Most people’s understanding of Christianity is comprised of trusting Christ as their Savior, having their sins forgiven, and then dying and going to heaven. But in between, it gets pretty desperate. They have lots of questions which boil down to one: Where is the life, the abundant life Jesus promised?
Yes, I think we have all asked this same question, “Where is the life?” Yes, I received Christ, but isn’t there more than what I am experiencing? Where is true Christian life?
I believe that I truly accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior and Lord very early in life. My life completely changed from the inside, a new person now lived in me. I didn’t know it yet, but I just knew that I was a “Christian”.
As a new Christian, I began to investigate what I believed, what I stood for and how to conduct my life properly. It was exciting at first knowing that my sins were forgiven, but I tended to rely on externals for the basis of my life – my family, my friends, my church, my performance within the church. The truth is that having our sins forgiven doesn’t tell us a thing about how to live the life. It is almost as if we were told: “Now you are saved through the cross of Christ. Now go to work and do the things that will keep that salvation secure, and GOOD LUCK! Jesus will see you when you die, and it will be wonderful over there. Go out there and try as hard as you can!”
I found that I had become like the rich young man who spoke to Jesus in the Bible; I did the best I could to keep the Golden Rule, the Commandments and the church rules. Now, where is the Life? There has to be something else, something more!
Then something wonderful happened; I discovered that I was never meant to live the Christian life. This was never God’s intention for me. I received the understanding that Christ IS the life and He will live His Life through me.
After all the years of trying on my own, I had become convinced that I couldn’t live the Christian life, not the way the Bible described it. But now I had a revelation that Christ lived in me from the moment that I accepted Him (Galatians 2:20) and that I was going to let Him do His thing in me – not perfectly because I have a weak humanity, but growing daily in trusting Him to live the Life. I was like Paul when he said, “But when it pleased God, to reveal His Son in me…” (Gal. 1:15-16).
For the first time at about forty years of age, I came to know that He had already made me the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Cor. 5:21). Because of Christ within, I was truly righteousness. He had made me holy (Col. 3:12). He had made me complete (Col. 2:10). I was blameless in God’s sight (Col. 1:22). I was loved and accepted forever because I was joined in a living union with the Son of God.
Galatians 2:20 had told me that I died to myself, as my point of reference. Now He, living in me, was my point of reference. Has He revealed that to you? If He hasn’t, He wants to because that is the real good news of the gospel!
1 John 4:15 states, “Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God…” There is a comma, then the verse continues, “…God dwells in him and he in God.” Well, I experienced the first half of that verse in the late 1930’s, but I didn’t EXPERIENCE the second half until 1975. Christ was forever within me but I hadn’t had the revelation of it yet. All along, the life of Jesus had been resident in me, and I did not know it.
The New Testament truth of Christ in the believer is foreshadowed in the Old Testament. In Exodus 12, God told the Hebrews to set apart a lamb from the flock, kill it and smear the blood on the doorposts of their dwellings. Then the household would be spared the death of the firstborn inside. Claiming and using the blood was all it took.
The lamb died for the household. In the New Testament, this is Christ dying for us. When, by faith, we apply Christ’s blood (His death) to our lives, we are spared the wrath of God upon us.
The second half of the sacrifice of the lamb was that God instructed the Hebrews to roast the sacrificial lamb, and EAT IT as nourishment for their upcoming journey. They were to take the lamb into their very being as life. In other words, everything necessary for the journey, living the life, comes from the lamb. It isn’t that the lamb dies for you and then you’re sent out to do the rest of your own. The lamb is the total answer. The lamb gave its blood for them, and also gave its LIFE to them. They took the meat into them, and that became their nourishment, strength and vitality for the journey. They lived their life’s journey out of the lamb’s life. They killed the lamb for two purposes: for the Passover and for the journey.
Unless they put the lamb’s life in them, they would be operating out of their own strength, out of whatever strength they had gained in captivity.
This whole ritual was a foreshadowing of God saying to us, “Only I can live My Life. But I will impart the Life to you. I will give you the Life of Christ the Son and He will live it in you and through you.”
We are saved and recreated not only by Christ’s death, but there is an ongoing daily process of nourishment for the journey by His Life.
The Blood of the Lamb saved us when we accepted Him, an instantaneous event.
The Life of the Lamb in us is our WHOLE strength for our journey of life. It is as the human Jesus said, “For as the Father has Life in Himself, so He has given to the Son to have Life in Himself…I can of my own self do nothing…because I don’t seek my own will but the will of the Father…” John 5:26,30).
Have you ever come across the boating analogy for discovering God’s purpose in your life? It imagines three navigational lights in the harbor approach. When all three lights are in line, your course ahead is safe.
The “lights” are the Bible, the Church and the Spirit. So if you have a guiding Bible text, other Christians agree and the voice within says “Go!” - you go. But no one ever explains what happens when the three are not in line. The “boat” doesn’t just stand still. Life goes on. Decisions still have to be made.
So what or who is the FINAL AUTHORITY in my life? Is it the Bible, the Church or the Spirit living within? This is an old and very important question for daily living.
Up to the Reformation, the answer was the Church. An authoritarian priesthood banded down the answers to an obedient flock. The church system was the final authority in questions of faith and conduct.
