Your Feelings Might Be Real, But They Won’t Impress an Atheist

Posted on December 17, 2017 by russellmckinney

“A Thought-Provoking Book” series (post #2)

We’ve begun a series of posts on the book, Why I Left, Why I Stayed. The book is coauthored by the father-son team of Tony and Bart Campolo and explores the reasons why Bart Campolo chose to abandon Christianity and turn atheist while his father, Tony, still clings to it. In my previous post, I provided some of the highlights of Bart’s opening chapter, which is entitled “How I Left.”

I don’t mind admitting that if either of my two sons had written that chapter my response would have been different from Tony’s in his follow-up chapter, “How I Stay.” My counterpoint chapter would probably have focused on why my son shouldn’t have left Christianity, or it would have at least offered refutations to the arguments he had used to make his case. Tony Campolo, on the other hand, lets Bart’s arguments stand as written while he explains why he himself chooses to continue in Christianity. My guess is that he does this out of love and respect for his son.

Tony retraces his life, citing various experiences, to show how his Christianity involves more than just a doctrinal textbook and a set of rules. To him, Christianity is a relationship rather than a religion. One of his quotes is:

I’m still a fairly good Christian apologist, but at the end of the day, I have to admit that the primary foundation of my faith is not what I know, but rather what I feel.

Along the same lines, he offers this paragraph:

I can’t remember when I did not accept the basic doctrines of the Christian faith, but before I met Burt and Tom (two members of a youth group Tony was a part of in high school), those doctrines were simply historical facts to me, not life-changing experiences. So then, while I cannot pinpoint exactly what an old hymn calls “the hour I first believed,” I know it was during high school that I gradually came to realize my soul was hungry for something more than just salvation, and by the time I enrolled at Eastern Baptist College, the inner presence of Jesus had become for me an everyday conscious reality.

You see, what Tony is describing there is something that can’t be quantified. It’s intangible and untouchable. It’s something that can’t be reduced to an equation or a formula. You don’t get it from reading a prescribed list of Bible passages, hearing an evangelistic sermon, or praying a canned “prayer of salvation.”

He describes it correctly as the inner presence of Jesus because that’s exactly what it is. It is God the Holy Spirit, whom the Bible calls “the Spirit of Christ” (Romans 8:9), literally dwelling inside one’s body. Furthermore, the indwelling Spirit performs various ministries inside the person. For example, He revives the person spiritually so that he or she can rightly worship God. He empowers the person by giving him or her at least one spiritual gift, that gift being a skill to use in service to Christ. He takes over the person’s conscience and turns human guilt into divine conviction. He provides direction, guidance, and instruction, and makes the words of the Bible come alive to the person.

But the problem we Christians face anytime we start talking about what’s going on inside us is that atheists won’t consider any argument that smacks of emotion. They want facts, not feelings. They want science, not scripture. They want the visible, not the invisible. They want God’s existence proven in the ugly here-and-now, not in the sweet-by-a-by.

I once heard the famed preacher, Adrian Rogers, say, “A Christian with a glowing testimony is never at the mercy of a pagan with an argument.” While I understand that line of thinking, atheists in this age of “the new atheism” really don’t care about a Christian’s emotions, feelings, or experiences. They want cold, hard evidences they can judge with their eyes and approve with their minds.

In the latter half of the Campolos’ book, Tony devotes an entire chapter to the idea that transcendent experiences can be classified as evidences that God exists. He entitles the chapter “Not from Nowhere: Why Transcendent Experiences Point to God.” Here he treads much of the same ground he treads in the chapter “How I Stay.” He writes:

I often wish that everyone could spend a few hours a week in a really good Pentecostal worship service. In such churches, the power and presence of the Holy Spirit seem more tangible, which is very important. Being a Christian is much more than affirming doctrine, after all, as important as that may be. True discipleship is ultimately about having a personal encounter with the living Jesus, and mystically (his emphasis) sensing His presence.

Unfortunately for Tony, one of Bart’s best chapters is the one he offers to refute the idea that transcendent experiences prove God’s existence. As Bart shrewdly points out, humans enjoy transcendent experiences all the time that have nothing to do with any kind of god. He writes:

If you don’t believe in human experiences of transcendence, I say with a sly smile, then clearly you haven’t attended the right rock concerts, or used the right drugs, or made love with the right partner, or been crowded into the right football stadium when the home team scores its winning touchdown on the last play of the game. Otherwise, you would know that we human beings aren’t just susceptible to being overwhelmed by feelings of deep connection or oneness with other people, with nature, or with the universe itself, we are positively hardwired to crave and enjoy those feelings.

A couple of pages later, he takes things even further by explaining that roller coasters and scary movies are specifically designed to manipulate people’s experiences. Then he confesses that he himself used to use jokes, stories, and body language to do the same thing from the pulpit. He says:

Many preachers ascribe that power to the Holy Spirit, but that doesn’t stop us from carefully taking into account what we wear, the layout and temperature of the room, what kind of music is played before and after we speak, and a hundred other environmental factors that can influence our audience’s receptivity to what we have to say.

I’ve got to admit that he nailed me — and every preacher I know — with those words. As I said, his entire refutation to his dad’s assertion that transcendent experiences evidence God was strong. It got me to thinking about how certain concerts, movies, and ballgames have taken me to the emotional heights of human existence, heights I must confess I rarely reach while praying, reading the Bible, or attending church. Basically, I have to wonder how many times a “move of God” in our churches is, in reality, nothing more than the emotions of church members being well played by a pastor or a worship leader.

Now, as I begin to close this post, let me offer what I think is a solid comeback to Bart’s opening chapter, the chapter in which he describes the lack of “real life” evidence for a supernatural God who works miracles. Bart and his fellow atheists need to be reminded that even the miracles in the Bible are few and far between in terms of the totality of human history. Genuine miracles aren’t just rare today; they’ve always been rare except for a handful of eras in history.

