Tag: Jesus Christ

Unconventional But It Worked

The following is a true story as told to me by my son-in-law who is a North American Mission Board missionary. Only the names have been changed.

While talking with a pastor friend, the pastor related how Young Man had just asked Jesus Christ into his heart, been born again, and joined the church. The pastor was concerned because Young Man had a lot of zeal but lacked knowledge on how to be a witness to his friends. He was afraid he would turn people away from Christ instead of drawing them to Him.

Meanwhile, Young Man was out witnessing to his friends about their need for a Saviour to escape Hell. He carried a cigarette lighter in his pocket. He witnessed to his friend Tim by grabbing Tim’s arm and putting the cigarette lighter underneath his forearm and apply the flame to the skin. You can imagine Tim’s surprise as he jerked his arm away from the flame.

The next Sunday, the pastor runs into Young Man before church and Young Man tells him how he had witnessed to Tim, his friend, with the cigarette lighter. The pastor realizing that he was right about the Young Man, says to the Young Man, ” I have to talk to Tim right after the service. Where can I find him?”

The Young Man says, “Oh, Tim is seated in the church, he wants to be baptized.”

Tim had received his friend’s unconventional witness concerning his need to have his sin washed away by the blood of Jesus Christ so he could escape the justly deserved flames of Hell. In other words, Tim was born again and wanted to follow the Lord in believer’s baptism to testify to the world that he had been born again.

Do you need the flame of a cigarette lighter applied to your arm to get your attention?

The New Testament warns us there is coming a day “when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed –for our testimony to you was believed.” II Thessalonians 1:7-10

Today is the day to believe on the Lord Jesus and what He has done for you at the Cross by shedding His precious blood so your sins could be covered. Do not put it off.

Carl

Why We Should Prepare to Meet God

“The greatest reason why you should prepare to meet your God is because you MUST meet your God.”

It is not optional.

No excuse slips will be accepted. Your physical death nor your grave will keep you from it. There will be no back door to escape. No escape anywhere. No escape.

Unless your case is settled out of court through a meeting with the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, you MUST appear before the judgment bar of God and you are going to meet with yourself in the presence of God.

What a terrifying thought to meet with yourself! All your evil thoughts, evil words and sinful actions revealed in the presence of a pure, sinless Holy God who hates sin. A Holy God whose Son you have rejected as your Savior and whose precious blood that was shed for the forgiveness of your sins, you have trampled under your feet. A Holy God who is described as a consuming fire.

“But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth against them which commit such things. And thinkest thou this, O man, that judges them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shall escape the judgement of God.”

Romans 2: 2 tells us that man’s judgement will be according to truth. Every individual sees himself in the distorted mirror of his own imagination. We have seen mirrors in amusement parks which make a tall man look short and a thin man look fat. The human imagination makes the individual see himself in some sort of comparison with others, and always in a light more favorable than is justified by the truth. The coming of God’s judgment will destroy that distortion; a “hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies” (Isa. 28:17).

You will be forced to look upon yourself as you truly are, in the sight of a Holy God, who hates sin.

And Romans 2:3 says that there will be no escape. No escape. Don’t forget that –no escape.

No, there is no escape. But wait! There is a way of having your case settled out of court. You must move fast. You must come to Christ now. For now is the accepted time. Now is the day of salvation. The Bible teaches us that the issues of eternity are settled in this life. There is no second chance. The Lord said, If you “die in your sins; where I am going, you cannot come….for if you believe not that I am He, you shall die in your sins” (John 8:21, 24).

Today His mercy calls. You are guilty, but you can yet escape God’s wrath, through Christ. If you refuse God’s mercy, you must face Him.

There is no escape.

Come Today To Christ!

Carl

Excerpts from Donald Grey Barnhouse, Romans 1, pp. 12-14, 22

Our Focus

“If you want to be distracted, look around; if you want to be disgusted, look within; if you want to be delighted, look at Him.”

If we want to be distracted from our fruit bearing produced by our reverence for God, all we have to do is look around at the world and the seemingly hopelessness and futility of it all. We will soon find ourselves depressed and hopeless, distracted and overcome in spirit and soul by the world.