The reformers changed all that. The concepts of freedom flooded into all areas of life. The world planners struggled for a previously unknown world social equality. And alongside, in the spiritual realm, Anabaptists, Quakers and others began to express the freedom of the Spirit. The majority, however, drew back from the “dangers” of genuine freedom and again ended up in the grasp of external authority - The Bible of the reformers.
It is said that the reformers who came out on top rejected an infallible Church only to replace it with an infallible Book. Understand that here we are discussing not the nature of the Bible, but its place; not its truth, but its use. For them it became the final authority. The Bible had become the final revelation, and so for all practical purposes the Spirit within seemed to be unneeded.
The freedom to read and love the Bible became an extremely valuable force in western civilization, but because it came to be used as a conceptual code, it again brought people into bondage to an external authority.
There was a third group that dissented from this view. They saw that there was another choice: that the Life of Christ within through the Spirit was the FINAL AUTHORITY.
At the beginning of the charismatic movement, the Holy Spirit began to loosen up our reliance on externals. He set us free and people began to hear Christ for themselves. What was the importance of this new direction? It was because external law, whatever its source, always leaves us with a static and unnerving situation. Law can only say how things ought or ought not to be done, and then impose penalties for failure. When it is dispensed through people, it gives them an authority they can’t handle and their flock a “security” which keeps them immature and unused to hearing God for themselves. When it comes through a code, it produces disputes as to its meaning as well as evasions whenever the content is inconvenient.
But people always seem so afraid to trust the unpredictable dynamic of the Spirit of Christ - it seems too blurry to handle, too chaotic for faith! So we begin to organize Him again, moving back to the authority of an infallible leadership. But, thank God, He will not be organized.
Christ is not a tame lion! He is a free Spirit and He is our Life. He is continually presenting that glorious song of liberty which we have always known, deep down. It was the song in the background that held us safe through all the legalism and structure of religion. Christ sings of a life that is dynamic and exciting - not static, but unpredictable, because IT’S HE!
I have faith that in this day our Father is going to complete the incomplete revelation by bringing in its fullness the practical reality of “Christ IN you.” It is a dawning realization to many that He is actually THE Life and that you “need no man to teach you, for you have an anointing which will teach you all things.” (1 John 2:27).
JESUS CHRIST WITHIN IS MY FINAL AUTHORITY. He is my foundation (not words about Him), and He is in union with me. I have no fear of missing the way - because He is it! No fear of not walking in essential truth - because He is it! And the new eternal Life He gave me? No fear of losing it! You guessed it — He’s it! (John 14:6).
“Too subjective,” you say, “at best an indistinct mess and at worst, anarchy.” Not really, not if I have that faith assurance that it actually IS He in me.
“Arrogant?” Yes, it could sound that way, but not when I know He is All and in union with Him, I am complete.
“Dangerous?” Oh, yes! but so much better than the safety of the cemetery or the caution of the law court...
I hate crowds – the jostling, the noise, the sense of being herded in directions I might not want to go and the frustration of not being able to proceed at my own pace. It’s no wonder Jesus’ disciples were a bit sarcastic when He once asked the crush of bodies knocking Him around in a Judean crowd, “Who touched my clothes?” (Mark 5:21-43).
As it happened, Jesus was in this crowd only because He was on His way to heal the feverish daughter of a synagogue ruler who pleaded that Jesus have mercy on his dying child. Mark likes to tell his stories about Jesus like sandwiches – one story sandwiched in the middle of another – kind of like Jesus was sandwiched in this crowd.
“You see the people crowding against you,” His disciples sarcastically answered, “and yet You can ask, ‘Who touched me?’”
Yes, that’s exactly what Jesus could ask. He could ask because He’d felt something quite different from the normal collisions of shoulders and elbows and sandals and hips and thighs. He’d felt that “power had gone out from Him” (verse 30). He’d sensed that someone had touched His clothes with a definite purpose in mind, a definite need, and that this person had done so believing that through this act God would give deliverance. And indeed God had.
Mark fills in the story for us, even though at the time the disciples were in the dark about what had happened. It seems that a woman had been suffering from debilitating menstrual hemorrhaging for 12 years. This woman had spent everything on doctors to try to find a cure, and they had done nothing but make her problem worse. Now she was out of options, but that’s when she heard that Jesus was coming to town. She decided that if she could just touch His clothes, she would be healed. So she bored her way through the sweaty bodies, came up behind Jesus and touched His cloak. Instantly the bleeding stopped, and her suffering was over.
The mustard from Mark’s sandwich of two stories begins to leak over onto both slices of bread at this point. Jairus, the synagogue ruler, was not afraid to walk right up to Jesus, fall at Jesus’ feet and plead for the daughter he loved. But the sick woman was different. She was just as determined and just as believing as Jairus in Jesus’ power to save. But she was too afraid to approach this mysterious man of God head on. Unlike Jairus, she sneaked up behind Jesus, flicked a finger across the wrinkles of His robe and sunk back into the anonymity of the crowd.
But despite her fear, despite her low opinion of herself, maybe because of her status as a woman, but even more likely because of her status as unclean because of the purity laws about menstrual flow, Jesus noticed her. And He called her to Him. And He called her daughter.
