Category Archives: My Past

Salvation and rewards

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Is salvation cheap? In some ways it is. In fact it is free because it is a gift of God. This upsets some folks and they just don’t think it’s fair or right. Of course it cost Jesus the ultimate price to give us the gift of salvation. But for us it’s free, it can only be received.

But some say, “Well, the devils believe in Jesus”. Someone said that to me yesterday. There’s a verse that says, “You believe in one God? You do well; the devils also believe and tremble.” (James 2:19) It doesn’t say they “believe in Jesus”, there. Certainly the demons in the spiritual world are knowledgeable that there is a God and when Jesus was on earth some of them said to Him, “We know who you are, the Son of God.” (Luke 4:34) But personally I would never say, “the devils believe in Jesus.”

A verse that was priceless to me at the very beginning of my salvation was this one. “But as many as received him, to them he gave power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.” (John 1:12)

That’s exactly what happened to me. In my experience of having Jesus dawn in my life, it was “receiving” Him that brought to me a power in my innermost heart and soul that had been so completely missing before that.

Sin had had dominion over me in such a complete and overpowering way. But through some dear young teen-aged Jesus People sharing the Bible with me, I came to know of the path of salvation. So I came to Jesus.

But in my case, “believing” in Him was utterly united and linked to “receiving” Him, as that verse says. Receiving Him by actually verbally inviting Him into my heart and life, after my friends showed me John 1:12 and other verses, like Revelation 3:20, where the Lord said He would come in to us.

Some say, in fact someone said to me yesterday, that this is not enough. But it certainly was for me. It wasn’t some mental thing, a glib recitation of some lines of rhetoric. It was the cry of my heart to the throne of God. And God answered. Jesus did come into my heart. I did become “a new creature in Christ Jesus” (II Corinthians 5:17). I was “born again”. (John 3:3)

But Mark, is that all?!

Well, no, of course not; that’s not all. My life is an example of that in that I’ve gone on from that event (when I was 21) to an incredible life of joy and Christian service that’s still fresh and exhilarating many decades after my original born again experience.

But I think I know what some are concerned about.  I guess it could be called accountability. They’re concerned that someone can just almost trick God, “say the magic words” and then skate home free all the way to heaven, while living the same hellish life that most people do in this world.

No, that’s not how it works. For one, I can tell you that I’ve virtually never run into a person like that who has prayed to receive Jesus. Those who do instinctively come to God with a reverence, already knowing their desperate need and that there is a God and His Son who are there to help and answer.

My life and the life of my friends has been based primarily around witnessing and soul winning. That’s what Jesus called His disciples to 2000 years ago and what the original Jesus Movement of the early 70’s was fundamentally about. So I spent many years witnessing on the streets in places like Hollywood Boulevard, Sunset Strip, Trafalgar Square in London, Dam Square in Amsterdam and later in Vienna, Budapest, India, Indonesia and on from there, endeavoring to lead souls to Christ with the message of salvation.

It’s a spiritual thing. It’s something that the Lord does through you and with you and it’s a very serious time when you’re trying to win people to Him. The Lord gives you enough discernment to know whether the ones you are witnessing to are receiving what you are saying and are receptive or whether they are shallow and playing games. So in my experience, I don’t think I’ve run into almost any people who were just insincerely, nonchalantly reciting a prayer instead of really coming to God in prayer for His help and salvation.

But then, you ask, “What happens next?” Well, for so many I know, they really had an experience with the Lord and were astounded by the change in their lives. Like the apostle Peter wrote, “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the Word that you may grow thereby.” (I Peter 2:2)

That’s what happened to me; I immediately had a huge appetite to study the Bible and to feed from it spiritually. My friends were there to help me and I just gulped down all I could, day after day and it became the new main source of knowledge and truth for me from that day on.

But I know what some are driving at. What about if someone just tries to go on their merry way, no sign of change, no different from what they were before? Of course I would question them about the depth and reality of the prayer they prayed, if that happened. But, to cut to the chase, let’s say that something like that does happen. Are they saved? Will they go to heaven? Have they sort of “pulled a fast one” on God?

This is where rewards come in. I’m convinced that there will be folks in heaven, perhaps a lot of them, with not a whole lot of rewards. They had saving faith. They believed in God, they believed that Jesus was the Son of God and in the basics of what Christ said and did. Maybe they went to church. Sometimes they prayed or even knew a little from the Bible.

But the vast and main thrust of their lives was for this world, the things of this world, the pleasures of this world, and the goals of this world. Jesus and God were in no way first place. What’s God going to do with people like that? Send them to hell? They were actually believers.

Maybe it’s like Jesus said to one group of believers in the book of Revelation, “You have a name, you live and are dead.” (Revelation 3:1) Some people, probably very many people are like this. For some the Lord in His mercy sends along chastening, bereavement, tribulation, tests and purgings to try to get them to turn to Him and away from their sins. Sometimes this works. He has to smash their idols, just as He did with the people of Israel in ancient times.

If we are truly one of His children but we are not following forward with the path and leading that He is calling us to in this life, then He will very definitely send along chastening to our straying ways. There are oodles of promises in God’s Word about that. But getting back to the original issue, still the bottom line and opening paragraph comes back to “belief”. This is repeated over and over in the Word. That’s the beginning and the requirement. “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved.” (Acts 16:31)

Shedding the blood of war in peace

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Some people crack up very easily. The slightest provocation, a hint of disagreement and they just freak out. For some, they take a dive into depression. Others burst forth with a stream of accusations against the person they felt offended by. Sometimes it even goes beyond words to physically violence and death, all because of some perceived slight, something taken the wrong way that was never meant or should have never been blown up to what it was.

