian areas; even encouraging Muslim men to impregnate Christian women. Failure of those tactics has led to threats, intimidation and often violence against Christians.

Persecution peaked in the late 1980s but has continued sporadically. Last September, a Baptist church building was burned and a pastor and deacon from an evangelical church killed in Potiskum, in northeastern Nigeria's Borno State. About 6,000 people -- mostly Christians -- have died in rioting since the 1980s. One result: the growing popularity of a militant Christian faction, the Christian Association of Nigeria, that pledges to retaliate for every instance of anti-Christian violence.

Lateju abhors such vengeance -- or violence from any side -- even though he himself has suffered at the hands of Muslim militants. Instead, he participates in PROCMURA (Project for Christian and Muslim Relations in Africa), an organization dedicated to winning Muslim to Christ.

Organized in 1959, PROCMURA conducts seminars to teach Christians the basic tenets of Islam. Understanding Muslim beliefs opens the door to friendships -- and opportunities to share God's love -- Lateju says.

Muslims revere Jesus as a prophet, virgin-born and sinless in life. This provides an important point of contact for Christian witness. When Christians show they understand the basic beliefs and customs of Islam, the door to friendship often opens.

"We emphasize witness through living the Christian faith before our Muslim friends: prayer, Scripture reading, attending Christian meetings, being kind to others," Lateju explains. "Muslims respond to such witness. Many converts have been won this way among both nominal Muslims and Muslim leaders."

Vengeance and retaliation will not defuse Nigeria's religious powder keg, Lateju says. Understanding, friendship and living a life of love will.

Some observers expect Muslim-Christian tensions to worsen over the next decade, culminating in the division of Nigeria into a Muslim north and Christian south. Others dismiss the idea as a myth.

While a northern Muslim oligarchy has controlled the country since independence in 1960, elections in 1993 demonstrated the power brokers hold little sway over the populace. Not only did a moderate Muslim from the south get the overwhelming majority of votes in presidential balloting, but non-Muslims prevailed in most local elections in many northern states.

When the military government annulled election results and arrested the self-declared presidential winner, riots and strikes swept Nigeria. A strike in the oil industry, which generates 90 percent of Nigeria's foreign earnings, paralyzed the country and sent an already-declining economy into a tailspin.

If rapid growth of Christian churches continues unabated in the north, the Muslim power base will continue to erode, observers say. Muslim political or religious leaders may feel driven to more desperate -- and violent -- measures to maintain control.

Should that happen, will Christians fight fire with fire, or respond with love and mercy -- like Fola Lateju?

================================

This story first appeared in the July-August 1995 issue of The Commission magazine, published by the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board. (BP)

Copyright (c) 1995 Baptist Press RNbp5928mrjB5928g6929

Heather Holmes gave the following testimony at Friendship Pregnancy Center's banquet on October 11, 1996. Heather is a volunteer who lives in Towaco, N.J., and attends Grace Bible Church in Pompton Plains, N.J.

__________

Good Evening. Last year was my very first Friendship banquet. Of course, I was late and we sat way in the back at Table 78. If anybody was to tell me then that I'd be up here speaking I would have told them they were crazy. What a difference a year makes!

I became a Christian in 1993 and I really didn't need much convincing that I was in need of a Savior. I had carried around the sin of abortion with me for about ten years and never told anyone. It wasn't spoken of - I just kept it hidden in my heart. I was very happy to leave it at the foot of the cross, except I don't think I really left it there.

Two years later I was at a health fair in Wayne and I saw the pregnancy center's booth and took some information. When I found out that it was a Christian organization I said, 'Ah, the Lord has led me here to reach out and help some young girls. I'm going to tell them not to do what I did.' So I started my training to be a counselor at Friendship. At the time I was pregnant with my son, Timothy (I also have a 4-year old daughter, Alexandra) and at home things were really starting to come to a head. I was angry a lot and didn't know why. I didn't have a lot of patience. Sometimes I felt numb, like I didn't have any emotion at all, and other times I was depressed and didn't know why.

Then I met Ann Marie [Van Sickle, PACE coordinator] when she came to our counselor training to tell us about the PACE [Post-Abortion Information & Education] program. I toyed with the idea of trying to get some help but never followed-up on it. Then I got a really bad nightmare one night and it involved my son. I couldn't tell anybody about it but that's all I needed. 'Thank you, Lord, for only giving me one nightmare!'

The next morning I was on the phone with Beverly [Frutchey, client services director] and she had no idea that I was post-abortive. I didn't tell anybody because at that point shame, guilt and secrecy were a big part of my make-up. [After I told her I was post-abortive], Bev hooked me up with the PACE program - a wonderful program. It gives hope after abortion, an intense Bible study and a safe, non-judgmental environment. We could share with each other and mourn and grieve. It took me twelve long years to bring this to light.

I really believe Satan rejoices when you keep things like that in the dark because that's where he works best and has a stronghold. I believed every single one of his lies. When I was saved I knew I was saved in my head but I didn't feel it in my heart. I believed that I wasn't worthy of forgiveness and that I was a bad mom. Then through the group I began to see him for what he was - a liar - and I began to look up for help and started believing and seeing God through healthy, biblical eyes. I knew that Jesus died for every one of my sins - not just this or that sin - every single one. In Ephesians 1:15 it says that God loves me and He chose me in all wisdom and understanding. He knew every single thing about me, and He still loved me, no matter what! That's kind of amazing to me, but I hold on to that so tightly.

Today I have so much less stress in my life. I enjoy my children so much more fully. I'm not afraid that God will punish me by taking away one of my children. I know God loves me - He gave me a wonderful family, a wonderful husband. God graced me with a wonderful church full of supporters to help me also. I know now that my debt is unequivocally paid, and I really have left it at the foot of the cross. I'm enjoying my God-given, God-intended freedom through my salvation. I can tell you right now that I can feel it in my heart, and I never thought that was possible.

