Author: carljohnsonsite

Happily married born again believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Remedy For Immorality

“The remedies for this sin are fasting, prayer, and keeping at a distance from it. For other vices may be subdued by fighting, but in this we conqueror by flight, and by not coming near it; of which we have an example in Joseph. We must pray to the Lord daily, that He would remove far from us the sin of lasciviousness, and grant us the gift of understanding and chastity.”

Source: An excerpt from a Waldenses barb’s (pastor) defense of Waldenses’ teaching and character from accusations by Roman Catholic Pope, Bishops and Priests seeking to justify their extermination by labeling them heretics – From History of Ancient Christians Inhabiting the Valley of the Alps: Part I. The Waldenses, Part II. The Albigenses, Part III. The Vaudois by Jean Paul Perrin (1843): P. Miller, New York

The Word of God says:

“Now flee from youthful lusts, and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.” Paul to Timothy — II Timothy 2:22

“For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God…” Paul to the Thessalonian Church — I Thessalonians 4:3-5

May sanctifying grace and tranquil peace from God the Father and Jesus Christ be upon each of you.

Carl

Narrow… but Safe

The Ten Commandments may seem narrow, but so does every runway on airports around the world. Yet no passenger wants his pilot to miss the narrow runway and land a few yards off the mark in some field or waterway or row of houses. The narrow ribbon of pavement is really the broad way that leads to a safe, comfortable landing. So the seemingly rigid Decalogue guides to happy, fulfilled living. -Leslie Flynn, Now a Word from Our Creator

Hammers on an Anvil

Last eve I paused beside the blacksmith's door
And heard the anvil ring the vesper chimes;
Then looking in, I saw upon the floor
Old hammers worn out with beating years of time.

"How many anvils have you had," said I,
"To wear and batter all these hammers so?"
"Just one," said he and then with twinkling eye, 
"The anvil wears the hammers out, you know?"
And so I thought, the anvil of God's Word
For ages skeptics' blows have beat upon.
Yet, though the sound of falling blows was heard,
The anvil is unharmed, the hammers are gone.

John Clifford

“ALL FLESH IS LIKE GRASS, AND ALL ITS GLORY LIKE THE FLOWER OF GRASS. THE GRASS WITHERS, AND THE FLOWER FALLS OFF, BUT THE WORD OF THE LORD ENDURES FOREVER.” Peter – I Peter 1:24-25

Wise Advice

“Stick close to the exercise of Repentance, till the end of thy life, and never think of obtaining pardon “ab humano die”(from the human), because he who has made thee make this Promise, has deceived thee.  As thou hast properly sinned against the Lord, so seek thy Remedy only at his hand.”

Ambrose, Bishop of Milan 374 AD – quoted in Bishop Nicea of Aquileia (420-485 AD) Book “ab Virginem lap-sam” – quoted in Some Remarks Upon Ecclesiastical History of the Ancient Churches of Piedmont by P. Allix D.D. – London, 1690

Watch What Your Heart Goes After

“One thing I must warn you of, Beware of Antichrist. Tis ill done of you to fall in love with Walls. Tis ill done of you to reverence the Church of God in Buildings and Edifices. You do ill to rest in such things. Or, can you question, that it is on these Antichrist will fix his throne?”

Hilarius, Bishop of Rome from 461-468 AD, quoted in History of the Crusades Against the Albigenses by J.C.L. Simonde De Sismondi – 1826

A Word For The Saints Today

If you have fallen into the habit of wringing your hands over your failure and inability, and if in the back of your mind you think that this somehow excuses you, please understand something. It does not. It is now time for you to rise up as a soldier of the Cross, put on the whole armor, and go out to fight the good fight of faith in total reliance upon the One who has called you, who has promised to be with you and give you His victory. Stop concentrating on your weaknesses and failures and look instead to Him. Fall in love with Him afresh because of who He is and what He has done. You need to turn from your own inadequacies and trust God.

“And the Lord said unto Joshua, “Rise up!” Why is it that you have fallen on your face? Israel has sinned, and they have also transgressed My covenant which I commanded them. And they have even taken some of the things under the ban and have both stolen and deceived. Moreover, they have also put them among their own things.” — Joshua 7:10-11

Source: Berean Call

Cause of Fanaticism

“Woe to the man whose religion is completely perverted.”

