Reaching a Lost Son

The case could be made that it is getting more and more difficult to raise children in modern times.  However, we need to be careful that we do not lose sight of the truth that it has always been difficult to raise children.  Sheltering, feeding, and clothing children can be challenging at times, but they represent the "easier" tasks of being a parent.  The more difficult task is teaching and preparing the child to take on the tasks of caring for itself in a way that does not prey on others.

The Bible is filled with the history of parents having trouble raising their children.  It wasn't easy back then either.  Thus we do not have a special case that only we can answer.  Throughout history mankind has wrestled with the issue of how best to raise children.  In the Bible we have the examples of many failures in this regard and yet counsel from God himself on what we could do better.

Before we talk about reaching a lost son, I believe that there is an amazing teaching in the bible in this area.  The Bible makes it abundantly clear that God intends us to make the connection between our difficulties raising our children and the often stormy relationship between God and mankind.  Think about it.  Children are born helpless, in a weakened condition, unable to care for themselves, and unable to interpret the world around them.  If it were not for the "god-like" care and influence of parents then they would die.  Parents as the "gods" of their children care for their every need, help them grow and understand the world around them.  The frictions that happen during this process are both unavoidable and necessary.  We are the lost children God is trying to reach and the passage we look at today is God's attempt to help us see his heart towards mankind.  Today we do not look at the infant and toddler stages, but rather the end of the parenting process where our kids become adults in their own right and in that sense transition into standing beside us as our brothers and sisters.

Setting the Stage

Before we get into the story we need to understand the situation that led to Jesus telling it.  In Luke chapter 15 we are told that the tax collectors and the sinners "drew near" to Jesus in order to hear his teachings.  The point is that they weren't just hanging on the outskirts of the group, but that they were right in next to Jesus as he taught.  The fact that tax collectors are equated with sinners here is not lost on us modern readers.  However, these tax collectors were viewed even worse than in our society because they collected taxes for a foreign, oppressive regime, and often did so excessively so that they could skim profits off the top.  They were seen as opportunistic traitors.  The religious leaders saw that Jesus allowed these obvious sinners to be close to him as he was teaching.  They make the complaint: "This man receives sinners and eats with them."  If he really was God's holy representative than how could he let unholy sinners first come to him and then, even worse, have a meal with them?  It flew in the face of what they understood about God and what they taught Israel about their God.  Jesus gave them three stories to show how they neither understood God's heart nor were in a position to teach about it.  He also wants us to understand the heart of those who are lost.

Jesus primes the pump of their understanding by giving two quick stories about a lost sheep and a lost coin.  He then follows up with a much more involved story about a son who asks for his inheritance early and leaves his father's home.  Jesus' use of the three pictures of a lost sheep, lost coin, and a lost son, are highly illustrative of our lost condition.

• Luke 15:4-7, The Lost Sheep, this is a picture of how we stray from God through our own ignorance and stupidity.  God, as the good shepherd, "goes out after the one" even though he has 99 others.  If you are an animal lover than you will probably think that it is obvious that a shepherd would seek out the one.  But Jesus is showing how it makes obvious sense to the religious leaders when talking about sheep.  But, they don't see it when talking about lost people.  The point of this story is the waywardness of the sheep and its seemingly insignificant value and yet the shepherd's desire to "go out after" it.  God's heart is to go out after us even when we have ignorantly chosen a path that will destroy us.
• Luke 15:8-10, The Lost Coin, Jesus moves to an inanimate object that makes no conscious decision.  It is simply lost.  this is a picture of how we are generally oblivious to our own lost condition and how we got there.  The coin is not valuable to the woman who lost it because of what it does.  It has an inherent value to the woman regardless of its lost state.  So she diligently lights a lamp, sweeps the house, and searches the house till she finds it.  This is a picture of how God has lit a light in the world through his prophets and particularly Jesus.  He is even now sweeping the world and searching it as he sends out his Church to share the good news with all (to the ends of the earth), yet only some believing in and following Jesus.

• Luke 15:11-32, The Lost Son, here we come to the apex of the teaching where we are brought face to face with the picture of how we willingly estrange and separate ourselves from our heavenly Father, all along not understanding his true heart towards us.  This story is true of all mankind, as we seek to cast off God and go our own way.  Let's look at this story closer.