Meanwhile, Jairus’ daughter died, and the messengers of this news told Jairus not to bother Jesus anymore about it – after all, it was too late. But Jesus ignored them. He went straight to Jairus’ house and despite the scorn and disbelief at His statement that the girl was not dead but only sleeping, He took her by the hand and gave her back her life and Jairus back his daughter.
Let’s consider this sandwich of stories. When Jesus of Nazareth was on this earth, the only way that He could be approached was EXTERNALLY – either boldly from the front as Jairus did or sneakily from the back as the woman did. But Jesus’ death and resurrection changed all that.
This is now New Covenant time and by calling on Christ as Savior and Lord a wonderfully miraculous thing happens – we are born again with a new divine nature and with the risen Jesus Christ coming to live right within us INTERNALLY in a living union of human spirit to divine Spirit.
The relationship with Jesus changes from an external, Jesus near us, condition as in the gospels to an internal, Jesus IN US, condition in our life as a Christian. This, of necessity, causes a change in how we approach our relationship with Him.
In my earlier years as an immature Christian, I approached Jesus as external from me and I tried it both ways. I got bold and even angry at times trying to establish a relationship with Him. At other times I felt guilty and unworthy of His attention and I sneaked up on Him from the back hoping for whatever I could get from Him.
He understood my immaturity but didn’t want me to stay that way. One day, as I was reading Galatians 2:20, I got the message: “Lou, quit seeing Me as external to you. The whole reason that you are a son of God now is that I am living in you in an INTERNAL union. This is the key element of your salvation. From now on just think of yourself as being Me! Sounds radical doesn’t it. Of course there is a duality in our union – you can never become THE Son of God but you are A son of God because I live in you. Wherever you go, I go. Whatever you do, I do. I’m not leaving you for any reason. When you keep this perspective, you will have a new power over sin – My power! You’ve been calling on Me to come from somewhere and assist you in fighting off sin. But this fight has to be ALL ME IN YOU! There’s nothing in your soul or body to resist sin – the power has to come from My Spirit input. In fact a good way to look at sin is that it is anything that you do with an independent attitude. Just remember that I am in you always and you will be well on your way to maturity as a child of God.”
Jesus doesn’t care who you are. He doesn’t care if you’re timid and shy, young or old, a leader or an outcast. He knows you, loves you, cares about your needs, fears, crises, and He is ready to be the power in your weakness.
As a Christian, now that He lives in you, He listens to your up-front, head-on pleas, and He senses hopeful hearts at the back of the line and behind the door. Your personality, your temperament, your status, not even (especially) your sinful history can erect a barrier He can’t bring down like the walls of Jericho.
What’s your need? What’s your crisis? What’s your fear? Take it to Jesus in whatever way works for you, but always on an internal basis. Approach Him in your spirit boldly from the front or sneak up on Him from His back. Either way He will end up on your side! And He’s always going to be there – in you for salvation, as you and through you as you allow Him.
A friend called my attention to the article I posted on Monday, September 11. The title was: "Christ does not "help" me, and I do not "help" Christ". He said that there are many references in Scripture stating that "God helps us" and "Christ helps us", so the use of the word "help" in the article could be misleading. I agree that "not helping" was a poor choice of words to use. I went to my Webster's Dictionary and looked up "help". I found that the synonym "assist" would have been a better choice. Webster said, "the synonym 'assist' suggests a secondary role in the assistant or a subordinate character in the assistance." My point which I hope came through in the article was that Christ does ALL the work through us and that without Him we can do nothing. Any idea of "help" or "assistance" tends to put forth the concept that we can do some "good" in our own strength. The truth of GRACE is too powerful for that. Again I state that if Jesus said that of Himself He could do nothing because the Father in Him did the works, then I as a Christian must state that I can do nothing of myself because Christ in me does the works.
“In the land of the Bible, it’s eye-for-eye justice once again in yet another round of attack and reprisal in the Middle East.”
So began an evening news report about the latest cycle of Mideast violence.
Much of the violence in the Middle East is in direct retaliation for prior violence. And often, the perpetrators of such violence invoke the ancient “eye-for-an-eye” principle in order to justify their acts.
What they ignore is the fact that this principle was NEVER meant to be applied in such a ruthless and barbaric fashion!
You may be surprised to learn that the original intent of this Old Testament law was to limit retaliation, not to encourage it. It mandates that the penalty must fit the crime, not go beyond it in wild revenge.
ONE eye – not two – for an eye. ONE life – not a whole family’s or town’s – for a life. Random and indiscriminate retaliation against innocent men, women and children was never permitted by this law. Only the individual perpetrator himself was punishable. The eye-for-eye principle was designed to control bloodshed and unrestrained violence.
So don’t blame the Bible for the endless cycle of retaliatory violence in the Mideast. If applied as intended, the eye-for-eye principle would diminish the level of violence.
What’s more – “eye-for-eye” has been superseded by a new and higher standard. For those who accept Him with the moral strength from Him to break the cycle, Jesus showed another way – the law of LOVE, FORGIVENESS, and PEACE.
Unfortunately, that principle remains largely untried throughout the world.
I met a woman at church this week who had recently come out of the New Age Movement into Christianity. I was able to sit down with her and get a real perspective on what she went through.
She told me she grew up poor with a single mother and two little brothers in the inner city. She knew what it’s like to go to sleep hungry when there just isn’t a thing to eat. She wore hand-me-downs and rode on buses.