If there is anybody here who's feeling like I did last year ... maybe I'm talking to you. Call Friendship, call the PACE program. Reach out because I promise you you'll find healing.

I'd like to read you a couple verses that meant so much to me. They're from Psalm 116:1-9:

I love the Lord, for he heard my voice;

he heard my cry for mercy.

Because he turned His ear to me,

I will call on Him as long as I live.

The cords of death entangled me,

and the anguish of the grave came upon me,

I was overcome by trouble and sorrow.

Then I called on the name of the Lord:

"Oh Lord, save me!"

The Lord is gracious and righteous;

our God is full of compassion.

The Lord protects the simple-hearted;

when I was in great need He saved me.

Be at rest once more, 0 my soul

for the Lord has been good to you.

For you, 0 Lord, have delivered my soul from death,

my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling,

That I may walk before the Lord in the land of the living.

#4315

*

JUBILEE is the first clue for recovering the Sermon on the Mount for preaching, teaching, and living.

The Sermon on the Mount really does need to be recovered. It is the largest block of Jesus' teachings in the New Testament. In the first century of Christian churches, it was the most cited part of the New Testament. It was how early churches taught what it means to be a Christian. It is Jesus' teaching of the commands we are to teach and obey that Jesus refers to in the Great Commission ("Make disciples of all nations, baptize them, and teach them to obey everything I have commanded you"). The attitude people take to the Sermon on the Mount affects the attitude they take to Jesus' teachings as a whole, and to Jesus as Lord and Savior. Yet the Sermon on the Mount is distressingly absent from Christian preaching, teaching, and living. One big reason for that evasion is the hermeneutic of idealism, which interprets the Sermon on the Mount as high ideals to be reached by human moral effort, but impossible to live in the real world. Preaching or teaching it as high ideals tires people out and causes evasion. Praising Jesus for teaching impossible ideals, and then living some other ethic, makes Jesus the captive of 19th-century idealism; and it makes us unfaithful disciples.

Instead we need a hermeneutic of Hebraic context.(1) The Jubilee in the Hebrew Scriptures is key to understanding the Beatitudes -- the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount that sets the tone for the whole Sermon. If they are interpreted as high ideals, it sets that tone for the remaining teachings. But the beatitudes are based largely on Isaiah 61, which is the passage on which Jesus preached his inaugural sermon in Luke 4:16: good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovering of sight to the blind, liberty for the oppressed.(2) Notice how the Beatitudes echo Isaiah 61, the Jubilee passage of deliverance.

ISAIAH 61

61:1 The LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor...

61:2 to proclaim the year of the LORD'S favor ... to comfort all who

mourn,

61:1 To bind up the brokenhearted; (61:7) ... they will inherit a

double portion in their land.

61:3 They will be called oaks of righteousness.

61:11 So the Sovereign LORD will make righteousness and praise spring up

before all nations.

MATTHEW 5

5:3 "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of

heaven.

5:4 Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

5:5 Blessed are the meek (or the tamed, as Clarence Jordan translated

it) for they will inherit the earth.

5:6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness...

5:10 Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for

theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

That's not about high ideals and impossible effort; it's good news about

God's grace-based deliverance. In Talmudic lectionaries, Isaiah 61 was

linked with the Jubilee in Leviticus 25. When Jesus said that today this

Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing, "for rabbinic Judaism and thus for

the listeners of Jesus it most likely meant ... the Jubilee year, the time

when the inequities accumulated through the years are to be crossed off and

all God's people will begin again at the same point."(3)

Once we see this, we see that the Beatitudes are set in the prophetic context

of God's deliverance. They are not about hard teachings and impossible

ideals, but about God delivering us. They are about joy, happiness,

blessedness, because we are being given the opportunity to participate in

God's deliverance. They are beatitudes or blessings, not exhortations or pep

talks. Jesus is announcing the kingdom is at hand and we get to participate!

The focus is on the joy of participation in God's deliverance, on God's

grace, not our perfection.

A second clue is like the first: when Jesus teaches about the Kingdom of God,

he is teaching in line with the Hebrew Scriptures, and especially Isaiah.

(As a good Jew, Matthew was reluctant to use the holy name of God, so he

wrote Kingdom of Heaven, but like Mark and Luke, he meant Kingdom of God.)

The shape of the reign of God was not an unknown for Jesus' hearers. The

theme of the coming reign of God or Kingdom of God recurs often in Isaiah.

Besides Isaiah 61, see also Isaiah 9:6-7; 52:7; 60:1ff., etc. The

characteristics of the coming Reign of God in Isaiah are fourfold: salvation,

justice/righteousness, peace, and God's presence (often symbolized by light).

Notice how much Jesus emphasized these four themes in the beatitudes: peace

(peacemakers), justice (righteousness), salvation (mercy), and presence (the

pure in heart will see God). Jesus continues these four themes in the rest

of the Sermon on the Mount. These four characteristics of the reign of God

already began in Jesus' teachings, deeds, and community. We can begin to

experience them as mustard seeds now, in Christ; they will come in fullness

in God's future.

The third clue for recovering the Sermon on the Mount for preaching and

living is to understand the central theme of righteousness (Matthew 5:6, 10,

20; 6:1, 33). Again, we find the meaning by studying the Hebrew Scriptures.

Jesus taught not in English or Greek, but in Aramaic, citing the Scriptures

in Hebrew. The Hebrew for righteousness is TSEDAQAH, which is very often

used as synonymous with MISHPAT, justice. It means the kind of justice that

delivers from bondage and exclusion and restores community. It means

delivering, community-restoring justice. That is why Jesus speaks so often

of giving alms to the poor, giving to the one who begs, investing our money

in God's reign and righteousness rather than hoarding it. It is, again, a

Jubilee theme -- a theme of deliverance. It is not impossible ideals, but

realistic attention to the kind of justice that restores people to community.