The Heart of the Lost Son

First we are shown the heart of the wayward son.  We enter the story at a point when the younger of two sons is doing an unthinkable thing.  He is asking for his inheritance before his father dies and is planning to get as far away from his father's house as possible.  In short he is completely rejecting his father.  We are not told what leads up to this point, but any parent can fill in some of the details.  The young man is chaffing under his father's supervision, rules, and overall way of thinking.  He is restricted from what he wants to do by his father and can only think of getting away.  He only sees what the father is keeping him from.  Thus he chooses to leave.  But somewhat hypocritically he wants a portion of his father's estate.  Yes, it naturally would be his at his father's death, but notice he is rejecting his father and wants nothing to do with him, however, still wants the wealth his father has accumulated.  The same mindset that he is rejecting is the mindset that he now expects to benefit him.   His father is merely a means of wealth for him.  This action is a deep wound into the father's heart that says, "you are only a means to an end for me, a stepping stone."  Another issue to see is that the inheritance is merely money to him.  A father hands down to his child far more than money as an inheritance.  However, the young man saw none of that.  The only thing his father had that he wanted was money.  He seeks to get away from his father's presence and supervision along with all its restraints and expectations.

The wayward son then takes the money and goes to a far country.  In this country he "wasted" all that he had in "prodigal" living.  The greek word translated as "wasted" is actually a picture of a farmer who is broadcasting his seed.  It is as if this young man began to throw his possessions to the wind.  Such "investments" generally give no returns.  The second word translated as "prodigal" has the sense of no morals or boundaries.  He plunges himself into immoral  activity without placing boundaries on his actions.   Again his lifestyle and mindset continue a rejection of all that his father is and has modelled to him.  Yes he is blazing his own path, but it is not a new one.  It is a tired, well used, familiar path that many a parent has wept over because it is a path that leads to destruction.

The son ends up in a humiliating condition.  He becomes penniless, but also has the misfortune to be so just as a famine comes upon that country.  Good times economically, militarily, and socially often mask the effects of our own poor decisions.  If there hadn't been a famine, perhaps the young man could have had a better situation by taking a job, but he is not so lucky.  The famine hits.  Everyone else is hurting too.  They either do not have anything left over or are so fearful for themselves that they are not willing to share any extra that they have today.  The only thing he can find to do is to feed the swine of a pig farmer.  This choice is clearly chosen by Jesus in the story to highlight the depths to which this young jewish boy has fallen.  Pigs were an unclean animal and the religious leaders would see it as the bottom of the barrel if not under it.  Yet, this young man is so hungry that he is desirous to eat the pigs food!  The clincher comes in verse 16, "no one gave him anything."

Now remember why this story is being told.  Jesus was letting sinners come and listen to him and he was giving them teaching about God and eating with them.  Giving is a critical part of this story.  The only one in it who truly gives is the rejected father.  Everyone else, the son included, takes and wastes, but does not give.  Now, it is while he is in this humiliating condition that the young man, "comes to himself."  We would probably say that he came to his senses.  It dawns on him that his father's servants have it way better than he does.  This fact then gives rise to a possiblity that he previously could not see and desire.  He could go back to his father apologize for his wrong and beg to be a slave in his house.  It is in the dire situation that he is able to see how good his father's house really is.  The mindset that he before was rejecting, he sees now is a mindset that created a house that was one where even the servants had plenty of bread to eat.  It was a good place and his father was a good man.  When all good is lost from our life, it opens the door for us to see the wisdom of repentance.  In fact we can ask the question, Is true repentance possible without suffering?  All sinners who live a life in rejection of God's ways experience a life of waste and suffering.  Though not all "come to themselves" and desire repentance, some do.  Jesus wants us to see the utter humiliation, lack of grace, and lack of hope in which sinners find themselves.  They are in a desperate situation.  Will you help them?  What would God do, and more importantly what would God want you to do?

The Heart of the Rejected Father

At this point where the son's mind turns back to his father, so does the point of now showing the father's heart.  But before we do that let's think back to the father's actions already and think about what his heart must be feeling and thinking.  I mentioned that the son's actions would be very hurtful and were quite impertinent.  Instead of rebuking him and refusing to divide the inheritance, the father gives his son much wealth and lets him go.  When children are young we often rebuke them and refuse to let them have everything they want, but at some point the spankings and punishments fall away.  The father's heart is not to force his son to be like a slave that has to obey his every command.  He realizes that he has to let his son go or he will forever lose his heart.  The father also lets him take what he neither earned nor deserved simply because he loved his son.  But on top of this the father suffers the public shame of a son who would do such a thing.  Many a parent fails at this juncture.  We are unwilling to bear the public weight of our children's sins.  But this father carries the shame of a foolish son without flinching.  Later, as the prodigal son approaches home, vs. 20 tells us that "when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him."  The fact that the father saw the son while he was still a great way off implies that the father was watching for the boy.  His head knew he couldn't go out and force the boy to come home, but his heart was on the horizon looking for any sign of a changed heart.  At the first sign he quickly embraced the wayward, grievous son who had caused so much suffering to his heart and he did so with "great joy."  Instead of lording the son's failures over him, he rather completely restored him to son status.  "Are you kidding, you are not going to be a slave in my house, you are my son...!"  The father dresses the son in a fine robe and prepares a feast and calls all around to celebrate with him that his son had come home.  This is the heart of God towards sinners who have gone astray.  Yes he has been hurt and has carried the sorrow and heaviness of our rejection.  But he longingly looks for any change of heart that he might receive us back into his "house," not as a slave, but as a son.

