Category Archives: Faith

The right to be forgotten

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“And their sins and lawless deeds I will remember no more” (Hebrews 10:17).

Something happened this week to remind me of a note I received from a preacher some time back.

On my website, I had reported that the local newspaper was telling of the arrest of this man for incest.  I was appropriately concerned that servants of the Most High God should conduct themselves by higher standards and I probably shamed this fellow for his iniquity.

The man wrote, “All charges against me were dropped.  But every time I try to get a job and the employer googles my name, your article comes up telling of my arrest. That’s the end of that job.”

He needed me to go back into my files, find that article, and delete that story.

It took some doing, but I managed to find the article and erase the story. Then, I sent him an apology.

It was a well-learned lesson, and I’ve been cautious ever since.

It turns out that this is a far-reaching problem with all kinds of legal dimensions.

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Truth has this interesting quirk: Only those willing to adapt to it get it.

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“If any man is willing to do His will, he shall know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from myself” (John 7:17).

Truth is a funny thing: If you want it, you tend to find it.  If you don’t believe it exists, you never come across it.

A generation ago, Professor Allan Bloom wrote a bestseller called “The Closing of the American Mind” in which he said a growing percentage of young Americans considers the mark of the modern man to be an open mind.

By “open mind” they mean an intellect that tolerates everything and considers truth to be relative, that takes no hard and fast positions, and gives  all positions equal footing. To them, a “closed mind” ranks as the epitome of ignorance and backwardness.

Students enter the university, said Dr. Bloom, “just knowing” that maturity requires that they jettison all those “prejudices” and outdated restrictions from their parents’ repressed generation.  Those wishing to take a strong stand for (insert your favorite value here) patriotism, Americanism, the Bible, the Ten Commandments, or the church are old-fashioned and still bound in chains of ignorance.

In the years since Professor Bloom’s book topped the bestsellers’ lists, nothing has happened to change this sad state. To far too many young Americans, to be educated and sophisticated is to reject hard and fast notions of truth and to welcome relativity in every discipline.

Such is the philosophy of a large section of the up-and-coming generations.

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Sorry. I do not feel your pain.

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President Bill Clinton popularized the line: “I feel your pain.”  He could say it with such pathos in his voice, you felt–at first, anyway–that he just might do that.

“I feel your pain.”  I suspect that is said too easily much of the time. And I can almost guarantee that hearing the words does not give comfort to the one hurting.

For the last forty years of his life, my coal-miner dad had silicosis, “black lung” it’s called, the result of breathing coal dust for decades in the depths of the pits.  He started working inside the mines when he was 14–that would be 1926–when child-labor laws were in their infancy and safety for the workers was an afterthought.  As a result, he often had trouble breathing.

There were times when he would look at me with pained eyes and say, “I can’t get my breath. You have no idea how it hurts.”

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The abundant part of the “abundant life.” Not what we expected.

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In 1989, when Margaret and I were dealing with a church situation where the Lord had sent us three years earlier, we found comfort in the 66th Psalm.  Specifically a few verses in the center jumped out at us as we read it on our back porch one evening….

“For you, O God, tested us; You refined us like silver; You brought us into prison and laid burdens on our backs. You let men ride over our heads; We went through fire and water, but you brought us to a place of abundance” (Ps. 66:10-12).

As we were praying a few minutes later, Margaret surprised me with these words: “And Lord, in that scripture you said you were bringing us to a place of abundance.  So, we’re going to claim that right now. Whatever it is and wherever it is. Whether it’s here in this church or somewhere else, we believe you are going to lead us to a place of abundance.”

I had not seen that as a promise. But once my spiritually-sensitive bride spotted it, it made a world of sense.

Thereafter, when we prayed, we frequently thanked the Lord for HIs promise to lead us to a place of abundance.

Not long after, things went south.

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What they are missing who believe we can lose our salvation

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Those who follow this blog–thank you for your endurance!–will recall that a few months ago, we posted several assurances of the eternality (is that a word?) of our salvation.  We mentioned two or three of the strongest affirmations of Scripture that one’s salvation, once given by the Lord Jesus Christ, is forever secure.

To our surprise, some protested.

I should not have been surprised. After all, I was raised in a church of the Arminian persuasion that teaches (officially at least) one can be saved multiple times. As a teen, I recall my mother mentioning some in our large family who were Southern Baptist–“missionary Baptists” she called them–who believed in the doctrine familiarly known as “once saved, always saved.”  Mom would say, “They believe you can go out tonight and get drunk and still be saved tomorrow.” Which is true, of course. We do believe that, although that’s not our favorite way to express it. Smiley face, please. (And most definitely not something we encourage. But a person’s salvation has to be stronger than Jack Daniels or we are all in big trouble!)

To be fair, I never once heard a pastor of our home church teach that people may lose their salvation.  The pastors have always seemed certain of our security in Christ.

Anyway, long story short, since some protested and insisted that one can lose his salvation in direct contradiction to the sayings of our Lord, the subject will not leave me alone.  I’d like to return to it, if I may.  (As President Reagan once said, “I paid for this microphone.”  It’s my blog, so I can choose any subject I please. Please smile.)

So you will know, I’m not angry and not even arguing.  (I am a lover, not a fighter.)  Just trying to get at the truth of this most vital doctrine.

It matters a great deal.

Some random thoughts on this subject….

ONE.

Those who believe in the possibility of losing their salvation will quote scriptures which they say we must answer, such as those which speak of “falling from grace” and “making shipwreck.”

I get that, but they are missing something.

