The Mechanic

Posted on February 13, 2019 by russellmckinney

As an old story goes, in the early 1900s a husband and his wife purchased one of those newfangled Model T Fords. They took it out for a drive one day, but something happened to the engine and the car came to a dead halt. The husband opened up the hood and started tinkering with anything he could find under there, but nothing he did made the car fire again. After a while, he became convinced that he had thrown away his money on something that would end up being nothing more than a fad. So he closed the hood and started figuring how he and his wife were going to get home.

Along about then a brand new Model T came chugging down the road. The car pulled over and the driver climbed out. He was a distinguished looking elderly gentleman wearing a high collar. He asked the husband, “What’s the matter, friend?” The husband answered, “The dang thing’s broke. I knew I shouldn’t have bought it.” The elderly gentlemen said, “Will you let me see what I can do?” The disgruntled husband replied, “Go ahead, but it won’t do you any good.”

The elderly gentlemen promptly pulled a screwdriver and a pair of pliers from somewhere, lifted up the hood, and tinkered with the engine for just a moment or two. Then he said to the husband, “Now pull up on the crank once.” Reluctantly the husband did as instructed, and the little engine immediately roared to life.

As the elderly gentleman started making his way back to his car, the husband yelled, “Hey, wait a minute. Thank you so much. Who are you?” The elderly gentleman just started his car and began to pull away. As he rolled by, though, he waved at the couple, gave a big smile, and said, “My name is Henry Ford. I made your car.”

I don’t know if this story is historically true, but even if it isn’t it surely could be. And just as Henry Ford could have fixed any Model T that he happened to find broken down on the side of the road, Jesus Christ can fix any broken down human life that lies in disrepair on the side of life’s highway. He is, after all, the one who creates each person. Don’t believe it? Then read John 1:1-3, which refers to Jesus by the title “The Word” and says of Him:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. (N.K.J.V.)

Need some more proof? Read Colossians 1:16-17, which says of Jesus:

For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. (N.K.J.V.)

Still not convinced? Read Hebrews 1:1-2, which says of Jesus:

God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high…. (N.K.J.V.)

Need a little more, you say? Read 1 Corinthians 8:6:

yet for us there is one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we for Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and through whom we live. (N.K.J.V.)

Finally, for you hard cases out there, you might also read Revelation 22:13, where Jesus says of Himself:

I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last. (N.K.J.V.)

Alpha is the first letter of the Greek alphabet and Omega is the last. In English, Jesus would say, “”I am the A and the Z, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last.” This means that not only is He the A and the Z, He is also all the other letters in between those two and all the words that can be made from all those letters. Therefore, He is a Savior who can definitely help you get your life running smoothly again if you will allow Him to work on you. After all, who knows you better than the One who made you?

Posted in Change, Comfort, Creation, Dying To Self, Encouragement, Individuality, Problems, Salvation, Submission, Trials, Worry | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Baptizing Your Job into Service to Christ

Posted on February 11, 2019 by russellmckinney

There once was a young man named Arsene who lived in Paris, France. Arsene worked as a grocer, but he absolutely hated his job because he felt like he was meant for bigger things. In his mind, circumstances created by a cruel world had robbed him of his true destiny and had conspired to keep him in his lowly place.

Finally there came a time when Arsene could stand his life no longer and he committed suicide by hanging. He left a note in which he railed against his lot in life and asked his parents to place a simple tombstone over his grave. The inscription on the tombstone was to read: “Born to be a man; died a grocer.”

The hard, cold fact of life is that the majority of us are born to be “grocers” of some sort. We aren’t rich. We aren’t powerful. We do what we have to do, not what we want to do. Factory workers. Cashiers. Truck drivers. Cooks. Maids. Desk clerks. Waitresses. On and on the list goes. None of these jobs will make you a millionaire or land you on a list of the world’s most influential people.

Isn’t it interesting, though, that Jesus chose the life of a lowly person for His worldly existence? He was born in a stable, a barn, or some other such place, not in a palace. His first crib was an animal’s feeding trough. He was raised as the earthly son of a carpenter.

He never owned a home. He didn’t have a closet full of clothes. He didn’t demand an audience with the Emperor of Rome or the Jewish High Priest. He depended upon the hospitality of others. He ate with anyone who would eat with Him, and He sought out society’s undesirables: rough fisherman, despised tax collectors, scarlet women, lepers, and demon-possessed people.

You tell me, if Jesus had lived in Paris during the days when Arsene lived there, would He have looked upon the grocer as being beneath Him? You know that answer. The chances are more likely that He would have gone into the place of business where Arsene worked and made a point of speaking to him. Remember, this is the same Savior who said:

Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. (Luke 6:20, N.I.V.)

Does this quote mean that Jesus loves poor people more than He does rich people? No. It also doesn’t mean that every poor person has an automatic pass into Heaven, regardless of whether or not the person has believed in Jesus as Savior. What it does mean is that Jesus doesn’t use the same standards as the world in dealing with people. He doesn’t dismiss the lowly out of hand. He doesn’t see them as a means to an end. To Him, they are every bit as important as the richest people on earth.