The Other Son

Here Jesus inserts a question in the story.  For you see there was an older brother who had always been faithful to his father and had never disobeyed.  He was, in a sense, the perfect son.  But was he?  What makes a "perfect" son?  It is interesting that in the Scripture "perfect" carries the sense of matured or completed.  Was this son really completed?  Had he really become like his father?  It is at this point that we find the heart of the elder son.  The elder son is offended and angry at his father's actions and refuses to come into the celebration.  The father tries to reason with the elder son by reassuring him of his place in the father's house and that everything that was his belongs to the elder son.  He also speaks to the morality of the situation.  It is only right to rejoice when the brother who was as good as dead has come back to life.  You see this is the other thread throughout the stories.  The joy that breaks forth when the lost thing is found.  The shepherd calls his friends to rejoice with him.  The woman likewise entreats her friends to rejoice with her.  The father celebrates and throws a feast for his son along with music and dancing.  This is the heart of God.  He longs for our repentance and rejoices with great joy when we turn to him.  He is quick to embrace and restore.  This was not the heart of the religious leaders.  They were so proud in their obedience to God that they became offended when God had mercy on sinners.  Here is the question.  Jesus doesn't question their obedience, which he could have (we all like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way).  Instead he questions whether they were really like God and was God really as they thought.  They claimed to represent him and speak on his behalf, but in the end their heart is diametrically opposed to God's.

John MacArthur gives an interesting twist on this story.  Although the parable ends here, we might ask the question, "if the elder brother represents the religious leaders of the day then how might the parable continue?"  MacArthur says that the story would continue this way.  The elder brother becomes so enraged that the father intends to drag the family name through the mud by embracing the wayward son and because his own service seems to be slighted in the circumstances, that he picks up a staff and clubs his father to death.  When the true essence of his father was displayed he then rejected his father's heart and killed him.

The real question is not how obedient we have been to God, but is this.  When the true nature of God's heart is displayed do you reject it or do you embrace it?  Only the proud, self confident, and self righteous who refuse to see their own sin reject God's heart.  But those who have suffered and been humiliated because of their own sin rejoice and are amazed at the heart of God displayed at the cross.  God is all powerful.  But he does not use that power to wipe out those who dare disobey him.  Instead he uses that power to carry the weight of their sin and provide a way for them to be restored to him.  Yes, there will be a day of judgment because there is a real rejection of God, but is is not always seen by the outward appearance.  Many who are sinners will be restored to sonship and many who appear to be great religious leaders will be cast out of his house in that day.  Which heart is yours?

When did my little angel become a devil?

The initial beauty and joy of a little child is always spoiled by the eventual "sprouting of horns" that will happen.  The phrase "terrible twos" is used to reference that period of time in which the child has gained enough physical mastery to begin to assert its own will, and rather demonstrably, I might add.  Babies and toddlers are, in general, focused only on their desires and how you can meet them.  It has been pointed out in many different places that no one has to teach their kids to be selfish.  No, that comes naturally to them as well as other vices like lieing, forcible taking of toys, violent behavior towards other kids, tantrums, etc...  

This reminded me of the animated Disney movie, "The Incredibles."  It is about a family of super heroes who are fighting against an evil villain.  Although they defeat the villain's evil plan, the villain gets them back by kidnapping their little baby, "Jack-Jack."  As he is gloating over the fact that they are too late to stop him, the little baby begins morphing into various things like fire, heavy metal and lastly he turns into a devil and begins beating and biting the villain.  What seemed to be a nice, innocent, helpless baby turns out to be more than a handful for him.  No matter what name we are going to give it, it is abundantly clear that man has an inner bent towards self at the cost of others.  Even if we are to say that a baby cognitively doesn't know any better, the problem still remains that universally children display selfishness, not selflessness.  How can that be if they are born innately good?

To say that they are influenced to hurtful behavior (sin) is to beg the question.  If it was their parents, siblings, and or society that influenced them to embrace sin (at whatever level) then who influenced the parents and the others?  Of course the answer has to be other people prior to them.  We cannot infinitely regress backwards and have also answered the question.  If men are born innately good and are just influenced to do bad things then someone somewhere had to start it all.  However, before we follow that thread, ask yourself this.  Is it really reasonable to explain all bad behavior as having been taught or modeled?  The two year old that takes a toy from another toddler and hits them on the head with it was taught this?  It stretches credulity to claim all bad behavior cannot ultimately be the fault of the child.  Let's look at what the Bible has to say about this.

