Is Violence a Civil Right?

Sherif Girgis writes:

Can we provide every member of the human family equal protection under the law? Your record as a legislator gives a resounding answer: No, we can’t. That is the answer the Confederacy gave the Union, the answer segregationists gave young children, the answer a complacent bus driver once gave a defiant Rosa Parks. But a different answer brought your father from Kenya so many years ago; a different answer brought my family from Egypt some years later. Now is your chance, Senator Obama, to make good on the spontaneous slogan of your campaign, to adopt the more American and more humane answer to the question of whether we can secure liberty and justice for all: Yes, we can.

The Princeton senior gets to the heart of the issues of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in this open letter to Senator Barack Obama.

(HT: JT)

American Idol, Sex, and True Manhood

I know, I know, you claim to never watch the television show American Idol because you are too spiritual. Or at least, the name just turns you off - I mean, who on earth is that honest about idolatry? (Well, the Bible calls us all to be, but that's not the point . . .)

Well, my wife and I find the show amusing, entertaining, and honest on several levels. And, yes, folks, even the Bible says we need a good laugh every now and then. So we watch it, mostly for its hilariously bad singing and its accurate take on modern American culture.

Thus, I wasn't surprised when I read about Bruce Dickson. At his audition, Dickson told the three famous judges that he had purposefully never kissed a girl and would not until his wedding day. After a couple of snide remarks from judges Randy Jackson and Simon Cowell, Idol host Ryan Seacrest closed Dickson's segment by saying, "Maybe next year he'll come back less a boy and more a man."

Dickson was not amused, and corrected Seacrest's wicked view of manhood by retorting, "A real man would rather wait than just do whatever with whoever."

Let us praise God for young men like Bruce Dickson who follow Him fully, even into insults. O that our high schools and colleges would be filled with them! That our young men would see visions of the true God and His true glory and turn from their dead idols to serve the living God!

(HT: Gender Blog)

"Planned Parenthood" is a Lie

I was driving a few hours ago between job sites and stopped at a light beside our local "Planned Parenthood" organization. It dawned on me that this name is a total falsitude. This organization does not exist to "plan" people's "parenthood," but rather to deal with people's "unplanned childhood." They should just be honest and call it, "Unplanned Childhood."

Or, more to the point, "Ended Childhood."

Start a Bible Study in Your Neighborhood?

I was just reading David J. Hesselgrave's Paradigms in Conflict: 10 Key Questions in Christian Missions Today (one of the missions books for my class) and found this quote particularly inspiring for thinking on to reach our neighborhoods and cities and nations for Jesus:

"[Calvin] Hanson's ministries were varied, but looking back at the Christian leaders who came out of those early morning Bible studies, Hanson says, 'I have little doubt that that simple Bible study was the most effective thing I ever did during my years in Japan.' "

Amen?

Hope this stokes our fires to study the Bible with all kinds of people around us.

So This is Why I Go to Bojangle's

Look, unless you don't know me at all, you probably already know that I love hanging out at Bojangle's. I love the tea, I love the biscuits, I love the chill atmosphere, I love the free refills and the hours spent with my friends there (you know who you are) - but this is what I hadn't realized so fully until minutes ago - I love hanging out there for the glory of God in meeting whoever He sends my way.

It's like I set up shop there. I take my Bible, another good book or five, maybe my laptop, a pen, and a notebook and sit down at a table in the corner near a power outlet and a window. I go through the line and get my sweet tea and maybe a biscuit, and then I'm off to work. I even try to meet people as they come and go. Novel idea, huh?

What I didn't know is that, this whole time, I have been trying to hang out for the glory of God because I believe it is important to be out in our real world and meet real people, many of whom are really lost.

This is what JT's post on Jim Eliff's article taught me. "Hanging out for the glory of God" is - yes, actually is - a valid means of ministering to the lost and dying all around us. So pick a spot - go ahead. It doesn't have to be Bojangle's, but it should be somewhere in public.