First, God performed a cluster of miracles to give us creation and the human race. That’s Genesis chapters 1 and 2. Second, He performed another cluster over 2,000 years later in leading the Israelites out of Egyptian bondage and into a settling of the land called Canaan. Third, His next cluster took place more than 500 years later during the days of the prophets Elijah and Elisha.

Truth be told, these three clusters catch most of the Old Testament era, even though there are some other miracles such as God opening the barren wombs of certain mothers or providing certain healings. You see, approximately 4,000 years of Old Testament history teach us that God proving His existence by way of supernatural miracles is exceedingly rare. Frankly, if we live our entire lives and never see Him do it, we shouldn’t be surprised at all.

Someone says, “But what about all the miracles in the New Testament?” Well, here again the miracles occur in clusters, two primary ones. First, Jesus performed hundreds of miracles during the three-and-a-half years of His earthly ministry. Even at that prolific rate, though, He didn’t heal everybody in the entire land of Israel. Second, Jesus’ apostles performed many miracles in the early days of the church. However, while some of those miracles are documented in the book of Acts, even in Acts the apostles’ miracle-working power wanes over the decades described in the book. Interestingly, in 2 Timothy, which is the last epistle the apostle Paul wrote, even Paul concedes that he had to leave a friend of his, Trophimus, sick in Miletus (2 Timothy 4:20).

Rather than God performing a miracle on every page and in every story of the Bible, the Bible makes no pretense that this world is an easy place in which to live. God didn’t perform a miracle to save Abel from Cain. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep Joseph’s brothers from selling Joseph into slavery. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep the Midianites and the Amalekites from stealing Gideon’s harvests every year. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep the Philistines from gouging out Samson’s eyes. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep Israel’s northern kingdom from being conquered by the Assyrians. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep Israel’s southern kingdom from being conquered by the Babylonians. He didn’t perform a miracle to save those babies that Herod the Great murdered in his efforts to kill baby Jesus. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep Herod Antipas from beheading John the Baptist. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep the Jewish Sanhedrin council from stoning Stephen to death. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep Herod Agrippa I from making a martyr of James the apostle. He didn’t perform a miracle to keep the Romans from banishing the apostle John to the island of Patmos. On and on I could go.

So, in light of all this, if you have to experience frequent manifestations of God’s supernatural power in your circumstances before you will give Him credit for existing, all I can say is get comfortable in your atheism. For that matter, if you have to see just ONE manifestation of God’s supernatural power in your circumstances, you’re on ice so thin it shouldn’t even be called ice. Speaking for myself, I’ve never seen God work in my life in such a way that a skeptic couldn’t provide a reasonable explanation without bringing God into the explanation. And yet I do believe in God’s existence. Join me for my next post as I address another one of Bart Campolo’s chapters and in so doing keep exploring what has been dubbed “the new atheism.”

Posted in Atheism, Belief, Christ's Miracles, Conscience, Conviction, Creation, Discipleship, Doubt, Faith, God's Omnipotence, Guilt, Music, Personal, Preaching, Salvation, Series: "A Thought-Provoking Book", The Bible, The Holy Spirit, Trusting In God | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

One Reason Why One Man Stopped Believing in God

Posted on December 14, 2017 by russellmckinney

“A Thought-Provoking Book” series (post #1)

As part of our Christmas shopping at the mall a couple of weeks ago, I went into a Barnes & Noble store to kill some time while Tonya shopped for shoes or something like that. I made my way to the “Religion” section and started browsing, not looking for anything in particular, and the one book that piqued my interest was entitled Why I Left, Why I Stayed. It was coauthored by Tony Campolo and his son, Bart. Tony is a bestselling author, a Baptist who has long been one of the leading figures in what is known as the “evangelical left.” Bart is a humanist chaplain at the University of Southern California.

Even though I didn’t pull the trigger that day, purchasing the book stuck in my head until I finally ordered it through Amazon a couple of days later. What made the book so appealing to me was its unique subject matter. After publicly professing Christ as a sophomore in high school, and spending several years assisting his father in ministerial efforts, Bart Campolo made the radical decision to forsake Christianity and go the atheist-humanist route. Consequently, his half of the book is Why I Left, referring to why he left Christianity. The book’s other half, obviously, is his father’s Why I Stayed.

I wouldn’t attempt a full book review here or try to cover every bit of ground the Campolos cover, but what I do feel led to do is build a blog series around some of the point/counterpoint arguments the two men use to make their differing cases. I realize this isn’t your typical Christmas-season fare, but it’s the stuff that is rattling around in my brain these days after reading the book. I’ll present the highlights of one argument per post, and as you consider each argument, please take the time to look deep inside yourself and do some personal introspection. That’s what I found most helpful about the book.

I’ll lead off the series by using this first post to address Bart’s argument that he can find no evidence of a supernatural God who deals in the miraculous. By Bart’s own testimony, he could never fully shake, even when he was knee-deep in ministry circles, the fact that he found major sections of the Bible to be pretty much unbelievable. Those sections were the ones that have to do with the miraculous.

His argument reminds me of Thomas Jefferson, who famously went through the Bible and cut out the portions that he didn’t accept. What did he keep in? The words of Jesus and some of the deeds of Jesus. What did he edit out? Christ’s virgin birth, all of Christ’s miracles, Christ’s resurrection, and anything else having to do with the supernatural. Jefferson’s “bible” ends with Jesus being laid in the tomb.

Bart Campolo admits, “…for me, the supernatural aspects of Christianity were always the price of admission, not the attraction.” The paragraph that follows that line is one of his most compelling in the book. He writes:

Of course, all those revelations and miracle stories in the Bible might not have seemed so unbelievable to me if I had seen anything like them happening in my own world. Unfortunately, even on those occasions when divine intervention was most clearly called for, I saw no such thing. These days, people often ask exactly when I lost my faith, as though there were a single moment when the scales fell from my eyes. But the truth is that my Christian orthodoxy, and eventually my ability to believe in anything supernatural, actually died the death of a thousand cuts — and ten thousand unanswered prayers — over the course of more than thirty years.

