I have a book in my office which is called Is God a Republican or Democrat? I have never read the book, but you can barrow it if you want. Abraham Lincoln said something like: The question is not “Is God on our side?” but “Are we on God’s side?”  That is an interesting quote. Last week I read a Scripture that goes along on with this quote:

Joshua 5:13-15:

¹³ Now it came about when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, a man was standing opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand, and Joshua went to him and said to him, “Are you for us or for our adversaries?” ¹⁴ He said, “No; rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the Lord.” And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and bowed down, and said to him, “What has my lord to say to his servant?” ¹⁵ The captain of the Lord’s host said to Joshua, “Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy.” And Joshua did so. 

The issue is not a party, political issue, but an issue of being on God’s side and having faith and confidence in God. In Joshua chapter 6 the Israelites defeated Jericho and they did this because God was with them. As we vote, and we should vote as it is an awesome right, we should remember that we serve God and we can trust in Him regardless. God is in charge regardless of local, state and national elections. If you read Daniel chapter 5 you’ll see that God worked through might Babylon and later Persia to bring the Hebrew people back to their land. God accomplishes His will through His people and even through people who wouldn’t consider themselves His people. 

On another note: This Sunday one of the verses is Titus 3:14:

¹⁴ Our people must also learn to engage in good ^[a]deeds to meet pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful.

notice in the translation above (NASB) we see the word engage. That is the possible name for our Saturday night service, We as Christians must engage each other, engage in our relationship with God and engage the world. I love that word and I love this verse. You’ll hear more this Saturday and Sunday. (By the way, engage is a good Star Trek term)

blessings, 

Pastor Steve

2 interesting articles:

Survey: One in five Americans has no religion

http://timothytennent.com/2012/10/09/are-there-really-any-atheists/

I recently read a book which Bonnie Kingsly recommended. The book tells the life of Louis Zamperini. Zamperini was in the 1936 Olympics  held in Germany. He was famous for setting records for how fast he could run the mile.

Later he was planning to enter the next Olympic competition but it was canceled because of WWII. Zamperini entered the war and served on a B 24. He was shot down and spent 47 days at sea and then around three years as a Japanese prisoner of war. He was badly mistreated in the POW camps.

Following the war he dealt with post traumatic stress disorder. This caused him to plunge into alcoholism which brought on a host of other problem. He was married and had one child, but his marriage was being threatened with divorce. Every time he closed his eyes at night he was plagued with memories of his time as a POW. He was filled with hate and wanted to kill one particular guard (Mutsuhiro Watanabe (nicknamed “The Bird”), who was later included in General Douglas MacArthur’s list of the 40 most wanted war criminals in Japan. Finally in 1949 as the 31 year old Billy Graham was preaching an evangelical crusade in Los Angeles, Louis wife gave her life to Christ at the crusade. She eventually convinced Louis to also attend. Louis attended once and was convicted but left in anger during Graham’s invitation. Louis’ wife Cynthia convinced him to attend again. He did and started to leave again during the invitation. But he was convicted and went forward giving his life to Christ.

Following the conversion his life changed dramatically. He went home that night, and at the time when he would usually drink alcohol to excess, he dumped his alcohol down the drain. His hate was changed to forgiveness. His marriage lasted until his wife’s death. He never had nightmares of his time as a POW again. He later went back to Japan and spoke to the guards who were accused and convicted of war crimes. He forgave them. But the one guard who was the worst to Louis, Mutsuhiro Watanabe (nicknamed “The Bird”), was thought dead and Louis never was able to talk to him. Later they found out he was alive and Louis was scheduled to meet with him and wrote the letter below. But he was not able to meet with him as Watanabe declined the invitation. Someone was supposed to take the letter to him, but no one knows if Watanabe received it. The letter is below:

To Matsuhiro [sic] Watanabe,

As a result of my prisoner of war experience under your unwarranted and unreasonable punishment, my post-war life became a nightmare. It was not so much due to the pain and suffering as it was the tension of stress and humiliation that caused me to hate with a vengeance.