If we start to focus on our lack of fruit bearing and the sin that so easily besets us, we will be disgusted by what we see within ourself. We surely have sinned and come short of the glory of God…as born-again believers. We find ourselves still carrying on our back the corpse of the “old self”, our crucified sinful nature (Romans 6:5-7 & 7: 15-25). Truly disgusting.

But, if we focus on our Savior and Deliverer Jesus Christ and all He accomplished for us through His death and resurrection and His continued intercession for us, there is bright, living hope and assurance and Holy Spirit power for living a Christian life that is pleasing to Him.

And He alone can truly delight our soul!

Amen. 

Carl

Conversation With a Truth Seeker

As a result we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by waves, and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by the craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him, who is the head, even Christ…..  (Ephesians 4: 14-15)

It is a blessed thing to see Christians who are builded up by the spirit of God and accordance with the truth. But so many always seemed to be running after some new thing, never seeming to have any discrimination. Let me give you an absurd case.

 Years ago as I sat in my office in Oakland there came in through the book room a man whose very appearance betokened a heretic. He was tall and gaunt, had long flowing hair coming down over his shoulders, and a long unkept beard. He came up to where I sat writing. I did not like to be interrupted, for I felt that he was going to waste my time with some religious oddity. He said, “I gather, sir, from the books I have seen in the window that you are a truth seeker, and I thought I would come in and have a chat with you.”

“You are mistaken,” I said; “I am not a truth seeker at all.”

“Oh, you are not; may I ask why you are not?”

“Why, because, sir, I have found him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life, and therefore my seeking is at an end. Once I was a truth seeker, but now I am a truth finder, for I know Christ.”

“Well, but are there not many things that you still need to know?”

“Oh, yes; there are a great many things that I need to know, but I have found the great Teacher, and I am not going around seeking truth any longer. He instructs me through his Word.”

 “Well, as for me, I am always seeking; I go anywhere and everywhere that I think I can learn more.”

 “Yes,” I said, “I was reading of you in my Bible the other day.”

“Of me?”

 “Yes.”

 “What did it say about me?”

“It said, ‘Ever learning, but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.’”

“Why, that has no reference to me,” he said.

“Pardon me, but you said that you are always seeking and if a man is always seeking he is never finding. But, you see, those of us who know Christ have found him and have been found of him.”

Then he began to impart some of his weird gospel to me and said, “But you don’t know who I am.”

“No,” I said; “beyond what is written here I do not know who you are.”

“I am one of the 144,000 of whom you read in Revelation.”

“What tribe, please?” I asked.

“Well, the Lord knows; I don’t,” he said.

“Then you will have to excuse me for not taking your word for it and really believing that you are one of the 144,000.”

“But have you not heard that the first resurrection has already taken place?” he asked. “I am in my resurrection body.”

“Oh, I am dreadfully disappointed,” I said. “I never thought it would look like that. I thought it was to be something beautiful.”

Maybe I was a little discourteous to the poor old gentleman, but he was so indignant he turned and cursed me in the name of the Lord and tramped out knocking his shoes against the floor to shake off the dust as a witness against me.

“Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” (II Timothy 3:7)

Source: H. A. Ironside, LITT.D, In The Heavenlies [Ephesians] (Loizeaux Brothers, 1937) pp. 197-199

If you are a truth seeker seeking to know the truth of the universe, let me point you to Jesus Christ who made the universe. He is, as revealed in the Holy Bible, The Truth. Once you meet Him, your journey will be at an end.

Speaking of Jesus, it is written:

And He is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all creation. For by Him all things were created, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities –all things have been created by Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

And He is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the first born from the dead; so that He Himself might come to have first place in everything. (Colossians 1: 15-18)

Following The Teacher,

Carl

Priesthood of The Believer and A Once for All Sacrifice

“But the doctrine of the universal priesthood of believers is not merely a negative teaching abolishing an order of clergy. For along with that freedom which makes the believer responsible only to God for his faith and life, there is an added responsibility. We are members of a Christian community, “an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession” (1 Peter 2:9). As Christians, then, we are not “laymen,” not mere spectators of the Christian enterprise who may or may not engage in it as we choose, but “priests,” and therefore responsible to God for the faith and lives of others.