Regardless of whether or not you agree with Bart’s conclusion, you should at least appreciate the fact that it comes from a man who is being bluntly honest. Who among us hasn’t begged God to show up and been disappointed when He didn’t? Who among us hasn’t longed for a parting-of-the-Red-Sea moment and never gotten it? Who among us hasn’t wanted to see a Lazarus come walking out of the tomb, only to have the tomb remained closed?

Specifically, Bart references the late 1970s when he and three of his fellow high schoolers ran a Christian summer day camp in the inner-city ghetto of Camden, New Jersey. That ghetto was marked by boarded-up houses, broken-down cars, graffiti-laced buildings, and a whole lot of the new drug-of-choice: crack cocaine. As Bart spent the summer trying to play the role of missionary to the children of that setting, he heard story after story from them about everything from street violence to sexual abuse. All those stories took a toll on his core beliefs. At the time, he was still just a teenager and was young and green in his profession of Christianity, but he was already asking hard questions such as, “If God is a God of love and power, why doesn’t He help these poor kids and their parents?”

It was the plight of Shonda who got to him the most. She was the mother of Craig, a ten-year-old who was one of his favorite campers. When Bart tried to win her to Jesus, she quickly informed him that she didn’t want to hear about the love of God. Then she told him her story. She had been raised in a Christian family and had enjoyed going to church, but one day, as a nine-year-old walking home from school, she had been gang-raped. Later, when she had asked her Sunday School teacher why a God who is all-knowing and all-powerful hadn’t stopped the rape, the answer given was, “He must have allowed it for a good reason. So, what can you learn from the experience that will enable you to love God more and glorify Him more?” That answer went over like a lead balloon with Shonda and she never wanted to hear anything else about God.

After hearing Shonda’s story and getting to know her, Bart simply couldn’t fathom that a God of love would send a woman with her history to hell. That was the beginning of his disbelief in the reality of hell, and from there the process of his retreat from his profession of Christianity continued. After high school, he attended Haverford, a liberal arts college just outside Philadelphia. That’s where he met two gay roommates who caused him to reject the Bible’s teaching that homosexuality is a choice and a sin. That was the final nail in the coffin of his belief in Biblical inerrancy. Later on, while he was employed as a youth pastor, he and his wife Marty worked to recruit Christian college students to organize evangelical day camps for inner-city kids. In summing up that season of his life, he offers another telling quote:

Later, as we saw one beloved child after another crushed by neglect and abuse, along with loving couples unable to conceive, young parents dying of cancer, and addicted friends relapsing — not to mention the destruction of poverty, war, and all kinds of natural disasters — despite our desperate prayers, the idea that God could do anything more than grieve with us slipped away too.

And it’s there that I’ll put a period on this first post from the series. I trust, though, that I’ve given you enough of Bart’s opening chapter to explain why he ultimately chose to reject the supernatural altogether, including his belief in an omniscient, omnipotent God. In my next post, I’ll give you some of the highlights of the chapter that Tony, Bart’s dad, offers in reply to Bart’s opening chapter. How will the dad respond to the son’s sledgehammer opening remarks? Tune in next time to find out.

Posted in Atheism, Belief, Bible Study, Children, Christ's Birth, Christ's Miracles, Christ's Resurrection, Doubt, Faith, God's Love, God's Omnipotence, God's Omnipresence, God's Omniscience, Hell, Homosexuality, Lesbianism, Personal, Scripture, Series: "A Thought-Provoking Book", Sunday School, The Bible, Trusting In God, Truth, Virgin Birth, Witnessing | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Five Bottles of Wine

Posted on December 12, 2017 by russellmckinney

An elderly woman who lived in the north of England hadn’t been able to truly pray for years. She needed to pray, even wanted to pray, but each time she tried to pray her mind went to five bottles of wine. Those were the bottles she had once stolen when she had been employed as a housekeeper for a wealthy estate in the English countryside.

Her reasoning for the theft had been, “This family has such an extensive wine cellar, they’ll never miss just a few bottles, especially bottles of an inexpensive vintage.” And she had been correct in her assessment. Years had now passed and she had long since moved on from that job, but no mention had ever been made of the missing bottles. She had enjoyed the wine in the months following the theft and was obviously long since clear from any threat of charges being brought against her. What she wasn’t clear from, though, was the conviction she came under every time she tried to pray.

Finally, she reached a breaking point and visited a local pastor who counseled her to go back to the estate, confess her theft, and make monetary restitution. She protested by saying, “But the lord of the estate died some years ago and there is no one there now who would even remember me.” The pastor said, “Well, did he have an heir?” The woman answered, “Yes, a son.” To that the pastor replied, “Alright, go to that son, confess the theft to him, and make your monetary restitution to him.” The woman, however, recoiled at such a thought and went away sad.

After a sleepless night, she returned to the pastor and said, “I really do want to do something that will enable me to pray again, but I just can’t go back to that estate and do as you ask because it would be too humiliating. What if I take the amount of money the wine was worth and use it as a contribution to the church?” A greedy pastor might have jumped at that offer, but this man was a genuine servant of the Lord, and so his answer was, “No, God doesn’t want your stolen gift.”

Several more days passed, and each one brought an even greater conviction and burden upon the woman until she could no longer stand her situation. So, she got in her car, drove out to the estate, introduced herself to the son, made a full confession of her sin, and extended a satisfactory amount of repayment to him. He thanked her for her honesty and graciously refused to accept the money, but she was so insistent that he finally accepted the repayment only to satisfy her. Then the woman returned home and, for the first time in years, prayed the way she was meant to pray.