Under your discipline, my rights, not only as a prisoner of war but also as a human being, were stripped from me. It was a struggle to maintain enough dignity and hope to live until the war’s end.

The post-war nightmares caused my life to crumble, but thanks to a confrontation with God through the evangelist Billy Graham, I committed my life to Christ. Love replaced the hate I had for you. Christ said, “Forgive your enemies and pray for them.”

As you probably know, I returned to Japan in 1952 [sic] and was graciously allowed to address all the Japanese war criminals at Sugamo prison… I asked them about you, and was told that you probably had committed Hara Kiri, which I was sad to hear. At that moment, like the others, I also forgave you and now would hope that you would also become a Christian.

Louis Zamperini

Hillenbrand, Laura. Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. Random House, Inc.. New York. 2010. Specifically pages 396-397 for the letter and pages 368-398 for Louis conversion and life transformation.

Pages: 78-88: This is the final chapter besides the conclusion.

I love the opening of this chapter:

In the 1930s, German church leaders defended Adolf Hitler as a leader who didn’t smoke or drink, encouraged women to dress modestly, and opposed pornography. Alcorn writes: If that’s your checklist, Hitler was a swell guy.

Alcorn says that “nothing’s colder than dead, legalistic, orthodoxy.”

Isn’t that true though. But we do need to focus on truth, don’t we? It is such a difficult balance. Towards the end of the chapter Alcorn writes: “Truth hates sin, grace loves sinners.” I find that very well put and if we can combine this paradox in our lives and be full of grace and truth, I think we will live like Christ. Grace should never give us a license for sin and truth should never give us a license for legalism.

A good quote:

• “If we minimize grace, the world sees no hope for salvation. If we minimize truth, the world sees no need for salvation. To show the world Jesus, we must offer unabridged grace and truth, emphasizing both, apologizing for neither. The Colossian church ‘understood God’s grace in all its truth’” Col 1:6). (page 87)

In a few weeks I will begin blogging on another short book by Randy Alcorn called “The Treasure Principle.” This deals with giving.

Please comment on this book and have a blessed week!

I read this on James MacDonald’s Vertical Church blog:
Evangelism Breakthrough Starts Here
SEP
20
2012