Yes, certainly sometimes it was more than a perceived slight. It was long term oppression and injustice and people are outraged about that. I’ll get to that in a moment.

But, about people freaking out and cracking up very easily, you might be one who says, “Happens all the time”. Yes, it does. And the damage done to friendships, families, lives, children, marriages, societies and even nations is often close to irreparable. Some of this gets personal for me. I’ve had a good life in many ways. But also I have seen this kind of destructive behavior up close and have experienced the long term devastation that is not just hurtful but damages almost beyond redemption the souls, hearts and lives it touches.

Jesus said one time, “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God.” (Matthew 5:9) In my life, I’ve seen a lot of “domestic warfare”, I guess it could be called. And from seeing this, I came to where I felt the most important thing in life was the wisdom of the heart rather than the intelligence of the mind. I’d seen a lot of smart people who ruined the lives of others without regrets because they were “so smart” but they didn’t care how much they hurt their loved ones, how much they brought disruption to their families.

I have always been in a family that believed in changing the world , that there are serious problems around us in our societies and in the world, injustices that need to be exposed and addressed, causes worth fighting for, staying stirred up about and sacrificing for.

But then, how do you do that? How do you actually address those things, whether in your personal family or in society at large? How vehement do you get? What “weapons” do you use? Are there any tactics that are not allowed? Is there any need for accuracy and truthfulness in what we say and do?  Or is it more important to just be as raw and visceral as you want to be and then let the chips fall where they may? What sacrifices are worth making in order to reach your goal?

There are so many factors in this, so many tangents that could be gone down and explored. But I’ll use an example from history where this subject and difficulty is highlighted. An ancient king, David, had a most trusted and loyal commander of his armed forces, his own cousin Joab. But ultimately, David said of Joab that he had “shed the blood of war in peace”. (I Kings 2:5) Joab murdered a rival military leader in Israel, Abner, who had been the leader of the forces of King Saul.

But it was uncalled for, unprovoked, unnecessary and unwise. The murder of Abner could have easily brought Israel into full civil war between those still loyal to Saul’s regime and the new one of King David. Joab shed the blood of war in peace. He murdered his rival and ultimately Joab was sentenced to death for his crime. He wasn’t in some battle against those bent on destroying his people; he just committed murder because of jealously and rivalry. He shed the blood of war in peace.

But many today do just what Joab did. They fly off the handle at the drop of the hat and feel utterly justified in doing it. Usually it doesn’t end up as a murder but then sometimes it does. But if they don’t commit murder, their words spoken in haste and without love or wisdom go out as firebrands and stick in the hearts of ones who are often friends or loved ones. David’s son, Solomon, said, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue”. (Proverbs 18:21) Words are real things, they bless or they curse, they lift up or they drag down. Jesus even said that we will give an account one day of every word we have spoken.

Again, to remember the words of an ancient king and poet, “I am for peace. But when I speak, they are for war.” (Psalms 120:6) Today I see a lot of vehement people. I even agree with a lot of what they say and the way they see things. There are things that need to be changed, things that have been tolerated for far too long. A good measure of vehemence and righteous exasperation is needed in order to keep some of these subjects on the boil until changes have been made and corners turned.

But I do fear that behind the words and in the hearts of at least some of these folks there is more than just a call for change and justice. There is hatred and vengeance. And a determination to achieve domination over ones they perceive to be utterly evil. I often feel that nothing short of full capitulation and surrender in a most complete sense by their perceived enemies will satisfy a number of these who have grievances. And again you could say, “What’s new? It’s been going on for thousands of years.”

Well, I am for peace. I am for conflict resolution. I’m for standing up to injustice. I’m also for living peaceable with all men. Sadly, I don’t think we are going to have that level of wisdom, unity and civility in this world we have now. It will only happen at the return of “the Prince of Peace“. (Isaiah 9:6) Meanwhile, I am going to do what I can to live within the peace and wisdom of God as much as I can in my interactions with others. And I hope to persuade all I can to do the same.

Ageism

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In her 70’s, my mom said, “I’m old. But I’m not old-old.” But it’s sad and wrong to discriminate against anyone because of their age. And “ageism” is the relatively new word for this. Discrimination is a hurtful but very common thing, worldwide. You’ve heard of “racism”, I’ve written about that several times. And “sexism” is now a common word, usually meaning discrimination against women. But ageism is just as hurtful and also just not smart or even productive.

Both of my parents made it well into their 90’s. It runs in their families. My mom in particular never “lost it” mentally in any way and hardly lost it physically much at all until the last month of two of her life. In earlier generations it was not uncommon that by the time someone hit 60, they were really considered old and were sometimes at the edge of their families who treated them with detached aloofness at times. And often they died sad and alone. Progress has been made in these things and in more recent times there is more concern in many societies for “the elderly”.

But I have to admit I probably could be considered in that category at times, as are now many of my friends. How’s that working for me? Actually, it’s probably a surprise to younger readers but it’s really not too bad. If I go about things wisely, I’ve felt very little drop off in my physical abilities and vitality compared to twenty or more years ago. I’ve got a host of “irons in the fire” and “pots on the stove” that keep me busier than I almost can keep up with. I’m doing fine, as far as I’m concerned.