It is from this simple little story that I offer one self-evident lesson: If some past sin that you have committed against someone is standing between you and God, you must do whatever God requires of you to make things right. Have you wronged someone? Do you owe that person a sincere apology? Do you owe him or her some kind of restitution? Then consider the following passages (all from the N.K.J.V.) as your application to this post:

If I regard iniquity in my heart, The Lord will not hear. (Psalm 66:18)

Isaiah 1:15: When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; Even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. (Isaiah 1:15)

Isaiah 59:1-2: Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, That it cannot save; Nor His ear heavy, That it cannot hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear. (Isaiah 59:1-2)

Micah 3:4: Then they will cry to the Lord, But He will not hear them; He will even hide His face from them at that time, Because they have been evil in their deeds. (Micah 3:4)

Posted in Aging, Confession, Conscience, Conviction, Doing Good, God's Will, Guilt, Making Restitution, Prayer, Reconciliation, Sin | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Flesh & its Drag Effect

Posted on December 10, 2017 by russellmckinney

“…The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” (Matthew 26:41, N.K.J.V.)

For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other… (Galatians 5:17, N.I.V.)

We pastors are forevermore trying to build momentum in a church. If we have good attendance for Sunday School one Sunday, we want to build on that. If we have good attendance for a worship service, we want to build on that. If we have a good service all the way around, we want to build on that. Unfortunately, however, just about anything can be a momentum killer in regards to church. For example, bad weather (rain, wind, cold, ice, snow) can kill momentum by way of services that either get cancelled altogether or at least altered, and good weather can kill it by way of church members heading out of town for weekend getaway trips, full-fledged vacations, family outings, travel ball, etc.

But why is it so hard to build momentum in a church and keep that momentum going anyway? It’s because the human race is a fallen race. That means that sin comes easily to us and spiritual endeavors don’t. Even born-again Christians who have God the Holy Spirit dwelling inside them still struggle with their inborn sinful nature. The Biblical term for this Adamic nature is “the flesh.” It’s “the flesh” that rebels against praying. It’s “the flesh” that rebels against studying the Bible. It’s “the flesh” that rebels against living a holy life. It’s “the flesh” that rebels against giving. It’s “the flesh” that rebels against witnessing. And, yes, it’s “the flesh” that rebels against attending church.

When I think about the fact that sin comes easily to us while spiritual endeavors don’t, my mind goes to that story from Exodus 17:8-16. Moses and the Israelites have recently experienced God miraculously parting the Red Sea, sending them manna from heaven, and causing water to gush from a rock. They are on their way to Mount Sinai, where they will receive the law and build the Tabernacle. Before they get there, though, the Amalekites hit them with an unprovoked sneak attack.

The attack causes Moses to hastily organize Israel’s first army, with Joshua being tapped to play the role of general. The next day, while Joshua and Israel’s army march out to retaliate against the Amalekites, Moses heads to the top of a hill that overlooks the battle site. From that vantage point, his job is to intercede for Israel with God. This intercession is publicly evidenced by him holding up his rod.

And what happens? As long as Moses is able to hold up that rod, Israel surges ahead in the battle, but when he grows tired and the rod drops, the Amalekites surge ahead. Finally, Moses’ two aides (Aaron and Hur) get him a stone to sit upon and they themselves support his hands so that he can keep holding up the rod until the sun goes down that afternoon and Israel’s victory is ensured.

What’s noteworthy about that story is the fact that the Bible never mentions Joshua and the other soldiers getting tired in the fight. It does, however, speak of Moses getting tired in his interceding. So, the lesson is: The more spiritual the endeavor, the harder it is physically. 

You’ll find this out anytime you commit yourself to doing something for the Lord. Oh, you might start out with a bang, but then you’ll learn that it takes more and more effort to keep your momentum going. It might even seem as if the entire world is conspiring against you to knock you back into line. That’s when you’ve got to dig in, straighten your back, and redouble your commitment. That’s how you can overcome the drag effect “the flesh” inflicts upon you to keep you spiritually inert.

Perhaps you are right now planning to make some spiritual change in your life. Or perhaps you’ve already begun that change. Or maybe you are well past the beginning stage and have already hit a wall with your change. Regardless of the stage in which you find yourself in the cycle, please hang in there. Yes, the spiritual lesson is true that the more spiritual the endeavor, the harder it is physically. But there is vast difference between hard and impossible, and you can outdo “the flesh” if you show some stick-to-it-iveness and ask the Lord to strengthen you. You see, just as He wanted Moses and the Israelites to win their battle, He wants you to win yours as well.

Posted in Addiction, Adversity, Alcohol, Backsliding, Bible Study, Change, Church, Church Attendance, Commitment, Depravity, Dieting, Doing Good, Drugs, Gambling, Giving, Gluttony, Lust, Perseverance, Prayer, Problems, Sin, Temptation, The Tongue, Witnessing | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Special Antenna

Posted on December 7, 2017 by russellmckinney

As a Christian, I sometimes get frustrated with people who just can’t seem to grasp spiritual issues. No matter how many Bible passages I cite, how many illustrations I use, or how eloquently I explain a subject, these folks simply can’t catch what I’m throwing. All I get in return from them is either confusion (“I don’t understand”) or apathy (“I don’t care”). Honestly, it’s like I’m speaking a different language.

The truth is, I’m not speaking a different language, but the information I’m sharing can only be heard on a different frequency of communication, a frequency that must be accessed by way of a special antenna. It’s sort of like these new cars that include the factory option of an antennae for Sirius XM Satellite Radio. Tonya and I own a Kia Soul and a Ford Focus that both have that option.