My mom, who went to heaven in July 2010, was the most effective personal evangelist I have ever known. It was extremely common during my childhood to see my mother sitting at the kitchen table with her Bible open in earnest conversation with another mom who lived on our street. Some of these were friends, some became friends, and some remained friends though they did not respond to the gospel. I have never sensed my mother’s friendship was a bargaining chip in evangelism. She found the biblical balance between influence and boldness. My mom led to Christ a woman named Shirley, who lived to the north of our house and now resides in heaven; in the two houses directly across the street, she reached Judy and Marg and a fourth woman (whose name escapes me) who lived behind us. What’s more incredible is that even after moving three times since those days in the 1970s, she continued to influence each of these women for Christ. They remained friends until my mom died, and the three still living were all at her memorial service. But what of the woman to the south and the other neighbor women who had equal opportunity to hear my mother’s bold witness but refused it?
When Harvest started, I wanted our people to experience success in personal evangelism and thought a lot about the women my mother reached versus those who refused the very same messenger with the very same message using the very same bold method. Hidden inside the stories of the women who responded to her compelling witness for Christ are stories that shatter their apparent similarity, revealing what God was doing to ready their hearts. In each instance where my mom was able to win and disciple a woman for Christ, there was an overarching life issue that ripened that woman’s heart to the good news of Jesus. Understanding that difference is the key to effective evangelistic ministry in a Vertical Church.
Same Lesson, Different Location and Time
Lest you think I built our entire evangelistic ministry on my mom’s witness pattern, let me show it to you in Scripture, and then how we seek to implement it in our Vertical Church. What did Jesus mean when He exhorted every future evangelist? “Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, then comes the harvest’? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are already ripe for harvest. Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life” (John 4:35-36). Please don’t miss what Jesus is saying about the people He wants you and your church to get the good news to.
Stop saying the harvest is months away; it’s today.
All around us this moment are people ripe to the gospel.
Look past the preference of who you want saved and locate those God has ripened.
I can reap now where others have sown, if I look for the ripe fruit.
Gathering ripe fruit is reaping souls for eternal life.
In Vertical Church, we seek to adopt the most biblical language possible. In evangelism, we refer to people ready to respond to the gospel now as red apples; they are ripe to the gospel. For that reason we refer to people not yet ready as green apples. If you take that thinking out of John 4:34–38 and into Jesus’s interactions with people, it changes the way you see the Gospels and gospel work today. Jesus Christ constantly cut through the crowd filled with green apples to focus His energy on the red ones already ripe for His message. He left a crowd of green apples to talk with Zacchaeus, the lone red one. He turned to the desperate woman with the issue of blood even though surrounded by masses. He stopped for the centurion determined to see his daughter healed, He embraced the woman shamed by her sin whom the crowds despised, He talked at great length with Nicodemus who longed for more than his formulaic religiosity. In every instance Jesus invested in the ripe red apples, those with strong readiness abandon the life they knew for something better. Repeatedly Christ even explained His rationale: “The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost” (Luke 19:10), “Those who are well have no need of a physician” (Matthew 9:12), and there is “more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance” (Luke 15:7). Jesus gave time without limit to the red apples He met, but would hardly give the time of day to the green apples. Without insulting those not yet ripe, Christ did refuse them. When the rich, young ruler came to Jesus, he asked, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Luke 18:18). How many churches in our day would have that guy’s name on a card or serving as an usher in a matter of minutes? “He seems so interested, so passionate, so hungry for the things of God.” But Jesus used the law to elicit his prideful assertion that he was not sinful: “All these things I have kept from my youth up; what do I lack?” Christ responded to him, “Go, sell everything you have and give it to the poor” (Luke 18:21-22). Why did Jesus say this? Not because divesting his wealth would gain him eternal life, but because his refusal to do so revealed his unreadiness for a God other than the god of his possessions.
This revealing of a green apple’s unripeness was common with Christ. In the closing verses of Luke 9, Jesus had three quick encounters with green apples as He walked down a road. Two expressed a desire to follow Christ; the third He invited. In each instance Christ responded in a way that revealed the person’s unripeness: “You’re not ready to follow me, I don’t have a place to lay my head down,” “Leave the dead to bury their own dead,” “Followers don’t look back; you’re unfit” (Luke 9:57-62). Too shallow, too superficial, too slow, in each instance Christ turned the green apple away. But when people become aware of personal sin, open to complete life change, humbled enough to see their needs, they are ripe, red, and ready for a gospel witness. Those are the ones Christ sought out.
Excerpted from Vertical Church.

Here is an interesting video regarding the Jesus wife papyrus which is making a lot of news:

BW3 on Jesus’ Wife?

Alcorn begins the chapter writing about John chapter 2. In that chapter Jesus turned water into wine. This was an act of grace. This was all for fun. But then, total truth. Jesus then makes a whip to drive people out of the temple courts who were selling things at prices that equaled extortion. John 2 has a demonstration of grace and truth.
On page 73 Alcorn writes: “we have redefined Christlike to mean ‘nice.’ By that definition Christ wasn’t always Christlike. He confronted people with sin, raised His voice, threw tables, and called people snakes, blind hypocrites, and whitewashed tombs. If we don’t talk about sin and hell because we want to be nice, we’re trying to be nicer than Jesus, who spoke a great deal about both.” (page 73)
Some other points I wanted to share:
• “We imagine that hell is out of proportion to our offenses precisely because we don’t grasp how serious they are. God’s grace faces hell’s reality straight on, offering full deliverance. Denying hell takes the wind out of grace’s sales. If there’s no eternal hell, the stakes of redemption are vastly lowered. What exactly did Jesus die to rescue us from?
• A rescue is only as dramatic and consequential as the fate from which someone is rescued.” (page 75)
He also writes
• “One out of five women having an abortion in America claim to be born-again Christians. Yet pastors tell me, ‘I don’t talk about abortion because it will make our people feel guilty, since many have had abortions.’ Isn’t that exactly why we should talk about it’?
o “our silence isn’t grace—it’s cruelty.” (page 76)
• Eph 4:15: speak the truth in love. (page 77)
• Share the truth; then offer him grace and help. (page 77 about helping a friend share Christ with his father who is dying.)
• In a spirit of grace, love people enough to share the truth. (page 77)

I thought this chapter has some great points, what do you think?
have a blessed week!