History of the Crusade Against The Albigenses In The Thirteenth Century –J.C.L. Simonde De Sismonde – 1826

A Historical Perspective On Church Growth

The rise of monasticism did much to pull the Western Roman church back to spiritual purity, personal holiness, and devotion to Christ. On the other hand, monasticism had many questionable practices and perspectives that border on the extreme of fanatical asceticism for asceticism’s sake. The drive for things like isolation, silence, and mystical experiences are a curious contrasts to Jesus’ call to go and make disciples and engage with sinners in a fallen world.

The laity’s esteem and veneration of a monk’s lifestyle only cemented the perception that true spirituality is reserved for a special class of believers. One has to wonder: If the church had maintained its early and fierce devotion to Christ’s commands to love God and neighbor and to make disciples of all nations -instead of becoming secularized – would monasticism ever had come about as it did? In The Way – Church As We Know It – Damian Gerke

Dear Saint: Cooperate with the Spirit of Almighty God that indwells you. Be all you can be in Christ for your sake and the sake of the lost. Bring your salvation to its ultimate conclusion, Christ-likeness, so you can be light in the midst of this crooked and perverse generation which desperately needs the Savior’s message of redemption. (Phil. 2:12-16)

We should not lock our light away. He intends for it to be on a stand for all to see.

May grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus be upon each one.

Carl

UFOs, Hyperspace and The Unseen Realm

Years ago I remember talking to a man who was concerned about the environmental future of planet Earth. He was an intelligent, highly educated medical research doctor, and a firm atheist. His “hope” for humanity rested in the colonization of space. He seriously suggested that the planet Mars could be made to support life by exploding nuclear bombs at its poles, breaking up the ice detected there, and somehow creating a life-supporting environment!

This was his faith – his faith, in spite of the fact that the Martian atmosphere consists almost entirely of carbon dioxide and is very thin. Atmospheric pressure is 5,000 times less than that of the Earth’s. Temperatures are much too cold, averaging more than 58 degrees Fahrenheit below zero!

But evolution predicts that life has occurred throughout the Universe “accidentally”, with many different routes toward the culmination of intelligent life. The different imaginations of intelligent life, evolving through different chemistries along different paths – such as those found in the science fiction of Star Wars – should be evident all around us.

This medical research doctor wanted something to hope for other than the gospel of Jesus Christ. Of course, there is no personal hope in his scenario, only a collective hope that mankind would be able to continue “evolving” on another planet.

Because of our pride and determined resistance to our Maker, mankind tries to hope for anything that makes us humans the hero. We search for anything that makes no mention of sin and the moral justice required by a Holy God. If human life had somehow been planted on Earth by visiting space aliens in time past, there would be no standard of morality which an all-knowing Creator would require of His “image-bearers”. This absence of accountability to our Creator is the attraction – and temptation – which evolution presents, including the outgrowth idea of space-aliens as “seeding” life on Earth and “guiding” mankind through the “wise men” of history.

Evolution does away with a Creator. At best, there are only “lesser gods” – much like ourselves – that could be “extraterrestrial”. They would be members of the space-time Universe further along the evolutionary ladder in their evolved planetary systems.

Currently this summer, a report is being issued by the U.S. government on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAPs, aka UFOs). The report includes decades of “incidents” reported by the U.S. military, noting that many are not of American origin.

But the report does not rule out foreign or extraterrestrial origins. So, its conclusions become another incentive for national security, and for more global government!

“We must defend ourselves against another Cold War-type threat of hypersonic weapons that may be able to go in and out of extra-dimensional space” – “hyperspace”, as the science fiction of Star Wars popularized. “Who knows? Extra-terrestrial life may be spying on us, and it might be unfriendly!” There are, indeed, so many things to fear and obsess about if we don’t know the Lord and keep looking to Him!

Hyperspace, in theory, is a set of extra dimensions beyond the three spatial dimensions that we experience daily. These extra dimensions are presumably able to connect distant points in real space and allow for faster-than-light speeds across the Universe. In the Star Wars movies, the characters would cross into “hyperspace drive” to travel quickly in their spacecraft. It’s pure science fiction – just like space aliens.