The fourth clue is that the structure of the Sermon is not twofold

antitheses, but threefold triads. The first member of each triad is always a

traditional piety whose verb is either a subjunctive or future, like "thou

shalt not kill," or "when you pray." The second member is always a diagnosis

of a vicious cycle with a continuous action verb like "being angry with your

brother," or praying to be seen by others. The third member is where the

emphasis comes, and is in an imperative, like "go and be reconciled to your

brother," or "go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father, who

is in secret." The command is always a practical, doable transforming

initiative, based on grace, and is the way of deliverance from the vicious

cycle. Jesus does not teach the impossible ideal of never being angry, but

the realistic transforming initiative of going to make peace with the person

who is separated from us by anger. He does not teach the impossible ideal of

praying, giving alms, and fasting in public while thinking only of God and

not of whether other people are noticing us, but the transforming initiative

of doing these practices secretly so you can think of God singly. He does

not teach the impossible ideal of hoarding money but keeping your eye and

heart fixed on God, but the transforming initiative of investing your money

in God's reign and justice. This threefold structure, with the emphasis on

the imperative in the third member, is consistent from Matthew 5:21 through

7:11.(4)

There were fourteen such triads, just as Matthew's gospel begins with three

sets of fourteen generations from Abraham to Jesus. Matthew loved numbers

like this, and has about 75 triads in his Gospel. Once we study this pattern

of fourteen transforming initiatives carefully, we see that each is a

transforming initiative, each is grace-based, realistic, practical, doable,

and the way of deliverance from the vicious cycles that we get stuck in.'

The fifth clue is that Jesus does not teach us "do not resist evil." He

himself certainly resisted evil. He confronted evil directly. The Greek in

Matthew 5:39 is ME ANTISTENAI TO PONERO. ANTISTENAI in the rest of the New

Testament does not mean simply "resist," but "resist with vengeance and

violence."(6)

TO PONERO has the grammatical ending that means it is either dative -- "do

not resist evil" -- or instrumental -- "do not resist by evil means." The

grammatical rule is that you determine which it is by what makes sense in the

context. If it means "do not resist evil," it makes no sense in the context;

it contradicts Jesus' direct and consistent resistance of evil. But if it

means "do not resist by evil means," it is thoroughly consistent with Jesus'

actions.(7)

Clearly it should be translated "do not resist revengefully by evil means."

Furthermore, it is decisively confirmed by Paul when he reports Jesus'

teaching in Romans 12:19-21 exactly as we have seen: "Do not take revenge....

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good." How much reading

of Jesus as teaching impossible ideals could have been avoided if Matthew

5:39 had not been translated in this impossible way!

As Romans 12 reports it, Jesus is not teaching the impossible ideal of not

resisting evil, but the practical initiatives of transforming your enemy into

a friend by feeding your enemy if she is hungry and giving her something to

drink if she is thirsty. In Matthew 5:38ff., the initiatives that Jesus

teaches are to turn the left cheek, go the second mile, give your shirt, and

give to the one who begs. None of these is a doormat strategy, as they are

usually taken in our culture. To understand them, we need to see that in

Jesus' Jewish culture they each mean not simply to do what the other demands,

but to seize the initiative, stand up for your dignity, and ask for justice

and reconciliation, as Martin Luther King did. I do not have the space to

explain the meaning in context further here, and have to refer to my book or

Walter Wink's book in the footnotes. There you can see a more extensive

explanation of this and the other clues that I am presenting in a very small

space here.

The sixth clue is to see that Matthew 5:48 doesn't mean "be perfect" in the

sense of morally ideal, but "be merciful," as Luke 6:36 says. "Nowhere in

the Old Testament or in the Dead Sea Scrolls is God called" perfect; you

can't measure God by ideals of moral perfection. Rather it means "be all-

inclusive" as God is all-inclusive in giving sun and rain to the just and

unjust alike.(8)

That is a more accurate translation for three reasons: unlike "be perfect" in

the sense of morally ideal; it makes sense in Aramaic and Hebrew; it makes

sense in the context of Matt. 5:45; and it agrees with Luke 6:36.

The seventh clue to recovering the Sermon on the Mount is to pray and

practice: Pray, puffing our trust not in what Jesus' compatriots called the

"dogs" and "pigs" (the powers and authorities of the status quo), but in God.

God knows our needs even before we ask, and unlike the Roman authorities

knows how to give good gifts far more than we do (Matt. 5:44; 6:5-15; 7:6-

11). So pray, relying on God's grace. And practice Jesus' words (Matt.

7:16, 22, 24). If we don't start practicing what Jesus commands, then we

will surely rationalize self-defensively by teaching that the Sermon on the

Mount is high ideals that we cannot live. We will praise Jesus as idealistic

without listening to his way of discipleship, and we will follow some other

way.

=============================================================

End Notes:

1. See Pinchas Lapide, "The Sermon on the Mount: Utopia or Program for

Action?" (Orbis, 1986).

2. Robert Guelich, "The Matthean Beatitudes: Entrance Requirements or

Eschatological Blessings?" Journal of Biblical Literature 95 (1976),

415-34; Guelich, "The Sermon on the Mount" (Dallas: Word, 1982) 62ff.

3. John H. Yoder, "Politics of Jesus," 2nd edition (Eerdmans, 1994) pp. 29-

30.

4. The one exception is the teaching on divorce in Matt. 4:31-32, where the

transforming initiative is missing. But Paul reports the initiative

that Jesus taught in I Cor. 7:11 -- "be reconciled."

5. I develop this insight and its implications for recovering the Sermon on

the Mount for realistic living more fully in "Just Peacemaking:

Transforming Initiatives for Justice and Peace" (Westminster/John Knox

Press, 1992), and the forthcoming "Christian Ethics as Following Jesus"

with David Gushee (InterVarsity Press).

