If Lazarus, when he was raised from the dead, had been asked to sing about the experience, and had to choose one of the following, which song would he have sung?

a. “I Have Decided to Follow Jesus”

b. “Amazing Grace”

Death is separation. A physical death is the separation of the soul from the body. Spiritual death, which is of greater significance, is the separation of the soul from God. In Genesis 2:17, God tells Adam that in the day he eats of the forbidden fruit he will “surely die.” Adam does fall, but his physical death does not occur immediately; God must have had another type of death in mind—spiritual death. This separation from God is exactly what we see in Genesis 3:8. When Adam and Eve heard the voice of the Lord, they “hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God.” The fellowship had been broken. They were spiritually dead.

When Jesus was hanging on the cross, He paid the price for us by dying on our behalf. Even though He is God, He still had to suffer to agony of a temporary separation from the Father due to the sin of world He was carrying on the cross. After three hours of supernatural darkness, He cried, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” (Mark 15:33-34). This spiritual separation from the Father was the result of the Son’s taking our sins upon Himself. That’s the impact of sin. Sin is the exact opposite of God and God had to turn away from His own Son at that point in time.

A man without Christ is spiritually dead. Paul describes it as “being alienated from the life of God” in Ephesians 4:18. (To be separated from life is the same as being dead.) The natural man, like Adam hiding in the garden, is isolated from God. When we are born again, the spiritual death is reversed. Before salvation, we are dead (spiritually), but Jesus gives us life. “And you He made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins,” (Ephesians 2:1 NKJV). “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins” (Colossians 2:13).

To illustrate, think of Jesus’ raising of Lazarus in John 11. The physically dead Lazarus could do nothing for himself. He was unresponsive to all stimuli, oblivious to all life around him, beyond all help or hope—except for the help of Christ who is “the Resurrection and the Life” (John 11:25). At Christ’s call, Lazarus was filled with life, and he responded accordingly. In the same way, we were spiritually dead, unable to save ourselves, powerless to perceive the life of God—until Jesus called us to Himself. He “quickened” us; “not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy” (Titus 3:5).

The book of Revelation speaks of a “second death,” which is a final (and eternal) separation from God. Only those who have never experienced new life in Christ will partake of the second death (Revelation 2:11; 20:6, 14; 21:8).

Recommended Resource: What the Bible Says about Heaven & Eternity by Ice & Demy.

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins. – Ephesians 2:1

In those words, the Apostle Paul is speaking of a ‘former’ state of those believers, a state of being spiritually dead.  So we have to ask – former to what? Well, that is rather self-evident in the context and can only mean before they believed in Christ, since he is speaking to professing believers in Ephesus.

That begs the question:

‘Since they formerly were spiritually dead and therefore unable to deal with spiritual matters, and because believing in Christ is a spiritual matter, how did they come to believe in the first place?

Paul answers that question a little further along in the same passage of scripture:

“God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ–by grace you have been saved– Ephesians 2:4-5

We are always eager to give the ‘credit’ for the grace that saves us to God and God alone, and rightly so. On the other hand, we are not so quick to give God the credit for the faith we place in His Son. We read the following passage, giving God all the credit for the grace that saves us, but we take credit for placing ‘our’ faith in Christ.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” – Ephesians 2:8

Concerning faith, John Gill’s commentary explains:

“through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; salvation is through faith, not as a cause or condition of salvation, or as what adds anything to the blessing itself; but it is the way, or means, or instrument, which God has appointed, for the receiving and enjoying it, that so it might appear to be all of grace; and this faith is not the produce of man’s free will and power, but it is the free gift of God; and therefore salvation through it is consistent with salvation by grace; since that itself is of grace, lies entirely in receiving grace and gives all the glory to the grace of God: the sense of this last clause may be, that salvation is not of ourselves; it is not of our desiring nor of our deserving, nor of our performing, but is of the free grace of God: though faith is elsewhere represented as the gift of God, (John 6:65) and it is called the special gift of faith, “

Yes, faith is the means by which God saves a person, but it’s not the same human faith that we are born with and exercise in all things temporal. Since before God gives us life, we are spiritually dead and totally lacking the ‘spiritual’ faith necessary to exercise toward salvation.