It’s a shame that Arsene either didn’t know this about Jesus or didn’t place value upon it. It’s a shame the young fellow didn’t understand that there is no greater version of being a “man” than serving Jesus and letting Him use you — whatever your station in life happens to be — to serve others. In Jesus’ way of thinking, true greatness comes through serving. To Him, greatness isn’t ruling the world; it’s washing the feet of others (John 13:1-13).

Christian, let me encourage you today to take whatever role you are playing in life right now and “baptize” it into service to Jesus. You see, it’s not just the pastor, the evangelist, or the missionary who can be classified as being in full-time service to Jesus. The fact is that every Christian should see himself or herself as being in such service. Does Jesus need a servant in the pulpit? Yes, but He also needs one in the assembly line. Does He need one on the mission fields? Yes, but He also needs one in the grocery store. This is what Arsene, tragically, never realized.

Posted in Complaining, Contentment, Disappointment, God's Work, Humility, Influence, Ministry, Missions, Prosperity, Service, Suicide, Work | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

A Weekly Reminder

Posted on February 8, 2019 by russellmckinney

The April 16, 1990 edition of People magazine featured the story of a young man who was in the midst of paying off an interesting sentence for drunk driving. Eight years earlier his drinking and driving had resulted in the death of an eighteen-year-old girl. He had been found guilty of drunk driving and given a sentence of three years probation and one month of community service.

“He got off light,” you say? Well, there was one other stipulation to his sentence. As part of the civil suit the girl’s parents brought against him, the young man had been ordered to send a check (made out to the deceased victim) for $1.00 every Friday for eighteen years.

$1 every Friday adds up to $52 per year, and $52 for eighteen years adds up to $936. Of course the amount of money wasn’t the issue. After all, the girl was dead. The weekly checks were the parents’ way of keeping the young man reminded that he had killed their child. As they said, “We do want him to remember. But that doesn’t mean we don’t want him to accept it — and get on with his life.”

While I can sympathize with those parents’ loss, their quote sounds a bit illogical to me. I mean, it’s pretty hard to accept something and get on with your life when you are vividly reminded of it once a week for eighteen years. It would have made more sense to me if they had stopped at, “We do want him to remember.”

The article pointed out that there had been weeks when the young man had failed to send the check. His reasoning was, “It hurts too much.” That tells us all we need to know about how effective the punishment was. If those parents wanted that young man to remember his sin, that box can be marked “mission accomplished.”

This whole story makes me very thankful that when God forgives, He forgets. Need some scripture on that? Okay, here you go. In Isaiah 43:25, God says:

“I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions for my Own sake; And I will not remember your sins.” (N.K.J.V.)

Here’s another one. In Psalm 103:12, David, writing under the inspiration of God, writes:

As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us. (N.K.J.V.)

The phrase “as far as the east is from the west” is David’s beautiful, poetic way of describing the infinity into which God casts the forgiven sinner’s transgressions. If a traveler starts out traveling east and continues going that way, he will always be traveling east. There is no point where he will cross some line and begin traveling west. In the same way, when God forgives sins, He sends them into a metaphorical oblivion and remembers them no more.

Because of all this, the question that each of us needs to ask is, “Have my sins been forgiven and forgotten in this way?” And the answer is: They have if you have authentically believed in Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. Jesus was God the Son in human flesh, and His death on the cross was Him playing the role of the sacrificial lamb whose shed blood has the power to cleanse sin and thoroughly remove it not only from the sinner’s eternal record but also from God’s own memory.

This means that once you know Jesus as Savior, He will never remind you of your sins. The devil will do that. You can bank on that. For that matter, you can even remind yourself. Many Christians have this problem. But Jesus won’t remind you. The forgiveness He provides is not conditional or probationary, and this should make us want to serve Him all the more.

Posted in Christ's Death, Comfort, Eternal Security, Forgiveness, God's Mercy, Grace, Making Restitution, Salvation, Satan, Seeking Forgiveness, The Devil | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Choosing the East Side of the Jordan

Posted on February 6, 2019 by russellmckinney

Numbers chapter 32 provides us with a fascinating twist in the story of Moses and the Israelites. The twist involves the tribes of Reuben and Gad and half the tribe of Manasseh, and it holds multiple metaphorical lessons for us in regards to the spiritual life. As such, every Christian should know it.

As the story opens, Moses and the Israelites are in the final stages of their forty years of wandering in the wilderness regions surrounding the land of Canaan. These forty years have been God’s judgment upon the people for being too unbelieving and cowardly to cross over the Jordan river, go to war with the inhabitants of Canaan, and take the land forty years earlier (Numbers chapters 13 and 14). But now a new generation of Israelites is preparing to right the wrong of that previous generation.

God has already decreed that Moses himself will not be the one to lead the nation in its conquest of Canaan. A certain sin that Moses has recently committed at Kadesh has cost him that opportunity (Numbers 20:1-13). Joshua (Moses’ general, right-hand man, and successor) will be the one to lead Israel in the conquering of Canaan. Prior to the commencement of that full-scale invasion, however, certain territories on the eastern side of the Jordan river have been conquered (Numbers chapters 21 through 31).