She was fortunate to, as she said, “marry well”. Her husband was a prosperous businessman and they eventually had five children, a lovely home, and a successful business in one of the top ten most affluent counties in the country.
She said that our society, built on capitalism and free markets, has always measured success in one way and one way only – money. So they found spiritual fulfillment in New Age ideas of prosperity from finding your inner self.
But she and her husband began to see cracks and flaws in New Age and in searching elsewhere found “Christianity” in Houston, Texas. Joel Osteen, pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, with 30,000 attendees per week, the largest evangelical church in America, could well be the “Poster Pastor” for the prosperity gospel.
They were there for a while but through a series of circumstances, they lost their infatuation for the prosperity teachings.
She carried in her purse some quotes from Joel Osteen as follows: “Many of you today know this, you believe it down here in your heart. But the reason that you’re not experiencing as much as you should is because you’re not declaring it. You’ve got to give life to your faith by speaking it out. Your words have creative power. When you go around saying, ‘I have favor, people want to be good to me and supernatural doors are opening – when you make those declarations of faith, you are charging the atmosphere. And your own words can help to bring it to pass.” (Joel Osteen, Experiencing More Of God’s Favor, Tape #212, Daystar, July 10, 2004).
“Words are like seeds, they have creative power…You can change your world by simply changing your words.” (Joel Osteen, Speaking Faith Filled Words, Tape 223, Daystar Television, May 2, 2004).
She said that the picture of God as a Cosmic Vending Machine is not a Christian view of our Creator, but unmistakably New Age.
She said that it was easy for her to think of God this way before she’d actually met Him. Now it seems like an atrocity. And such an unbelievable aberration for Christians who are supposed to have made a commitment to get materialism out of their hearts to make room for Jesus. Being a Christian is all about how closely we are becoming conformed to Christ and how well we serve Him.
She said, “As a Christian now, I realize the ugliness of my old belief in karma – that it was this kind of belief that allowed the misery in India to continue unabated, that encouraged people to pass by suffering without any response, thinking, He doesn’t need help – he’s just working out his karma.”
She continued, “But when Christians point to individual faith as the source of or lack of health and wealth, isn’t that the same? Isn’t it just a philosophy which gets us off the hook for responsibility for our fellow man?”
She finally said, “There’s just too much prosperity teaching going on in Christianity today. I really like this church because there is no “name it and claim it” teaching going on here. Thank you for listening to my story.”
I replied, “You don’t have to thank me. What you have said is what I believe also.”
Christ Does Not "Help" Me - And I Do Not "Help" Christ
The picture Jesus gives us concerning Himself is, “My Father works hitherto, and I work.” John gives us a revealing insight of how life worked for Jesus. He made it very clear that, “the Son did nothing of Himself” (John 14:10). This means that God, His ever-working Father, was doing the Father’s works and giving the Father’s Word through Jesus. It could have been said of Jesus, “For Me to live is the Father living,” in the same way as Paul later said, “For me to live is Christ living.”
Now the surprising thing here is not the glimpse we get of the Father being the supreme initiator and actor in Jesus, but of this also being the unfailing pattern for us, His many children - sons and daughters. We do not and indeed cannot live the Christian life on our own - just as Jesus could not do so. He lived the Life of the Father and was taken over, by that indwelling Holy Presence. He was never just Himself - He was always the Father in manifestation.
The various stages of man’s misunderstanding of God, and of his faulty reactions, are made very clear in pictures such as we get in Francis Thompson’s poem, “The Hound of Heaven.” In that masterpiece Thompson sees that in every step of his disastrous flight from God there was God’s gracious action of love and yearning for him. So toward the end of the poem Thompson asks, “Is my gloom, after all, shade of His hand outstretched caressingly?” It is only when this question is settled for each of us, and we fall into the hands of the ever-loving Pursuer, that our future becomes the unfolding of this same pursuit of love. Christ then becomes my only Life.
We often hear it preached that we need to call on Christ for HELP in our lives in times of distress. This is a well-meaning instruction but it still puts the spotlight on Christ’s strength “helping out” our own independent strength. The basic change in awareness that God is purposefully making in all Christian lives is that Christ is no longer in my life acting as my assistant, helping me to live the Christian life; He is there to do it Himself by a form of REPLACEMENT. That transition is totally without any loss of my personhood. My unique personhood is the vessel through which He acts. He becomes the living Christ through me. My illusory self-autonomy is finished.
The pattern is clear: God is in action in me. “He does the works,” as Jesus said of the Father. Of course, this is also what Jesus meant in His call to us to REST (Matthew 11:28). In this we should gladly give way to Him being the sole actor in doing the impossible through me. Life becomes a stream of consciousness of the divine Indweller as my only Life. The mystery of “Christ in you” (Col. 1:27) is brought into full clarification by Paul in Galatians 2:20 where the nature of that mystery is clearly defined - CHRIST LIVING MY LIFE.
As Luther once wrote, “God is creating a race of Christs.” We, in this way, become Christ in action. As immature Christians, we are hesitant to come to such a bold definition of faith, but it is the center and heart of Christian revelation. For all who are “in Christ”, all real living flows from this great affirmation of faith.