Do we find that spelled out in our favorite passage in Ephesians (v 8)?  Not explicitly, but we are told that we have nothing about which to ‘boast’ in our salvation. If the faith that of which Paul speaks; faith that leads to true salvation, is the same human faith I was born with, and I somehow applied human logic to the issue of my eternal destiny, and ‘decided’ on my own that I would like to be saved from hell, I have reason to boast, even if it’s just a little bit and even if I did not actually boast about being smart enough to reason it all out. I would have a reason to boast if I chose to do so.

So I ask again, how dead is DEAD?

“God has mercy on whom He wants to have mercy, and He hardens whom He wants to harden.” [Romans 9:18]

“The doctrine of the sovereignty of God will guard those who seek salvation from two opposite extremes-presumption and discouragement.”

Do not presume upon the mercy of God, and so encourage yourself in sin. Many hear that God’s mercy is infinite, and therefore think, that if they delay seeking salvation for the present, and seek it later in life, that God will bestow His grace upon them. But consider, that though God’s grace is sufficient, yet He is sovereign, and will use His own pleasure to determine whether He will save you or not. If you put off salvation till the end of your life, salvation will not be in your power. It will be as a sovereign God pleases, whether you shall obtain it or not. Therefore, seeing that in this matter you are so absolutely dependent on God, it is best to follow His direction in seeking it, which is to listen to His voice, which says, “Today, if you hear My voice, do not harden your hearts” [Psalm 95:7-8].

Beware also of discouragement. Take heed of despairing thoughts, because you are a great sinner, because you have persevered so long in sin, have backslidden, and resisted the Holy Spirit. Remember that, no matter what your case may be, no matter how great a sinner you are, God can bestow mercy upon you without the least prejudice to the honor of His holiness, which you have offended, or to the honor of His majesty, which you have insulted, or of His justice, which you have made your enemy, or of His truth, or of any of His attributes. Let you be what sinner you may, God can, if He pleases, greatly glorify Himself in your salvation. Amen.

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The above quote from Jonathan Edwards is part of a larger manuscript that can be found and read here.

A pastor friend in Hawaii recently posted on Facebook this emphatic statement:  “Make no bones about, the purpose of the church is EVANGELISM.” (Emphasis his.)

When I read that, various ‘purpose’ and ‘vision’ statements that I’ve found in the pages of church web pages came to mind. It is with a certain sadness that I confess that most were not nearly as Gospel centric as Pastor Derrick’s Facebook statement, however they did reflect a certain level of marketing savvy, with their slick visual presentations, catchy slogans, and often omitted actual scripture passages, that after all might turn off seekers.

So that I don’t appear judgmental (too late?), let me say that it was the contrast between the clear statement of my pastor friend and the content of church web pages that came to mind, not a desire to intentionally find fault with either the pastor’s statement or the content of church web pages. That contrast begs the question: “What should be the ‘vision’ of the church? Is there a single vision that evangelical churches, without exception, should share?

Perhaps there is:

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” – Revelation 7:9-10

In my former career as a combat soldier, we might have called that passage of Scripture ‘the commander’s intent’ – the overarching goal of our mission on the ground. I don’t remember exactly when ‘The Commander’s Intent’ became a mandatory articulated statement in combat orders, but it’s inclusion in those orders helped us maintain our mission focus. We could always turn to it when the situation of the ground might have caused us to wander off on in a direction that, while doing the enemy harm, would have detracted from our primary purpose.

Our passage from Revelation reflects the Commander of the Universe’s intent – to have a people for Himself – rescued out of the mass of fallen humanity, so that one day they would gather around His throne, giving Him the honor due His Name!

And for a reason only God knows, He has chosen flawed, imperfect humans as the primary means of spreading the perfect Gospel message. This is indeed the greatest privilege ever bestowed on mankind and yes – the purpose of the church!

Thanks for the reminder, Pastor Derrick!