6. Walter Wink, Engaging the Powers (Augsburg Fortress Press, 1992), chapter

9.

7. Clarence Jordan, "The Substance of Faith and other Cotton Patch Sermons"

(Association Press, 1972), 69.

8. W. D. Davies and Dale Allison, "A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on

The Gospel According to St. Matthew" (T&T Clark, 1988), Vol. 1, 561-563.

Glen Harold Stassen is the Lewis Smedes Professor of Christian Ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary and the author of "Authentic Transformation: A New Vision of Christ and Culture and Just Peacemaking: Transforming Initiatives for Justice and Peace."

#4426

*

Many Christians cling to the promises of God's deliverance. Is it a guarantee? A sobering illustration from real life:

During World War II, Private Keith Lance of the 84th Division was that rare creature, an atheist in a foxhole. His buddy was "a good Catholic boy from upstate New York." They were being shelled and the buddy "Hailed Mary" all night. "After taking so many hours of that," Lance commented, he had had enough, so he dashed out of the foxhole to "check on the guys." As he threw himself into the next hole, Lance heard an explosion. He looked, aghast - the enemy artillery shell had hit his old hole. His buddy was badly wounded and buried in mud.

________

Taken from Egger and Otts, "G Company's War," page 118.

"Black blood or white blood!" echoed through Maasai land as young warriors grabbed clubs and spears in an effort to stop the spread of the gospel, which has been challenging parts of Maasai culture.

Christians in northern Tanzania went into hiding as large groups of Maasai "morani" (warriors) moved through villages, ransacking churches and threatening believers. International Mission Board missionary Tim Tidenberg's home became a sanctuary for local Christians of all denominations.

After three weeks of destructive conflict, God opened the door for the gospel even wider than before.

The Maasai are among the most colorful people in eastern Africa. Known for their bright red clothes and beaded necklaces, their most important possession is cattle. A man's wealth and status in the community is determined by the number of cattle owned. Though once completely untouched by the gospel, in recent years large numbers of Maasai have come to Christ.

The morani are unmarried men between the ages of 18 and 26. Their job is to guard the community as well as protect the cattle from wild animals.

Conflicts between the morani and Christians had been brewing for some time, but surfaced Aug. 1 when the young warriors stormed Olopuko Baptist Church with war cries. One Pentecostal church was destroyed in a similar attack.

"Most of the conflict deals with the very promiscuous practices among the warrior class as well as polygamy," Tidenberg said. "The conflict has also come as many Christians are no longer seeing the need for the 'laibon' [witch doctor] and his powers. As Christians have matured, they have begun to stand firm in many of these areas."

During the uprisings, a group of volunteers from Hill Baptist Church in Mobile, Ala., trekked through many of the villages praying and sharing. They covered much of Maasai land on foot -- almost 100 miles -- to pray for God to continue working among this people group.

Tidenberg said the volunteers saw many people saved despite vocal and physical resistance by the morani. One of the men who prayed to receive Christ was a very influential witch doctor.

The largest battle came the first day of the uprising when 70 men stormed Olopuko Baptist Church. The morani beat the unarmed church members with clubs and attacked them with spears. A cry went up from the warriors proclaiming that "black blood or white blood" would be shed.

Tidenberg and local Christians tried to fight back but soon realized God was more powerful than physical weapons. The group stepped back and prayed.

"The battle continued around us as a story from the Old Testament began to unfold -- confusion of the enemy," Tidenberg said. "The army Gideon fought against was confused and fought themselves while Gideon's army stood and watched. That is exactly what happened."

As the morani battled each other, the small Christian group stood at peace in the midst of the fight. Then, unexpectedly, the morani began to retreat. The Christians were left standing, unharmed and thankful for God's protection.

After the battle, Tidenberg was able to speak to the morani. He met with the group for two hours, but they were determined the church was to be closed and houses burned down if the believers met in homes. They wanted no Christian witness in that area.

The missionary told the warriors that closing the church building would not remove the church.

"The church will grow stronger," Tidenberg said. "I expressed to them that this is not a struggle with customs or culture. It is not that the world around them is changing, but it is a hardness of their hearts that has caused this conflict."

The door for the gospel has been wide open in Maasai land and Tidenberg asked prayer warriors throughout the world to ask God for its continued openness. In an Aug. 12 meeting between Christians, village elders and morani, the missionary's prayer was answered.

The elders testified about what God has done in their lives and villages. Several morani stood up and admitted they were wrong, asked the Christians to stay and asked for forgiveness. They requested the Christians share what Christ has done and help them fully understand.

"We had asked for prayers that the doors would not close because of this heated conflict between the Maasai culture and Christianity. We never expected such intervention," Tidenberg said. "The main result of this meeting? The doors for evangelism and church planting in this area have never been thrown as wide open as they are now."

*

A frail young man, with sad, lustrous eyes and face so blanched that he seems to be the palest of the palefaces, is engaged on a serious and dangerous mission. Having heard of a tribe of particularly ferocious Indians living in the dense forests of the region known as the “Forks of the Delaware,” he is on his way to tell them of a loving Saviour. Coming at sunset in sight of the smoke of their campfires, he decides to spend the night in the woods and to proceed in the morning. Little does he realize that several red men, with wolfish eyes and as silent as serpents, have followed him for hours. As he builds a fire, the Indians steal away to their encampment to tell the startling news that a white man is in the woods nearby. “Let us go at once,” says the chief, “and kill this paleface, whose people have taught us to drink firewater and then, while we are drunk, have taken our baskets and skins and even our lands for almost nothing.”

As the warriors silently draw near, they see the white man on his knees, praying most fervently that the Indians might come to realize that the great God of the universe loved them and sent His Son to save them. While he prays, a rattlesnake squirms up to him, lifts its hideous head, flicks its forked tongue close to his face, and then, for no apparent reason, glides away into the darkness. And so does the chief, followed by his men.