When you purchase a new vehicle that has the Sirius satellite antenna built into it, you get a few weeks of Sirius XM programming as a free trial. We’re talking about a slew of radio channels, each one playing only music from a specific genre, with no static and no commercials. Yeah, put me down for that. I immediately fell in love with the ’70s and ’80s channels (the songs of my younger days), and so now we pay the monthly charge to receive the Sirius XM programming. But if our vehicle didn’t have that Sirius XM antenna, we couldn’t hear any of that programming, even though it gets broadcast 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

In 1 Corinthians 2:11-14, the apostle Paul says to the Christians of Corinth:

….no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things that have been freely given to us by God. These things we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. (N.K.J.V.)

What Paul is talking about is the fact that God the Holy Spirit dwells inside the body of each Christian. This indwelling takes place the moment the person places saving belief in Jesus, and it creates the “born again” experience inside the individual as the person is spiritually reborn. And do you know what else the indwelling Holy Spirit does? He becomes the antenna through which the person can tune in to the broadcast signals that God is sending down from heaven. In that way, the indwelling Holy Spirit is the Christian’s special antenna.

But, of course, the majority of people aren’t Christians and therefore don’t have the Holy Spirit living inside them. Paul calls these people “natural,” as opposed to born-again Christians who are, in a sense, “supernatural” because of the Holy Spirit’s indwelling. Herein lies the breakdown in communication between the two groups. As Paul puts it, “…the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”

Believe me, I’ve tried to have spiritual conversations with people who surely classified what I was saying as “foolishness.” You know that’s what’s happening when they look at you with either that deer-in-the-headlights look or that one where every blood vessel in their face is about to burst. The first look will cause them to get away from you as quickly as possible, and the second one will cause them to want to come across the table at you. As you might guess, neither option creates understanding and agreement.

Oh, and there’s one other problematic aspect about this ongoing spiritual frequency crisis: Even born-again Christians can operate like “natural” people if those Christians choose to ignore the indwelling Holy Spirit. One thing about Tonya and I having Sirius XM programming in our vehicles is that we can choose to turn off the feed. To do that all we have to do is either turn off the radio altogether or set it to a mode where it plays music from a CD, an iPod, or regular AM/FM radio. You see, even though each of our vehicles has an antenna for Sirius XM, we can choose not to use that antenna. Well, Christians do this same kind of thing when they don’t listen to the indwelling Holy Spirit. It’s not that He vacates their bodies; it’s just that His voice is muted.

So, Christian, don’t walk around receiving only the signals the “natural” person can receive when you have a whole other antenna, a “supernatural” one, inside you. Don’t blindly follow the masses further and further out of God’s will when you can show spiritual discernment and plunge deeper and deeper into God’s will. Don’t settle for listening to the world’s static and commercials when you can listen to God’s crystal-clear, commercial-free broadcasting night and day. And, lastly, don’t expect lost people who can only act “natural” or fellow Christians who’ve muted the Holy Spirit to understand you when you talk about spiritual matters. That’s just not a frequency they are picking up.

Posted in Backsliding, Communication, Discernment, Discipleship, Evangelism, God's Guidance, God's Work, Personal, Salvation, The Holy Spirit, Truth, Witnessing | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Oak Tree’s Fall

Posted on December 5, 2017 by russellmckinney

In the center of a town stood a giant oak tree that had been planted there many decades earlier to mark the founding of the town. The tree was massive and had proven that it could withstand any storm. Through wind, rain, sleet, and snow, it had held its ground. Through spring, summer, fall, and winter, it had remained. The tree was an abiding symbol of strength for the townspeople, and they had come to think of it as an object lesson for the strength of the town.

Then one day an unimpressive little storm blew through the town and to the horror of the townspeople brought down the giant oak. Because such a thing seemed unimaginable, an investigation was immediately begun. A tree expert was brought in to examine the felled giant. Everybody in the town wanted to know what could have possibly happened to their tree.

It didn’t take long for the expert to render his verdict. Years earlier, the tree had become infested with a certain type of boring worm that systematically destroys oak trees from the inside out. The end result was a severely damaged tree that was much more susceptible to wind. Had the townspeople been paying closer attention to their tree, they could have stopped the infestation before it was too late. But that window of opportunity had long since passed.

Like those worms that eventually brought down that oak, something that initially appears small and inconsequential can get into your life and ultimately cause your fall. An adulterous affair starts with playful flirting. Drug addiction starts with, “I’ll try it just this once.” Murder starts with hatred in the heart. Theft starts with coveting what someone else has. These facts hold true for one and all, whether the person be a Christian or not. The process is nothing less than sin’s universal way of incessantly creeping, gradually poisoning, and finally destroying.

To keep this process from playing itself out in your life, you must be vigilant to guard yourself. Don’t dabble with sin. Don’t toy with it. Don’t rationalize it or try to minimize it. See it for what it is: a boring worm that won’t stop until you are lying on the ground from it. Only by remaining vigilant and resisting sin’s allure can you remain tall and strong.

Most readers will finish this post and never think about it again, but my guess is that some readers will be brought under conviction over “worms” of sin they have allowed to bore into their lives. If you are such a person, let me urge you as strongly as I can to take the post as your warning from God and deal with your sin. If you have never made the decision to believe in Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, look to Him, the divine One who died on a cross so that all your sins might be forgiven. By believing in Him, you will not only experience complete forgiveness but also be given the strength to repent of your sin and resist it going forward. On the other hand, if you know Jesus as Savior, what you must do is access the spiritual strength He has already given you by way of the indwelling Holy Spirit and put that strength to use by repenting of your sin.

You see, your tree doesn’t have to fall. If, however, you refuse to deal with your sin, you can expect a great crash at some point. It will simply be a matter of waiting on the right storm to blow your way and send you toppling. Friends, neighbors, and family members will hear about your fall and wonder what happened, but what they won’t know is that the fall began many months or many years earlier. It just took your “worms” time to get their job done.