This sets the stage for Numbers chapter 32. As part of those recent victories, the Israelites have conquered the land of Jazer and the land of Gilead. Basically, this is all the territory between the Arnon river and the Yarmuk river (Joshua 12:1-6). What makes these lands particularly appealing is the fact that they are perfect for raising livestock. This appeal doesn’t go unnoticed by the Israelite tribes of Reuben and Gad, both of which own large herds of livestock, most of which are the spoils of a recent plundering of the Midianites (Numbers chapter 31). The appeal of the lands causes the leaders of the two tribes to think, “No matter what the other side of the Jordan river holds for us, it can’t be better than what we have right here.”

So, the leaders of the two tribes go to Moses and ask if he will give them the lands as their inheritance and allow them to settle there (32:1-5). They even say, “Do not take us over the Jordan (v.5, N.K.J.V.) Moses’ response, not unpredictably, is one of fury. He accuses the two tribes of being cowards who want to remain in safety while their fellow tribes go to war in Canaan (32:6-7). He also tells them they are acting like their ancestors did forty years earlier in refusing to take Canaan (32:8-14) and calls them “a brood of sinful men” (32:14).

It’s at this point that the leaders of the two tribes explain to Moses that they have no intention of not taking part in the fighting to settle Canaan. Is this a “plan B” explanation devised on the spot in the wake of Moses’ appall at their request? Probably.

Their new proposed plan begins with them first preparing their requested lands by building pens for their livestock and cities for their women and children (32:16-17). Once those projects are completed, the fighting men from the two tribes will take their place in Israel’s army, cross over the Jordan with the rest of Israel, and continue the warfare until Canaan is completely conquered (32:18). They will even take point by going “before” the children of Israel (32:17). Only when the land is conquered will they return to their families and herds by crossing back over the Jordan river (32:19).

After hearing this explanation, Moses does agree to the request, but he warns them that they had better live up to their part of the deal (32:20-24). If they don’t, God will judge them harshly. Since Moses already knows that he won’t be around to ensure that everything gets handled correctly, he calls in Eleazar the priest, Joshua, and the heads of all the tribes and explains the agreement to them (32:28-32). At some point, half the tribe of Manasseh gets in on the deal as well because they also have livestock and like the looks of the lands (32:39-42). A full listing of the lands and the cities that ultimately either got built, rebuilt, or conquered is provided in Numbers 32:33-42.

In the end, the fighting men from Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh did make good on their agreement with Moses, and they did return to their lands and settle there. Joshua 13:15-33 tells us that the tribe of Reuben settled in the southern portion of the lands, the tribe of Gad settled in the northern portions, and half the tribe of Manasseh settled furthest north in Bashan. (According to Joshua 13:1-7, the other half of the tribe of Manasseh settled in an allotted portion of Canaan.) 

All this brings us to the question: “When all the dust was settled from all the centuries that would follow, was the decision of the two and a half tribes to settle on the east side of the Jordan river a good one?” The answer to that is, no. Consider the results of the decision:

  1. By agreeing to join their fellow Israelites in the war to conquer Canaan, the men of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh were forced to remain away from their wives and children for the length of the war. That turned out to be a period of seven long years.
  2. By settling on the eastern side of the Jordan river, the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh forfeited the natural protection of the Jordan river and left themselves susceptible to attacks from the east.
  3. In 732 B.C., the Assyrians invaded Israel from the east. And who were the first tribes they defeated and carried off as prisoners of war? Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh (1 Chronicles 5:1-26).

So, what spiritual lessons can we Christians learn from this story? Well, here are a few, and I offer them as the close to this post. Consider each one carefully and take heed that you don’t fall victim to it:

  1. We must resist the temptation to place prosperity and easy living above obeying God’s plan for our lives. As James Mays writes in The Layman’s Bible Commentary, “The promise of prosperity loomed larger than the promise of a destiny as the People of the Land.”
  2. We must resist the temptation to succumb to the fleshly temptation of what looks good in our eyes. Just as those members of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh gazed lustfully and longingly upon those lands of Jazer and Gilead, Lot had once cast the same look upon the plain of Jordan, that plain where the twin cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were located (Genesis 13:10-11). The results of Lot’s look, of course, proved similarly disastrous (Genesis 13:12-13; 14:1-17; 19:1-38).
  3. We must resist the temptation to settle for anything less than God’s fullest and best for us. As Merrill Unger writes in his Unger’s Commentary on the Old Testament, “How easy it is for God’s people to get so near to what is God’s purpose for them and yet be diverted from it by what is expedient from a worldly standpoint.”
Posted in Choices, Covetousness, Desires, Disobedience, God's Will, Lust, Obedience, Patience, Rebellion, Temptation, Trusting In God, Waiting | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Will Explain Later

Posted on February 4, 2019 by russellmckinney

In his day, Dr. Thomas Guthrie was one of Scotland’s most popular and respected preachers. On the subject of the Christian life oftentimes being difficult, perplexing, and downright confusing, Guthrie said:

A man standing on the summit of a lofty mountain commands a wider landscape and sees things that on the plains below would have been quite invisible. So many things unknown, incomprehensible to us on the plains of earth will be all visible on the mount of Heaven.