When the young missionary enters the Indian village early the next morning, he receives a much more cordial welcome than he had anticipated, for not until later does he learn of the strange events of the preceding night. When the people gather around him in an open place among the wigwams, he opens his Bible, reads from the 53rd chapter of Isaiah and tenderly tells the sweet story of how God sent His Son to die on the cross that He might take away the sin from people’s hearts and make them good children of the Heavenly Father. At the close of his message there are tears in the eyes of many of his auditors.

“The paleface is a praying man!” remarks one of the warriors who had gone forth the preceding night intending to kill him.

“And the Great Spirit is with him!” says another, remembering how the rattlesnake had mysteriously failed to strike.

“And he brings a wondrous sweet message!” says the squaw of the Indian chief.

A MAN IN A MILLION

This young paleface was David Brainerd. He was born at Haddam, Connecticut, April 20, 1718, and died on October 9, 1747, at the early age of 29. He is remembered not only as the great Apostle to the North American Indians, but also as a chief source of inspiration in the lives of thousands who have been challenged from ease and selfishness to lives of holiness and sacrifice, as they have prayed and wept over his Journal.

“Have a good look at him,” writes F. W. Boreham; “he is a man in a million; he did more than any other to usher in the world’s new day.”

“His story,” as J. M. Sherwood says, “has done more to develop and mold the spirit of modern missions, and to fire the heart of the Christian Church, than that of any man since the apostolic age.”

In answer to the question, “What can be done to revive the work of God where it has decayed?” John Wesley said, “Let every preacher read carefully the life of David Brainerd.”

One of the many who heeded Wesley’s counsel was William Carey, and God used Brainerd’s life story to open Carey’s eyes to the need of all races everywhere and to fire his heart with a passion to speed the gospel to “the uttermost part.” It was chiefly the reading of the story of Brainerd’s heroic missionary labors that thrust Henry Martyn out as a bundle of fire into the darkness of India and Persia, and caused Robert McCheyne to become the Apostle to the Jews. May some earnest-hearted young people reading this account be similarly inspired to “burn out for God” in some needy foreign land. May many others be shaken out of living, as Brainerd says, “at the rate of common Christians,” and be inspired to live lives of fervent prayer, genuine piety and holy passion for souls. And may any hearts without Christ be melted into penitence and saving faith as they read of God’s marvelous love revealed in His dear Son.

HIS TEXT AND CONVERSION

Tradition says that Mary, the mother of Jesus, could never bear to read the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, and if another should read it in her hearing, she would break into weeping, as with grief inconsolable. This passage was as bitter wormwood to her soul because it brought to her mind a vivid recollection of that day when, through a fountain of tears, she beheld her divine Son suffer and die on the cross.

Isaiah 53 reminded Mary of the tortures in Pilate’s hall! Isaiah 53 caused her to remember the horrors of the Via Dolorosa! Isaiah 53 brought to her a vivid recollection of the sorrows of Golgotha! Isaiah 53 was a fountain of wormwood to her soul!

But in this attitude Mary stands singularly alone. To a multitude that no man can number the 53rd chapter of Isaiah has been precious beyond all estimation.

It must have been so to the Ethiopian eunuch, ever after that memorable day when Philip stepped into his chariot in the desert and, reading about the Man of Sorrows, smitten and afflicted, “preached unto him Jesus.”

This passage was very dear to the heart of Philip Melanchthon, Luther’s valiant helper. On the last Good Friday of his life, he prepared and delivered his last sermon. And the theme of that final message was the 53rd chapter of Isaiah!

John Knox prized this chapter more than any other. He often preached upon it and, during his last illness, requested that it be read to him every day.

Dwight L. Moody was of one mind with Knox and Melanchthon in appreciation of Isaiah’s inspired description of the Suffering Servant. When the great evangelist went to conduct his first campaign in London in 1874, he was asked concerning his creed. “It is already in print,” replied Mr. Moody. “You’ll find it in the 53rd chapter of Isaiah.”

The 53rd chapter of Isaiah was exceedingly precious to David Brainerd. When his soul was enveloped in blackness, the 53rd chapter of Isaiah became a ladder of light leading from earth to heaven. When preaching to the Indians, his favorite theme was Isaiah 53. And, when he came to the end of his pilgrimage, the last sentence of the last entry he made in his Diary was a quotation from the 53rd chapter of Isaiah!

At the early age of eight, as he himself expressly states, David came under “a conviction of sin,” and subsequently, for prolonged periods, his heart was filled with the most melancholy forebodings. He was terrified at the thought of death and often pictured himself descending into hell. His mood was like that of John Bunyan when under deep conviction. Said Bunyan:

“I envied the toads in the ditch and the domesticated animals, for they had no soul to perish as mine was like to do.”

Said Brainerd: “I was much dejected and some times envied the birds and beasts their happiness, because they were not exposed to eternal misery as I knew myself to be.”

It is interesting to note that John Wesley on one side of the Atlantic and David Brainerd on the other were, at about the same time, passing through a similar religious experience. Just as Wesley, prior to his conversion at Aldersgate, sought spiritual peace by joining others in the Holy Club in a continual round of religious observances, so Brainerd sought to satisfy his soul’s deep need of regeneration with the husks of external piety. He attended church services faithfully, read the Scriptures through twice in a single year and joined a group of young men meeting weekly for prayer and Bible study. Others may have been deceived by his zeal, but he was not. “I had a very good outside,” he says. “Thus I proceeded a considerable length on a self-righteous foundation.”

Eventually the sublime truths embedded in the 53rd chapter of Isaiah guided his wretched soul through the Wicket Gate and to the sight of the Cross, where his burden, like Bunyan’s, rolled away to be seen no more.

