Stephen
Terry, Director
God's
Grand, Christ-Centered Plan
Commentary
for the July 8, 2023, Sabbath School Lesson
"Peter
replied, 'Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ
for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy
Spirit.'" Acts 2:38, NIV
Several decades ago, as a
teenager, I attended youth meetings of a group called "King's Teens," an outreach
to young people offered by the Nazarene Church. As many as a couple of dozen
teens would attend, mostly drawn by all the sweet treats that faithful church
members baked and provided each week to support this ministry. We would all sit
and listen to the leader who was trying to expose us to the gospel. No one took
it seriously. We all endured the preaching to later enjoy the desserts. It was
an old model the church was using that offered earthly treasures in hopes of
cultivating interest in heavenly ones. This is why the gospel has found larger
audiences among the poor. Those have little and are seeking some material
blessing in life. The wealthy who can buy whatever dessert they like are little
attracted to such an outreach. But it is an unfortunate fact that much of the
world does not enjoy the standard of living found in Western Civilization. Thus,
this type of evangelization has met with much success in Third World countries.
In fact, anyone who wishes to gain a following, regardless of religion, can do
so by feeding the people and caring for their physical needs.
In many respects, this is the ministry
that Jesus modeled with feeding the hungry and healing the sick. When we depart
from that model, we struggle to make an impact in the world. What we are left
with without that is an attempt to argue someone into following Jesus. But an
empty belly isn"t interested in arguments and the person will simply turn away
to find someone else willing to fill that belly. Those who come to Christ that
way have often been referred to disparagingly as "Rice Christians." Some may
indeed only be Christians on the surface to feed themselves and their families.
Even pastors are not exempt from maintaining a front to maintain a livelihood.
Hunger and need are powerful motivators, and people, even within the church,
are not above using them to manipulate others, to control their lives and those
of their families. Whereas Christ fed thousands and demanded nothing of them in
return, we tend to extend largesse at a profit. If we cannot find a decent
return in accretions or offerings, we move on to something else that promises
to do so. We abandon the model that Christ provided. I cannot help but wonder
how much more successful our evangelism would be if we simply fed those who
come to the meetings. We draw them in with brochures and media campaigns
featuring fantastic beasts and a promise to interpret what each of these
symbols mean to us. But once they come and see what is being presented,
attendance begins to fall off. How many more would have continued to come if we
added a meal. And what an opportunity that would be to share the health
message.
In my experience with King's
Teens, I attended along with two dozen other teenagers for weeks and none of us
took it seriously until one night after the preaching and before the desserts,
the leader gave an altar call. He had us bow our heads with eyes closed and
repeatedly asked those who wanted to give their life to Christ to raise their
hand. This went on for some time until I began to feel that I was likely the
only one who had not raised his hand. I did not want to be the lone holdout
preventing the others from enjoying the treats, so I raised my hand and the
leader said, "Amen!" and closed the prayer. At first this confirmed that I was
the only hold out until the leader asked me to join him in another room, just
me and no one else. Then I realized I was the only one who raised his hand. In
that room with him and the woman who hosted the meeting in her home each week, we
knelt, and he led me in The Sinners Prayer. Something happened that evening. I
went on my knees as a cocky teenager worried that I was missing out on the
desserts, but I got up feeling a deep hunger for God and the Bible, something I
never experienced before. I have been feeding that hunger ever since. I believe
it is the evidence that the Holy Spirit came into my life. And although I am no
longer censured for my sins,[i] I
am not perfect, nor do I expect to be this side of the transformation at the
Parousia.[ii]
Nonetheless, the hunger persists and just as I pursue daily nourishment for my
physical need, I also daily nourish that spiritual need and have for sixty
years.
For those who like the mystery
genre, the Bible presents one of the greatest mysteries of all time. It is the
mystery of iniquity. According to the twelfth chapter of Revelation, it originated
in heaven. If any place personified perfection, I would expect heaven to be
that place. How does one decide to exchange perfection for something else? The
story of The Fall in Genesis attempts to answer that with Adam and Eve. They
lived in Paradise, but it was not enough. Even though they had everything, someone
told them that God was a lie, and their belief in him was holding them back
from all they could be otherwise. It is not hard to understand how that could
work. Many repeat that very same argument today. Although Paul's letter to the Ephesians
speaks of predestined salvation, it is not inevitable. It is more in the sense
of our having it and holding it in faith believing in that promise. But we can
also choose to believe it is all a lie and turn away from God.
The Koine
Greek for the word translated as "repentance" in the Bible means to make a
complete about face from the direction we were going. Instead of believing God
is a lie and walking away from him, we begin walking toward him, and as each
step brings us closer to him, a resonance between Creator and his creation
builds, a resonance enhanced by the Holy Spirit's presence, given when we
choose to begin that change in direction. Despite God having offered this from
the beginning, few choose to accept it. It was not an afterthought; everyone
was written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world.[iii]
But not everyone remains there.[iv] We
have complete control over our presence in that book. If we adamantly and
persistently choose to follow the lie that we are missing out if we turn to
God, we can remove our name from that tome, blotting it out as the Bible says.
This is the mystery I spoke of.
It is the mystery of iniquity that drove Adam and Eve to reject the relationship
they had with God. It also drove the Israelites, despite their deliverance from
Egyptian slavery, to choose to worship the idols of the very nations that
oppressed them, rejecting God who had delivered them from that bondage. That
rejection was so remarkable that the prophet Jeremiah exclaimed, "Cross over to
the coasts of Cyprus and look, send to Kedar and observe closely; see if there
has ever been anything like this: Has a nation ever changed its gods? (Yet they
are not gods at all.) But my people have exchanged their glorious God for
worthless idols." (Jeremiah 2:10-11)
We pride ourselves in not
worshiping lifeless idols like the pagans of antiquity but are we truly any
better than they? We think that because they worshipped gods that were not
real, all gods must be imaginary. But to have a counterfeit, there must be the
genuine or the counterfeit serves no purpose. The worshipping of these many
idols over the millennia may reflect the truth that there is legitimate worship
obscured by the many efforts to suborn that worship. What then should be the
character of worship? Is it possible to discover a true path forward
spiritually? Despite popular consensus to the contrary, Paul would emphatically
have agreed that worship is both possible and necessary, derived from the relationship
between humanity and their Creator.
Some may feel that discoveries
in geology and archaeology obviate the possibility of creation by divine fiat.
I agree that they require a reinterpretation of long-held religious assumptions
about the nature of the Bible, inspiration, and the meaning of a world much
older than is presented in scripture, but our faith should not be dependent on
a dogmatic literalism about scripture as much as on a charismatic interaction
with God through the Holy Spirit. This is a foundational truth that makes the
reception of the Holy Spirit's presence in our lives essential to faith and
ongoing spiritual growth. The Christian walk to God is so experientially broad
that it cannot be confined to the limited pages of a book, and yet it is so narrow
that too few find it in a world filled with many voices all clamoring to be
heard. This is especially true since the call to that path is given with only a
whisper.[v] It
took an altar call during a prayer for me to finally hear that whisper on my
knees. Not in a church, but in a private home. It changed my life.