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What I would say at your graduation

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(I have not been invited to speak at anyone’s high school graduation in years, and am not unhappy about that in the least.  Sitting through the lengthy program–sometimes outside in the sun!–and eventually rising to try to convey some heavy thoughts to a crowd interested in a thousand things other than my message, no thank you.  So, I’ll just post a commencement address here. Thank you very much. Oh, and congratulations.)

“Thank you, Superintendent!  Congratulations, graduates. And may I say, you look beautiful today.  Even the fellow on the front row who appears not to be wearing pants under his robe.

Today is a great day in your life.  But don’t let it be the high point. In fact, if you do life well, you will forget almost everything that happens today, as a hundred other great events in your life will crowd out these memories. So, savor the moment. It’s fleeting.

Here is what I’d like to convey to you. Got your pencil and paper ready? This will be on the test!

1) Keep on growing.

You’re not ‘you’ yet; in some ways you’re still an embryo.

When looked at through the lens of your complete life, you are today graduating from the 3rd grade. You have so much to learn, so much farther to go. This is no time to quit growing.

Someone in my high school told of a classmate rowing his boat out into the middle of the lake and dumping all his textbooks overboard.  His new high school diploma was all he would be needing. This is suicidal.  Not to say stupid.

I hope you didn’t love high school too much. One of the worst things that can happen to any of us is to have hit our peak in high school, to have loved it so much that we never want to leave, and to spend the rest of our days trying to recapture those moments.

Far better to have been a little frustrated in your schooling that “they” weren’t teaching something you needed, that “they” were wasting much of your time, that you could do better than this. This angst, if we may call it that, has a way of jet-propelling you out of school toward the next stage.

That’s good. You’re so ready to get on to the next thing.

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12 ways of understanding faith

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“Without faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6).

Faith is vastly different from presumption.

Faith has its reasons for believing a thing, doing something, going someplace. Presumption is blind faith, and believes/does/goes without having been told or sent.

“The just shall live by faith” (Habakkuk 2:4; Romans 1:17, and Galatians 3:11). “We walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7).

Presumption has no place in the life of a believer.

The parents who withhold medical care from a child because they “just know” God will heal him are living by presumption, not faith. The preacher who leaves home for some foreign land without a clear word from God because he “just knows” the Lord will not abandon him is testing God’s patience and being presumptuous.

“Keep back thy servant from presumptuous sins” (Psalm 19:13).

I want to live by faith.  Faith means “I believe in God and I have confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ” (John 14:1).  I have evidence, conviction, and to some extent, proof. What I do not have is all my questions answered, all my doubts removed, all the evidence I’d like. If I did have all that, I would not need faith but would be walking “by sight.”

God wants us to live and work, worship and teach, pray and serve by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

When lived out and applied, faith shows up in a lot of ways….

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Some preaching is a waste of time

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I love some of the specialized channels on Sirius XM satellite radio. Recently, however, they replaced the channel playing big band music of the 1940s with one devoted to Billy Joel’s music. At first, that sounded all right. He had some great hits we all love. The problem is he also recorded a whole lot of junk.

To get to the occasional hit, you have to endure all the mediocre stuff.

Same with novelists.  Our favorite writers can turn out some real bombs.  You wonder why they don’t write only best-sellers.

The answer, of course, is that when they’re writing the books and recording the music, they have no way of knowing. If, as Paul said, “we see through a glass darkly,” it’s equally true that we write books and compose songs without a clear idea of the result.

When I was young in the ministry, I spent three years on the staff of a large church and got to see upclose how things are done.  Most of it was great and educational; all of it was interesting.

On more than one occasion, I chaffeured our pastor–a young man himself and unfortunately a little too impressed with his accomplishments, it turned out–on short trips where he would address a group of ministers in some nearby county.  I can still hear him saying, “Why am I wasting my time doing this? That bunch is never going to do anything.”

Now, I disagreed with him then–and said so, leading to some interesting conversations–and do so to this day.

However.

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Letter to my six granddaughters on whom to marry. And whom to avoid.

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Six of the finest young people on this planet happen to be our granddaughters.  Margaret and I are blessed beyond measure.

In order of their arrival into our lives, they are Leah Carla, Jessica Mae, Abigail Rebecca, Erin Elizabeth, Darilyn Samantha, and JoAnne Lauren.  They are as pretty and sweet as their names.

Sometimes, when I’m in the car with one of you, I will raise the question: “How do you choose a husband? What kind of man will you marry some day?”

Now is the time for you to be thinking of this.  In fact, you should have been giving this thought for some time now. Leah, senior member of this sextet, is 25 and little sis JoAnne is the youngest at 16.

First, whom to avoid.  Run from these types just as fast as you can, as far as you get…

1) Lazy.  No matter if he’s charming and sweet-talks you and thinks you are the best thing ever (which you are!), do not be taken in by him. If he can’t hold a job and prefers to live off the earnings of others, marrying a bum like him would be a disaster.  You will be the breadwinner for your entire married life. Marry a hard worker.

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Think God can’t use you? Think again.

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“And Moses said, ‘Who me, Lord? I’ve not been to seminary. I didn’t even finish college. The other preachers won’t respect me. Pulpit committees won’t have anything to do with me. There’s a bounty on me back in Egypt. I stutter a lot, and tend to freeze up in front of groups. You’ve clearly dialed a wrong number, Lord.”

“And God said, ‘Shut up and listen.'” (My rather free version of Exodus 3-4.)

“The Lord can’t use a nothing nobody like me.”

Ever heard that? Ever said it?

Repent, sinner.  You underestimate God! (And you might be overestimating your own importance in the equation.)

The Lord delights in taking nobodies and doing great things with them.

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