The 53rd chapter of Isaiah did three things for David Brainerd. It revealed to him his own heart, full of vileness and corrupted by sin. He not only assented to the statement, “all we like sheep have gone astray;” he also came to see that only a terrible disease, humanly incurable, would have called forth so great a remedy as the death of God’s Son on the Cross. Thus he was led to recognize that his indispensable need was not deeds of external righteousness but the divine remedy of a new birth for the disease of a corrupted nature. He finally realized that no struggles or reforms could change his sin-corrupted nature and that the Law of God – to quote his own words – “condemned me, not for outward actions but for the sins of my heart, which I could not possibly prevent.”

The 53rd chapter of Isaiah also revealed to him the Saviour’s heart, full of love and the excellencies of grace. When, in Bunyan’s epic story, Christiana’s son James had read the 53rd of Isaiah as a part of family worship, Greatheart sought to explain the majestic syllables, “He hath no form or comeliness. He is a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” These words were written, said Mr. Greatheart, “for those who lack the eye that can see into our Prince’s heart.” The 53rd chapter of Isaiah was like an open window, enabling Brainerd to peer into the heart of the Prince of our salvation, and what he saw there melted his heart. His vision of the Saviour’s broken heart broke his own heart into penitence and glad surrender. It was on Sunday evening, July 12, 1739, “as I was walking in a dark thick grove,” he writes in his Diary, “unspeakable glory seemed to open to the view and apprehension of my soul. My soul was so captivated with the excellency, loveliness, greatness, and other perfections of God that I was even swallowed up in Him.” On that never-to-be-forgotten day Brainerd found in the Saviour’s riven heart a stairway of light leading to the Holy of Holies in the heart of God.

The 53rd of Isaiah also revealed to him a door of access to the heart of all mankind. Having seen the need of his own depraved heart, he saw a world of hearts in the same dark plight, and having found that the message of the suffering Son of God was “wondrous sweet” to his own soul, he believed that all other souls were eagerly waiting to hear the same sweet story. He was convinced that Christ is the answer – the only answer – to the deepest yearnings of the human spirit, just as water is the answer to the thirst of the human body. Believing that others were just as thirsty as he had been, he longed to proclaim far and wide, especially among the neglected and mistreated Indians, the gospel invitation, “Let him that is athirst come and take the water of life freely.”

HIS MISSIONARY LABORS

Accordingly, after three years of study at Yale College, he became a missionary to the Indians, under appointment of the Scottish Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.

On the way to his work among the Indians at Kaunaumeek, New York, he stopped and preached at Montauk, Long Island, at that time chiefly inhabited by Indians; and what was his text? He says: “I went and preached from Isaiah 53 - ‘Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him … [and] make his soul an offering for sin.’”

Jesus’ death on the cross was part of the divine plan: “It pleased the LORD to bruise him.”

Jesus’ death on the cross was the costly remedy for a terrible disease: “ … an offering for sin.”

Jesus’ death on the cross would be divinely used to the salvation of multitudes: “The pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand … and justify many.”

Several months after reaching Kaunaumeek, the young missionary set aside a day “for secret fasting and praying from morning till night.” Thus far he felt that his work had been a failure. He was overwhelmed by a sense of his own unworthiness and of the obstacles confronting him, chiefly, the depravity of the Indians and the weakened condition of his own pain-racked, consumptive body. He read extensive passages from the Bible, “frequently in the meantime,” he states, “falling on my knees and crying to God.” As he read of the worthies of old and of how marvelously God had used them, he longed to be like them. That day the pattern of his amazing life was formed, as he solemnly consecrated himself to walk in the footsteps of four of the heroes of the Bible. “O that I may be, as were they, aflame for God,” he prayed. That night he wrote in his Diary, “My soul blessed God that He had shown Himself so gracious to His servants of old.”

Brainerd longed to be AFLAME FOR GOD, living, like Moses, a life of self-abasement to His service and glory.

When God spoke out of the burning bush in Midian, He found Moses very different from what he was forty years earlier. Then he was self-assertive, endeavoring to deliver his enslaved brethren by his own hand and by his own ill-chosen methods. Now he was self-abased, conscious of his inadequacy and unworthiness. “Who am I,” he said, “to undertake so great a task?” God could and did use mightily one thus yielded and eager, not for self-glory but for the glory of God. No man ever yearned more ardently to be like Moses, or succeeded to a greater degree, than did David Brainerd. “I spent the evening,” he says, “praying incessantly that I might not be self-dependent but have my whole dependence upon God.” In a letter to his brother, January 2,1744, he wrote:

“We should always look upon ourselves as God’s servants, placed in God’s world to do His work; and accordingly labor faithfully for Him. Let it then be your great concern, thus to devote yourself and your all to God.”

His Diary contains innumerable passages of similar import to the following. “April 26,1742. Oh, that I could spend every moment of my life to God’s glory!” “August 30, 1742. My soul longs with a vehement desire to live to God.” “November 22, 1745. I have received my all from God. Oh that I could return my all to God.” Not in self-dependence but in God-dependence, Brainerd found the source of unlimited power, the secret of a gallant spirit, the sacrament of inward peace.

Self-abasement was not to Brainerd an end in it self. “It is so sweet,” he confides, “to be nothing and less than nothing” that Christ may be “my all in all.”

Oh, the bitter shame and sorrow That a time could ever be When I let the Saviour’s pity Plead in vain, and proudly answered: “All of self, and none of Thee.”

Yet He found me: I beheld Him Bleeding on the accursed tree; Heard Him pray, “Forgive them, Father,” And my wistful heart said faintly: “Some of self and some of Thee.”

Day by day, His tender mercy, Healing, helping, full and free, Sweet and strong, and oh, so patient, Brought me lower, while I whispered: “Less of self and more of Thee.”

Higher than the highest heaven, Deeper than the deepest sea, Lord, Thy love at last has conquered: Grant me now my soul’s desire, “None of self and all of Thee.”