We are under obligation to make known this message of salvation. The word
“layman” is not found in the New Testament, nor is there any “layman’s movement” in the Bible. A priest is inevitably involved in the lives of others, and is responsible to God for others. He has the high privilege and duty of making God known to others.

This priesthood, therefore, applies to all believers, and consists of two things: (1) Immediate access to God in prayer for one’s self, and (2) the right and duty of intercession for others. Only as we grasp these ideas can we appreciate the full, rich meaning of the doctrine of the universal priesthood of believers.

Furthermore, we are a royal priesthood. That means that we have been called, chosen, by the King of Kings to be His priests before our fellow men. We are not first of all clergy and laymen. We are first of all a royal priesthood, under obligation individually to make known the message of salvation. And the strength of Protestantism lies precisely here, in the willingness of its people to accept this strange office and all that it means, and to serve in the household of God as the royal priests that we really are.

False religion has created “priest” who inserts themselves between man and God insisting that they alone are the source of God’s marvelous grace therefore you have to come to them. The New Testament says this is a lie.”

“In the Epistle to the Hebrews several chapters are devoted to showing that the Old Testament priesthood has been abolished and that there is no place in Christianity for a sacrificing priesthood, because Christ, “through his own blood, entered in once for all into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption,” and that He has offered “one sacrifice for sins forever” (9:12, 10:12). The many human priests (of OT Israel) with their innumerable animal sacrifices were effective in their work of reconciling the people to God only because they represented the true High Priest and the one true sacrifice that was to come. But after the reality appeared, there would be no more need for the shadows and types that had preceded it.

Hence we read concerning the sacrifice of Christ: “But now once at the end of the ages hath he been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself”(Hebrews 9:26); and again: “We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Christ once for all” (Hebrews 10:10). The sacrifice of Christ was therefore a “once-for-all” sacrifice which only He could make, and which cannot be repeated. By its very nature it was final and complete.

It was a work of Deity, and so cannot be repeated by man any more than can the work of creation. By that one sacrifice the utmost demands of God’s justice were fully and forever satisfied. Final atonement has been accomplished! No further order of priests is needed to offer additional sacrifices or to perpetuate that one. His was the one sacrifice to end all sacrifices. Let all men now look to that one sacrifice on Calvary!

Any continuing priesthood and any “unbloody repetition of the mass,” which professes to offer the same sacrifice that Christ offered on Calvary, is in reality merely a sham and a recrudescence of Judaism within the Christian Church.”

Source: Roman Catholicism by Lorraine Boettner, p. 43 and 45, online version

Dear Reader, false religion will insert itself between you and Jesus Christ, and tell you they are the source of the grace God wants to freely give you. Jesus said,

“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11: 28-29 NASB, emphasis added)

Do not let any Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant priest/minister stand between you and God. Jesus Christ is your High Priest if your born again and you yourself are a priest before Almighty God (I Peter 2:9). The New Testament exhorts us,

“Since then we have a high priest who has passed through the heavens , Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrew 4:14-16)

If you have not been born again, which Jesus said you must be to enter the Kingdom of God (John 3), I encourage you to put your faith and trust in Jesus’ death on the cross for your sins today. Ask Him to forgive you of your sins, to save you from the wrath to come and be your Lord and Savior. He will. Then He will give you the gift of the Holy Spirit to guide you through this life and to lead you into all truth about our Himself. Then find you a Bible teaching church where you can be baptized and grow in grace and faith feeding on the Word of God only, not the commandments and teachings of men.

So be it! May God richly bless you and lead you into all Truth. Carl

When The Grace of God Appeared

For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.

For we ourselves were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another.