And as it is not a case of “help” from Christ, it is also not correct that we are “helping” Christ as we go about our good works to those around us. What does Scripture say about “our divine Performer”? “He who has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” No hint there of our “helping Him out!” What a profound relief and comfort! That day may have dawned for you already, the day when it is “no longer I, but Jesus Christ” in total charge: the day when all the heavy workload of your well-meant, but fruitless, efforts at personal performance are finished.
God’s performance in and for me is not aimed at adding to me piece-meal that which I see as so greatly lacking in myself. Actually, NOTHING is lacking. What can the new “I” have beyond a living Christ? God daily is working out the dissolving of the illusion (at some points it is a painful process!) that I am the performer, with divine assistance! The net result is that I finally see and know experimentally the whole and inner Christ as the true “I”.
So then, you ask, what is our responsibility in all this? It is without question TO BE WIDE OPEN TO THE INNER VOICE AND LEADING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT, AT ALL POINTS AND IN ALL THINGS. By this means, Christ can “be Himself” through us. He does not have to “help” us and we do not have to “help” Him.
And this opening to leading is no supreme effort on our part, but a secret delight of any soul that is aflame with love for Him. When once the fact has truly dawned on us that “He is living as the divine contents of this human vessel,” and “He is living as the divine resident of this human temple,” and “He is living as the divine sap of the Vine through this human branch,” and “He is living as the divine Master in this submissive human slave,” and that now “the government is upon His shoulders,” THEN OPENNESS TO HIM AT ALL POINTS BECOMES OUR NORMAL WAY OF LIFE.
All life centers in the natural recognition of Christ in myself, in others, and in all circumstances. There are moments when we are temporarily thrown off balance, moments when we need to use of the key of faith to get right back on track - back into the flow of Christ living as our replacement and not as our helper, and especially not us as His helper. Jesus answers the question from the disciples about our responsibility. They asked, “What shall WE DO to work the works of God?” And He replied, “This is the work of God: THAT YOU BELIEVE. . .“ (John 6). So there is nothing left for us but the simple key of faith: “This is the victory that overcomes the world. . . faith” (1 John 5:4). Not self-effort with Christ’s “help”, not “helping” Christ to convert the world in our own way, but recognition that in Christ there is nothing for us to do but be used by Him and praise Him for it.
At this point the great temptation is being occupied with self. Instead, the heart of the Christian life and experience is to see only God in yourself with the logical extension of this being that you see God dealing in infinite ways with those around you - and you are being used by Christ to them. All history is God speaking and demonstrating and man ignoring or misunderstanding the voice or the demonstrated message. That redeeming work of dealing with humans is what we feed upon. By His indwelling union with us, we are moved and sustained until the final glory discloses the full wonder of it all.
In recent years I have become more and more aware that it is a sheer impossibility to live the Christian life! Today I am convinced that it is utter foolishness to even try to produce any righteousness of our own. All efforts and well-meant intentions are in vain from His standpoint. As we grow daily in awareness of Christ becoming our very LIFE, we will reflect Him who is that Life. Only He can live it (not helping us and without our help) in us and through us, moment by moment, day by day.
This revelation has set me free and brought me to rest and peace. I have come to know my total utter helplessness and complete dependency on Him. My goal is to refuse to do anything to off-balance His Life in me. After all, Jesus Himself gives us a stern warning: “...for apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5).
I have found that there is an appointed time for everything and I could write volumes about all that has occurred during these past thirty years or so since the Master opened my eyes to Him! He never ceases to work in us, though He doesn’t usually reveal to us what will happen next. We must learn daily to rely completely on Him. I am learning daily by trial and error to spontaneously live and move and have my total being in Him.
Can you imagine and fathom this? Now I celebrate the resurrection Life of the King of the universe IN ME, His earthen vessel, His branch of the vine to bear fruit. As His glory builds more and more visible in me, may all those around me be dealt with by God to see the joyous rest, rich beyond comprehension as they CHOOSE TO BE USED - not helped or helping. And as they choose this, they will also choose not to give in to loneliness, fatigue, and emotional feelings of all kinds. “I have come that they might have LIFE more abundantly” (John 10:10). Not a life “helped” or “helping”, but a divine LIFE lived daily by Christ in this world.
Joe and Mary really didn’t know what to do about church. Joe’s parents were members of a church when he was born, and they baptized him into their church as an infant. He was educated in the church’s schools and even served at the altar during the rituals of the church.
Joe remembers attending, as a young person, all his church activities and he does have fond memories of some of these experiences. But when he evaluates his total experience at the end of it all, he feels that control and manipulation were the main objective of his parent’s church.
Joe speaks about the steady spiritual diet he was served at home, at school and at church: guilt lavishly ladled upon a bed of rules and regulations. Sermon after sermon, week after week, and year after year – the same old thing. “When you live by the rules, God loves you. When you break the rules, it separates you from Him.”
Joe did well enough in school to satisfy his parents, his pastor and his church teachers, but he became convinced that he would never be good enough for God.
In his late teens, Joe met Mary who was what some people called “unchurched”. Love blossomed and Mary joined Joe’s church to become one with him in marriage.
When Joe decided to leave his old, established church, Mary left with him because her ties were not strong there. When Joe and Mary visited his parents, sometimes he would give in and attend his old church with his parents, but he could hardly stand it. Joe did not talk religion with his parents anymore. He was burned out with his parents’ hell fire and brimstone, our-way-or-the-highway, no nonsense church.