Men Leading in the Home (and the World)

I greatly enjoyed Randy Stinson's conference sermon on men leading in the home. (I wish I had time to listen to all of these conference sermons!) It especially hit me hard because I am not regularly practicing most of the things he mentions, but I want to.

So don't be scared off. It is a wonderfully insightful application of Biblical principles by the grace of God. The Lord has been using it in our family to press us on to rely on Him more in our direction, vision, and encouragement.

Also check out Randy's article version of this talk in the Southern Baptist Seminary magazine (it's a pdf file).

Randy is the current president of The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood. They have a vast and resource-filled website for thought on the theology and application of Biblical manhood and womanhood. They even have their groundbreaking, massive work, Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood online for free!

For at least three years now, God has been using CBMW's resources to move me to think Biblically and live more faithfully. I'm surprised I've never blogged on their ministry, but go check them out for faithful, Biblical exposition, especially if you struggle with these issues.

Praise the Lord for these gifts to His church!

Raleigh Wants You

To buy a house in our city, especially downtown. And it's pretty easy.

So here you go, buddies. You asked me to put this up, and I'm not getting paid by the city or by any realtor.

May God use this in your life as he has in our life and the life of our church.

Worshipping Man at the Mall

On some nights and weekends, I work at a local mall. This weekend, my mall is having a "model & talent search," so yesterday they decided to set the stage up five feet from my kiosk. Needless to say, I've gotten a good look at this modeling extravaganza.

What's sad is that everyone claps and claps and laughs and laughs whenever some little cutie struts the stage. It is ridicule-worthy. What is to applaud when a child simply wants attention? Why are we clapping for children who simply say a few lines and walk across a stage? What is the big deal?

Then I realized that this is the worship of man, plain and simple. The Bible says in Romans 1:21-23,

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

We fail to honor God, even though we know Him, and fail to give Him thanks, so we become worthless in our thinking and our hearts become blind and wicked. We think we are wise and knowledgeable, but we actually have become fools. Then we trade in the infinite glory of God for worthless worship of mere man. We trade out gold for shrapnel, filet minion for rat poison, living water for sewage.

And we do it every day. We care more about what people think of us than what God thinks of us. We want to think about novels and poetry and romance books more than we want to think about God's own Word. We look for ways to make ourselves look better to others instead of trusting God to make us happy in Him. Our foolish hearts are very dark indeed. Come Lord Jesus, come change us by Your Spirit, that we would worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.

Male Leadership in the Family, Church, and Culture: Pt. 1

Last weekend, a well-loved family member brought up some thoughts about gender roles in the church, and it got me thinking all over again about the need for male leadership in the family, church, and culture. I say all three for several reasons: one, because they necessarily go together and one would be hypocrisy without the others; two, because they are generally the three spheres in which we operate; three, we men need reminders that our proper leadership is needed in all three.

It's often said that exclusively male leadership is a thing of the past, a relic of a bygone age, and a vestige of the oppression of women by the male majority. I've even heard it said, and staunchly defended, that commands in the Bible like 1 Timothy 2:12-15 apply not to every culture and age but mainly the one to whom Paul was writing. This could not be further from the truth.

When God the Holy Spirit, through His apostle Paul, wrote,

I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing - if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.

He neither framed it as a time-sensitive command nor intend it as such. The reasoning of the context simply does not permit it. It's more straightforward and universal than that.

So God says, "I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet," then what is the reason? Why does He say such a preposterously chauvinistic thing?

Because "Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor." In couching these commands in (1) creation and (2) fall, God makes them as universal and straightforward as possible. There is no pandering to that particular culture or ours. There is no yellow-bellied wimpery in God's decree. He says, "I made man first, therefore woman cannot, by My design, be the leader."

And all who disagree - men and women - are rebelling against God. God made the man to be the servant leader of his family, church, and culture; just look at the way Jesus live and led and spoke and died. He lived and breathed the servant leadership God placed upon Him; who are we to question God's call?