But it’s disheartening to run into manifestations of ageism. It seems  some folks think that people in their 60’s and 70’s are unquestionably “over the hill”. There’s that hint of condescension from some who try to be polite but you are left with the feeling that they secretly wish we’d just go away. Or at least we’d go someplace else where we are not seen or where we don’t interfere with the way things should be run and done in these times.

Sad stuff. Of course not everyone is like that. But ageism is just as real in our times and felt by folks just as much as is racism or sexism. It’s a waste of human resources as well as a lack of vision. What some short sighted people don’t get is the wealth of knowledge and experience that “older people” have gained. Certainly some folks who are into their 60’s are not able to do as much physically as they did before. But on the other hand many of them are really doing just fine and have a lot of gas in the tank and fire in the belly. The Bible says, “A grey head is a crown of glory, if it be found in the way of righteousness.” (Proverbs 16:31)

But it’s just the inborn sinful nature of mankind to discriminate, to “judge according to the flesh” (John 8:15) and “look on the outward appearance” (I Samuel 16:7), rather than the heart. Also, it must be said that some people “faint in their minds” (Hebrews 12:3), as they grow older. “Where there is no vision the people perish” (Proverb 28:18) and this can happen to people as they age. They give up spiritually and also give up mentally and physically.

However, not everyone does that. In the Bible, Caleb, at the age of 85 famously said, “I’ll take the mountain” (Joshua 14:10-12) and he led his tribe up the mountain in military conquest of the land promised to the Jews in the years after Moses.

It’s cruelty, discrimination and a lack of godly wisdom to let ageism affect your views, especially if you are a Christian who is dealing with and shepherding other Christians. If there is any place in this world where compassion and empathy should triumph, it is in Christian circles. So when there is discrimination and segregation according to age that goes on in Christian fellowships, it is particularly hurtful and unwise as well.

“But Mark, aren’t you creating division here? In saying these things you are dividing the body of Christ and encouraging division.”

I’ve thought about that. But if a person of color experiences racism, is it wrong of him to mention it? Or if a woman experiences sexism, should she remain silent? In the same way, I mean to cause no division by mentioning the fact that ageism exists. Rather, I hope that by talking about these things we can overcome them together and heal any divisions.

It takes a mature, seasoned person to not default to ageism when it comes to Christian shepherding. You just naturally want to hang out with your kind of folks. “Old people” can just seem like a drag if you”re not looking at things with the eyes of the Lord. But this is opposite of the ways of God’s Spirit. Paul said to Timothy, “Let no man despise your youth” (I Timothy 4:12). I think we can certainly say conversely to the ones who are 60 and older, “Let no man despise your age.”

*****

 One final thought: we’re all sinners; we’ve all been guilty of these things. Racism, sexism and ageism are part of the inborn sinful nature of mankind and all of us have been guilty of these things, and more, at one time or the other. So if you’ve been affected by ageism, it’s good to remember that. Jesus said, if someone sins against us, that we are to “go and tell him his fault” (Matthew 18:15) between he and you alone. Getting self righteous, bitter and unforgiving are some of the easy sins that those who’ve been sinned against can easily fall into. Lord help us all to forgive and strive for love and unity.

The Coral snake in the driveway

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Yesterday there was a big Coral snake in the driveway. We killed it. Coral snakes are the most poisonous snakes in my part of the world, more poisonous than rattle snakes. It wouldn’t really have been right at the time to say, “Oh, don’t worry. Don’t be afraid. Everything is going to be alright.”

No, at that moment the danger was real. Waiting until the snake was biting your foot would not have been a good idea. Clear, immediate action was needed to eliminate the danger, and in this case it was to kill the snake. This can all seem so simple and basic that it doesn’t even deserve discussion. But in these times, with very real and deadly danger upon so many nations, it’s an object lesson in how to react to this.

Certainly there are times to say, “Oh, don’t be afraid, don’t worry.” Certainly there are times to “Just trust the Lord.” But somewhere in most people is a modicum of what we nowadays call “common sense”. It’s not right 100% of the time but on the other hand it often is. And just knowing when to go with the simplest and most childlike reaction to things can turn out to really be the wisdom of God in some situations.

But when things get a little more complicated than a Coral snake in the driveway, that’s when it becomes more difficult to discern truth from falsehood and reality from something conjured up in our minds or in the minds of others. It seems to me like the snake yesterday was almost allegorical of the present crisis. That snake was real. It wasn’t a hoax, it wasn’t a conspiracy, it didn’t have an agenda, it didn’t come from the Left or the Right or a foreign power. In was utterly real; it was deadly, alive and on the property.

At times like that, if ever, our most basic being needs to be working properly, our minds clear, our heart in the right place and our practical understanding fully functioning. And, I should add, we’re hearing from God. It’s a matter of life and death. For many if not most of us in these times and in the affluent West, we haven’t almost ever run into situations like this. But we have now. The snake is in the driveway. It doesn’t really matter where it came from. It doesn’t really matter if some neighbor put it there, it doesn’t seem to be the time to really get cerebral about it all.