“Essentially there are only two religions in the whole world. One of them is “I”…I live a good life, I keep the commandments, I pray, I go to church, I follow the Golden Rule, I love my neighbor, I do the best I can, I don’t do this bad thing, I don’t do the other. That’s called autosoterism, or self-salvation where I become my own savior, glory be to me. I’m in competition with Jesus Christ who claims to be the Savior of the world. The only other religion is the cross, symbolized and standing right behind me. All…there are over 30,000 religions in the world but when you take off the ribbon and the wrapping and open the box, you’ll either find the “I” or the cross essentially. And everyone is going to either be saving himself and be his own savior, or he’s going to trust in Christ and in Christ alone. And I would say to anyone that wants to know the free salvation of God to get out of the savior business, declare spiritual bankruptcy, turn to Christ and trust in Him alone for your salvation and He will freely give you the gift of everlasting life. He will come into your heart and enable you to trust Him and to repent of your sins and change your life and give you new meaning and new direction and new power to live a godly life. And He will take you to be with Him in paradise forever and ever.” – D. james Kennedy

1. Plead his promise, Ezek 36:26,27. “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.” It is a free, gracious promise: cry to him to make good that word to you, seeing he has said, “Once again I will yield to the plea of the house of Israel and do this for them.” ver. 37. Tell him, that now you are come to inquire, and request him to do it.

2. Plead your own feebleness and inability to help yourselves; this was the impotent man’s plea at the pool of Bethesda, John 5:6,7 “When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, ‘Do you want to get well?’ ‘Sir,’ the invalid replied, ‘I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred. While I am trying to get in, someone else goes down ahead of me.'” So say you, Lord, I have lain many years with this dead plagued heart, beside the open fountain of your blood; I am unable to move to it of myself; I have none to put me in: ordinances cannot do it; ministers cannot do it; you must put to your helping hand, or else the work will remain unperformed.

3. Plead his power, in a sense of your own weakness. Do you feel the power and multitude of your corruptions within you? Say with Jehoshaphat, “Lord I have no might against this great company; neither know I what to do: but mine eyes are upon you.” With you all things are possible. Though I may despair of help in myself and others; yet, you have forbid me to despair of help in you. You said, Let there be light, and there was light; therefore say, let there be faith, and it will immediately take place; for faith is your work and your gift: it is “the work of God that we believe: by grace we are saved, through faith, and that not of ourselves, it is the gift of God.”

4. Plead your necessity, your extreme need of Christ and of faith in him. O man, there is not a starving man that needs food so much as you need Christ: there is not a wounded man that needs a physician; a shipwrecked man that needs a plank; a dying man, with the death rattle in his throat, that needs breath so much, as you need Christ. O then, cry, “Give me Christ, or else I die.” I may live without friends, without wealth, and honour, and pleasure; but I cannot live without Christ, and without faith. Plead his power; how easy it is for him to help, saying, as Psalm 80:1 “you who sit enthroned between the cherubim, shine forth!” It will cost you no more pain to work faith in me, than it does the sun to shine forth. Yea, he can more easily put forth his power and grace, than the sun can dart out its beams. It is no trouble nor loss to the sun to shine forth, so neither will it be to him, to show his power and mercy: a look, or a touch, will do it; since he can so easily do it. You may cry with hope; he will never miss an alms bestowed on a beggar, out of the ocean of his bounty. Nay, as the sun, the more it shines displays its glory the more; so will he gain glory by putting forth his power to help you.

5. Plead his mercy, and the freedom and extension of it. Plead the freedom of his mercy, that needs no motive, and expects no worth: it runs freely, so that the mountains cannot stop the current of it, no more than the rocks can stop the ebbing and flowing of the sea. Plead the extension of his mercy to others: he had compassion on men’s bodies, that came to him for healing, and will he not have compassion upon souls, that come to him for life? Is not mercy the work that he delights in? The perfection of his nature, he takes pleasure to display.

6. Plead Christ’s commission, Isa. 61:1, that he came “to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.” Cry, Lord, here is a poor prisoner, a locked and bound up heart; here is employment for you. O loose and knock off my fetters, and bring my soul out of prison. O here is a naked sinner for you to cover, a wounded soul for you to cure, a lost sheep for you to seek and save; and was not this your errand? You came to seek and save that which was lost. And will you not find a lost sinner, that desires to seek you through your grace? Plead his commission under the broad seal of heaven; for, “Him has God the Father sealed.” And plead the value of his blood, and merit of his righteousness: and upon that ground whereby all grace is purchased: plead for faith and grace to receive Jesus Christ the Lord.