The gist of Guthrie’s words is that in Heaven the Christian will at last have access to God’s perspective. If life on earth is the low valley where visibility is limited, life in Heaven will be the mountaintop where visibility is total. “Why did this happen?” “Why didn’t that happen?” “Why did God cause such a thing?” “Why did He allow such a thing?” “Why did He send me ‘B’ when I plainly asked for “A’?” All questions will be answered in Heaven. Not only will they be answered, each Christian will also be able to truthfully say, “Ah, yes, I see it now. I understand. Now I know why.”

Another notable preacher, America’s Vance Havner, used to say, “God marks some things, ‘Will explain later.'” When will this “later” be? In some situations we get our explanations after only a few hours, days, or weeks. Other explanations, however, take longer, and we only receive them after many months, years, or even decades have passed. And then there are those really bad ones, those exceedingly difficult ones, those ones that wrench the gut and break the heart. Those, unfortunately for us, must wait until Heaven.

Why does God treat His servant this way? The answer is that He knows that if He gave you all the answers at one time and laid out your whole life’s course in one setting, you would quickly grow spiritually complacent. You’d stop asking Him for guidance. You’d stop looking to Him for wisdom. You wouldn’t need His guidance and wisdom because you would have all the answers already. This would inevitably cause you to become spiritually sloppy and, even worse, spiritually cocky. After all, it’s a humbling thing not to have all the answers.

So, Christian, do you currently feel as if you are stumbling around in the dark? Do the recent events of your life have you as confused as a goose in a hail storm? Have you grown wildly frustrated with God because He hasn’t given you that answer you need? Well, I wish I could promise you that your answer will arrive soon. The fact is, it might. But then again, that answer might just be on that list of ones that you aren’t slated to get until Heaven. And if it is, the question will then become a very simple one: “Will you continue to trust in the Lord and faithfully serve Him even if you never receive that answer in this life?” Ah, now that’s a good question, and the answer to it is one that only you can provide.

Posted in Adversity, Commitment, Disappointment, Doubt, Eternity, Faith, Faithfulness, God's Omniscience, Heaven, Patience, Problems, Trials, Trusting In God, Waiting, Wisdom | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

It’s Hard to Be Still

Posted on February 1, 2019 by russellmckinney

Be still, and know that I am God… (Psalm 46:10, N.K.J.V.)

Our son Royce is 18 years old now, and sitting still continues to be a challenge for him. He’s hyper. He’s active. He’s fidgety. He’s squirmy. He’s, well, you get the idea. He can sit and play his PlayStation IV for hours on end, but he does it by constantly changing positions. One minute he’s sitting in his beanbag. The next minute he’s lying in his beanbag. Ten minutes later he’s sitting on the floor. Five minutes later he’s lying on the bed. Again, you get the idea.

Then every so often he will jump up like a sprinter hearing the gun fire, bolt out of his room and into the kitchen at 100 miles per hour, grab a snack by way of a skill and precision that would make pit crews coming over the wall at the Daytona 500 envious, and then bolt back into his room. The whole event doesn’t take 20 seconds. If anything, his time has improved with age.

In Royce’s younger days in school, my wife Tonya literally had to explain to his teachers, “Don’t expect him to sit perfectly still in a chair. He can’t. If he did, he would die.” Of course it’s not like he was much better sitting in church. He always had to have something in his hands, something he could toy with for no other reason other than to gobble up some of that ocean of pent-up energy he had inside him. What I always found fascinating was that he could remember large portions of my sermons without ever actually looking up to make eye contact with me. He was the contrast of the church member who could hold eye contact with me for an entire sermon and not remember a thing I said fifteen minutes later.

Truth be told, most of us have a little “Royce” in us when it comes to being still and knowing that God is God. Do you take those words “be still” literally? Fine, but when was the last time you actually sat down, ceased all motion, calmed yourself to the point of serenity, and spent some time one-on-one with God? If your answer is, “It’s been a while,” feel free to take your place in a long line.

Actually, though, the words “be still” don’t have to be understood in a literal, physical way. After all, you can be physically still and your mind be racing a million miles per hour. You can be lying in bed and your entire body be racked with worry and anxiety. You can get away from it all, only to find that you brought it all with you. This is why I say that “be still” can also be understood in a way that is less literal and physical.

What I’m talking about is you purposely ceasing from your plotting, planning, and scheming. Stop trying to jump three moves ahead of God. Just focus on doing what He wants you to be doing today, right now, this very second. To me, this kind of “be still” is every bit as important as the other kind.

And do you know what most everyone misses about these words, “Be still, and know that I am God”? It’s the fact that the words are found within a Psalm that is all about God’s ability to provide deliverance and protection. For example, verse 1 says: “God is our refuge and strength, A very present help in trouble.” Verse 2 says: “Therefore we will not fear…” Verse 7 and verse 11 both say: “The Lord of hosts is with us….”