To me at least there’s a parallel to the greater picture of our present crisis. There’s just real wisdom to, in certain situations, being very practical and not procrastinating. “Hesitate and all is lost” is a saying many of us have heard. Practical common sense yesterday was to just run get a shovel and smash the thing. It was that dangerous. Similarly in these times, those who survive, individuals and societies, are the ones who recognize the danger, recognize also what the needed response should be, and then do it.

Admittedly, every situation may not be as simple and clear as a poisonous snake in front of us. This pandemic is full of unknowns. This disease is primarily new and confronting it is not as simply as running to get the shovel. It is worldwide or becoming so. There are no extremely simply, unarguable methods in how to deal with it. But there are some lessons and parallels.

For one, focus. If there suddenly had been a big discussion and argument about what path to take as the snake slithered towards the house, that would not have been smart. Some could argue for the rights of the snake, the moral implications of whether it should be killed or not. Sides could be taken and more time spend on who was to blame, why this had happened, if we were seeing things the right way, is there an agenda, if the snake was even there or not and who could end up wining the high ground with their viewpoint on the crisis that was there on the ground.

King Solomon said, “The prudent man foresees the evil and hides himself, but the simple pass on and are punish.” (Proverbs 27:12) We could even apply the words of Jesus here when He said, “A strong man armed keeps his goods in peace.” (Luke 11:21) I’m very thankful in these times for the practical-minded scientific and medical communities who are often working around the clock to try to find genuine real solutions to this crisis that can save lives and help make it so that this doesn’t turn into the kind of thing that happened in earlier centuries when 100’s of millions of people died from various kinds of plagues. “Oh, don’t worry! It can’t happen here” is all too easy a thought and reaction to that possibility. But I’m pretty sure it definitely can and in some places and ways it already has gone rather far that direction.

May God help us all to be clear minded, unprejudiced, not too cerebral, political or holding on to old prejudges in this very real time. Lord help us to move fast when we need to, to not procrastinate or overestimate our safety and underestimate the dangers that are about. And may the Lord help us to pull together, to love our neighbors, walk in wisdom and even be led of Him so we can make it through this time that is unprecedented in the lives of almost all of us.

Should Christians be passive?

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There is a time for every purpose under heaven. So said a famous song, quoting from King Solomon. So there is a time for believers to do more than fold their hands and pray. There is a time for that, certainly. But, equally, there’s a time to take action in the real world, to put feet to your prayers and deeds to your faith.

This goes against the grain of so many believers in these times. Part of the crippling weakness of so many people of faith currently is that they’ve been conditioned to believe that there’s very little they should do besides pray. Of course, prayer is vitally important, essential, necessary and even required. But nowadays it just escapes most believers that there would be any more than prayer that God would want from us.

I could cite innumerable examples from the Word of God where believers were commanded to take action in real time to do God’s will in this world. In one situation even, some people were praying when the Lord spoke, asking them why they were praying when there was sin to be confronted. “And the Lord said, ‘Get up, why do you lie there upon your face? Israel has sinned.” (Joshua 7:10)

Probably most believers know (if they know much about the Bible) that it’s full of commandments to action, not just prayer. “Go into all the world.” “Roll away the stone.” “Teach all nations”. “Visit the fatherless and widows.” And on and on it goes.

So why doesn’t that resonate with believers today? Why is prayer all they think they can and should do? Are they lazy? Fearful? Complacent? Do they think that all the admonitions through the centuries to Godly activism are now all in the past? Do they think, “All we need to do today is be good citizens, acquire wealth and after that give a little to charity and missions” ?No, we should just pray and “Trust the Lord”. “The Lord knows”, I’m often told.What a sad delusion and compromisers’ limbo has the vast majority of modern nominal Christianity fallen into.

Most of us have heard of “The Salvation Army” and many people, Christian or not, respect the work they do with homeless people and the dregs of society in our times. But few know that in the late 1800’s Salvation Army workers were being killed on the streets of Europe, martyred for the work they were doing at that time. What were they doing? Well, for one, they were some of the most adamant and extremist folks there were when it came to fighting against the greatest plague on society of that time, the demon of drink.

One of the most famous Christian fighters of those times against drinking was Carrie Nation, a 6 foot tall woman who became famous for walking into bars in the US in the late 1800’s with a hachet (!) which she used with vigor to do all the damage she could as frightened patrons and bartenders looked on.

Don’t laugh. Yes, alcohol in our time has been far eclipsed by a host of seemingly worse things, cocaine for decades and now the opioids crisis. But back in the 1890’s, alcohol ruined countless families and was the bane and scourge of generations, rather like it is still in parts of eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to this day.

Did the Salvation Army offer “thoughts and prayers” back then? I’m sure they did. But the Christian activists of those times who went into bars and starting destroying the places are perhaps reminiscent of Jesus going into the temple in Jerusalem with a whip. Seems to be a pretty good example there of the Lord Himself getting active against a prevailing evil of His time when He was here on earth.

And certainly it can be mentioned with this that the Civil Rights movement in the southern USA in the 1960’s was frequently led by ordained ministers, black and white. These ones came to feel that simply praying against the racism and injustice that had prevailed for so long was just not all that the Lord wanted them to do. There is no greater example of that than Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer could be mentioned, one of the most famous modern martyrs who stood up against the Nazis in World War II and was killed by them shortly before the end of the war. Ordained minister and theologian, Bonhoeffer choose to speak and act with passion against the Nazi regime, becoming well known in the 1930’s for his opposition to the doctrines and actions of the Nazis.