Thus I have laid before you some directions, in order to the receiving of Christ. O cry for grace to follow them, and put them in practice, so you may indeed close the bargain with him. O shall all these directions be lost, and Christ be still slighted and rejected! O friends, you cannot please God better, than by coming to Christ and embracing the offer of him; and you cannot please the devil better than by refusing the offer of Christ; and putting him off with delays, till you perish in your unbelief.

And now, after all that has been said, what are you resolved upon? Will you receive Christ or not? Our glorious Lord and Master has sent us to pose you man, woman, and demand whether you will receive him or not? O! what answer shall we return with? Must we go and say, that all this people, upon no terms, will receive him; none of them are for precious Christ? Oh! God forbid! shall he not see the travail of his soul, who travailed through all the armies of God’s wrath for you, and gave his soul an offering for your sin? O give your soul to him, saying, Lord, in spite of the devil and of unbelief, through grace I will open my heart and arms to receive Christ! The Lord himself help you to receive him, and walk in him.

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Ralph Erskine [1685-1752] was the son of Rev. Henry Erskine of Cornhill, Northumberland and later of Chirnside, Berwickshire. Henry Erskine was a Puritan and, as such, was forced to vacate his living at Cornhill under the Act of Uniformity, 1662. One of the greatest successes of Henry Erskine’s preaching was the conversion of Thomas Boston. In his turn, Ralph had made considerable study of many of the great commentators, preferring above all Matthew Henry. Among his favourite writers were Owen, Manton, Flavel and Boston. But above all books the one he studied most was, of course, his Bible. His biographer, Fraser of Kennoway could say ‘His delight in study was cordial and persevering.’

Ralph was an emphatic believer in the Sovereignty of God as may be seen from the following extract from his diary: ‘After I had remembered the public abroad and at home, particularly in beseeching the Lord to bless my ministry at Dunfermline and toremember His word, “Lo, I am with you,” and to bless what I was preaching on, even all things being in the hand of Christ, that He would give evidence of it by His working powerfully upon many. I was then helped to beg the Spirit constantly to water and watch me. Under a sense of absolute weakness and inability to stand of myself, I was helped, with a heart poured out before God, to declare to Him that, though He was calling me to wait upon Him, yet I could not wait on Him a moment, unless He would water me “every moment.” I was made to seek assistance, success, strength and courage for my work in the congregation, while the Lord called me to the Ministry therein, being conscious that my fainting spirit was unfit for any work, if the Lord would not be with me.’

A collection of Ralph Erskine’s sermons can be found here.

We all have probably heard the phrase that speaks of believers having three enemies – the world, the flesh, and the devil. I probably should have said “some of us” instead of “we all” since there seem to be quite a few churches who embrace the world these days, but I will leave it that way because we should consider the world an enemy, since the world system(s) are under the control of the evil one, so the Bible tells us.

What I would like to ask, and then answer is this: “Of those three; the world the flesh and the devil, which one should we as believers be most concerned with? Can we consider one above the others a more ‘formidable’ enemy? Have you ever thought about it? Why or why not?

Consider those rhetorical questions, I am not after an argument or debate. I think scripture tells us which of the three causes us the most problems; not in exact words, but implicitly nonetheless.

Some years ago now, when I was traveling in Christian circles that made much of battling Satan, and blaming him for just about everything from the evils in the world to individual sins (If he didn’t tempt us we wouldn’t sin, would we? ), I had one of those “moments”, the kind that happen when you hit a passage of scripture that sort of settles an issue, or question you might have about your Christian walk. There have been a few of those through the years, some more memorable than others. This was one of those more memorable “moments”.

Now that you’re sitting there on pins and needles for the answer I said I would give you, here it is:

“But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.” – James 1:14

As far as I’m concerned, that one passage tells me which of the big three I should be more concerned with. All that the world has to offer me would be nothing to me if I didn’t have “my own lust” – those desires still lurking within that are at odds with, yet live along side the new nature in Christ. If you don’t believe me just ask the Apostle Paul – read Romans 7. Likewise, Satan would not be able to tempt me with anything If I did not have “my own lust”. All of his schemes and cunning devices would be worthless!