You see, the Psalm isn’t advocating having a quiet time. It’s advocating resting confidently in the promise that God has your back and is going to take care of business for you. Really, when we get right down to it, the “be still” the Psalmist has in mind is something akin to the phrase “Let go and let God.” The idea is, you don’t have to have all the answers. You don’t have to hack your way through that jungle you call a life. All you have to do is get in step with God, obey Him in each and every decision, and find your rest in Him rather than in your circumstances.

The word is TRUST. Trust God to protect you. Trust Him to sustain you. Trust Him to meet your needs. Trust Him to guide you. Trust Him to handle your enemies.

But such trust doesn’t come easily for us, does it? No, what comes easily for us is worrying, plotting, planning, scheming, being impatient, and being anxious. Like Royce, we’ve got to be active, got to be on the move, got to be doing something. In this way we are the polar opposite of, “Be still, and know that I am God.” And in this way we bring untold damage upon ourselves mentally, emotionally, psychologically, physically, and, obviously, spiritually.

So, my challenge to you today and every day is: let God retrain you and teach you how to genuinely be still and know that He is God. All you’ve got to lose is a ton of stress and a few points off your blood pressure, right? It’s a case of less being more. The less includes less worry, less strife, less nervous energy, and less fear, while the more includes more peace, more calmness, more contentment, and more joy. It sure does sound like a great trade off, doesn’t it? You’d be crazy, then, not to take God up on it.

Posted in Adversity, Comfort, Contentment, Depression, Dying To Self, Faith, Fear, God's Omniscience, God's Provision, God's Sovereignty, Impatience, Joy, Needs, Patience, Peace, Personal, Problems, Trusting In God, Worry | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

If In This Life Only…

Posted on January 30, 2019 by russellmckinney

Sometimes you’ll hear a preacher say, “Even if there is no heaven, the benefits you receive in this life make it worth it to follow Jesus.” I remember saying this myself a time or two in my younger days as a preacher. The fact is, though, the apostle Paul would strongly disagree with the statement.

In 1 Corinthians 15:12-19, Paul offers a hypothetical description of what life would be like if Christ’s resurrection hadn’t really happened, if the whole story was a lie, a sham, a hoax. Here’s the list of how that description reads:

  • All preaching about Jesus would be empty (v.14).
  • All faith in Jesus would be empty and futile (v.14, 17).
  • Paul and the other apostles would be false witnesses proclaiming an untruthful message (v.15).
  • Christians who think they have been forgiven of their sins would still be in their sins (v.17).
  • Dead Christians would have perished rather than going to heaven (v.18).

After listing all these things, Paul then ends his hypothetical description by making the summary assessment:

If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable. (1 Corinthians 15:19, N.K.J.V.)

Why would Christians be the most pitiable of all people? It’s because we Christians are known to actually make sacrifices for the Savior we serve. We sacrifice our time by spending it in prayer, Bible study, and church attendance. We sacrifice our money by putting some of it in church. We sacrifice our privilege of “getting even” by turning the other cheek. We sacrifice our right to hold a grudge by forgiving our enemies and praying for them. We sacrifice the pleasure of participating in worldly, fleshly activities by foregoing them in favor of living a holy life. We sacrifice our opportunity to make an easy dollar by not cheating on our income taxes. We sacrifice our chance to bend or break the rules to gain a competitive edge by always playing by the rules.

Even worse than all these things, if Jesus is a fraud who didn’t truly show His divinity by resurrecting from the dead, we might as well be serving Santa Claus. If you think the idea of Santa Claus is silly, try building an entire religion around the foundational concept that believing in Santa Claus is the only way to get into heaven. Try getting up every Sunday and telling a crowd of people that Santa Claus is the answer to all of life’s problems. Try writing books that proclaim the greatness of Santa Claus. Try buying t.v and radio time to tell the world about Santa Claus. Try devoting entire websites to Santa Claus. If someone did that, wouldn’t you classify that person as worthy of pity?

Therefore, let’s put a permanent ban on the statement, “Even if there is no heaven, the benefits you receive in this life make it worth it to follow Jesus.” No, they don’t. If this life is all there is, and if we Christians are getting up every day and living for, sacrificing for, and trying to get other people to believe in a Savior who is no better than a fairy tale, that doesn’t make our lives better. Much to the contrary, it wastes them and turns us into fools.

Posted in Belief, Bible Study, Christ's Resurrection, Church Attendance, Discipleship, Dying To Self, Eternity, Forgiveness, Heaven, Missions, Pastors, Prayer, Preaching, Revenge, Reward, Sacrifice, Salvation, Witnessing | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Give God All There is of You

Posted on January 28, 2019 by russellmckinney

William Booth was one of the most famous ministers who ever lived. When he became a Christian at the age of 15, he wrote in his diary, “God shall have all there is of William Booth.” He then spent the next 68 years making good on that promise.

Booth was a successful pastor in the early part of his ministry, but he found that a permanent ministry at one site didn’t suit him because his burning passion was always evangelism. In particular, he loved sharing the gospel with the poor and ministering to them. He became best known as the founder and “first General” of the Salvation Army, which in Booth’s time was recognized as one of the leading evangelistic organizations in the world. When Booth died at the age of 83, his body laid in state for three days at the Salvation Army’s Clapton Congress Hall in London. 150,000 people attended his viewing. His funeral was later held at London’s Olympia and was attended by 40,000 people, including Queen Mary.