Brainerd longed to be AFLAME FOR GOD, being, like Elijah, a man fervent and mighty in prayer.

His soul “was much moved” as he read the story of Elijah the prophet, who, by laying hold upon God in prayer, was sustained in all his trials and was enabled to overcome the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel, to call a multitude to repentance and to bring down rain upon a famished earth. Thereupon, says Brainerd: “My soul breathed after God, and pleaded with Him, that ‘a double portion of that spirit’ which was given to Elijah, might ‘rest on me.’”

He usually spent several hours a day in prayer and frequently devoted an entire day to this purpose. June 14, 1742, he writes: “I set apart this day for secret fasting and prayer. Just at night the Lord visited me marvelously. I wrestled for an ingathering of souls … I was in such an agony from sun half an hour, till near dark, that I was all over wet with sweat. Oh, my dear Saviour did sweat blood for poor souls. I went to bed with my heart wholly set on God.”

Brainerd discovered the reality of prayer: “The Lord visited me marvelously.”

Brainerd experienced the agony of prayer: “I wrestled for souls … in agony.”

Brainerd discerned the resources of prayer “treasures of divine grace were opened to me.”

Brainerd learned the transforming power of prayer: “My heart was wholly set on God.”

July 21,1744, on hearing that the Indians were planning to hold an idolatrous feast and dance the next day, he spent a day and night in prayer. He writes: “This morning about nine I withdrew to the woods for prayer. I was in such anguish that when I rose from my knees I felt extremely weak and overcome, and the sweat ran down my face and body … I cared not where or how I lived, or what hardships I went through, so that I could but gain souls for Christ. I continued in this frame all the evening and night.”

Thus empowered, he went forth to meet the Indians the next morning, convinced that God was with him in this contest just as He was with Elijah on Mount Carmel; and, wonder of wonders, instead of promptly scalping him when he called upon them to stop their dance, they actually desisted and listened to the missionary preach, both morning and afternoon.

Made strong by prayer and the awareness of the divine companionship, Brainerd dragged his tortured body through the forests from village to village, preaching with such tenderness and conviction that the stony-hearted Indians were frequently melted to tears.

Brainerd longed to be AFLAME FOR GOD, his life, like Abraham’s, being characterized by the holy piety of one on pilgrimage to eternity.

In his Diary Brainerd makes frequent reference to the ancient patriarch. He spoke of “Abraham’s pilgrimage” and of “what a stranger he was here on earth.” He longed to be like Abraham and the worthies referred to in Hebrews 11:13, who “confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” As a citizen of heaven, he felt that he should be insensible to the enjoyments of this world. “My desires,” he wrote on July 19, 1742, “seem especially to be after weanedness from the world, perfect deadness to it, and that I may be crucified to all its allurements. My soul desires to feel itself more of a pilgrim and stranger here below, that nothing may divert me from pressing through the lonely desert, till I arrive at my Father’s house.”

Being on such a pilgrimage, he was filled with the most intense longings after holiness and sanctification. “Blessed Jesus,” he prayed, “may I daily be more and more conformed to Thee. All I want is to be more holy, more like my dear Lord … that I may be fit for the blessed enjoyments and employments of the heavenly world.” As a “pilgrim here below,” Brainerd was animated by a threefold yearning: to be crucified to the allurements of this world, to be conformed daily to the holy purposes of Christ, to be made fit for the enjoyments and employments of heaven!

Brainerd frequently felt himself cast down into the dust because of his sinfulness and spiritual deadness. “What a vile wretch I am!” he exclaims. “Oh that I could give up myself to God, so as nevermore to attempt to be my own, or to have any will or affections that are not perfectly conformed to Him! But alas, alas! I find I cannot be thus entirely devoted to God.”

Few men have ever exposed their inmost souls as did Brainerd; and yet it should be remembered that he had no idea that any other eye than his own would ever see his private writings. If a saint is one who lives in time with a view to eternity, no saintlier man ever lived than David Brainerd. “I love to live,” he said, “on the brink of eternity.”

Brainerd longed to be AFLAME FOR GOD, living, like Paul, to preach Christ and to share His sufferings unto the salvation of souls.

His Diary contains this entry, July 6,1744: “I long and love to be a pilgrim; and want grace to imitate the life, labors and sufferings of Paul among the heathen.” He and Paul were kindred spirits in being captivated and animated by one great design – the salvation of lost souls, and in believing that this objective could best be attained by preaching the gospel of Christ and by living a life of self-denial and sacrifice.

Brainerd and Paul were kindred spirits! Captivated by one grand design – “to testify the gospel of the grace of God.” Animated by one superb longing – “to fill up that which is lacking of the sufferings of Christ.” “I long to imitate the life, labors and sacrifices of Paul among the heathen.”

Almost every page of Brainerd’s Diary tells how he “endured hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.” His sufferings, caused by a diseased and weakened constitution, were intensified by the rigors of his life among the Indians and his arduous travels through the wilderness. Concerning his first night among the Indians, he made this entry, “I rode to Kaunaumeek and there lodged on a little heap of straw.”

He was frequently in distress for lack of suitable food, exposed to hunger and cold, lost in the forests, caught in storms with no shelter available, obliged to ford raging streams and to spend the night in the woods, in peril from wild beasts and wild savages. Concerning one such incident he relates, “About six at night I lost my way in the wilderness, and wandered over rocks and mountains, through swamps and most dreadful places. I was pinched with cold and distressed with an extreme pain in my head and stomach, so that much blood came from me. But God preserved me, and, blessed be His name, such fatigues and hardships as these seem to wean me more from the earth and I trust will make heaven the sweeter.” This man was no secluded saint. He was apostolic in his labors and in the way he gloried in tribulation.