Jim Naugle Takes a Stand

Ft. Lauderdale Mayor Jim Naugle cares about his city. Sadly, homosexual activists don't see it the same way. While he campaigns against his city's rampant homosexual activity in public bathroom stalls and its astounding number of homosexual AIDS cases, gay activists have responded with a call to roll the town hall with toilet paper. They have since settled for sending the mayor "virtual rolls" of toilet paper.

Mayor Naugle also has been working, though unsucessfully as of yet, to remove his public libary's newly-approved homosexual porn section. The fact that a city of this size and prominence is voting for this wicked, mind-killing filth only magnifies the problem. But Mayor Naugle isn't backing down - though he lost that battle, he is still fighting mightily for the God of all goodness and righteousness and truth.

When it comes to sex in public restrooms, asWorldNet Daily's Janet Folger points out, that is still very illegal. So Jim Naugle simply wants Ft. Lauderdale authorities to enforce the law. Imagine that! And as Folger says,

What do you know? The mayor is right. Enforcing the law changes behavior. Ft. Lauderdale Mayor Jim Naugle is right. I not only stand by him. I want to see him run for governor and then for president.

A man in a high political office who sees evil clearly and wants to fight it with the good law, who cares about how such evil affects children and adults at large, who apologizes for not for what he has said rightly but for the fact that he didn't say it soon enough - such a man is hard to find. I praise God for putting men like Jim Naugle in positions of authority. May his work continue to point all kinds of people to the final authoriy to whom all must give an account.

Dear Nancy Pelosi

"This isn't really an abortion issue," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, as she walked the Capitol on Friday. "That is what really saddens me about what the justices said. This is about a procedure that any parent would want her daughter to have access to if she needed it. And to frame it as an abortion issue is doing a disservice to medicine and to our young women and our country. So I hope we can get the focus back on the fact that this Supreme Court is deciding what medical procedures are necessary for child-bearing women."

Dear Nancy Pelosi,
In response to your quote in the San Francisco Chronicle about the partial-birth abortion ban recently upheld by the Supreme Court, these "child-bearing women" you speak of helping, are they bearing any children in the procedure that kills their unborn children? I'm not sure you understand what "child-bearing" means.

Britt Treece

(HT: JT through Denny Burk)

P.S. - Also note the liberal slant of the news articles. They spin the issue to be about "freedom" and "justice" for women rather than freedom and justice for all people. There are also some amazingly scary quotes in this article.

Kids In Mind

This link to Kids-in-mind.com has been down below on the right, in the links list under "Smart," ever since I started this site, but I had a conversation with a buddy last night that reminded me just how important it is to look ahead at movies before you take your friends, your wife, or your kids to see them. He rented a movie with his wife that they both squirmed and fast-forwarded through and regretted it later, and I have made the same mistake with my wife.

So, when you are considering whether to see a movie, go to Kids In Mind and read their review of it. They give three ratings, from 1 to 10, based on the movie's objectionable content - sex, violence, language - and let you decide its merit for yourself. It'll be worth the extra two minutes to keep you from seeing something you would have rather not seen.

North Carolina Marriage Amendment

North Carolina Senators Forrester, Smith, Allran, Apodaca, Berger of Rockingham, Bingham, Brock, Brown, Brunstetter, East, Goodall, Hartsell, Hunt, Jacumin, Pittenger, Preston, Snow, and Tillman submitted the marriage amendment bill, Bill S13, on January 24, 2007. It opens by saying, "Marriage is the union of one man and one woman at one time. This is the only marriage that shall be recognized as valid in this State. The uniting of two persons of the same sex or the uniting of more than two persons of any sex in a marriage, civil union, domestic partnership, or other similar relationship within or outside of this State shall not be valid or recognized in this State."

On February 12, 2007, President Pro Tem Marc Basnight referred the bill to a committe that hasn't met in five and a half years, the Ways and Means Committee. This is a silent filibuster to keep the people of North Carolina from voting on one of the most fundamental issues of creation and society. We cannot sit around and simply watch this kind of legislative arrogance.

Defining marriage correctly is in the range of the biggest issues in the world, right alongside abortion-murder, justice, and freedom. For those of us who live in the world, this is a big deal. For those of us who live in America, this is a bigger deal. And for those of us who live in North Carolina, this is one of the biggest political-cultural deals out there right now. If you care about marriage as it is defined by God, get involved. Here are some links:

AFA.net's info page on the marriage amendment - where I got the information first

The NC Legislature's Home Page - find your representatives, send them letters, emails, phone calls, cards, etc.

Bill S13 on the NC Legislature page - the bill itself

Senator Fred Smith's blog on the issue

Return America.Org - "We need your help in building a network of churches and individuals to educate, motivate and mobilize citizens in a united effort in promoting Judeo-Christian values; to educate and influence government in these principles upon which our state and nation were founded." This organization is based in North Carolina, and they just held a huge rally in the legislature's backyard this past week.

Please don't skip on past this. This is more important than the next thing on your to-do list. It is more important than the next task at work. Our society will become pure darkness if we don't fight to shine God's light of truth all over it.

Heartbeat of Miami

Justin Taylor interviews John Ensor here, and what struck me about the interview was the utter Biblicity of it - Rev. Ensor simply speaks the Bible about the issues of abortion, life, and justice. He heads up Heartbeat International's urban initiatives and is working on planting pregnancy life care centers in the large urban areas of the US.

Ensor basically says the Christian reaction to our country's abortion culture should be:

• Read the Bible on the subject. (He highlights key passages.)
  
• Repent for our carelessness. (Yes, that means everyone.)
  
• Get involved with pregnancy life care centers. (Or join with their ministry.)
  

I wholeheartedly recommend the article and the ministry.

It's High Time You Learned of the AFA

The American Family Association is a wonderful, God-honoring organization that is working for the restoration of family (read, Biblical) values in our country. Their website says:

AFA is for people who are tired of cursing the darkness and who are ready to light a bonfire. We are a non-profit (501(c)(3)) organization founded in 1977 by Don Wildmon. The American Family Association represents and stands for traditional family values, focusing primarily on the influence of television and other media – including pornography – on our society.

AFA believes that the entertainment industry, through its various products, has played a major role in the decline of those values on which our country was founded and which keep a society and its families strong and healthy. For example, over the last 25 years we have seen the entertainment industry "normalize" and glorify premarital sex. During that time we have suffered a dramatic increase in teen pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS and abortion as a means of birth control.

We believe in holding accountable the companies which sponsor programs attacking traditional family values. We also believe in commending those companies which act responsibly regarding programs they support.

AFA supporters receive a monthly letter about a specific issue with a recommended action such as sending a postcard or making a phone call. In addition, supporters receive the AFA Journal with news on various moral and family issues.

Check them out. Sign up for the emails. It's simple to get involved by writing e-letters to politicians, companies, and media outlets. The most current issue is House Resolution 254, a bill that's trying to give homosexuals special status under the law, but there are always things coming up in our ever-darkening world.

Those who love Jesus are called to love His light and walk in it, shining Him to expose the darkness along the way (Ephesians 5:1-15). As Micah 6:8 says,

He has told you, O man, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?

Luke 14 and Who We Invite to Dinner

Jesus said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”
Luke 14:12-14

The John Piper sermon on this text from 1980 (see directly below) got me thinking about this text again. My wife and I had also recently read it in our nighttime Gospel reading, so it was more fresh in my mind. But seriously, do the applications get any clearer? Is there anyone who can understand English who doesn't understand the simplicity of this command?

I doubt it, but instead of the grammar being hard for us, the truth is hard for us. It is hard for us to listen to Jesus on this one. We say, "Yeah, Jesus, that's good for You, I know You invited the poor and crippled and blind, and I'm so thankful, but I just can't do it . . ." We become experts at giving Jesus excuses.

The plain truth of this text is that those who invite the ones who cannot repay them will be blessed of God Himself on the last day and forever. Conversely, those who look for repayment from men will stand ashamed at the last day, and, like the rich man of Luke 16, go to hell forever.

So let's believe Jesus. His repayment is better than all that relatives and friends and rich people could ever give us. His repayment is Himself. Let us believe together and press on to know Him even in the way we eat dinner.

Halloween or Reformation Day?

Since tomorrow is Reformation Day, on which many will instead celebrate this strange festival known as "Halloween," I thought it wise to post today on "Halloween" and tomorrow on Reformation Day and save the best for last.

My thoughts on Halloween are summed up as follows:

• It is clearly a holiday with pagan, even demonic, roots
• Generally, it is clearly not practiced as such in modern America
• But, it is still pagan in the sense that it does not honor the Triune God
• It overshadows the real meaning of October 31, Reformation Day (see tomorrow)
• It is the only holiday in which children will show up unannounced and uninvited to my door
• Thus it is one of the best opportunities for loving our neighbors and preaching the Gospel with our whole lives

Tomorrow night, my wife and I will be meeting children, handing out candy, building relationships, and talking about Jesus and the men who point us to Him.

But Can You Wait?

In our neighborhood (I don't know about yours), we have several "wanderers." They are the men and women of our area who, whether they have a home or not, always seem to be wandering the streets. I'm not saying this is, of itself, necessarily good or bad, but simply fact. In Hebrews 11, the Bible actually commends similar wandering because it is by faith in Christ's superiority. Last night, God gave me another opportunity to talk to one of our neighborhood's wanderers, who is also one of my friends. Let's call him T.

Our conversation came to a head about midway through. After we discussed faith in God's provision, T was explaining to me why he was having such a hard time going without a job or a house. "Man, I want to be married and have a family and have a home, like you, Britt. And, look at these shoes (he grabs his actually fairly nice pair of basketball shoes), I need better shoes. I just, I like nice things. I can't live like this," he explained.

I simply looked him in the eye and said, "But can you wait for it? Even if you never have your own house for the rest of your life, Jesus has promised us mansions better than this world could ever offer, better than the richest man in the world has ever had. Can you wait for it and look there instead?"

So, can you wait? Can I?

Is This Other Gospel Really Any Gospel At All?

I was browsing through one of my favorite blogs when I came across this link to the front-page article of the latest Time magazine which asks the question, "Does God Want You To Be Rich?" (Here's the CNN.com summary.) More and more of our country's "Christian" leaders are answering, "Yes, oh yes."

Some of the Leaders
Joel Osteen, while appearing on Larry King Live, says, "I think what sometimes you see is it's just all about money. That's not what I believe. It's the attitude of your heart, and so you know, we believe - but I do believe this, that God wants us to be blessed. He wants us to be able to send our kids to college, excel in our careers. But prosperity to me, Larry, is not just money, it's having health. What good is money if you don't have health?"

Popular speaker and author Joyce Meyer is more obvious when she says, "Who would want to get in on something where you're miserable, poor, broke and ugly and you just have to muddle through until you get to heaven? I believe God wants to give us nice things."

Atlanta, GA, pastor Creflo Dollar says on his website, "We believe that God wants us to have a full life, free from poverty, sickness and disease." Dollar recently told his TV audience,"When you understand what you have a right to, you won't tolerate being broke, in debt, living in shortage."

The Biblical Response
What is troubling about these questions and responses is not that they are coming out, but that very few biblical, Christ-loving voices are speaking up against them. This is what the Scripture, speaking through Paul, calls those who love the Jesus of the Bible to do: "Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in my gospel, for which I am suffering, bound with chains as a criminal, but the word of God is not bound!" (2 Timothy 2:9)

I want to first make it clear that I love each and every word of faith, prosperity "gospel," health and wealth, or otherwise God's-good-gifts-seeking person I have ever met. I regularly pray for many of them to be turned from their vain pursuit of things that will fade away and to the only treasure that will last - Christ Jesus. I have spent much of my life with many of them, and they are very near and dear to my heart.

So, dear reader, please hear me out on this one. I am more grieved and saddened than angered and frustrated at such developments in local churches and ministries. False teaching always hurts the sheep of God. Wolves in sheep's clothing will arise, even out of the true church, Paul tells the Ephesian elders in Acts 20:29-30, and we must be on the lookout. If you become convinced of the Bible's witness to this subject, please ask and beg your friends and family to stay away from such false teaching! It will certainly lead many to destruction (1 Timothy 6:9)!

So, I have your eyes for the time being, now let us turn them toward God in His Word and let us pray that He would seek out any wicked way in us and lead us in the way everlasting (Psalm 139:24).

A Few Readings
Probably the plainest teaching on the subject of the temporal quality of life for the Christian comes, fittingly, from Jesus Himself in the Gospels. Take Mark 8:33-38, for example. Here Jesus responds to Peter's attempt to divert Him from the cross by saying,

" 'Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.' And he called to him the crowd with his disciples and said to them, 'If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? For what can a man give in return for his life? For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.' "

He effectively tells Peter, the disciples, the crowd, and every reader who would every read the book of Mark that to follow Him is to (1) deny yourself, (2) take up your cross, and (3) follow Him to the cross where you will die a death like His.

Is this not what Christ Himself tells Peter again at the end of John's Gospel? "Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go." This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. And after saying this he said to him, "Follow me." (John 21:18-19) So John inserts a comment to explain to us, the readers, that Jesus' words were specifically meant to tell Peter that he would die a helpless death by following Jesus. Folks, it doesn't get much plainer than that.

What links these two passages together is clear: following Jesus. The Gospel is how we follow Him. And the Gospel is clear - it is about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus for all the sinners who will ever believe in Him (1 Corinthians 15:1-4). Jesus is saying in these passages that those who follow Him will follow Him to His death. But all of His own will also follow Him to eternal life.

All Christians claim to follow Jesus. But, at the same time, all people in their sin and even many of us in our professed Christ-ianity still want to avoid the cross. So many Christians, and beware of them, dear friends, construct a theology in which the cross is something that only Jesus did, while life is what we all get. And that is simply false. The Bible tells us that those who follow Jesus will follow Him to His death in this life, and into His eternal life of perfection and happiness and eternal treasure after their death, not before.

Dear reader, I know your heart longs for a life of true joy and lasting happiness and no more crying or pain or sorrow, but the only way that is acheived is through the shed blood of Jesus and His resurrection from the dead. So look for Him, hope for His eternal life, see it shining through into this sinful world. But the Bible warns us not to attempt to skip Jesus' cross in this life. He paid for sins in love on that cross, and we do not pay for sins but do love Him and others by following Him there to suffer and die. Believe it. Believe it is the way to true joy and lasting happiness in Him.

But why? Why would Jesus call us to such a life and such a death? Why does He say we must lose everything in order to gain everything? Why can't we have it both ways? Because in Matthew 13:44 He explains to us that the kingdom of heaven, not of earth, is the treasure for which we must give up everything. "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field."

And what is so great about heaven? It is not the golden streets or the missed loved ones, the perfected character or the endless feasting on food. It is Christ Himself. When the Jews questioned how Jesus could give them His own flesh to eat in John 6:52-58, He responded:

"Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not as the fathers ate and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever."

Do you hear him sounding like Isaiah 55 when He says, "Eat on Me! Drink on Me! I am your sustenance! I am your bread and your water! Me!"? He sounds so inviting, so trustworth, and so treasurable - because He is. And nothing and no one else is.

But Someone Would Say . . .
Some would still respond, "But this life He speaks of, isn't that supposed to be your best, richest, fattest, happiest life now?" And the Bible responds, "Not exactly. It depends on what you mean by each of those words. Because meanings matter." So let us compare and contrast a few definitions for a moment.

If by, "best life," you mean, "the most possessions for the most worldly enjoyment possible, with the happiest emotions for the maximum amount of time possible," then Bible answers, "No. That is not the life that Jesus means. Have you not read the prophets? The Gospels?" But if by, "best life," you mean, "the maximum amount of happiness in Christ and His ways because of the cross that I can have in this life no matter what the cost," then the Bible answers, "Yes, exactly."