In the latter years of his ministry, Booth struggled mightily with his eyesight. In 1909, he began a planned six-month tour of the United Kingdom, but the tour was ended prematurely when it was discovered that he had gone completely blind in his right eye and was greatly limited by cataracts in his left. In August of 1909, a surgeon removed that right eye altogether. A few months after the surgery, in 1910, Booth resumed his ministry by embarking upon a tour of the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. Following his return to England, he embarked upon a motor tour of that country, a tour that proved to be his last.

The story is told that when Booth’s eyesight began to leave him, his son Bramwell said to him, “Dad, you are going to be permanently blind.” Booth responded, “You mean that I am going to live the rest of my life in physical blindness?” “I fear that you must reckon with that fact,” said Bramwell. “Shall I never see your face again?” Booth asked. “No,” said Bramwell, “probably not in this world.” Booth then moved his hand slowly forward until he found Bramwell’s hand. He grasped his son’s hand and said, “I have done what I could for God and for the people with my eyes. Now I shall do what I can for God and for the people without my eyes!”

That story from Booth’s life should inspire all Christians to follow his example by giving God all there is of us. We should do this when we are young. We should do it when we are middle aged. We should do it when we are elderly. We should do it when we are in great health. We should do it when we are in declining health. We should do it when we are in poor health. As the old hymn says, “Jesus gave it all. All to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow.” Since our Savior gave His all for us, can we do any less for Him?

Posted in Adversity, Aging, Christ's Death, Commitment, Complaining, Disappointment, Doing Good, Dying To Self, Evangelism, Faithfulness, God's Work, Human Life, Ministry, Missions, Obedience, Persecution, Perseverance, Problems, Sacrifice, Salvation, Sanctification, Service, Suffering, Trials, Witnessing | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Does Heaven Have a Wall?

Posted on January 26, 2019 by russellmckinney

Perhaps you’ve seen a recent meme that has been making the rounds on social media. There are different variations of the meme, but most of them feature a picture of either heaven’s gates or a wall, along with the caption: “Heaven has a wall with strict immigration policies. Hell has open border policies.” Needless to say, those in favor of President Trump’s proposed wall to help America protect its southern border have been fueling the meme’s popularity.

I myself don’t claim to have all the answers concerning what the United States should do about illegal immigration. That’s not the purpose of this post. My purpose here is to clarify what the Bible teaches about heaven. I can’t fix Facebook and Twitter, but if I can help just one person get their thinking straight about heaven’s “wall,” I will have done some good.

So, let’s get started. The “heaven” that has a wall around it is the heavenly city of New Jerusalem that is described in Revelation chapters 21 and 22. New Jerusalem’s wall has twelve gates cut into it. That’s three on the eastern side, three on the northern side, three on the southern side, and three on the western side (21:13). Each gate is one solid pearl (21:21), while the wall itself is solid jasper (21:18). There is an angel posted at each gate (21:12), and each gate goes by the name of one of the twelve tribes of Israel (21:12).

The wall has twelve foundations, and upon each foundation is written the name of one of Christ’s twelve apostles (21:14). Each foundation is made from a different type of precious stone: jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald, etc. (21:19-20). The wall is 124 cubits (approximately 216 feet or 72 yards), which most likely refers to its width rather than its height.

If you wonder how a wall can be 72 yards thick, let me point out that the city it surrounds is approximately 1,400 miles squared (Revelation 21:16). That means the city is 1,400 miles long in not only length but also width and height. That adds up to over two million square miles, enough territory to take in most of the entire eastern portion of the United States! If you are going to have a wall around a city that size, the wall had better be big!

New Jerusalem is made of pure gold, but it’s not the kind of gold that we know. It’s a gold that is transparent enough to look like clear glass (21:18). The city’s street is made of this same type of gold (21:21). By the way, that’s not a typo on my part. The city of New Jerusalem has a street (singular), not streets (plural).

The transparent clearness also extends to the river that has its source at the throne of God and runs through the city. This river is described as being clear as crystal (22:1). The city has a tree of life, too, a tree that yields a different type of fruit each month (22:2).

One thing the city doesn’t have is a temple. It doesn’t need one because God the Father and God the Son are literally present on the scene (21:22). It has no sun or moon either, because the glory of God illuminates it (21:23; 22:5). Try to imagine all the glory that beams forth from God the Father and God the Son bouncing off not only all that clear gold but also that clear river. It’s no wonder that the city doesn’t have any lighting problems!  Oh, and did I mention that there is no night there (21:25; 22:5)?

There is, however, an important fact about those twelve gates inside that wall around that city, and this fact gets to the heart of this post. Those gates are never closed (Revelation 21:25). That throws a definite monkey wrench into the the comparison between New Jerusalem’s wall and President Trump’s proposed wall, doesn’t it? Furthermore, New Jerusalem is a city in which all kinds of different nationalities walk (21:24; 22:2). That throws a definite monkey wrench into any segregated “white nationalist” thinking.