So there’s an old soldier’s answer to the original question. I hope that didn’t sound too simplistic. Our own flesh, with it’s evil desires, is our most formidable foe in the battle against the Big Three.

So what do we do? How to defeat the flesh? How do we “walk in the spirit”? There are probably several sound biblical answers to those questions and I’m glad you asked. (You were asking, weren’t you?)

Of all the things I can come up with that we should be doing, the activities or behavior we should or should not be engaged in, one thing stands out as of most importance:

” For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh: (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;” – 2 Cor 10:3-5 (Emphasis mine)

What does that mean? How do you do that? Again, thanks for asking! I don’t think that’s rocket science either. Read the Book. If you are His, you already have a desire to do so, a grand desire to know Him, His thoughts, His commands, His desire/plan for you as His child (Phil 2:13). read His book! Get to know Him and you will truly taste eternal life here on earth (John 17:3)

Friends, the front line of spiritual warfare begins at home, in our own minds, in our own thought life!

If you were waiting to hear the Ephesians 6 thing about putting on the armor of God, while that’s part of it, we’ll get to that in another post.

May God richly bless you as you “bring every thought captive to the obedience of Christ”!

A View from the Classroom

David R. Nienhuis

“For well over twenty years now, Christian leaders have been lamenting the loss of general biblical literacy in America. No doubt you have read some of the same dire statistics that I have. Study after study demonstrates how nearly everyone in our land owns a Bible (more than one, in fact) but few ever take the time to read it, much less study it closely. Indeed, while the Exploring Religious America Survey of 2002 reports that over 84 percent of Americans consider the Bible to be “very” or “somewhat important” in helping them make decisions in life, recent Gallup polls tell us that only half can name even one of the four Gospels, only a third are able to identify the individual who delivered the Sermon on the Mount, and most aren’t even able to identify Genesis as the Bible’s opening text.”

This is the opening paragraph of a much longer article that speaks to a serious issue in today’s evangelical church. I encourage you to read the rest of the article here. I also encourage you to listen to this last Sunday’s broadcast of The White Horse Inn, which can be found here. the above article was quoted from by the hosts of the broadcast introduced the theme of the weekly broadcasts for the year 2010. You can listen to the latest White Horse Broadcast, Recovering Scripture, as well as several previous weekly broadcasts in the “Listen Now” section of the page. Directly beneath that section are links for listening and/or recording broadcasts in several other formats.

Have a blessed week!

Below is the short A.W. Tozer devotional I received for today:

Some things may be neglected with but little loss to the spiritual life, but to neglect communion with God is to hurt ourselves where we cannot afford it. – The Root of the Righteous, 9.

Personal Life: To Think God’s Thoughts

But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night.–Psalm 1:2

To think God’s thoughts requires much prayer. If you do not pray much, you are not thinking God’s thoughts. If you do not read your Bible much and often and reverently, you are not thinking God’s thoughts….

There also has to be a lot of meditation. We ought to learn to live in our Bibles. Get one with print big enough to read so it does not punish your eyes. Look around until you find a good one, and then learn to love it. Begin with the Gospel of John, then read the Psalms.

Isaiah is another great book to help you and lift you. When you feel you want to do it, go on to Romans and Hebrews and some of the deeper theological books. But get into the Bible. Do not just read the little passages you like, but in the course of a year or two see that you read it through. Your thoughts will one day come up before God’s judgment. We are responsible for our premeditative thoughts. They make our mind a temple where God can dwell with pleasure, or they make our mind a stable where Christ is angry, ties a rope and drives out the cattle. It is all up to us. Rut, Rot or Revival: The Condition of the Church, 42.

Of course. thinking God’s thoughts might end up changing what we like to talk about the most, even where we work, play, and/or study as ordinary people in the ordinary environments of life in general.

How is it that we evangelical Christians can gather for specifically Christian topics/endeavors and talk about everything except what we have just read in Scripture, how God has blessed us recently, divine appointments in which we shared the Gospel, or other spiritual topics? We do this even in church on Sunday mornings, switching gears at the appropriate ‘time’  – when the service ‘officially’ begins.

How genuine is my profession that God is of first importance and all else follows in my life, if He is also not my favorite topic of conversation? That is what this old guy asks himself this morning.

Food for thought. . .