Posted in Addiction, Adultery, Alcohol, Anger, Backsliding, Christ's Death, Conviction, Covetousness, Desires, Disobedience, Drugs, Forgiveness, Gambling, God's Judgment, Guilt, Idolatry, Jealousy, Lust, Lying, Pride, Rebellion, Repentance, Salvation, Sex, Sin, Sowing and Reaping, Temptation, The Tongue | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Christmas & the Absent-Minded Professor

Posted on December 2, 2017 by russellmckinney

Donald L. Deffner, in his book Seasonal Illustrations, tells the story of an absent-minded professor who tended to get so absorbed in his work that he forgot the simplest details. One morning his wife said to him, “Now Henry, remember, we are moving today. Here, I’m putting this note in your pocket. Don’t forget!” Henry dutifully nodded his head and headed off to his office.

At the end of the day, Henry returned home, opened up the front door, and found the place empty. Bewildered and distraught, he walked out to the curb and sat down. When a young boy came walking up to him, he asked the boy, “Little fellow, do you know the people who used to live here?” The boy answered, “Sure, Dad. Mom told me you’d forget.”

Now that it is December and the Christmastime madness has begun in earnest, let’s be sure that we don’t get so absorbed in it all that we forget those who are the most important to us. The older I get, the more I realize that the most valuable gift you can give someone is the gift of yourself. I guess middle age has a way of reorganizing your priorities like that. And, of course, when the subject is giving yourself as a gift, our minds should immediately go to Jesus.

You know the story. Christmas is the day we have set aside to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, the greatest gift God could give to the fallen, sinful human race. Jesus was God in the flesh — God the Son/the Son of God — miraculously conceived in the womb of a virgin, born in some type of livestock pen, and first laid in an animal’s feeding trough.

He grew up completely sinless and began His public ministry when He was approximately 30 years old. For three-and-a-half years, He preached, taught, performed miracles, and gathered followers unto Himself. Then He was betrayed, arrested, tried on trumped up charges, found guilty, scourged, and crucified on a cross. That death was a sacrificial one that paid the sin debt owed to God by the entire human race so that all might have the chance to be forgiven.

Jesus then arose on the third morning after that death and made periodic appearances to His followers in His resurrected, glorified body for the next 40 days. At the end of those 40 days, He ascended back to heaven and resumed His eternal place at the right hand of God the Father. And now He offers salvation (the forgiveness of all sin, the privilege of going to heaven in the afterlife) to each and every individual  who will place their belief in Him as their personal Savior. MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Deffner concludes his illustration about the absent-minded professor by saying this:

How often do we become so absorbed in “the things of this world” that we forget who we are and whose we are and where we are going.

Christian, don’t let that be the case with you this Christmas. Never forget who you are, whose you are, and where you are going. This world is relentless at trying to conform you to its mold and bring you in line with its warped standards and wrong thinking, and there is no better example of this than what passes for normal at Christmastime. But don’t let the world win you over and cause you to miss the meaning of the season. Jesus was born! Jesus was born! Jesus was born! That, you see, is what we are celebrating this month, and if any event is worthy of a holiday, surely that one is.

Posted in Christ's Birth, Christ's Death, Christ's Miracles, Christ's Resurrection, Christmas, Forgiveness, Priorities, Salvation, Virgin Birth | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

The Best Position for Praying

Posted on November 30, 2017 by russellmckinney

Three ministers were engaged in a conversation on the subject of prayer. Naturally, they all agreed that prayer was vital, but the debate was about which bodily position works best for praying. As they commented back and forth, a telephone repairman, who happened to be in the room that day working on the phone system, listened quietly. (Obviously, this illustration comes from that prehistoric time before cell phones existed.)

One minister said, “In my opinion, the position of the hands is the key to praying. I always clasp mine together. This helps focus my attention. Also, I make sure that my joined hands are pointed upward toward heaven. This is a symbolic act indicating that I want my prayers to rise to God’s ears.”

The second minister said, “Well, I’ll grant you that praying with your hands clasped together and pointed upward makes sense, but these things should be done while the person is on their knees. Praying on your knees shows that you are approaching God in humility. It’s actually an act of worship because you are kneeling before Him as you pray.”

The third minister said, “No, no, you are both wrong. The best position for praying is lying completely prostrate upon the floor, with your face on the ground. Praying from that position is you saying to God, “Lord, I am nothing and You are everything. I don’t even have a right to gain an audience with you. Because of your mercy and grace, though, I humbly submit my request.”

It was then that the repairman thought he could add something to the conversation. He said, “Gentlemen, I hate to interrupt men such as yourselves when you are debating a topic as important as this one, but if you are interested, I’ll tell you the position I was in when I prayed my most emotional and powerful prayer.” Now the repairman had the ministers’ full attention, and they replied almost in unison, “Yes, please tell us.” The repairman said, “Okay. At the moment I prayed the best prayer I have ever prayed, I was dangling upside down by my heels from a telephone pole, suspended forty feet off the ground!”

The moral of this story is simple: Genuine need in your life leads to genuine praying. Show me a person who is praying a canned prayer they’ve heard the pastor pray in church, and I’ll show you a person who doesn’t have a genuine need. The fact is, when things get serious in your life, your praying will get serious.

I don’t know where this post finds you, but if some problem, situation, or circumstance currently has you dangling upside down by your heels, feeling like you are suspended forty feet off the ground and ready to drop to your demise, I advise you to pray. You say, “But I’ve already prayed about it, and nothing has happened.” Fine, then pray again, and again, and again, and again. Keep praying until something does happen.

If you like praying with your hands clasped together and pointed toward heaven, then pray from that position. If you like praying from bent knees, then pray from that position. If you like praying from a prostrate position on the floor, then pray from that position. If you like praying with your eyes closed, then pray from that position. If you like praying while you are lying in bed at night, then pray from that position. If you like praying while you are walking, then pray from that position. If you like praying while you are driving, then pray from that position. Of course, I wouldn’t suggest praying with your eyes closed from those last two positions! But you get the point. Pray. Pray. Pray. Pray. Why? Because the best position for genuine praying will always be a position of genuine need.