But when the kindness and the love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that having been justified by His grace, we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 2:11-14; 3:3-7)

Praise Almighty God for His grace that has appeared to us! Bless His Holy and Righteous Name. May we all respond fully to the teaching of His Spirit contained in that ancient book, the Bible.

Carl

You Can Be A Christian, You Can Be A Marxist, But You Can’t Be Both

Christians are being pressured into repeating the beliefs of a neo-Marxist, collective guilt ideology that’s incompatible with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
— Read on thefederalist.com/2020/06/11/you-can-be-christian-you-can-be-marxist-but-you-cant-be-both/

What To Trust In


It is not good for us to trust in our merits, in our virtues or our righteousness; but only in God’s free pardon, as given us through faith in Jesus Christ. —

John Wycliffe (c. 1320s – 31 December 1384, English scholastic philosopher, theologian, biblical translator, reformer, priest, and a seminary professor at the University of Oxford. He was considered “the morning star of the Reformation).

(Berean Call)

Knowing God In A Deeper Way

“That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of Him.” Ephesians 1: 17

Following is a true story from Dr. H. A. Ironside, a former pastor of Moody Memorial Church in Chicago. The subject is Ephesians 1:17. The story also contains the best definition of biblical meditation I have ever read. Enjoy. Carl

“I remember years ago, while my dear mother was still living, I went home to visit the family, and found there a man of God from north of Ireland. I was a young Christian at the time, engaged in gospel work. He was a much older man, an invalid, dying of what we then called “quick consumption.” He had come out to Southern California, hoping climatic conditions would be of some help to him. But it was evident that he was too far gone to be recovered to health again. He lived, by his own desire, in a small tent out under the olive trees a short distance from our home. I went out to see him there, I can remember how my heart was touched as I looked down upon his thin worn face upon which I could see the peace of Heaven clearly manifested. His name was Andrew Fraser. He could barely speak above a whisper, for his lungs were almost gone, but I can recall yet how, after a few words of introduction, he said to me, “Young man, you are trying to preach Christ; are you not?” I replied, “Yes I am.” “Well,” he whispered, “sit down a little, and let us talk together about the Word of God.”

He opened his well worn Bible, and until his strength was gone, simply, sweetly, and earnestly he opened up truth after truth as he turned from one passage to another, in a way that my own spirit had never entered into them. Before I realized it, tears were running down my face, and I asked, “Where did you get these things? Could you tell me where I could find a book that would open them up to me? Did you learn these things in some seminary or college?” I shall never forget his answer. ” My dear young man, I learned these things on my knees on the mud floor of a little sod cottage in the north of Ireland. There with my open Bible before me, I used to kneel for hours at a time, and ask the Spirit of God to reveal Christ to my soul and to open the Word to my heart, and He taught me more on my knees on that mud floor that I ever could have learned in all the seminaries or colleges in the world”

Is it not true that most of us do not stay long enough in the presence of God? We do not get quiet enough to let Him talk to us and reveal His mind to us. “Meditation,” someone has said, ” is becoming a lost art in our day.” To meditate is really to chew the cud. Just as the cattle take their food in the rough, and then ruminate and get the sweetness and the good out of it, so the believer needs to read the Word and then spend time quietly in the presence of God, going over it again and again, ruminating, chewing the cud, until it becomes truly precious to the heart.

It is when one thus gets in the presence of God that the Holy Spirit delights to take of divine things and show them unto us. It is thus we grow in the knowledge of Christ. That is one reason why the Spirit came. Every believer to a certain extent has the knowledge of Christ, but the original word implies more that that. It is not merely knowledge as such; it is really super-knowledge, or full knowledge. “That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of Him.” Perhaps you know him as Savior, as the One who has redeemed you from everlasting destruction, as the glorious Head of the Church, with whom you are linked by the Holy Spirit. He would have you to go on to know him better, for there are riches in Christ that you may be sure you have never yet entered into. We cannot afford to be negligent, or to let other things crowd out the blessing we might have by giving more time to the teaching of the Holy Spirit. ”

H. A. Ironside, LITT.D – In the Heavenlies [Ephesians] (1937), pages 86 – 89

Relics Anyone?

When Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris caught fire recently, it was reported that early in the fire they were able to move religious relics to safety. You may be asking “What are religious relics?” The following from Martin Luther (1897) by Miss Whately throws light on this unbiblical practice in the 1500s (AD):

“In those days of superstition and ignorance people were taught that holy men could perform miracles, cure the sick and even raise the dead. Therefore, they often gave large sums of money for part of the leg or arm, even the tooth of a saint. These relics sold for very high prices, and, indeed, a great part of the wealth of the church [Roman Catholic Church] came from selling of relics. Some of the most precious relics were said to be a part of the cross upon which our blessed Lord was crucified, and the crown of thorns which he wore when the people mocked him…. They also pretended to show some of the hay in which Christ lay in the manager in Bethlehem, and the head of John The Baptist, though it is well known, from history, that the Saracens [Arabs and Muslims] opened his tomb and burned his remains to ashes. (Page 49-50)

We see that a religious relic was, and still is, body parts of the people the church considered holy and items supposedly associated with the Lord’s life on Earth. In the Middle Ages, whichever church had the most religious relics was considered to be the holiest. Martin Luther, being a Catholic Doctor of Theology who started reading and preaching the Bible, knew that relic veneration was not of God and was not based on biblical truth. Like indulgences, he knew it was a money making racket. He tells the following curious story about a relic:

A German, making his confession to a priest in Rome, promised to keep secret whatsoever the priest should impart to him, until he reached home. Whereupon the priest gave him a leg of the donkey on which Christ rode in Jerusalem very neatly bound up in silk, and said, ‘This holy relic on which the Lord Christ did sit, with his sacred legs touching this donkey’s legs.’

Then was the German wondrous glad, and carried the said holy relic with him into Germany. When he got to the borders, he boasted of his holy relic in the presence of four others, his comrades, when, lo! It turned out that each of them had likewise received from the same priest a leg, promising the same secrecy. Thereupon all exclaimed, with great wonder, ‘Oh, had that donkey five legs?

Page 50: The Story of Martin Luther edited by Miss Wheatley (1897)

The spiritual gloom created by the teaching and commandments of men produced this erroneous practice of relic veneration ….and they both are going on today.

Jesus Christ said,

So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” John 8:31-32

May His word set you free from the religious teachings and commandments of men.

Carl

Making Life Meaningful

A good friend recently sent me a copy of To End All Wars by Ernest Gordon. It is Gordon’s account of the true story behind the Academy Award-winning film The Bridge on the River Kwai. During World War II he was a member of the Scottish 93rd Highlanders captured by the Japanese and put in a POW camp in Thailand. They, along with other allied troops and indigenous people, were used as slave labor to build the infamous bridge and railroad for a future Japanese invasion of India.

He describes the horrible living and work conditions and hopelessness that they had to endure daily. Death was everywhere, with many good men dying. Interpersonal relationships were almost non-existent; it was basically every man for himself.

After almost dying of multiple diseases brought on by the non-stop hard work, poor diet and extreme climate, Gordon and some of the other men, at the bottom of the abyss of human existence, stripped of all human comforts and status, began to experience revival. A turning from despair, selfishness, greed and loneliness to serving their fellow prisoners with the love that only God could put into a human heart yielded to Jesus Christ.

Following is a quote from the book that sums up his experience. I strongly recommend this book. Courage to you. Carl

“We had two alternatives: we could choose the way of men, based on the sovereignty of the natural order, closed, sealed and impersonal; or we could choose the way of Jesus Christ, free and personal, based on the sovereignty of God the Father.

The wind of the spirit had blown upon us; we could not prove how or whence it had come. But our experience pointed to a source beyond ourselves. We knew personal fulfillment, love, joy, peace, wholeness, as we committed ourselves to the One who had called us. Only as we responded to this Word did we receive the power to progress towards true humanity. Our life on the horizontal plane was made meaningful at the point where it was met by the vertical. At the point marked by the Cross we found ourselves. “

Ernest Gordon – To End All Wars (emphasis added)