If there is anything Jesus wasn’t, He wasn’t passive. And He didn’t command His disciples to be passive. But maybe it’s like Paul said in one place, “To will is present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not.” (Romans 7:18) We do want to be led of the Lord in what we are doing, not just do a bunch of feverish good works and helping needy causes of which there are so many. “But wisdom is profitable to direct”. (Ecclesiastes 10:10)

I guess sometimes it’s like the saying, “The boat has to be in motion for the rudder to take effect.” There seems to be a paucity of Christians really willing and ready to get “in motion”, to stand up like the Salvation Army, Martin Luther King and Dietrich Bonhoeffer did, at the forefront of the moral and spiritual crises that are also now everywhere in our times.

And to bring this all back home, I personally am facing some of these things right now. I’m looking to the Lord about things going on in my part of the world, appalling, infuriating things that are beyond the political and are fully into the spiritual sphere, which need spiritual warriors to confront and expose what’s happening. Or so it seems to me. I’ll try to keep you updating as I look to the Lord about what my reaction and actions should be in the next months. God bless you and God help us all.

Godly weirdness

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If you’re going to be Godly, you may end up having to be weird. It’s just the way the world is now. It’s not really that the Godly are weird, it’s that the world is weird and contorted against the ways of God. So if you follow God, then you are going to look twisted to the majority.

I come from a weird family. What do I mean by that? It was weird when I was growing up not to use “the N word”. (Google it if you don’t know what that means.) Out of 500 kids in my school in central Texas, I was the only one that didn’t regularly use that word. Of course back then everyone in my school was white; no brown or black kids at all. This was before integration of the schools.

So I got mocked by everyone for saying “Negro”, which was the accepted non-racist word that was used back then. I was a little weird. But my folks told me how that hating people because of the color of their skin was wrong and evil, even though most of my friends who did were all Christians and went to church while my family were not Christians.

I grew up being just a little bit proud of being from a weird family. I realized that the modern majority may not hold the moral, ethical high ground; in fact they often don’t. Then in university I experienced the shocking event of nearly dying and finding out that there is a spiritual world, an eternity that we pass into, ready or not. It was the biggest shock of my life and it put me on the path to becoming a radical Christian some months later.

You could think, “OK, now he won’t be weird anymore. He’s going to be a nice, normal Christian, settle into society and be like everyone else.”

Nope, not at all. I actually found that, if you look to the Bible and history, Christianity is full of weirdoes! “Peculiar people” (I Peter 2:9), as the Bible actually says we are to be. Jesus, (was He the greatest weirdo of all?), said to His motley crew of followers, “Because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.” (John 15:19) What? Christians are called by Jesus to be “out of the world”?! We are not of this world?!

My experience up to that time was that the Christians I knew were usually the most worldly, conformist, bland people I ever met! But here in the Bible I’m finding other weirdoes like myself! People who went against the status quo of their day when the majority were proponents of hatred, unbelief, injustice and utter Godlessness.

I learned about some pretty weird people in the Bible and church history, people who were rejected and mocked by the majorities of their generation and who often ended up paying for their Godly weirdness with their lives. No greater example can be found than Jesus Himself. His flesh and blood brothers thought He was weird and they tried to straighten Him out. But Jesus said to them, “The world cannot hate you but Me it hates, because I testify of it that the works thereof are evil.” (John 7:7)

So I guess all my life, running in the background has been that little awareness that I’m weird. But I’ve been ok with it because I have felt that it’s more important to stand on the side of truth, justice, love and the cause of righteousness than it is to be accepted by “this present evil world”. (Galatians 1:4)

But not everyone looks at it this way and it’s a tremendous struggle for many Christians to rise above their desire to be accepted and thought well of by their surrounding worldly neighbors.

This is what happed to Lot in Sodom and Gomorrah. Here’s what Peter the Apostle said about Lot. “But that righteous man, dwelling among them [the people of Sodom], in seeing and hearing, did vex his righteous soul from day to day with their ungodly deeds.” (II Peter 2:8)

Lot and his family probably seemed weird to the people of Sodom. But it sounds like Lot, although he didn’t partake in their sins, was pretty much compromised where he was, like so very many Christians are becoming more and more in our times. Finally, in Lot’s case, the angels had to come down and just forcibly take his family out of Sodom before its utter destruction at the hand of God.

And maybe I need to add a little something for balance. We all should know that there is “good weirdness” and “bad weirdness”. Just being constantly anti-social, contrary, freaky and difficult to be around is certainly not what I am talking about here. It’s about holding truths, values and deeds that reflect the ways of God, which are so often thought of as weird when any of us dare to be different and go against the status quo.

Are you weird? Are your values at odds with the values and deeds of our present world? Are you compromised with the world because you don’t want to stand out and be different from others? Or are you like the heroes and heroines of faith in the Bible and history who were not “conformed to this world”? (Romans 12:2)

If you’re willing to buck the tide and stand up for the ways of God, you’ll be blessed in this life and the one to come. It can be lonely at times but then the Lord can bring you into contact with other weirdoes like yourself, “sheep in the midst of wolves” (Matthew 10:16), as the Lord said. It’s way better to flock together with the sheep than to run with the wolves and snakes of this world when you actually aren’t one of them.

If this be weirdness, make the most of it.

Stay weird, my friends.