After a few years of no-church recovery from burnout, Joe discovered a church that was heavy on prophecy and futurist teaching which Joe himself had always been interested in. Joe and Mary attended this church for quite a few years until a disillusionment set in – too much hell fire and brimstone along with more rules and regulations and immorality within church hierarchy.
Again, Joe and Mary became “unchurched”. They still considered themselves “Christian” and they still read their Bibles to stay close to God.
Some years later one of Mary’s friends invited her to a mega-church. It had been several years since Joe and Mary had set foot in any church. They felt like “some church” wouldn’t hurt them, so off they trudged with little idea of the kind of church they would visit. After two visits, they once again became disenchanted. It was a prosperity gospel church. This church spent most of the time telling its members that God wanted them to be healthy and wealthy, but as Joe and Mary checked out the hundreds of cars in the parking lot it seemed that the only ones getting rich were the pastor and his staff.
After bailing out of this think-and-grow-rich church, Joe and Mary started to feel like religious skeptics and cynics. Their friends kept saying that they were too critical, finding something wrong with every church they visited. And they started to think that their friends might be right.
They saw an advertisement for a church that sponsored revivals, so they decided that such a church might give them the spiritual kick-start they needed. The next weekend Joe and Mary found themselves in a church they now jokingly refer to as the “Heebie-Jeebie Church”. As Joe and Mary looked for a seat, people were running up and down the aisles. They stepped over two people who seemed to have passed out in the aisle, except their arms and legs occasionally twitched. Joe and Mary were later told that these people had been “slain in the spirit”. In the middle of the service a few people started to laugh uncontrollably, even though the pastor didn’t say anything Joe and Mary found remotely humorous. They later found out that such an activity is called “holy laughter”. A few of the people transitioned directly from hilarious laughter to barking like a dog. Joe and Mary left before the collection.
After that little “shot in the arm”, Joe and Mary gave up on what they called organized religion for several more years. They studied the Bible and decided to not give up searching, but they agreed to be extremely careful about church visits.
Then they were invited to attend the baptism of a relative at another mega-church. They did so and even came back for a weekend service invitation. They liked the surroundings and the worship music, but they especially liked the pastor’s sermon on the topic, “Jesus Christ Lives In You”. Joe had been discovering this very fact in his private Bible study and the concept had been changing his whole perspective on what’s important in Christianity.
It seems to Joe and Mary that this church they now attend and have joined as members is on the right track with its teaching, and that it is not involved in some wild theological or experiential goose chase. It is a church that insists upon grace over human works, and that emphasis comforts them. But they have been burned so often that they will keep a wary eye on this church which, for now, is their church home.
Get a load of this lead sentence from a recent U.S. study: “Women who go through menopause in their early 40s may have a slightly higher risk of death later on in life compared with their peers.”
Imagine it, a slightly higher risk of death later in life. Apparently, some women have a slightly lower risk of death later in life. Death must not be as inevitable as we all thought.
Hmmm. Who pays for these studies, anyway?
Actually, of course, the study itself made sense – it showed that women who go through early menopause may not live quite as long after the age of 75 as women who go through menopause later than their early 40s. The presentation was misleading – not the study. Sometimes it’s like that with the gospel too.
Presented poorly, even the gospel can be misunderstood. And sad to say, there’s a lot of that going around these days.
The gospel is actually good news. It exposes the chink that Jesus put in death’s armor. It promises a new birth and life in union with Christ, an eternal life continuing beyond death, a life rich in joy, peace, friendship and love. A life in harmony with a God who loves you and wants you with Him no matter who you are, where you’ve been or what you’ve done.
But it’s not always presented that way. Sometimes the gospel is presented as a way to get big cars, big houses and fancy clothes right now. Just “name it and claim it” people are told.
Sometimes it’s presented as an austere framework of rules and regulations overseen by an angry God who’ll roast you forever if you don’t toe the line.
Sometimes the gospel is presented as a glorious pyramid scheme in which the more pious salespeople you fast-talk into joining, the greater your eternal income will be. Jesus did say to let your light shine before men – but some believers let their pushy, memorized spiels so grate before men that given a choice, I suspect that most people would rather live next door to a used car salesman than to a Bible-thumping evangelical Christian.
If we could all do it the way Jesus said to, if we could all let our light shine in such a way that people are won over instead of put off, imagine what a positive reputation the good news could have.
If only we could present the gospel the way it really is – as a completely new life in union with Christ, a life of HIS love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (see Galatians 5:22-23) instead of as some wacky caricature that misrepresents both the gospel and Jesus.
I wonder if there might be some merit in placing our emphasis on being the kind of people who show others how to live rather than just telling people what to believe. Wouldn’t that win more people over to the real power of the gospel of a new birth in Christ?
The chink in death’s armor is love, after all, not memorized testimonies. Testimonies have their place, but it’s love – God’s love – that overthrows death and hell. And people can digest genuine, godly love a whole lot easier than fast talk, pushy questions and judgmental frowns. The proof is in the pudding, not in reciting the recipe.
Probably the next U.S. study will show that we all have a slightly higher risk of death today than we did yesterday. But because God loves us, because His Son died for us and now, if we accept Him, lives in us, death has had its teeth pulled (pardon the pun from this old dentist).