But the idea of “extra dimensions” carries an important biblical truth: “Interdimensional entities” are a reality! They are beings which can cross from one set of dimensions to another. The Bible – throughout its pages – speaks of angels, fallen angels, demons and the Spirit of God as moving between the four-dimensional time-space continuum (the physical world we live in) and a spiritual dimension that is unseen and unlimited by the space-time Universe.

For example, in Genesis 6 we are told how fallen angels interacted with mankind (inter-dimensionally) to bring a thorough corruption which helped lead to the Great Flood of Noah. Jude, the epistles of Peter, and the apocryphal books of Enoch elaborate on this. Psalm 82 discusses how God stands in a congregation where “He judgeth among the gods (elohim)”, who are being rebuked for ruling with corruption.

These are arguably the “principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world, spiritual wickedness in high places” (Ephesians 6) which, in the study of angels, are power-player beings over the nations in collusion with Satan. This corruption of the nations, of course, led to the fact that God had to select and train His own people-group through the believing Abraham and his descendants (Deuteronomy 32). All of this supernaturalism made sense to the Hebrew worldview and writers of the Bible. But it is more difficult for modern man to be comfortable with – enlightened and limited as we are by a worldview of materialist science.

Implications for “space aliens” ala Star Wars, thus, have a basis for truth in the supernatural/spiritual reality of the God of the Bible. Satan and his fallen-angels hierarchy would like to cater to our sin nature and deceive mankind with misplaced hopes, fears, and false philosophies – thwarting the purposes of God in drawing a special people to Himself.

But our great Creator wants us to be forever united with Jesus Christ and the rest of the saints now and in eternal communion and glory – able not only to “travel safely through hyperspace” but to enjoy the heavenly blessings that He “has prepared for them that love him.” Such blessings are so wonderful that they are beyond what we can possibly imagine! This is truly a hope worth having! — Creation Moments

Where Should We Start Our Search For Truth

There is a simple shortcut to truth: start with the Bible first and investigate it thoroughly. Why start there? Not just because the Bible claims to be the only inspired Word of the one true God who created us. It also claims that all of the world’s religions and their scriptures are false and actually in the service of Satan. The Bible calls Satan “the god of this world” (2 Corinthians 4:4) and thus the author of its religions. So if the Bible is true, we have saved ourselves a lifetime of vain searching through false systems. 


In fact, we can prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that every word in the Bible is true. The Bible has several unique features not found in the scriptures of the world’s religions, making it possible to substantiate its claims. Christianity is not a philosophy, mystical experience, or esoteric practice [but] is based upon undeniable and historical facts. The Bible stands on a four-fold foundation, every part of which can be examined and verified: 1) prophecy foretelling events and doctrines in advance, 2) fulfillment of those prophecies in detail, 3) secular history testifying to the fulfillment of prophecies and events, and 4) factual data corroborated by archaeology and science. None of this is the case with the teachings or scriptures of any of the world’s religions. —Dave Hunt[Excerpt taken from Seeking and Finding God (Bend, OR: TBC, 2007), pp 66-67) – Berean Call

UFOs – Fact or Fiction?

On January 4th 2021 the US Central Intelligence Agency declassified thousands of documents on unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and posted them online. These mostly contain documents “reporting UFO sightings in the foreign press and memos about how the Agency handled public inquiries about UFO sightings.”


This provides compelling evidence of how the US government has been taking the sightings of UFOs seriously for the past 70 years, despite publicly denying their existence.  


The Bible does not have any specific information on the subject of life in outer space. In Isaiah 45.18 we read: ‘For thus says the Lord, Who created the heavens, Who is God, Who formed the earth and made it, Who has established it, Who did not create it in vain, Who formed it to be inhabited: “I am the Lord, and there is no other.’ This verse teaches that the Lord is our Creator. It implies that the earth is unique in the universe in being ‘inhabited,’ suggesting that there are no other inhabited planets and therefore no aliens trying to visit us.  