Look, I’m not writing this to chose a side between Donald Trump and Nancy Pelosi. Let’s keep politics out of this. All I’m trying to do is keep our thinking straight when it comes to using certain Bible passages to make questionable analogies about current events. As Christians who take the Bible seriously, we have to be better than that. Is illegal immigration a major issue in 21st century America? Absolutely. But, please, let’s stop trivializing the Bible just so we can get a bunch of likes of Facebook.

For the record, the city of New Jerusalem is not even the heaven that Christians go to now at death. That heaven is described in passages such as Isaiah 6:1-3, 2 Corinthians 12:1-4, and Revelation 4:1-11, and no mention is made of it having gates. A ton of Bible prophecy has to come to pass before the city of New Jerusalem comes front and center in God’s plan, and I’ll list the order of those prophetic events as the close to this post. Again, I just want us to understand scripture properly. If we can do, that will take care of most of our meme problems. So, as a means to that end, the order for God’s prophetic plan goes as follows:

  1. the Rapture (1 Corinthians 15:50-58, 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11)
  2. the seven-year tribulation period, ending with the battle of Armageddon (Revelation chapters 6 through 19)
  3. Christ’s 2nd Coming (Revelation 19:11-21)
  4. Christ’s thousand-year reign upon the earth (Revelation 20:1-6)
  5. Satan’s final rebellion (Revelation 20:7-10)
  6. the Great White Throne judgment (Revelation 20:11-15)
  7. the passing away of the old heaven and the old earth (including the old city of Jerusalem), and the instituting of the new heaven, the new earth, and the New Jerusalem (Revelation 21:1-8)
Posted in Christ's Second Coming, Christ's Return, Current Events, Eternity, God's Timing, God's Word, Heaven, Politics, Prophecy, Racism, The Bible | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Will Tartarus Ever Be Emptied?

Posted on January 24, 2019 by russellmckinney

My previous two posts were my two-part answer to a reader’s question: “Are Hades and Hell the same place?” Now, another reader has asked a follow-up question to those posts. The question is: “Will Tartarus ever be emptied of the fallen angels who are imprisoned there?”

We get the noun “Tartarus” from the Greek verb tartaroo. That verb is used in 2 Peter 2:4 in reference to a certain group of fallen angels that God has cast down and delivered into chains of darkness. Most translations (K.J.V., N.K.J.V., N.I.V., N.A.S.V., E.S.V., etc.) use the generic term “hell” in that verse. However, if your Bible (regardless of what translation it is) provides center-column notes or bottom-of-the-page commentary notes for 2 Peter 2:4, those will always specify that the “hell” in question is literally “Tartarus.” As a matter of fact, a few translations (the Holman Christian Standard, Young’s Literal Translation, Wuest’s Expanded Translation) just go ahead and use “Tartarus” in the verse instead of “hell.”

So, what is this strange place called Tartarus? It’s a place created exclusively for the incarceration of certain fallen angels. The place has absolutely no bearing on human beings. As I pointed out in the post Are Hades and Hell the Same Place (post #1), the New Testament also uses the terms “the deep” or “the abyss” (Luke 8:31, Romans 10:7) and “the bottomless pit” (Revelation chapters 9.11.17, and 20) in reference to Tartarus. For example, in Luke 8:31 a group of demons (fallen angels) beg Jesus not to command them to go out into “the abyss” (N.K.J.V.). Undoubtedly, every fallen angel is terrified of Tartarus.

As for the angels who are currently imprisoned in the place, the Bible provides only one explanation for who they could be. They are the “sons of God” (note how the same term is used in reference to angels in Job 1:6 and 2:1) whose sin is recorded in Genesis 6:1-4. Their sin was that they married earthly women and produced offspring.

The questions raised by this sin boggle the mind. How can a fallen angel and a human woman have sex? And how can that sex produce a child? Perhaps the most logical explanation is that the fallen angels did their marrying and their procreating by demon possessing the bodies of earthly males. That would account for the male reproductive seed that is required to produce a child.

Whatever the exact details of the event were, one thing is for certain: God was sorely displeased with the whole mess. It’s certainly no coincidence that Genesis 6:5-7, the three verses that follow the story, find God determining to destroy the whole earth by way of a flood. But wait a minute, you can’t kill a fallen angel. Humans can drown, and half-human/half-fallen-angel offspring can as well, but angels are immortal. How, then, could God punish them for their sins? The answer is, Tartarus (the deep, the abyss, the bottomless pit).

Jude verse 6 says of those angels:

And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; (N.K.J.V.)

You see, if we undermine the story of Genesis 6:1-4 by saying that the “sons of God” described there are something other than fallen angels, we are left to wonder why some fallen angels are reserved in everlasting chains under darkness while all the others are free to roam the earth and demon-possess people. Therefore, Genesis 6:1-4 must refer to fallen angels, fallen angels who blurred the lines between angels and humans and paid a steep price for it. Basically, these angels fell twice.