Posted in Adversity, Fear, Needs, Prayer, Prayer Requests, Problems, Trials, Trusting In God, Worry | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

A Lesson Learned From a Poor Widow

Posted on November 28, 2017 by russellmckinney

Monetarily speaking, the greatest giver of all time was not a rich industrialist who made his billions and then contributed a portion of his wealth to philanthropic efforts. Instead, it was a poor widow who placed two small coins in the treasury of the Jewish temple in Jerusalem. Her story is told in Mark 12:41-44 and Luke 21:1-4.

The Greek word that is used to describe each of her offertory coins is lepton. This was the smallest coin in circulation in Israel. In our American economy, such a coin would be the equivalent of one-eighth of a penny.

The plural of lepton is leptra. In the Roman empire under which the Jews lived, the widow’s offering of two leptra was the equivalent of one-sixty-fourth of a Roman denarius. Since a denarius was the average daily wage for a worker, the poor widow would have had to repeat her offering 63 more times just to reach the monetary equivalent of an average day’s pay for a Roman.

In his commentary notes on the story, Herschel H. Hobbs explains that the widow gave her offering in The Court of the Women, the part of the Jewish Temple complex that was devoted to women. He goes on to say there were thirteen receptacles in that Court. Those receptacles were called “trumpets” because of their shape, and each “trumpet” was designated to receive specific offerings for specific purposes.

What the widow didn’t know was that she was being watched as she placed her two leptra inside the appropriate receptacle. On that day, Jesus was sitting on the other side of the Court watching people come and go and place their offerings inside the receptacles. When He saw the widow contribute her scant offering, He called the chosen 12 over to Himself and told them that she had contributed more than anyone else who had given to the Temple treasury.

How could that be? Well, according to Jesus all the others contributed out of their abundance while she contributed out of her poverty. As a matter of fact, He went so far as to say that she contributed her entire livelihood. That means that when she left the Temple that day, she didn’t have any money whatsoever to her name.

Tell me, if you had been in that woman’s place, do you think you would have been tempted to not give any offering at all? Even if you were determined to contribute something, would you have been inclined to contribute just one lepton and hold back the other one? I’m sure that thought would have crossed my mind,

And it’s not like that widow could depend upon a husband to meet her future financial needs, either. Consequently, for her, placing both those coins in that receptacle was an act of real faith. It was her acknowledgement that if her needs got met, God would have to meet them. Even if she did hold down some type of job (which was certainly not a given in that culture), her job obviously didn’t pay much.

Now, there are numerous spiritual lessons that we can glean from this story, but for the purposes of this post I just want to leave you with one. It goes like this: As far as the Bible’s record goes, this woman lived her entire earthly life and never knew that Jesus not only noticed her offering but praised it to the skies. You see, that widow’s offering is like the myriads of good deeds that Christians do around the world each day. These deeds go completely unnoticed and unrecognized by the world, but they rate high marks with Jesus and earn great rewards in eternity.

So, Christian, take heart in this and keep faithfully serving the Lord. He really is watching, and all those behind-the-scenes good things you are doing for Him really are getting noticed. Even more than that, in eternity He’ll reward you for them with eternal blessings beyond your wildest dreams. Remember, nothing ever goes unnoticed by Him. Sure, that can be a bad thing when the subject is sin, but the flip side is that it can be a great thing when the subject is holy deeds.

Posted in Commitment, Discipleship, Doing Good, Dying To Self, Eternity, Faith, Faithfulness, Giving, God's Omniscience, God's Work, Heaven, Humility, Ministry, Money, Needs, Reward, Sacrifice, Sanctification, Service, Sowing and Reaping, Stewardship, Trusting In God | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Born Again

Posted on November 24, 2017 by russellmckinney

“Salvation” series (post #9)

Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” (John 3:3, N.K.J.V.)

The Bible teaches that each individual consists of a body, a soul, and a spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:23). In this way, we are somewhat like God in that we are triune beings. The difference is that our body, soul, and spirit aren’t each distinct persons, as is the case with the three members of the holy Trinity.

Now, Jesus said that an individual cannot see the kingdom of God unless that individual is born again. But what exactly does that mean? To answer that, let’s refer back to those three different parts of a person.

First, does the person’s body need to be born again? No. That’s the question Nicodemus asked when he replied, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

Second, does the person’s soul need to be born again? No. The soul cannot either die or be “born” again. The soul is that part of you that goes into the afterlife when your body dies (Genesis 35:18). We might say that your soul is the real you. This explains why verses such as Psalm 6:3 and Ezekiel 18:20 use the word “soul” to speak of the entire person. Think of this way: You are a soul who is right now living inside a body.

Third, does the person’s spirit need to be born again? Evidently, this is the case. A parallel passage on this subject is Ephesians 2:1, which speaks of people as being “dead in trespasses and sins.” If neither the person’s body or soul is dead, that only leaves the spirit. So, while in one sense the spirit is that part of the individual that animates the human body (James 2:26; Ecclesiastes 12:7), in another sense it is that part that houses the capacity for the kind of worship and communion with God that Adam and Eve enjoyed before the fall.

This is what Jesus meant when He told the Samaritan woman at the well, “But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:23-24, N.K.J.V., emphasis mine). You see, Jesus didn’t say that we must worship God “in body” or “in soul.” It’s the spirit that earns that unique distinction.

Putting everything together, what scripture seems to teach is that each of us is born with an inner spirit that isn’t functioning as it was originally designed to function. It’s doing fine at bringing life to our otherwise lifeless body and thus creating physical life, but it’s downright shut down when it comes to creating spiritual life. Therefore, each of us is born “dead in trespasses and sins” and needs what we might call a resurrection in our spirit. That’s why Jesus said, “You must be born again” (John 3:7).