On the other hand the Bible does point to the existence of angels and demons who are able on occasions to interact with humans. This raises the possibility of another question, which is actually being asked by physicists today. Is the observable universe all there is? Is our universe one of many within a ‘multiverse’, in other words other realms which exist in a different dimension which we cannot see?


In a way the Bible agrees with this idea. Not a ‘multiverse’ but at least three different realms which are capable of interacting with our world. And the ‘visitors’ are not aliens from another planet.    


In the New Testament Paul writes of a man in Christ who ‘was caught up to the third heaven…he was caught up into Paradise and heard inexpressible words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter.’ 2 Corinthians 12.2-5.  
In the Book of Revelation John writes of his experience of being taken out of the realm where he was (in captivity on the island of Patmos), into a heavenly realm…”  


All these experiences speak of another realm which could be described as a parallel universe. It is interesting that Paul speaks of the ‘third heaven.’ If the first heaven is the physical universe and the third heaven is the realm where God dwells, what is in the ‘second heaven?’   


These passages show that the Biblical view is that we do live in a kind of ‘multiverse’. There is the physical universe in which the earth is situated, the eternal realm where God exists and the ‘heavenly places’ where the devil and the demons exist.  The Bible also teaches that it is possible for there to be interaction between all of these realms. The presence of God appears at times on the earth. The Lord walks and talks with Adam in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3….He comes as the Angel of the Lord to appear visibly to Israelites in various occasions and to act on their behalf (Exodus 3.2, Numbers 22.22-35, Judges 2.1-4, 6.11-22, 13.3-21.  


The Bible narrative also gives reason to believe that as well as interventions on earth from God we also have interventions from the other side, from Satan and the demonic realm….Throughout the rest of the Bible we have interventions into human affairs from Satan and the demons…   


Michael Penfold gave a talk on this subject in which he said that the UFO phenomenon is all about spiritual deception. It ties in with other influences like yoga, TM, hypnosis, Zen Buddhism, drug taking in altering consciousness so that the normal function of the mind is bypassed by a spiritual entity aiming to deceive. 

To back this claim up he cites the five main messages which have been communicated by supposed contact with aliens: 


We are on the threshold of a New Age of enlightenment. 


God is an impersonal force of which we are part. We are god and our divinity is within. 


There is no death. We are endlessly re-incarnated. 


Good and evil are only illusions and one side of the same coin. 


Jesus is just a great teacher, one of many avatars who have come to earth. All roads lead to God. 


This in itself should show us that these entities are not aliens crossing billions of miles of space. Why bother to make this hazardous journey in such vast numbers as is being claimed, just to give us the same message as you can find in New Age and the occult? 


https://lightforthelastdays.co.uk/articles/christianity-and-the-last-days/light-for-the-last-days-april-2021-edition/#UFOs_nbspFact_ornbspFictionnbspnbsp

Mankind Is Without Excuse

We do not serve a cruel God who demands too much. Paris Reidhead, a missionary in Africa for two decades, stated that his motive for going to Africa was that he felt that no one should go to hell without having heard the name of Jesus. After he got to Africa and had spent some time among the people, he found that they had a far more sophisticated concept of the Most High God than he would have suspected.

They had an amazing awareness of sin, freely confessed that they were monsters of iniquity, and continued to serve their tribal deities because they had convinced themselves that the Most High God had given up on them! It is a mistake to say that people don’t know better.


“For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.”—Romans 1:20

Tradition vs Holy Scripture

The Thessalonians of Acts 17 did not reject the message of Christ because of sola scriptura. They rejected the message Paul brought them for the same reason the religious leaders of Israel rejected Jesus.

The Thessalonians rejected the gospel because they did not believe the words of Scripture. They did not deliberate for three weeks and decide that Paul’s words contradicted the Torah; they simply refused to believe, because the words of Scripture clashed with their tradition.

“Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust. For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?”—John 5:45–47

Extra-Biblical Flood Legends

“Creation stands or falls on the Genesis Flood,” stated a creation geologist years ago. The fact of the Flood covering all the earth is undeniable. As described in Genesis 7,


19 And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered.
20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.
21 And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man:
22 All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died.