But the question is, “Will they ever be released from Tartarus?” The answer to that is, yes. When will this happen? It will occur sometime in the first half of the seven-year tribulation period that is prophesied to come upon this earth. The proof text is Revelation 9:1-3, which says:

Then the fifth angel sounded: And I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. To him was given the key to the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit, and smoke rose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. So the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit. Then out of the smoke locusts came upon the earth. And to them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. (N.K.J.V.)

The “star fallen from heaven to the earth” is none other than Satan. Don’t miss the fact that the “star” is referred to as “him.” And the bottomless pit is Tartarus, the entrance to which is clearly located somewhere on planet earth. How else could the smoke that rises up out of the place temporarily block out the sun? God gives Satan the key that opens the lid to the place, and Satan wastes no time using it to free his old buddies.

Someone might say, “But the passage says that locusts come up from the pit, not fallen angels.” Yes, it does, but in the same way that Satan is called a star, there is symbolism here. These locusts surely don’t look like any locusts we’ve ever seen! They have hair like a woman and teeth like a lion (9:8). When they fly (angels have wings, remember?), the sound of their wings sounds like a large throng of horses and chariots thundering the ground (9:9). And these angels also have tails, tails that sting like scorpions (9:10).

Oh, and here’s something else about these angels: they have a king (a head angel) over them. This fallen angel is referred to as “the angel of the bottomless pit” and his name is Abaddon in the Hebrew and Apollyon in the Greek (9:11). Both names mean “Destroyer.” He must be exceedingly mighty, perhaps only outdone by Satan himself and the archangel Michael. Evidently, this Destroyer was the leader of those “sons of God” who caused all that trouble in the pre-flood days.

For five long months (9:5,10) in the first half of the tribulation period, Destroyer and these other fallen angels will torment the lost people of the earth (9:4). The torment they inflict will be so bad that in those days men will long to die but be unable to do so (9:6). In God’s plan, Destroyer and his group won’t be allowed to literally kill anyone.

To get back to our original question, though, the release of these angels will empty Tartarus (at least for a few years). But all that will change at the end of the tribulation period when Christ returns for His Second Coming (Revelation 19:1-21). At that time, Satan himself will be locked up in Tartarus, and he will remain incarcerated there for the duration of Christ’s thousand-year reign upon the earth. In addition to Satan being imprisoned there, all the other fallen angels will be as well. Isaiah 24:21-22 speaks of this by saying:

In that day the Lord will punish the fallen angels in the heavens and the proud rulers of the nations on earth. They will be rounded up and put in prison until they are tried and condemned. Then the Lord Almighty will mount his throne on Mount Zion. He will rule gloriously in Jerusalem, in the sight of all the leaders of his people. There will be such glory that the brightness of the sun and moon will seem to fade away. (New Living Translation)

And would you believe that Satan and all the other fallen angels know all about this coming day when they will be imprisoned? Not only do they know about it, they dread it. In Matthew 8:28-34, Mark 5:1-20, and Luke 8:26-30, the Bible gives us the story of how a large group of demons who were living inside the bodies of two men asked Jesus, “Have you come here to torment us before the time?” What “time” did they have in mind? We find the answer in Luke’s account of the story, where the demons later on implore Jesus not to cast them into “the abyss” (Luke 8:31, N.K.J.V.). This leaves no doubt that the “time” those fallen angels feared was the time when they, along with Satan, will be imprisoned in Tartarus for the 1,000 years of Christ’s millennial reign.

Now, in closing, let me finish all this up by explaining what will happen to Satan and the other fallen angels following Christ’s thousand-year reign. According to Revelation 20:7-9, Satan and the other angels will be released from Tartarus, and God will permit Satan to mount one last spiritual offensive upon the earth. Satan and his angels will go out into every corner of the earth and deceive millions of people into aligning with them in an assault upon Jesus in Jerusalem. Who will all these people be? They will be the offspring of the saved people who lived through the tribulation period and went into Christ’s millennial reign in their earthly bodies. By the time those 1,000 years are finished, those offspring will total in the millions, and, tragically, they will chose the side of Satan in his final battle against God.

And how will that battle end? Revelation 20:10 says that God the Father will send fire down from heaven, and that fire will devour all of Satan’s followers. So much for the coup attempt. It is then that Gehenna (the eternal lake of fire) will come into full play (see my previous post). Gehenna is where Satan and all the other fallen angels will spend eternity.

In Matthew 25:41, Jesus explains that Gehenna was created to be a place for the devil and the other angels. What a shame it is, then, that so many billions of people who lived and died over the course of history will end up spending eternity in there as well. A rebel is a rebel, I suppose, and in God’s program for eternity all rebels, whether they be angels or humans, will share the same place. That’s why my advice to anyone is: Stop playing the role of the rebel and give yourself over fully to Jesus Christ. He is, of course, the one who died for your sins so that you wouldn’t have to spend eternity with Satan and his crowd.

Posted in Angels, Christ's Second Coming, Christ's Return, Coming Judgment, Demons, Disobedience, God's Wrath, God's Judgment, Hell, Prophecy, Salvation, Satan, Spiritual Warfare, The Devil | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 8 Comments