But just exactly how do we go about being born again? What does it take to be spiritually reborn? Is there a course we must purchase? Is there a five-step process? The answer is: The moment you place saving belief in Jesus, you are instantly born again. Believing in Jesus is your part and bringing you to life spiritually is God’s part.

Let me explain how this works. In John 3:5-8, Jesus describes being born again as being born “of the Spirit” (capital S, referring to God the Holy Spirit). Specifically, He says, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” You see, the moment you place saving belief in Jesus, God the Holy Spirit comes to take up literal residence inside your body (Romans 8:9-11; 1 Corinthians 6:19), and He is the one who fixes your defective spirit and allows it to function as it should. This is all part of the “new birth” experience the Holy Spirit creates inside you.

The apostle Paul described the Holy Spirit’s entrance as “the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5), and the apostle John described it as being “born of God” (1 John 5:1). What else could John have been referring to except being “born again”? So, to be born again is to be born of God the Holy Spirit.

John also associated the new birth with having “eternal life” (1 John 5:10-13). Most people hear that term “eternal life” and wrongly put the emphasis on the word “eternal,” as if having eternal life simply means existing forever somewhere in the afterlife. But the reality is that everyone will spend eternity somewhere in the afterlife, either with God in perfect bliss or separated from Him in torment. That’s why the emphasis in “eternal life” should be placed on the word “life.” The idea is that the indwelling Holy Spirit has entered into the body of a person who was spiritually dead in trespasses and sins and brought that individual back to spiritual life.

The Bible’s most well-known way of describing the Holy Spirit’s entrance into the believer’s body is to refer to the experience as “the baptism of the Holy Spirit” (John 1:33; 1 Corinthians 12:13). The first people to ever enjoy the blessing of this “baptism” were a group of Christ’s followers who were meeting for worship services in an upper room in Jerusalem in the days following Jesus’ resurrection and ascension to heaven. Just before Jesus ascended, He promised them they would be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from then (Acts 1:4-5). The fulfillment of that promise is recorded in Acts 2:1-41.

Someone asks, “So, is Acts 2:1-41 indicative of every instance of someone experiencing the baptism of the Holy Spirit (getting born again)?” No, it isn’t. As evidence that they had been baptized with the Holy Spirit, those believers all began to speak in “tongues” (foreign languages they had never learned). That in turn created quite a stir in Jerusalem, so much so that Peter ended up preaching a powerful sermon there on the spot, a sermon after which approximately 3,000 people believed in Jesus and agreed to water baptism (Acts 2:14-41). No mention is made, however, of those 3,000 new believers speaking in foreign languages. The same holds true for the additional 2,000 new believers who placed saving belief in Jesus shortly afterward (Acts 4:4), the scores of others who did so even later (5:14; 6:1), the Ethiopian eunuch (8:26-39), Saul of Tarsus (9:1-19), Lydia and her household (Acts 16:11-15), the Philippian jailer and his household (16:25-34), the believers in Thessalonica (17:1-4), the believers in Berea (17:10-15), etc., etc., etc.

The fact is, the book of Acts is a transitional book that serves as the record of the early years of what we call “the church age.” Those years were filled with all kinds of uncommon stories and miraculous happenings, none of which have ever been commonplace and certainly aren’t today. For this reason, we must always be hesitant about building core doctrine around the stories from Acts. Romans is considered the New Testament’s greatest doctrinal book, and it devotes pretty much an entire chapter — chapter 8 — to the subject of Holy Spirit baptism. Significantly, though, the chapter never once mentions speaking in tongues as the evidence of the experience.

Someone else might ask, “But what about the saved believers from the Old Testament? Didn’t the Holy Spirit indwell them? Were they not born again?” The truth is that Holy Spirit baptism (the new birth) was not part of God’s work in the lives of those believers. Just as those believers lived in a pre-Jesus era, they also lived in a pre-Holy Spirit baptism era.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that those believers didn’t worship God and commune with Him in their own capacity. No one is saying that believers such as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Samuel, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel couldn’t worship God, commune with Him, fellowship with Him, and be in right relationship with Him. However, the idea of having Him literally dwell inside their bodies was something completely unknown to them. In God’s plan, such a thing just didn’t happen in those days. This leads us to conclude that the worship and communion those believers enjoyed with God, as legitimate as it all was, was curtailed to a fair degree by the fact that the spirit part of their bodies remained defective. Unfortunately for those believers, that was one of the many spiritual disadvantages — along with not having a completed Bible, not having any churches, and not being able to look back upon Jesus’ death as an historical event — with which they had to live.

But now as I wrap up this post and this “Salvation” series, let me just ask you: Have you placed saving belief in Jesus and thereby been born again by the baptism of the indwelling Holy Spirit? Has the Holy Spirit taken up residence inside you and fixed your defective spirit? Since God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are one, has the indwelling Spirit changed your way of thinking, talking, dressing, conducting yourself, etc. and made them more pleasing to God? As 1 Corinthians 6:19 describes, has the Spirit transformed your body into His temple?

Friend, these are not unimportant questions. The “born again” experience is certainly nothing to take lightly, and if you doubt that you have experienced it, then you have every right to doubt that you have placed saving belief in Jesus and are on your way to heaven. Please understand that I’m not trying to cause you to doubt your salvation. But if I can cause you to doubt it by merely asking a few basic questions that come out of scripture, then you need to check up on whether or not you are authentically saved. That is the point I’m trying to get across to you, and it’s a point that I’ll leave between you and God. Always keep in mind, though, those emphatic words from Jesus: “You must be born again.” The man to whom He first spoke those words was Nicodemus, and all indications are that Nicodemus was part of that original group who experienced Holy Spirit baptism in Jerusalem. That means that Nicodemus took Jesus’ words seriously and brought his life in line with them. So, the question is now: Will you do the same?

Posted in Baptism, Belief, Christ's Resurrection, Church, Heaven, Hell, Human Life, Series: "Salvation", The Holy Spirit, The Trinity | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment