Archive for The Bible
Hate Crimes
Posted by: | CommentsHate crime legislation is a popular concept in the current US Government. Great Britain has already passed national hate crime laws. What is hate crime legislation?
The idea is that thought matters when it comes to criminalizing certain activities. American rights to free speech allow people to say what they want to say and express opinions that may “offend” certain other Americans. The trend of government passing hate crime laws in America and around the world will provide the opportunity to persecute Christians.
The Bible establishes moral standards for human beings and many of those standards create problems for people who want to establish their own personal standards of right and wrong. As the modern world moves to allow truth to be variable based on personal preferences, the idea about absolute standards decreed by an omnipotent God are terrifying to those who seek to be their own Gods.
In Great Britain a Christian is in danger of being prosecuted criminally for quoting scripture from the Bible that condemns specific sinful behavior, such as homosexuality. To do so is considered “hate speech” and it violates hate crime statutes. This movement is coming to the United States and in not too distant future the possibility exists that Christians will be imprisoned for preaching the Bible as absolute truth.
A Wake-Up Call!
Posted by: | CommentsThrough Jesus Christ and His written word, God has revealed that he is a holy, righteous, just, loving God. But, He has also revealed that human beings are separated from Him by their sin and rebellion and have been judged for it. Unregenerate human beings exist in a condition of spiritual death. However, God has also revealed that we can be restored to life by repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. Once restored by faith, we are ‘born again’ to spiritual life that is eternal. The price of this redemption is that we repent of our sin and rebellion and accept His Lordship over all that we are and do. Men who create religions out of their efforts to define God always place men at the center and exalt themselves. The true revelation of God is a big slap in face for men who are lovers of themselves, who really want to be little gods themselves.
God Has Landed!
Posted by: | CommentsWhat would happen to some poor European docking his ship on our shores for the first time and having to confront an entrenched culture that had already determined who he was supposed to be and what he was supposed to be doing? The preconceived notions and speculations would probably bear little resemblance to the reality of his presence. However, his presence would cause big problems for the leadership that had a big investment in keeping the traditional beliefs alive. Our newly arrived European would be in grave danger. The smart option would be to get back in his boat and leave!
This little theoretical concept is great way to understand the way man-made religions have been created throughout history and nothing has really changed about man-made religions in modern times. Humans haven’t come up with anything really new for thousands of years. They have merely couched their theories in different terminology and jazzed up the images to make them sound more intelligent and logical. All of their ideas are still based on human reasoning and logic and there is no divine revelation supporting any of it. Human, man-centered religions are all birthed from a belief that man can define God. In doing so, that belief sustains rebellion against the true God – the God of revelation and of life.
The Bible testifies that God has in fact landed on our beaches for the purpose of revealing Himself:
God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world. And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high…(Heb 1:1-3 NASB)
The Essence of Faith
Posted by: | CommentsMan instinctively knows that his soul will transcend time and exist again beyond physical death. Man seeks to define God so that the mystery of eternity can be understood in natural terms and allow himself to gain control over it. But, God has not granted man the right or the ability to define Him by experience or natural observation. God retains the right to reveal Himself to man and it is only by His own revelation of Himself that man has any hope of knowing anything about God or his relationship to God.
The exciting thing about God is that he wants us to know him! He loves to reveal his character and nature to us. It is said that the essence of faith is believing that God is who He says he is and will do what He says he will do. That means its impossible to be a person of faith if you don’t understand who God says He is, or what he is going to do. That information only comes by revelation – which is found in the Bible.
Defining Truth
Posted by: | CommentsThe idea that we can define absolute truth by our own thinking is a lie. Your initial reaction to that statement might be to disagree. You may believe you are quite capable of defining truth in your life. You may agree that even though your Body of Truth might need a makeover in certain corners, the idea that you are incapable of defining truth is ridiculous. If I was writing this from a secular perspective we might have something to argue about. However, this is not a matter of human or secular perspectives. I’m talking about spiritual truth; the things of God and the truth about ourselves as fallen creatures. It is spiritual truth that we are incapable of defining by human reasoning.
Spiritual truth must come by revelation and revelation alone. The Bible is that revelation and if you have not read it, the truth you believe you know is suspect.