In addition, 73% of the earth’s crust is covered by sedimentary rock laid down by the Flood’s waters about 4,500 years ago. Within these rocks are trillions of fossilized animals (mostly marine invertebrates) and plants—remnants of a world “filled with violence.”


Between Scripture and the geological-paleontological record, the effects of the Flood are clearly seen. There is, however, a third indication of this worldwide, devastating event—the universal flood legends recorded by all the major people groups of Earth. If “the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished” (2 Peter 3:6), it would undoubtedly leave an indelible memory of the generations following the Flood.


As people groups spread and migrated after the Tower of Babel, they would carry with them the Flood story. Through the centuries, stories of the Flood were passed on to each generation via early patriarchs such as Joseph, Jacob, and Abraham, records that Moses had access to. As the years went by in some parts of the world, there would be editing and embellishments of the Flood event, but the basic story of judgment via a worldwide deluge, the preservation of a remnant in a structure, and the events directly afterwards would be preserved. The account of the Flood in Genesis comes from Noah himself and is written and edited by Moses and is not dependent on Near Eastern texts. Knowing this, a wise historian would search out similarities between Moses’ Flood story and the flood stories told in other cultures.


Nick Liguori is a civil engineer and an avocational researcher. He has applied his knowledge of biblical history to painstakingly put together a compendium of Flood traditions from North and South America. His book Echoes of Ararat Liguori shows the reader that the critical opening chapters of Genesis are true and historically accurate. Such Flood traditions have been found to be even more prevalent than was originally thought, offering Liguori’s book as a fresh new resource for those interested in Flood geology and early biblical history.


A brief sampling of stories recorded by Nick Liguori are:

The water grew higher and higher until all the earth was covered . . . A single family remained alive. —the Chimila tribe of northern Colombia


Then the waters went up, up and up, flooding all the mountains and highest hills and killing all that had life on the earth. Only one house had been raised over the waters, which had covered all the species of animals. —Mayan ancestors of the Jakalteks of northwestern Guatemala


They have a tradition of the floud [flood], that all the world was once drowned, except a few that were saved, to wit, about seven or eight in a great canoro [canoe]. —Rev John Clayton (d. 1725) recording the narrative from the Powhatan tribe of Virginia


Very long ago there was a great flood by which all men and animals were destroyed, with the exception of a single raven. —the Kootenay people of southeastern British Columbia

https://www.icr.org/article/extra-biblical-flood-legends/

Source: Berean Call

Evolutionary Prediction Fails

“When a prophet speaketh in the name of the LORD, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him” (Deuteronomy 18:22).

If man is the result of billions of years of evolution from the simplest of creatures, evolution predicts that man should have retained most, if not all, of the best abilities of those other creatures in his heritage.

According to evolution, our ape-like ancestors had opposing toes, just as we have opposing thumbs. If we had retained those opposing toes, we could pick things up without bending over. The female chimp can pull 1,260 pounds with one arm. That would be a pretty handy facility. And then, there is the hero shrew of Uganda, just six inches long, but it can support the weight of a one hundred and sixty pound man on its back!

Even the lowly snail can pull up to 200 times its own weight, and lift ten times its weight. Then what about the trilobite, right at the bottom of the evolutionary ladder and supposedly extinct for 300 million years? This little fellow had the most sophisticated eye lenses, actually double lenses, ever found in nature!

Since all of these abilities would be greatly beneficial for us, why didn’t evolution let us keep or develop these abilities as we evolved? The answer is simple. We have not evolved. Rather, we have been made by a Creator Who made us for the purpose of a relationship with Himself through His Son, Jesus Christ.
http://www.creationmoments.com/radio/transcripts/evolutionary-prediction-fails-1

Who Is Our Mediator With Almighty God?

“For there is one God and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all…” I Timothy 2:5

“…we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.” I John 2: 1-2

Lord Jesus Christ is the only mediator between God and man. There is no other mediator, not His mother, Mary, no preacher, priest, saint or angelic being. He alone is our mediator.

The second verse in the original Greek tells us that the Lord Jesus is facing the Father for us, as our Advocate. He is seated at the right hand of God’s throne according to Scripture. He is there in His resurrected, glorified human body with the spike prints in his hands and feet and the spear wound in His side, evidence of His ransoming all born again Christians.