 

Heart Attack Blessings?

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Two days ago I had a heart attack. Last night I got back from the hospital I was rushed to where I had a stent placed in a vein. It’s been a very  (…)  time; I don’t even know what word to use to describe it. But I’m left here realizing what an amazing and loving God we have and how I’ve just survived, utterly by the His grace, an event that kills millions every year. And, strangely, there’s an emerging element of supernatural blessing and divine purpose in what’s happened to me over the last 36 hours.

I was fixing my lunch just after finishing a rather vigorous workout that I do at home. And I began to realize I was having a strange pain in the middle of my chest, unlike any I’d ever had before. I went to look up the symptoms of a heart attack and many of them I didn’t have: pain in my left arm or jaw, excessive sweating, shortness of breath, and others. But there was definitely a discomfort in my chest that didn’t go away.

After some hesitation, I talked to a dear friend who rents me the room in the place where I stay. He was busy but I told him it was an emergency. With difficulty I told him that I thought I was having a heart attack and needed to go to an emergency room. God bless him, he immediately dropped everything and we were off in the car right away.

At the emergency room things really swung into quick action. They did an EKG and the doctor said that I’d had, or was having, a heart attack. All during this time I wasn’t really feeling super bad. They ask me what my pain was on the scale of 1 to 10 and I said about 2 or 3 but that it was more discomfort than really pain. But it certainly was discomfort.

The emergency room people immediately took me in an ambulance to one of the main cardiac hospitals in our small Texas city. I actually was in fairly good spirits and was conversant with people in the ambulance and once I got to the hospital. Admittedly the thought did cross my mind, “Well, am I going to die now? I don’t feel really bad.”

It all was moving very fast. And I knew the reason for this as I’d read in the past how it does really come down to a matter of time in these situations. During this time one super busy nurse told me “Minutes are muscle” and the goal is to try to intervene before the damaged heart muscle really gets worse or the overall problem escalates.

What they did was to insert a stint through a hole in my wrist, up into my heart. I learned later that an EKG is able to identify the quadrant of the heart where the problem is. But then they insert some kind of dye in that area and by seeing how it interacts, they can identify exactly what the place is that needs the stint.

And I learned that this is not all actually about big arteries but about the smaller veins that run along the outside of the heart and supply blood to the heart itself. One of those veins had become blocked and needed the stint.

But here’s where it gets interesting. The big arteries that carry blood in and out of the heart could be seen like very big highways. But the veins are like smaller city streets, some bigger and some smaller. The place where my vein was blocked was what could be like a somewhat smaller street. They were able to identify it and put the stint in so blood could flow again. Within less than an hour after the operation, I was beginning to feel ok again and not having those symptoms.

And here’s the eerie thing, what they told me today. While I was on the operating table, when the doctors used that dye to find where the blockage had happened, they found another “bigger street” vein that was still functioning but was 90% blocked.

My cardiologist had not been able to know that without doing the stint work that was done yesterday during the operation. So they said very definitely that I need to come in and discuss another similar operation to get a stint into the vein that is 90% blocked. But if this incident yesterday hadn’t happened, we would not have known how badly that one is blocked and that vein is larger and more strategically placed than the one that went bad yesterday. This heart attack was used by God to bring to light a more serious condition I’ve had which no one was aware of until now.

I’m still personally coming to grips with all this. In Texas you can be bitten by a rattle snake. It may not kill you but it certainly can. Or your house can be hit by a tornado. It may not kill you but it certainly can. And 36 hours ago I had a heart attack. It may not kill you but it certainly can.

But here I am, back at my desk, in my room and not really at a place yet where I’ve fully fathomed what has happened to me. And it seems like it was, so strangely, almost an act of Providence that this till-now unknown blockage of a vein on my heart could be made known, so that it can be operated on.

What kind of comment can be made to this? What an experience of underserved mercy and prescient providence to allow something like this to happen. I think of the many people who have been praying for me. I think of the open doors of ministry that the Lord has given me over the last few months and years. I think of how my life on this earth could have come to its end over the last 2 days. But God has turned it all into something good. “Oh the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out.” (Romans 11:33)

 

More Stumps

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In the article before this I wrote about stumps in the garden. But, sometimes, you’re the stump. You’ve been utterly cut off, as far as you can tell. Deserted by friends or family, afflicted in health, ruined in reputation and with seemingly no real reason to even keep on living. You’ve been cut off at the ground, like a tree that’s been chopped down.

Sound familiar? Going through that now? Or know someone who is? Truth be known, I’ve been through that a few times in my life. It didn’t just seem like the end, it was the end. Yeah, I still was alive but all I held dear had come crashing down or was taken from me. I was cut off and my life was a disaster and ruined.

Thankfully, by the mercy of God, I somehow held on. I think one of the reasons is that my original first experience in coming to the Lord was so horrific and extreme that actually nothing since that time has been like that. So even though I’ve been through some real cuttings off, endings and final scenes, it wasn’t like what the Lord brought me through before I came to Him and His love and truth.

Maybe you say that I use this analogy a lot, like in posts such as “Broken branches” or “Green leaves holding on.” But God can sometimes really speak to us through the creation we see around us and He often will if we listen.

We all go through endings, in this life. Winters, fiascos, ignominy, complete failures, utter rejections and personal debacles. We are cut off, like a tree, and seemingly nothing is left. And, oh, how the devil likes to take center stage at that moment and claim us, telling us that it really is the end, that our goose is cooked and there’s no other alternative but to take our life. I won’t go into this since I wrote about it recently in “Suicide”.