A True Story
Posted by: | CommentsA young person is introduced to a “recreational drug” in high school. He ingests the drug, gets a good feeling and nothing bad happens. He comes to believe after several recreational use sessions that the drug is not harmful and he can control it. Then, he is introduced to harder drugs, such as crack cocaine or ecstasy. Still, nothing bad happens, so his belief that he is in control strengthens. Eventually, his need for drugs escalates and he suddenly discovers he needs more money to keep buying the drugs that help him function. He breaks into a home and steals computers, firearms and stereo equipment to sell and finance his drug habit. He gets caught. He stands trial. He is sentenced to five years in a penitentiary and he is only eighteen years old.
This is a true story about a young man my wife and I have known since he was fourteen years old. It all resulted from his believing several lies and that allowed him to surrender to an overpowering compulsion to take drugs because they made him feel good. He believed he was in control; he believed drugs were not harmful and he did not believe warnings about drugs applied to him.
For a number of years I conducted weekly substance abuse meetings at a prison. A thousand men were incarcerated there and all had similar stories to share about how they wound up in jail. They all believed lies that led them to tragedy and incarceration. Sadly, upon release, 75% of them return to prison within four years. I believe the 25% who do not return find ways to alter their Body of Truth and let go of the lies that got them jailed the first time. Those who can’t or won’t identify the lies they believe to be true, just keep on doing the same things over and over again expecting different results. Some say this is a definition of insanity. I’ll grant that it appears to be insane, but it’s really just the inevitable result of hanging on to lies that are not true, and allowing them to continue to control our thinking, our choices and our behavior.
The truth is found in Jesus Christ, yet so many do not want to look for Him.
The King is Coming
Posted by: | CommentsThe Old Testament of the Bible is largely a history of the Hebrew People and their stormy relationship their holy God. In the midst of this sprawling epoch that reminds one of a bad marriage taken to the extreme, there appear great shafts of spiritual light that burst on the scene in various forms. Revelations concerning the holiness and righteousness of God abound from beginning to end, as well as, the revelation of the nature of sin. In these revelations, God clearly claims to be the author of life, perfection, goodness, love, and the absolute owner of eternity and time.
At center stage of the entire Bible revelation is a striking theme positioned at the heart and soul of these people. This theme is built around many prophecies that a day would come when God would raise up a deliverer for His people and he would be their king. In these prophecies, the birth, life, death and resurrection of Jesus is foretold, hundreds of years in advance of his appearance, down to the last detail. The prophecies indicated this king would come into the world for the purpose of redeeming mankind from sin and to make them righteous.
A Stormy Relationship
Posted by: | CommentsThe history of the Jews presents them struggling with and against their God. At times they experienced great highs and amazing national success. More often, they were involved in corruption and rebellion. About 800 B.C., individuals began to regularly appear in Hebrew society who were called prophets. Though he was not labeled as such, Moses was actually the first prophet. He had warned those who were in the desert with him of what the future history of Abraham’s people would be.
Moses’ warnings were periodically ignored or forgotten by subsequent generations and their descendants also discounted the messages spoken by later prophets who were sent to them. These prophets claimed to be uttering the very words of God to this stubborn people and predicted their future fate if they continued to ignore the commands of their God. The warnings were quite specific and the news was not good. The prophets told them what would happen and who would cause it to happen. Every bit of what was prophesied happened.
Because Abraham’s descendants persisted in ignoring God, time and time again they were conquered by other nations and carried away into foreign lands. But God always preserved a remnant and continued to nurture and develop them as a people.
Abraham’s descendants were restored as a recognized nation in their ancestral homeland of Israel in 1948, and to this day, their national existence is continually threatened by the hostile nations that surround them. Yet, they continue to survive.
The revelation in the Old Testament is of a transcendent, personal God, who literally created this people from nothing and owned them body and soul. Creating something from nothing is a characteristic of this God. He relentlessly pursued this people as they fell away time after time. They were truly a people He had called to be His possession, and He expected them to respond accordingly. They rarely did.