Like the old gray mare, death ain’t what it used to be. And the good news of the gospel says just that.
The harmonious relationship between the nation of Israel and evangelical Christians remains one of the most bewildering of all religious mysteries. Jews obviously welcome evangelical, political and economic support for Israel. Yet Jews remain both puzzled and offended by the fact that the same people who relentlessly support them are convicted that Jews are going to hell for eternity.
These same Christians who pour money into Israel and unequivocally support Zionism are absolutely confident that the Holy Land will soon turn into a blood bath, with rivers of blood flowing to the depth of a horse’s bridle in one valley (the result of a literal reading of Revelation 14:20). Playing an endless game of retrofitting newspaper headlines into Scripture, evangelical and fundamentalist Christians have no question that apocalyptic carnage will happen at the Second Coming. Ideas have consequences, and religious convictions have practical implications; in this case it logically follows that anyone who accepts such presuppositions must build and support the nation of Israel today so that it can be destroyed tomorrow.
There is no doubt that unending group tours arriving in Israel, filling buses that wind their way throughout Israel, are a bonanza for the Israeli economy. It makes sense that the Jewish economy welcomes tourist dollars/pounds/Euros. But it is a mystery why Jews continue to roll out the welcome mat for such tourists when one considers what the average Christian on those buses believes.
Evangelical Christian tours make their way to Megiddo so that Christians may view a valley they are persuaded will one day soon host the war to end all wars, dwarfing the horror of the Holocaust. Most of these same not so accidental tourists firmly believe that Jews will suffer eternally in hell. These are friends of Israel?
Many evangelical Christians offer unquestioning support of the nation of Israel, even at the expense of Palestinian Christians who share this land of the Bible with Jews. They assume, along with conservative Israelis, that Israel has a divine right to all the land from Egypt to Iraq.
Where do these assumptions come from – a methodology that causes them to understand biblical prophecy in one, and only one, way?
For much of my life, I lived in a prophecy-saturated religious culture. I lived in constant apprehension and fear of an impending doomsday. The “end times” biblical interpretation I was taught exercised incredible power over me – influencing my view of the future as well as my geo-political perspectives.
I was into my fifth decade on planet earth before I started to question my prophetic presuppositions. After all, they came directly from the Bible – they were the literal Word of God, why should I question them? It was a dark journey but I finally had to admit that what I had accepted without question was fatally flawed.
I discovered that what I had been taught about eschatology (the study of last things) came directly from an interpretative method of understanding the Bible begun in the United Kingdom specifically through the writings and teachings of John Nelson Darby (1800-1882).
As the 19th century came to a close, prophecy conferences became a feature of Protestant fundamentalist churches in North America as they took up Darby’s teachings. In America, Cyrus Ingerson (C.I.) Scofield (1843-1921) emerged as a leading advocate and spokesman for Darby’s interpretation, and eventually published his Scofield Reference Bible in 1909. Scofield’s Bible was what we would today call a study Bible, a Bible that featured a running commentary printed alongside biblical passages. At times it was hard to distinguish the notes from the text, so that many who used this Bible throughout the 20th century accepted the notes as Holy Writ.
The practical implications of this in the Christian world view includes the idea that Jesus cannot and will not return to our world unless and until certain events occur. Darby’s teaching is based on overly literal interpretations of prophetic passages, which may at times involve some twisting and manipulating to make passages fit its conclusions producing a prophetic “outline” or “timetable”.
In recent times, Tim LaHaye’s Left Behind series, admitted to be fiction by its co-authors, illustrates this pieced together end time scenario.
Here is a one-size-fits-all summary of what will happen “at the end.” 1. Jesus will return to Rapture millions of Christians, who will suddenly disappear from this earth. They will be saved from the physical suffering others will endure in the Great Tribulation.
2. Led by the Antichrist who bears the apocalyptic number of 666 (Revelation 13:18) and his false-prophet sidekick – a political and religious combination gains worldwide power. The exact identity of this combination morphs as our own history unfolds, with each new political reality reported in daily newspapers said to then be clearly identified in “Bible prophecy”.
3. The Antichrist terrorizes the world, causing the world to worship Satan and somehow bear his mark of 666 on their hands or forehead (Revelation 13:16-17).
4. The Antichrist moves to Jerusalem, having previously resided (at least in most versions) in Rome. The Antichrist either builds a temple or appropriates one that has been recently constructed, And at that time all hell breaks loose. Natural disasters (like those which I believe are metaphorically described in Revelation) abound.
5. As human history comes to a close, one last huge battle takes place in the valley of Armageddon with two vast coalitions of forces facing each other (Revelation 16:14,16).
6. Jesus returns (again, a second Second Coming!) with His Raptured, safe and sound saints, defeats the armies of the earth gathered in Armageddon, and the thousand-year utopia begins.
Many evangelical Christians would be surprised, perhaps even disappointed, to discover that Christianity existed for some 1800 years before this prophetic scenario came on the scene. Is it any wonder that Darby’s scenario has been embraced by many authoritarian leaders for it offers many opportunities to manipulate and control?