Brainerd’s health was failing fast and he gave some consideration to the idea of giving up his missionary journeys and settling down, either among his Christian Indians or at one of the white churches which had extended to him a call. This prospect was immeasurably enhanced by his dreams of domestic felicity, for he was ardently attached to Jerusha Edwards. He realized, however, that he had at most a year or two longer to live, and concluded, after much struggle of soul, that he should “burn out to the last” as a traveling missionary. Falling on his knees in his resignation, he cried: “Farewell friends and earthly comforts; farewell to the dearest, the very dearest of them all. I will spend my life to my latest moments in caves and dens of the earth, if the kingdom of Christ may thereby be advanced.”

During the last months of his life, Jerusha was his nurse and constant companion; and so heartbroken was she at the death of her beloved, she faded like a flower famished for rain, and, just four months later, went to join him in the Celestial City.

Brainerd, like Paul, gloried in the Cross and determined to preach nothing “save Jesus Christ and him crucified.” He made Christ the center and goal of every message. “If I treated on the being and glorious perfections of God,” he wrote, “I was thence naturally led to discourse of Christ as the only way to the Father. If I attempted to open the deplorable misery of our fallen state, it was natural from thence to show the necessity of Christ to undertake for us, to atone for our sins and to redeem us from their power.” The Apostle to the Indians proved, not only that the preaching of “gospel truth” is the only thing that can melt savage hearts to repentance, but also is the only means by which to reform and transform their lives. Just as soon as the Indians were changed at heart, they gave up their heathen vices.

At the end of one year of labor at Kaunaumeek, Brainerd persuaded the Indians to move to Stockbridge, where they came under the ministry of a Mr. Sargeant and later of Jonathan Edwards. Henceforth his parish centered in the area of the forks of the Delaware and extended through wide areas of New Jersey and Pennsylvania. He made the Indian town of Crossweeksung his headquarters and there erected a little hut. For a considerable time he was greatly depressed by the heathen practices of the Indians, by the darkness of their minds and the hardness of their hearts. But he kept on sowing the gospel seeds and watered them with his tears, for he believed “the promises of God.” Often he retired into the forest recesses, and the leafy solitudes echoed with the pleadings of his anguished heart on behalf of his “poor Indians.”

The promises! The sure promises of God! “Sow in tears … reap in joy!” “Call upon me and I will answer!” Echoes among the leafy solitudes! Pleadings of his anguished heart!

At length a mighty revival broke out in Susquehannah, and the reaper with joy gathered the precious sheaves. One day while preaching on Isaiah 33, “the Word was attended with amazing power; many scores in that great assembly were much affected, so that there was a very great mourning among them.” Suddenly there fell among the Indian population of this area a sense of soul concern. From all directions they came, crowding around the missionary to hear his message and falling down with sobs and groans under conviction of sin. A besotted woman fell down crying, “Have mercy upon me, O Lord.” An elderly man, who had been a murderer, a pow-wow (or conjuror), and a notorious drunkard, cried for mercy with many tears. Scores were soundly converted and came to be known as “Praying Indians,” for, like their missionary, they spent much time in importunate prayer for the salvation of their people. And what was the message that produced such remarkable results? When one of the men was asked, “Why do you cry so?” he replied, “When I think how Christ was slain like a lamb and spilt His blood for sinners, I cannot help crying.” It was the message of Isaiah 53! And when Brainerd called his Christian Indians together for their first communion and talked to them of the great sacrifice represented by the sacred emblems, the whole company was dissolved in tears.

SWEEPING THROUGH THE GATES

During the conversation in the Palace Beautiful, Christian confessed that he sometimes lost his ardor on the pilgrimage. When Prudence inquired how he was enabled to revive his heart and press on his journey, Christian replied, “When I think of where I am going – that will do it!” It was the same with David Brainerd.

After five years of arduous travel, manifold hardships, and almost incessant pain, the frail consumptive, spitting blood and almost delirious with fever, stumbles down the road to Northampton to die in the home of Jonathan Edwards. But he is by no means despondent. He is thinking of where he is going and his soul is exultingly happy. The pilgrim has finished his course and waits eagerly for the chariot to take him home. When someone comes into his room with a Bible, he exclaims: “Oh, that dear Book! I shall soon see it opened! The mysteries that are in it will all be unfolded!”

As his physical powers wane, his spiritual perception heightens. “I was made for eternity,” he whispers. “How I long to be with God and to bow in His presence.” The light of another world is in his eyes as he murmurs, “Oh that the Redeemer may ‘see of the travail of his soul and be satisfied.’ Oh come, Lord Jesus! Come quickly!” And with this petition upon his lips he greets Death as a long-awaited friend, who will forthwith usher him into the presence of the King!

Brainerd’s Diary and Journal reveal an ardent and oft reiterated yearning to “burn out” for his Lord and to be “aflame for God.” “It is my fervent longing,” he said, “to be a flame of fire, continually glowing in the divine service, till my latest, my dying moment.”

To the very last, Brainerd was supremely concerned with the extension of the kingdom of his “blessed Redeemer,” the suffering Christ Isaiah 53.

On his deathbed he prayed that He who “was bruised for our iniquities” might “see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied.” October 9, 1747, he experienced the ineffable joy, which, in prospect, had so long cheered his lonely and heroic pilgrimage – namely, “to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.”

The flame that burned so brightly and glowed so warmly seems to have burned out at last. But it only seems so. Death is life’s sublimest illusion. For those “in Christ” there is no death, there are no dead. The event called death does not extinguish, but rather intensifies, the vital flame of life and service. “He is not dead.” The sweet and consecrated spirit of David Brainerd is “continually glowing in the divine service and, to a degree beyond all his imagining, he is still AFLAME FOR GOD.”

________________

Copied from Heroes of Faith on Pioneer Trails by E. Myers Harrison. Published by Moody Press, Chicago, Illinois, c1945. Copyright ©2002 Wholesome Words. All Rights Reserved.

*