The Problem of Sin
Posted by: | CommentsThe Bible reveals that sin is at the very center of the nature of human beings and is a terminal condition that results in spiritual death and separation from God. It is this revelation of the nature of sin that upsets the modern world that pursues relative truth and everchanging standards of morality.
In the Biblical history of the Hebrew people, the nature of man’s relationship to God is totally exposed. Human beings are left without defense before the awesome, transcendent God who claims to be the author of life itself. In the sin revelation, the message is clear that the best efforts of man are never enough to achieve righteousness or to be pleasing to a holy God.
Sin is probably the most hated word in the history of the human race, and one of the most misunderstood in our modern day. Many believe there is no such thing, and if there is, it does not present any problem for them in their relationship with God. The revelation of the serious nature of sin is an unexpected surprise, but lines up with the observable facts so evident in human history.
Nobody Wants This!
No human being in their right mind would have voluntarily created such a religious doctrine out of their own thinking, because they would have created an impossible problem to overcome by their own effort. In Hebrew theology, man always fails and no solution is provided that will produce a permanent, peaceful relationship with God. Man is portrayed as dust and beyond hope.
Man on his own would never have written it that way. Man would have created a theology by which he can triumph and appease God, thus fulfilling his dreams and desires. We do not see this as it is revealed in the history of the Hebrew people. We see sin, death and judgment. Man’s desire is to embrace ideas and concepts that will produce the results he wants. The things that man wants are found in naturalistic concepts of deity, and in bizarre idealistic theories. That fact indicates naturalistic religions are primarily functions of human thought, no matter how convincing the human explanations may sound.
How could man have created the Hebrew concept of God from his own thinking? To believe that he did strains logic, based on what we know about human character. The truth of it becomes clear when we can understand the concept of sin. The concept of sin is a foundational difference between the revelation of the Hebrew God, and the god-concepts of other religions. The uniqueness of the Hebrew revelation is in a personal God, and the revealed nature of sin which other theologies and secular ideas do not embrace. Sin is a hated concept and man wants to reject it as truth.
The doctrine of Sin indicates that man is a dead duck. The only way a person who thinks they are alive can come to understand that they are really dead, is by revelation. Because we are talking about spiritual death, it is a hard concept to grasp in a biological brain that thinks it is alive.
The Characteristics of Revelation
Posted by: | CommentsTo know anything factual about God or the eternity he occupies it must be revealed by God. That means our knowledge would come t us by supernatural revelation. There are 4 characteristics of a revelation and what a real revelation would accomplish.
- A revelation would reveal things we could not otherwise know.
- A revelation would be somewhat of a surprise.
- A revelation would line up with certain observable facts.
- A revelation would not conflict with itself, or be deceptive.
The first point is obvious. If we have the ability to know something as a result of our own effort, a revelation would not be required. Theoretically, humanity has demonstrated a progressive ability to uncover the mysteries of the natural world. What we need is information that is beyond the natural world. The revelation we seek would provide that information.
Regarding point number two, the nature of information we could not otherwise know would obviously be unexpected and would probably surprise us, especially if the information revealed was something we did not like. Truth in its most transcendent form cannot be controlled, changed or manipulated to be what we would prefer it to be. It would just be the way it is.
The third point is based on the idea that there would be historical evidence to support the revelation, and facts reported would be verifiable in one way or another. This is necessary because any revelation given would require involvement of the revelator, with the object of the revelation. The revelator would have to be God, and the recipient of the revelation man, who lives in a time-based, event-oriented existence. Any true revelation must involve history, because the revelation would have to take place in the natural world in the form of events.
The last item, which prohibits contradiction or deception, presupposes the revelation would be the truth. The supernatural occupant of eternity could have no possible motive to lie, because, there would be nothing to be gained by deception. If you own eternity it is hard to improve on that.
These four characteristics of revelation also give us an idea of the subject matter we might expect in a revelation. The primary information we need is that which would tell us about God, the eternity He occupies, and our relationship to both. Man has demonstrated the ability to find out just about everything, but the nature of God and Man’s relationship to God is unknowable without revelation. The Hebrew writings found in the Old Testament of the Bible meet all four of these requirements. No other alleged revelations can pass this test. They invariably fail at points three and four. They conflict, or do not line up with observable facts.