If by, "richest life," you mean, "the maximum amount of money I can have in this life so I can feel safe and secure in my bank account," then the Bible answers, "No. No. Not at all. Have you not read Hebrews 13?" But if by, "richest life," you mean, "the deepest and richest enjoyment I can have in Jesus Christ in this life and the next because of His cross so I can be safe and secure in Him for all eternity," then the Bible answers, "Yes, forever He is your refuge."

Ephesians 1:3 says that believers already have "every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ," including all the fullness of God's riches given in love by election, adoption, forgiveness, reconciliation, and His Holy Spirit. So, as Al Mohler says, "The saddest aspect of that question is its focus on material prosperity at the expense of the limitless spiritual riches we are given in Christ. The problem with prosperity theology is not that it promises too much, but that it promises so little - and promises that so falsely."

So the Bible must not only be our guide in asking and answering questions, but in how we ask and understand questions and define words. Words really do matter. That's how God has spoken and is speaking to us - in His Word. And if someone twists and contorts God's words to give them meanings that He did not mean, then that person is a false prophet teaching a false gospel and they are to be marked and avoided.

False gospels do no good, only harm. So watch out. Watch out for wolves in shepherd's clothing. Watch out, in love for Christ, love for your neighbor, love for your family, and care for your own soul.

Concluding Thoughts
All of this is not to say, "Start blasting away at the false gospel of prosperity," but rather, "Believe that God's best for you is to suffer well with Jesus in love for others." Believe it. Don't believe in money and don't let your neighbors do it either. Plead with them, beg them, pray for them to turn away from the deceit of this world and toward the truth of Christ. His worth cannot be measured in money so stop trying. He supercedes everything this world has to offer. All He created is good, and it is to be received with thanksgiving (not as though we are deserving) and sanctified by the Word and prayer (1 Timothy 4:4-5).

Let us close as Paul does to Timothy in his second letter, keeping in mind that he is building upon the Gospel of Christ and His death and resurrection. See if this sounds like a taking up of Christ's cross for the display of Him in truth to the church and to the world:

Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.

But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

But as for you, O man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will display at the proper time--he who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.

As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.

O Timothy, guard the deposit entrusted to you. Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called "knowledge," for by professing it some have swerved from the faith. Grace be with you.

1 Timothy 6:6-21

Are You Immersed in "Christian Subculture"?

"And as Jesus reclined at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples."
Matthew 9:10 (see also Matt. 11:19, Mark 2:15, Luke 5:30)

"The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’"
Luke 7:34

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus is pictured as the Son of God who spends time, even a great deal of time, with the known sinners of His day. In this Desiring God National Conference 2006 video, Pastor Mark Driscoll says,

"Many Christians don't have significant experience outside their Christian world. They listen to Christian radio; they listen to Christian music; they watch Christian television; they read Christian books; their kids go to Christian school; they go to Christian church; they go to Christian events; they go to Christian concerts; their friends are Christian; they go to community group or home Bible study with their Christian friends; they vacation with their Christian friends; and meanwhile their neighbors don't know Christ.

But the Bible says we're supposed to love our neighbor and we're supposed to practice hospitality, which is the welcoming of our neighbor. Well, to do that, we need to get to know our neighbor. And I think that is an attentiveness to the lives of lost people."

I am very convicted by this, and I suspect many of you are, too. It is sad that so many of us think that holiness before God consists in being around or not being around certain people and situations rather than in the blood of Jesus alone. This legalism is both sickening and deadly, and our very own "evangelical" churches are the ones who have perpetuated it.

So I asked myself, and I ask you now, "When was the last time you spent significant time with an unbeliever? A sinner? A tax collector? An atheist? And if you can't remember, or you haven't, why not?"

(The best thing I've ever read on Christian liberty is a paper by Martin Luther, called Concerning Christian Liberty.)