The Battle Cry!

The Unborn

The Unborn

Thru the veiled midst of a somber day, small voices hearken Why?

In a world where the essence of life forsaken, Silent voices cry….

“Where is justice, where are tears, where is the future, where are the years?

The silent chorus screams!

Who will avenge the small and weak, in echoed silence hear them speak?

Misshaped citizens swaddled in burlap, Evicted from life? A chosen mishap?

The stones cry out, Why, Why?

No crib, or bonnet, the grave a nursery?   Not even a stone to mark death’s anniversary

Life is given, life was free, but there will be no life for me

  The angels weep, because their children are no more ©

The Gospel; The Diamond of Hope

" The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil." 1 John 3:8

  Whenever I have read 1 John 3:8 before and have seen this sentence in context " Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared ..... I would always think of myself the way I was before I was saved, and all the works of the devil that I have been saved from.  As I read this passage recently the word "appeared" rose up off the page as if it had been written in a red letter Bible. As I looked and meditated on it the Spirit showed me that I often subconsciously read passages about the finished work of Christ devotionally but not devotedly. In other words I felt like the Spirit was saying, "Hey, Brett do you see how often you properly personalize the Gospel in Scripture, but at the same time empty it of it's global context? The word appeared is aorist tense meaning it is more of a snapshot of what happened rather than a full motion picture.  Truth be told, thats how I often times look at the Gospel.  There Jesus and I are in all the pictures, but surprisingly the rest of my unsaved brethren are not there.  Am I subconsiously abbreviating and limiting the work of Christ in demolishing the works of the devil in my own mind to my own past or immediate context?  I began to reflect on how subtle this has become, and how deep down it reflects that even under the seemingly pure auspice of worship for what Christ has done for me, self is oftentimes trying to trump or hoard the overall context of the Gospel which is me, us and them.   If I celebrate the cross exclusively without regard to the glory of God in His continual appearing in salvation to those whom He has chosen, is this fullness in worship?  There is no doubt in me that I love His having appeared for me, the question is do I love His appearing to others in saving grace?

A Christological gospel is what I need to reflect on and perhaps you do to. I feel like I need to meditate not only on the salvation of Christ in my life, but also the saving character of Christ that demands He saves others.  For us to reflect on salvation as merely a personal experience with borderline exclusiveness if not in word, in our tendency to be non urgent in evangelism practice, is to diminish the real and true character of Christ in the jewel of the gospel.  It could be compared to someone looking at the Hope diamond upside down. Upside down it would still be enormous and appear overwhelmingly great, but it was designed to appear and destined to be even greater.  The gospel was God's design to refract all the saving facets of the jeweled name of Jesus Christ past, present, future. It is interesting that Abraham, Jacob, Peter and others had their names changed to reflect who they had become or who they would be.  Jesus's name in eternity past and in eternity future has and will always be "Yeshua" Jehovah Saves. We need to look at the gospel in its Christogically upright position, and when we do we won't merely worship Christ because He saved us, we will worship Him because of the character He displayed saving us.  That same character we love and worship is the same character that demands that He continues to heroically save.  There are the others right here in this generation, surely some placed in our own lives chosen to be saved, chosen to be conformed to His image that He is concerned with as much as we who are found.  The Prodigal story speaks to this. So does Matthew 18:12 where it says "What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the mountans and go in search of the one that went astray? " It is not that our salvation was not paramount with God, but that the salvation of those whom He chosen in this generation that are still out there. Afraid, alone, and without God and without hope in this world whose salvation is paramount now. '"And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting  to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was , and is alive; he was lost, and is found." Luke 15:31-32

This is what I am wrestling with more and more these days. My piety absent a sincere redemptive heart is too shallow a reflection of a deeply concerned Savior. I don't want to be like the Prodigal's older brother who only wanted to celebrate his relationship to the father while others stood on the verge of eternal ruin. I want to be like Jesus. His concern for them must bear itself out, and we through the awesome privelege of evangelism get to participate in His beautifully jeweled character. Its as if Jesus appears in the burning corridor of a collapsing building called the lost world, and in the midst of mans suffocation, and his hopelessness of escape, and says I'm not leaving this building until everyone the Father has given me has escaped.  Christ never takes one of us to the ground safely and then stops saving.  My hope is that by the Spirit we will worship, praise, and thank Him for our own salvation while we follow Him back up the ladder.©

Living Hell

Matthew 9:36-38 ³⁶ When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.  Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. 

......

We are going through the Proclaim evangelism training curriculum in our church care group on Tuesday nights. At the end of one of the sessions last week, my care group leader asked what statement or idea during the session really stood out to us.  Some in the group mentioned that it was reassuring to hear the author of the curriculum admit that he still felt fear every time he shared the gospel. As we went around the room one of the other responses to the question caught my attention. A person mentioned how a quote by L.R. Scarborough in the curriculum had really made them think about urgency in evangelism.  The quote reads:

.....