I pray He is facing God as your Advocate and not your Judge.

Bless His Name forever more!

Remain faithful to Him above all else.

Carl

The Brutish Master of Sin

“What a brutish master sin is, taking the joy from ones life, stealing money and health, giving promises of tomorrow’s pleasures, and finally leading one onto the rotten planking that overlies the mouth of the pit.”

Jim Elliot (October 8, 1927 – January 8, 1956), American missionary, who was one of five missionaries killed during an attempt to evangelize the Huaorani people of Ecuador. (Berean Call)

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 6:23)

Do not pass up the “free gift of God”!!!

Carl

Is It Really Progressive Revelation?

It is blatantly dishonest to attempt to explain away differences in belief by saying that they simply represent Progressive Revelation, when, in fact, they represent different “revelations” that contradict each other—and, therefore, cannot possibly all come from God, who does not contradict today what He said yesterday. It may sound unifying to declare that Truth is one but called by different names. That, however, ignores the fact that Truth involves definite concepts—the correct answers to life’s ultimate questions—universal and timeless answers that do not change or vary with individuals or cultures. Greater revelation may be given, and has been given down through history as the Bible was being written, but the added revelations must agree with those of the past. You cannot build upon a foundation by undermining it.


“Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation. Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever. Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines.”—Hebrews 13:7–9

Source: Berean Call

God Uses Broken Things

See the source image

God uses broken things. It takes broken soil to produce a crop, broken clouds to give rain, broken grain to give bread, broken bread to give strength. It is the broken alabaster box that gives forth perfume. It is Peter, weeping bitterly, who returns to greater power than ever.


― Vance Havner, (1901-1986),  Havner often described his ministry as more of an old-time exhorter or revivalist than an evangelist: “I have come to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable”).

Source: Berean Call

Origin of Song “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus”

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For more than 20 years we have supported Garo evangelists from northeast India through our Asian Workers’ Fund, as they have taken the Gospel to unreached people groups in their part of the world.

Often, Christians are unaware of the origins of many of the songs we love to sing. In this brief email we would like to share the little-known background of one famous song: “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus.”

In the hills of northeast India live the Garo tribe, who number more than one million people. For centuries they were feared as a primitive head-hunting tribe, but in the most recent Indian census, over 95 percent of the Garo declared themselves to be Christians. Here is one reason why…

In the late 1800s, many missionaries came to Assam in northeast India to spread the Gospel. They succeeded in converting a man named Nokseng, his wife, and his two children. Nokseng’s faith proved contagious, and many villagers began to accept Jesus.

The village chief, angry at the prospect of losing control, summoned all the villagers. He demanded Nokseng’s family to publicly renounce their faith or face execution. Moved by the Holy Spirit, Nokseng said: “I have decided to follow Jesus.”

Enraged at his refusal to deny Christ, the chief ordered his archers to shoot the two children. As both boys lay twitching on the ground, the chief asked, “Will you deny your faith? You have lost both your children. You will lose your wife also.”

But Nokseng replied: “Though no one joins me, still I will follow.”

The chief was beside himself with fury and ordered Nokseng’s wife to be shot with arrows. In a moment she joined her children in death. Now the chief said for the last time: “I will give you one more opportunity to deny your faith and live.” In the face of death, Nokseng did not waver, and made his final memorable statement:

“The cross before me, the world behind me. No turning back.”

He was killed like the rest of his family, but a miracle took place. The chief was moved by Nokseng’s faith and he wondered, “Why would Nokseng and his family die for a Man who lived in a far-away land some 2,000 years ago? This God must have remarkable power, and I too want to taste that faith.”

In a spontaneous confession, the chief declared, “I too belong to Jesus Christ!” When the crowd heard this from the mouth of their chief, the whole village accepted Christ as their Lord and Savior. Later, Nokseng’s words became a beloved song of the Garo Christians, and was later translated into English and sung around the world.

May the Lord Jesus bless you as together we serve the Church in Asia,

The team at Asia Harvest
www.asiaharvest.org

Remember in your prayers our brother and sisters in foreign lands who face persecution everyday.

God bless you and yours,

Carl