This comes from Dr. Tennent’s blog. http://timothytennent.com/2012/09/13/reflections-on-the-embassy-attacks/

Reflections on the Embassy Attacks
Thursday, September 13th, 2012

In recent days we have seen multiple attacks on American embassies or consulates in the Middle East, including those in Lybia, Egypt, and Yemen. Dating back to the Iranian revolution in the 1970’s we have become accustomed to seeing this kind of violence expressed against America. In watching the news of these recent attacks, and in light of our recent memory of the eleventh anniversary of 9/11, I was reminded of a book by Bertrand Russell which I read years ago entitled, The Conquest of Happiness.

In that book he makes a very important observation about life. At one point he is discussing work and why humans spend so much time working. He argued that work is, in part, based on the desire to build or construct something. He is not merely referring to carpenters or skilled laborers who physically build things. He makes the larger point that integral to the human fulfillment is the desire to do constructive things with our lives – building a family, building a business, building an institution, building a movement, building a bridge, and so forth. He then goes on to argue that construction is, therefore, inherently more satisfying than destruction.

When you destroy something like tearing down the gates of an embassy, killing someone, turning cars over and lighting them on fire, the fulfillment in that kind of activity is fleeting and quickly subsides. Constructive work, on the other hand, provides an ongoing sense of fulfillment and peace. In fact, the deepest constructive work is never fully complete, so we have that ongoing sense of building, improving, making things better, and so forth. With destruction, there is no such lasting sense of accomplishment. Osama bin Laden came to symbolize one of the greatest acts of destruction in modern times. However, he was not fulfilled by it. He ended his life alone in a walled compound, spending his days with a sense of defeat and looking at pornography.

Those who march on embassies, kill ambassadors, burn buildings and turn cars upside down cannot avoid the fact that if their message is to be compelling and bring long term fulfillment they must demonstrate what they will construct once all the destruction is complete. What is their long-term vision for life, for society, for the world? The work of destruction is far easier than the harder work of construction.

Christianity, in the end, is not about destruction. Ultimately, it is the greatest construction project in the universe. The vision of Christianity is the in-breaking of the kingdom of God which is about reconciliation, peace, healing and the power of God’s love to overcome evil.

So, in the midst of a world of destruction and burning cars in the streets, keep on building, keep on constructing. Let your capacity to love this world be greater than any force which unleashes hatred on the world. Let your forgiveness be greater than any force of bitterness. Remember, the cross is the greatest intersection of the world’s hatred and God’s love. The resurrection is God constructing once again. The Risen Lord defeats death. Construction, in the end, always trumps destruction.

Thanks be to God.

This chapter is about grace. On pages 66-67 Alcorn talks about grace versus tolerance. To give grace is not the same thing as condoning something. By the way tolerance doesn’t mean condoning. Someone once told me that we tolerate the smell in an outhouse, that doesn’t mean we like the smell. Alcorn says that grace never lowers the standard of God’s holiness (page 66). the parable of the prodigal son is an example of grace (Luke 15:11-32). Also many of you know of the play and movie “Les Miserables.”
Alcorn shares a great example from C.S. Lewis: • “During a British conference on comparative religions, scholars debated what belief, if any was totally unique to the Christian faith.
• Incarnation? The gods of other religions appeared in human form. Resurrection? Other religions tell of those returning from the dead. The debate went on until C.S. Lewis wandered into the room. The scholars posed the question to him.
• ‘That’s easy,’ Lewis replied. ‘It’s grace.’
• Our Babel-building pride insists that we must work our way to God. Only the Christian faith presents God’s grace as unconditional.” (page 68 more explained on page 69: “’All religions are basically the same’? Imagine a geometry or French teacher who said to his students, ‘It doesn’t matter what answers you give on the test. All answers are basically the same.’ Hinduism’s gods are many and impersonal. Christianity’s God is one and personal. Buddhism offers no forgiveness or divine intervention. Christianity offers forgiveness and Divine intervention. In Judaism and Islam, men earn righteous status before God through doing good works. In Christianity, men gain righteousness only by confessing their unrighteousness and being covered by Christ’s merit. Every other religion is a man working his way to God. Christianity is God working His way to man.”)
Then another illustration:

• Michael Christopher’s play, The Black Angel pages 69-70:
What happens to us when we are forgiven?Christopher’s play is about a former German army general, Engel, who tried to make a new life for himself and his wife outside a little French village. He had been imprisoned for 30 years, sentenced by Nuremberg war war crimes court. He hoped that people will forget and forgive he terrible past. He built a log cabin in the near by mountains he wanted to start anew.A french journalist, Morrieu, could not forget the past. His family was massacred by the generals army. There was not a single survivor in the village. For thirty years Morrieu had planned his revenge. He said to himself: “If the Nuremberg court could not sentence General Engel To die, I will pronounce his death sentence and execute it.” He stoked the embers of hartred and fears in the mind of village radicals. and revolutionaries.They conspired to burn down the cabin in night, killing Angel and his wife. Morrieu as a journalist, had several questions for the General: why did he do it? After thirty years in prison, what did he feel know? So he proceeded to the cabin, surprised the General and his wife and spent the whole afternoon probing his past action, trying to analyze and learn the reason for the tragedy.He found the general full of regret and repentance. He was actually waiting to download his guilt to someone, He could trust. Moved, Morrieu offered to smuggle the General and his wife to safety. He disclosed to them that he villagers would atack his cabin at night and kill both of them. The general said: ” We will accompany you only on the condition; that you forgive me.” Morrieu could not forgive the general. He could save him but forgive him never! That night the villagers burnt down the cabin and shot Engel and his wife dead. The play when staged left the audience gasping for an answer…….
Do you have any thoughts about how tough grace is? Have a blessed week!

• Michael Christopher’s play, The Black Angel. Illustration pages 69-70 (copied and pastied from http://ahimsaakash.blogspot.com/2008/09/black-angel-by-michael-christopher.html
What happens to us when we are forgiven?Christopher’s play is about a former German army general, Engel, who tried to make a new life for himself and his wife outside a little French village. He had been imprisoned for 30 years, sentenced by Nuremberg war war crimes court. He hoped that people will forget and forgive he terrible past. He built a log cabin in the near by mountains he wanted to start anew.A french journalist, Morrieu, could not forget the past. His family was massacared by the generals army. There was not a single survivor in the village. For thirty years Morrieu had planned his revenge. He said to himself: “If the Nuremberg court could not sentence General Engel To die, I will pronounce his death sentence and execute it.” He stoked the embers of hartred and fears in the mind of village radicals. and revolutionaries.They conspire to burn down the cabin in night, killing Angel and his wife. Morrieu as a journalist, had several question for the General: why did he do it? After thirty years in prison, what did he feel know? So he proceede to the cabin, surprised the General and his wife and spent the whole afternoon probinghis past action, trying to analyze and learn the reason for the tragedy.He found the general full of regret and repentance. He was actually waiting to download his guilt to someone, He could trust. Moved, Morrieu offered to smuggle the General and his wife to safety. He disclosed to them that he vilagers would atack his cabin at night and kill both of them. The general said: ” We will accompany you only on the condition; that you forgive me.” Morrieu could not forgive the general. He could save him but forgive him never! That night the villagers burnt down the cabin and shot Engel and his wife dead. The play when staged left the audience gasping for an answer…….