“If we could only have a five minute glimpse into Hell our evangelism would be changed for a lifetime.”   

......    

There is no doubt that this power packed quote denotes urgency and virtue in outreach. The only other comment I would make is that when you take a close look at Matthew 9:36 the context of Jesus’ compassion for the lost is not the afterlife, but this life. As I think about Jesus’ heart in evangelism in the New Testament I see a lot of passages where Christ seemed to have both an eternal and an immediate rescue at heart. His words in Matthew 9:36 above indicate as much.  “When He saw the crowds, He had compassion for them……. they were like sheep without a shepherd.”  Many theologians and teachers define hell as eternal separation from God.  When Jesus saw the multitudes He saw both the eternal separation, and instantaneously grievous to His soul was their immediate separation. Jesus understood that the difference between being harrassed in this life, and not being harrassed was the peace of the presence of Himself now.  Jesus’ compassion welled up to overflowing in His human and divine heart because of what He saw in the people’s present spiritual condition with a clear view to their subsequent eternal condition. With minimal research I found at least a dozen passages that open with the words Jesus saw , or seeing Jesus..... Jesus seems to have had spiritual bifocals.  Jesus saw the state of the human soul both near and far.  He could see the misery of a soul without God’s presence in this life, and see the misery of a soul without God in the next.  Both represented oppressive, hopeless, harassing darkness to his 20/20 spiritual eyes.

.....

By far one of the Chapters I have found most effective in preaching compassionate concern for the lost has been Ephesians 2: 11-12 which reads:

....

“Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “Uncircumcision” by the so-called “Circumcision,” which is performed in the flesh by human hands---remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world “ 

....

Whenever I have preached this passage I have tried to draw attention to the word remember which I think is one of the absolute keys to us as weak humans to being able to convene a Christlike compassion from the bowels of our inner man. After reading this passage aloud, I would then ask Christians in the congregation to close their eyes for just a moment and reflect on statements like these:

....

…… remember when you were strangers to the covenants of promise, and you were without hope and without God in the world?   What was life like for you back then?  Do you remember how heavy the troubles of your life were when you carried them alone?  Do you recall how little peace you had, how unstable your state of mind was in those lost days?  Was your outlook for the future the same as it is now?  Do you remember how much guilt and unforgiveness you felt , the ever present condemnation, shame, and fear you had. Your fear of life, of hell?  I remember vividly my days without God, His promises, His Spirit, His Son, His Hope and it was it was living hell.

...

Its true that Jesus had a compassionate advantage over us in that He could infinitely observe the human soul without the cataract of self pre-occupation, or a finite ability to understand the human condition outside of his own experience. Proverbs 14:10 says noone can fully understand another persons sorrows, or another persons joys. Fortunately for us, we have someone inside us who can, and if we are willing to confess our shortsightedness, or even partial to complete compassionary blindness, then He can do the necessary surgery on our hearts eyes, and we will see both the waiting open graves, and the weary march towards hell. 

...

The first thing we first have to do is ask God to assess our own sight and its perception of the human souls around us. A lot of us can see the far away tragedy of a person’s eternal separation from God, but can’t see the end of our nose where there are those who are harassed and without a shepherd right now. Some harassed to the point of alcoholism, drug use, depression, hypertension and suicidal despair.  Some of us need Christs' healing salve to help us see at all because we have become near sighted from constantly glaring at our own Christian reflection that now we can't see a stone's throw past our own comfortable Christianity.  Many of us are blinded by an obsession with the tedium of our own lives that we can't see the expansive harvest in the field just beyond the boundary stones of our front yard. Are we even seeing the state of our neighbors souls that are ten feet in front of us?  Do we even try to imagine how hopeless they are, and how downcast their spirits must be in light of the accelerated , unkindness, immorality, and uncertainty of this modern day world?  If so, does that sight evoke compassionate soul concern? I have found that remembering what Christ has done for me and reflecting on what life in this world would be like without Him can be the strongest impetus for my own evangelism, alongside a passion for God's name to be hallowed. We need to see ourselves again without God and without hope in this world and remember what it was like for us, and what it still must be like for our neighbor. We need to pray for Christ to revive our eyes to see our neighbors as He sees them.  Jesus saw the crowds, a word which literally means “common people”.  He saw that they were harassed and enslaved , having no shepherd. They were distressed which means “thrown down” implying that their guilty consciences and hopeless outlooks had them living on the brink of utter defeat. 

....

Folks, no matter what the exterior of the people we live by may look like, regardless of how nice the cars, homes, manicured lawns, or how seemingly balanced their lives may appear.  Remember to be without God in this chaotic, sinful unanchored world is at the least a metaphor for the literal hell.  We are surrounded by people who look just like us, and who seem outwardly controlled and self reliant, but if they don’t have Christ they are just pretty shells filled to the brim with spiritual unease.  They may say their okay, act okay, or they may even be running away from God at a heat, but trust me in the closet of the lost heart the soul is restless and desperate.  The lost soul may even attempt to kill itself trying to numb and staunch its own quivering spiritual nerves. They may appear by all accounts to be collected, well mannered, tax paying, benevolent, disciplined, and seemingly joyous, but inside their heart there is a genuine state of emergency. 