In the 20th century, a tragic tale of flawed and bogus predictions, all based on Darby’s ideas, have appeared. The predictions of evangelist after evangelist failed. While redactions and explanations by those who continue to support these personalities and movements rise almost to the depth of a horse’s bridle themselves, original source documents for these embarrassing gaffes are generally available.
I believe it is imperative for Christians to be made aware of the harm that can come from the teaching of Darby. Among its chief flaws: It places an inordinate emphasis on future events, and at the very least distracts from the central message of the Gospel which is Christ in us today.
It is addictive. It can turn its followers into prophecy addicts, always looking for the next “high” given to them by speculation and predictions.
It can cause people of faith to lose faith, and place blame for failed predictions with God rather than the flawed human methodology.
It appeals to fleshly interests, of assuring that one’s personal interests and family will be save from physical tribulations to be suffered by less fortunate non-believers (and believers) who do not believe cryptic prophetic insights.
It is dishonest and dysfunctional, as the same old mistakes continue to be perpetuated and taught to each new generation of believers.
It teaches, without qualification or disclaimer, that Christian believers will be Raptured before the world at large goes to “hell in a handbasket”. The tribulation and coming horrific sufferings are primarily described from a North American and European perspective. It promotes a nationalistic and egocentric view of the Bible and fails to acknowledge the tribulations that much of the rest of the world suffered in the 20th century. The implicit idea in such teaching is that the biblical tribulation doesn’t happen until North American and European Christians are affected.
We might call what I have described as “Christian Zionism” – the Christian support of Zionism based on overly literal and futurist interpretations of Old Testament prophecies (particularly Ezekiel and Daniel), along with those of the New Testament book of Revelation. This interpretative method can lead Christians to give virtually unqualified support of the sovereign state of Israel.
Both political and religious authorities have played on the fears of conservative Christians – or rather, the toxic and heady brew of Darby has infiltrated and subverted both church and state.
If you or a loved one has even fallen prey to the idea that present day nations and political leaders are “named” in the Bible, it is tough to release yourself from such addiction. I know from my own experience.
Chances are you have heard this little theological maxim that masquerades as solid biblical advice but is loaded with unbiblical assertions (if you are like me you actually once believed it):
“Work as if it all depends on you; pray as if it all depends on God.”
This little gem is the theological equivalent of having your cake and eating it too. This axiom is a flawed assumption that we can hedge our heavenly bets, so that just in case God’s grace isn’t enough to cover us, we will be able to present our own righteous deeds to God. As if!
Does anyone really think that God has a Grace credit card that might max out? As if the sins have been so outrageous this month the requests for forgiveness so excessive that the plastic of his Grace credit card is just to hot to handle. As if any minute now, a vice-president from the Bank of Grace might call God to tell Him that His account is over-drawn.
This kind of fuzzy thinking and shallow misrepresentation of God is religious doubletalk. A Christian’s account with God has the top security software protecting it. No one can condemn us if Christ is with us and in us (Romans 8:1). God will never forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). And nothing can separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:39).
Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross was the once and for all payment for all of the sins of mankind forever, the debt has been paid, and we don’t need to worry about God’s heavenly Bank of Grace declaring “Chapter 11”.
So what is all this stuff about working as if it all depends on us? Do we actually think that a human insurance policy, underwritten by our deeds and performance, can actually work like an overdraft on our spiritual account in the event that God’s grace fails?
It seems to me that some would have us believe (often in the name of religion) that God is ladling out His grace in measured quantities – somewhat like the stereotypical stingy cook in the high school cafeteria line. There’s only so much grace to go around, and when the pot of grace is empty, then there certainly won’t be any seconds – in fact there may not be enough to go around for everyone to have a first serving. And, according to some, those who have earned all of the brownie points and merit badges religious institutions can fabricate are at the head of the line, How convenient.
Guess who, according to Jesus, is at the head of the line in the grace cafeteria? “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:31-32).
I know that some who advance the teaching, “Work as if it all depends on you; pray as if it all depends on God” sincerely believe that God will help you if you are really trying hard. Of course their idea is that God is impressed with our attempts to be good and before stepping in to help us God wants us to show Him our desire to do the right thing.
The problem with this teaching is that it is still rooted in the thought that what we do makes some contribution to our salvation. Such a teaching is completely at odds with “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works so that no one can boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).
If you accept that we should “Work as if it depends on you; pray as if it depends on God”, then it is a short journey to even deeper and more toxic religious swamps whose inhabitants believe: “God helps those who help themselves.” As if!! The truth is the exact opposite – God helps us because we cannot help ourselves.
Then where DO works come in? Doesn’t the Bible tell us to “be good” and to “live a good life”? Remember these points about “good works”:
1. Good works come only AFTER salvation – after you come to the realization that you can’t be good, that you need forgiveness and a Savior and Lord of your life. Any apparent good works done before salvation have as their root the wrong motivation.
2. We can still have wrong motives for our good works AFTER salvation when they are done with the motive of trying to please God and make Him love us more – this is called legalism.
3. The motive for true good works after salvation is the knowledge that God loves you no matter what you do because He has made you forever His child in His Family. Therefore, you love Him back with the love of Christ within you by daily learning the lifestyle of the Family of God (which IS good works!).
The maxim at the beginning of this article can better be stated: PRAY – because it all depends on God. WORK – because God loves you eternally and depends on you to show His love to those around you in your own little world.