But there’s another ending to the story. There is a happy ending and actually we can claim it. God is “the author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2) and He is the God of happy endings. Our job is just to hold on. If we hold on through these Gethsemanes, followed by what seem like crucifixions, He is able to raise us up again, as He did His only Son , to heights of victory and deliverance that are truly beyond our wildest dreams.

JobI’m not just talking here, I’ve been through it. A few times. And plenty of people in the Bible did as well. Job’s wife told him, in his miserable affliction to “curse God and die!” (Job 2:9) But he didn’t. Job held on through that incredible humbling and breaking so that God was able to deliver him from his sins of self righteousness and he ended up being doubly blessed.

Twenty years ago I thought my life was over. I felt I’d been a failure as a missionary and rejected by my friends and co-workers. I went back to my “Egypt”, got a secular job and just gave up on myself. But God hadn’t given up on me. If you want an amazing story from that time, you can read my testimony of “Strange, very strange. But true”. That was one of the incredible experiences I had back then where the Lord showed me that He wasn’t through with me, even if I’d been thrown on the scrapheap by others.

It’s possible that’s where you are now. Even fruitful trees go through seasons and we all go through our “winters” when it looks like we are dead stumps. But if you hold on and keep on believing, the Lord can and will bring a spring to you, perhaps one greater than you’ve ever experienced.

Like the stumps we’ve all seen which have new branches growing out of them, that’s a message to each of us of what God can and will do in our lives. It’s a test of faith. It’s a test of “walking by faith and not by sight.” But it’s all part of the making of a man or woman of God.

Are you a stump, cut off, abandoned by your family, mocked by ones who should love you, without hope except for the Word of God and the truths of the Bible? Hold on. Hold on to the truth of God’s Word and His promises. “Having done all, to stand” (Ephesians 6:13). Like I wrote about in “The Stand”.

When I came to the Lord, a long time ago now, a verse that stood out to me so much as being a truth I experienced when I’d been in the very fires of hell at times in months before, was this. “There has no temptation taken you but such as is common to man. But God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted above that which you are able to bear. But will with the temptation, also make a way to escape, that you may be able to bear it.” (I Corinthians 10:13)

If your “will power” won’t work, try your “won’t power”. Just say to yourself and to the devil and God, “I can’t seem to go forward now. But I’m not going to go backwards.” Hold on. It’s a winter. It’s a test. It will pass. And you’ll be like that little sprig coming out of the dead stump of a life that’s now past into the light of a new day, more glorious that you’ve ever experienced. Hold on. God won’t fail to answer, bless, explain things and bring you into a new day.

Roots, seeds and weeds

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I cut that down, how is it springing back up?! Well, the roots are still there, alive below the surface although I cut it to the ground. Hmm. The Lord spoke to me this morning through this. Some things in our lives keep springing back up, even though we cut them down. The roots are still there.

Personally, I have sins and weaknesses in my life that I still have to fight daily that have been there for decades. “Why don’t you just root them out?” you may ask.

My experience is that there are different kinds of things like this, just like there are different kinds of plants and weeds in the yard behind the house here. Some things can be gotten rid of easily. Maybe they’re just weeds that don’t have deep roots. Others are like big trees that were cut down years ago. But the roots are deep and they still try to send forth branches every so often.

I suppose if I really took the time and the gardening equipment, I’d be able to root out some of these things that keep popping up from time to time. But there is another way which I’ve found that works against “the sins that so easily beset us” (Hebrews 12:1), although it may take more time. It goes like this. “Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” (James 4:7)

If you keep up your resistance, the enemy just has to flee, whatever form or shape he comes in. If I keep chopping the sprigs off these stumps that keep returning in the back yard, sooner or later the roots die out from lack of the nourishment they need from leaves. Same with sins. For the most part, I’m not fighting the same sins I did in my 20’s. I either rooted them out by the grace of God or I kept saying no to the devil, every time I was tempted by him. And in time it just stopped happening, the same as the roots in the ground which finally die when you keep chopping off the sprigs.

Keep-your-heartThen other things are just like weeds. The seeds fly through the air and end up sprouting in the back yard. If you don’t make an effort to chop them down, soon your whole yard will be utterly filled with thorny weeds and choking thistles. Just like our hearts and lives. That’s why one of my favorite Bible verses is “Keep your heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life.” (Proverbs 4:23) I wrote a seperate blog article on that verse. You have to keep working on that garden, whether it’s the one in the back yard or the garden of your heart.

But not all roots are bad. Jesus is even called “the root and offspring of David” (Rev. 22:16). In that most significant prophetic chapter, Isaiah 53, speaking of Jesus to come, it says, “For he [Jesus] shall grow up before him [God] as a tender plant and as a root out of a dry ground.” (Isaiah 53:2) What a picture of the Lord, springing up out of the dry ground of His generation in Israel to ultimately be a tree of Life for all nations.

And what about us? We are to be “rooted and built up in Him and stablished in the faith” (Colossians 2:7). I’m so thankful that when I received the Lord, those who led me to Christ didn’t just cast seed into the ground and walk off. They nourished and cherished it, giving me daily Bible classes to really get me rooted in the Word, on the right track to a life of Christian service.

But, oh, how that “old man” (Ephesians 4:22) still likes to spring up in the garden of my heart if I let it. temptations-and-doubtsIt’s like the analogy about birds which says, “You can’t keep the birds from flying over your head but you can keep them from nesting in your hair.” Same with the weeds and sprouting from stumps you’ve cut down. You just have to keep going after them.

Some people think that once they are saved, it’ll just be clear sailing the rest of their lives. Well, you are saved and you do have that eternal power of Christ in you that you didn’t have before. But, believe me, you’ll still have self and sin and the devil to fight every day, especially if you’ve decided to take up your cross and follow the Lord. You are going to have to keep the garden of your heart, never let the evil start. It will; but you have to keep a watch and just cut it off as soon as it shows up, like the weeds and sprouting stumps.

Christians doing their homework

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A lot of Christians haven’t done their homework. And, sadly, that often results in their being made fools of in public discussions. If anyone should have and treasure the truth, it should be Christians. And facts and truth run hand in hand. If you think you are going to make it by just your emotions, how much you love Jesus and therefore are so vehemently right, I’m afraid you may often end up being made a fool of. And that shouldn’t happen.

My early years of being a Christian were often spent on the street, personally witnessing to people in places like Hollywood Boulevard in California or later Trafalgar Square in London and Dam Square in Amsterdam. And I can tell you, it took more than just loving the Lord to be able to do that. I had to do my homework. I had to know what the facts were or I’d be made a fool of by people who would ask me tricky questions that I didn’t know how to answer. Or sometimes sincere questions by “lost sheep” and I didn’t know what the answer was. It was similar to combat or working in an emergency room and I had to learn what to say and what to do or I’d really be failing the Lord, others and even endanger my faith.

But it seems nowadays that if we Christians just have a snappy rejoinder or popular comeback, we think that’s all we need. It’s not. And the enemy of God can again and again make us look like ignoramuses when that really isn’t necessary. I personally don’t feel like I need to retreat into my warm, fuzzy Christian shell and let the atheists take the day and the high ground. But if we don’t do our homework and even be willing to break out of some of our pet doctrines that some Christian leaders expect us to hold, then I think we can really see a continuing defeat for Christian truth in the realm of public discourse. Because so many think that babbling zingers back at people is what God wants us to do, rather than really speaking the truth in Christ.

We’re supposed to “be always ready to give an answer to them that ask of us” (I Peter 3:15). Sometimes those answers can be simple since often God’s truth is simple. But also there are times to “know your stuff” and not be browbeaten and made to look like fools so that we default to simplistic, cream-puff answers. It’s like the Lord said for us to be, “Wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” (Matthew 10:16) Jesus Himself and also the early Christians in the book of Acts were relevant and had the high ground in the battles of dialogue they had in their day. They said of Jesus, “no man ever spoke like this man” (John 7:46). And later it was said of Stephen, “They were not able to resist the wisdom and the spirit by which he spoke.” (Acts 6:10)

Today someone sent me from Scandinavia a very timely and troubling news article about more and more people having a biometric chip implanted under their skin on their hand. Of course for most Christians, this immediately brings to mind the verses in Revelation 13, having to do with the final days before the return of Jesus, how that “no man might buy or sell save he that had the mark or the number of the beast in his hand or forehead.” (Revelation 13:16)

I found it very interesting that this procedure in Scandinavia is continuing to gain ground where it’s been going on a few years. It’s another sign that things are getting closer and closer to the final days spoken of in the Bible. But then also I felt a sense of sadness. Because I just almost expect that a lot of Christians will immediate pipe up and say that what those folks in Scandinavia and other places in Europe are doing is the literal fulfillment of Revelation 13 and that those individuals who have done this already are now doomed by the Word of God itself to the Lake of Fire.

It’s like watching a chess match or a sport event and you see someone making a move and you just know they are going to suffer for it and be made fools of. Because, as far as I know,

what those people are doing in having that chip implanted in their hand at this time is not specifically, utterly and completely a fulfillment of what is spoken of in Revelation 13.

Is it a major step along the way? Certainly. Is that technology most likely to be what is used for the final Mark of the Beast in the final world government of the endtime? Almost certainly. But the Lord is not going to send people to hell because of some economic step they’ve taken to link them to the commercial system. The Mark of the Beast is certainly going to be that but also much more. Exactly what, we don’t know at this time.

But if Christians now go crazy and start getting irrational about these chip implants that are going on, this is playing exactly into the hand of the enemies of God. They can effortlessly make us look like religious kooks and extremist and the undecided people will be wondering about it since it looks rather innocuous at this time to them.

So, folks, do your homework. This reminds me of another article I wrote a few years back called “Don’t shoot till you see the whites of their eyes”. Or the video I did called “Famous Failures of Prophetic Interpretation.” Don’t go off half cocked. Try a little of that “wise as serpents” thing the Lord spoke of. He also said “The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light”. (Luke 16:8)

Maybe we ought to remember that in the endtime, “the people who do know thier God shall be strong and do exploits. And they that understand among the people shall instruct many”. (Daniel 11:32 & 33) But we will be made fools of, as has happened many times, when we just run our mouths in emotions without really getting the mind of the Lord and the wisdom of the Lord so as to know what we really ought to be saying in these situations. “If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God…” (James 1:5) “Wisdom is the principle thing”. (Proverbs 4:7