....

The following poem of Paul Lawrence Dunbar a son of former slaves emphatically reflects how a tormented souls can seem okay to an unsensitive eye:

.....

We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,--
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be overwise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
          We wear the mask.

We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from death souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
          We wear the mask!

If we are to ever hope to have a compassionate concern that even remotely resembles Christ’s we will have to remember our own hell we were freed from, and also ask virulently the Spirits help to awaken our consciousness to our neighbors Godless, hopeless, promiseless hell. 

One more time close your eyes.  How would you feel if you had to face the current financial uncertainty, health issues, joblessness, ism, school s, rebellious children, the negativistic and skeptic worldview, the unkindness of modern society, all without God, the Savior, the Holy Spirit, the Word, or the Body?

I have a wonderful pastor at my church who in his sermon said:

“Any day your sins are totally forgiven, and God’s wrath is totally removed is a great day”

Then by the same token, any day a persons sin remains unforgiven, and God’s wrath still abides on them is a terrible day.  Jesus didn’t just see people milling about busily, and He didn’t just see people bound for hell. Jesus saw people without Him, and without hope in this world, and He understood a state of emergency when He saw it. My hearts cry for the church in this world, who are the ambassador's of His offered hope in this world, will take firm hold of the cloak of our Savior's garment and plead that He would let this mind also be in us. We can open our eyes now.

©

A Zealous Man

Bishop R.C. Ryles

Zeal in religion is a burning desire to please God, to do His will, and to advance His glory in the world in every possible way. It is a desire which no man feels by nature-which the Spirit puts in the heart of every believer when he is converted-but which some believers feel so much more strongly than others that they alone deserve to be called "zealous" men.

A zealous man in religion is pre-eminently a man of one thing. It is not enough just to be whole-hearted and fervent in spirit. He sees one thing, he cares for one thing, he lives for one thing, he is swallowed up in one thing, and that one thing is to please God. Whether he lives, or whether he dies-whether he has health, or whether he has sickness-whether he is rich, or whether he is poor-whether he is thought wise, or whether he is thought foolish-whether he gets blame, or whether he gets praise-whether he gets honour, or whether he gets shame-for all this the zealous man cares nothing at all. He burns for one thing' and that one thing is to please God, and to advance God's glory. If he is consumed in the burning, he cares not for it-he is content. he feels that, like a lamp, he is made to burn, and if consumed in burning, will always find a sphere for his zeal. If he cannot preach, work, and give money, he will cry, and sigh, and pray...If he cannot fight in the valley with Joshua, he will do the work of Moses, Aaron, and Hur, on the hilld. If he is cut off from working himself, he will give the Lord no rest till help is raised up from another quarter, and the work is done. I have this essay framed and matted in my study and I look at it almost every day. Whenever I look at it invariably my mind races to all the men in the Bible who had this kind of zeal; Moses, Caleb, Enoch, Peter, Paul ... and especially Jesus. But what I most associate with it, and the reason it hangs on my wall is the line of Scripture found in Hebrews 12:1 that bookends chapter 11 and what many call the Hall of Faith, with a panopoly of bibilical heroes rich in zeal and faith. Hebrews 12:1 reads :

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us"

This forceful, spiritually inspired appeal indicates that the zeal of those witnesses that we are surrounded by in biblical history is a zeal that God wants us to have. That a zealous race is possible for us to run as well, or He would not command us to run it.
I can remember one of the first sermons I ever heard John Piper preach called "Will You Burn". He was preaching at his alma mater Wheaton College and early in the sermon he looked the young and eager students in the eye and said plainly " The Question is not whether someone will burn with zeal for the spread of the gospel; God clearly has ordained that it will be so in Matthew 24:14 "And this Gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughtout the whole world as a testimony to all nation, and the end will come." then he said "My Question to you students today is: Will You Burn?" When I heard that sermon years ago, I felt the spirit grab me and ask that same question. That is the same question I believe God is posing to all of us in these neediest of times. "Will You Burn? " Is zeal for your Father's household eating you up? Clearly John Piper believes we can have this zeal . Martin Lloyd Jones was convinced we could. We ourselves must realize that this kind of zeal is not for the spiritually elite, it is a zeal we can aspire to and that we should earnestly pray and perhaps even fast for. " Our Father who art in heaven hallowed be thy Name" "Oh, Jesus give me a fiery spirit but a humble grace. Strike a flame in me, and give me a Gospel focus. Please, Please Oh God don't let me waste my life quenched and flickering. I beg you, through your Spirit, make me a white hot flame! Make me a Zealous

Man

Amen