Sin is a universal problem

In Romans 5:12-19, it starts out by establishing that all people are sinners.  However, we are pointed back to Genesis chapter 3 where the fault of this problem is laid at the feet of Adam.  Whether you believe in an initial, created, ancestor named Adam (which is a generic word for man) or not, the Bible and modern intellects actually say the same thing, however, at different times.  Modern man says that people today are basically good but can be influenced to bad or evil.  If we were able to remove all evil influences then men would no longer act in evil ways.  I would challenge you to ask yourself if it is possible to remove all evil influences in this world without becoming evil yourself.  The Bible says that man was initially good.  But he was influenced to embrace evil by an outside influence.  Ever since that time, man has been born with a bent towards selfishness and sin.  Initially the world was "very good" with no problems.  Into this "Eutopia" comes the temptation to choose self over the top of God.  In these passages sin is spoken of in a way that almost makes it sound like a disease.  Through one man [Adam] sin entered the world.  But sin wasn't the only thing that entered the world, it has a natural and spiritual consequence of death.  Man was not originally mortal, but became so by rebelling against the Creator.

The affects of this rebellion were not just in the area of legal standing.  The separation from God changed how man functioned spiritually.  But something happened to man physically as well.  In Genesis 2:17 God told Adam that if he ate from the forbidden tree of the knowledge of good and evil he "would surely die."  Literally it is "dying you shall die."  Notice the phrase implies immediacy and process.  It is what we see today that even as we live the processes of aging can be compared to dying.  When I am young there is more growing happening than there is dieing.  But cells are dieing everyday.  As I grow older growing eventually comes to a stop and repairing also slows down.  At the same time the dieing of cellular tissues increases in rate.  Eventually this leads to death.  Something physical immediately changed in Adam that is called "dying."  Adam passes on both physical and spiritual traits to his children.  They too are born into a process of "dying you shall die," and they also are born spiritually bent toward sin and separated from God.

Sin is not merely breaking the law

In Romans 5 the Bible goes on to explain that sin is not just a result of the law.  In fact the law is given so that man will see that he is a sinner.  It is easy to think and say, "I'm a good person.  The problem is that there are too many laws.  The laws are bad not me."  Now when you are dealing with the laws of mankind it is true that sometimes "bad" laws are passed and no country has 100% good laws.  But even with that said, laws basically funtion as a societal discussion on what  is generally accepted as good and bad.  This discussion can't make me do good or bad things but it can dredge up things in me that I didn't realize I had. It is easy to think of myself as patient and law abiding, but when I am late for work and driving over the speed limit to get to work, do I see myself as the problem or do I blame everything else including the laws?  Have you ever had people swerve in front of you in the middle of rush hour traffic only to slam on the brakes and almost cause an accident?  Laws do not create sin, they only attempt to define sin.  Thus before Moses received the Law from God, mankind existed in a state where all manner of evil things were going on and the world functioned in a "might makes right" age.  Eventually God had to not only judge mankind, but also lay down a law.  This was first done generally with Noah and then far more explicitly with Moses and Israel.

So, God's law clearly and accurately defines sin for us so that we might discover the true depths of sin's tentacles in our hearts.  Psalm 51:5, "Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me." (NIV)

Jesus came to be a better Adam

Romans 5 goes on to contrast the first, natural man, Adam to the first, spiritual man, Jesus.  Because of the offense of Adam death entered the world and all mankind suffers its effects.  The judgment that came from the one offense condemns everyone.  Death reigns over mankind like a powerful tyrant as all grow up to personally embrace sin.  Jesus is, in a sense a 2nd Adam.  Where the first Adam failed and brought us into slavery and suffering, the second Adam succeeds and gives us freedom and eternal life.  The opposite of Adam, Jesus' one act of righteousness and grace causes grace to overflow to many (whosoever will).  Also, out of many offenses, came grace to justify sinners before God.  Lastly, in Jesus new life is made to reign over and in those who have been made righteous by God.  Jesus begins a new "race" of spiritual men who are able to rule over death through Jesus.  In Jesus we do not fear death nor shrink back from doing the right thing because of death.  Also, even when we die God has guaranteed through Jesus' own resurrection that he will overrule death's hold on us.  A day of resurrection is coming when all who are in the grave will hear the command of Christ and come forth into resurrected bodies.  Those who put their faith in Jesus are also reconnected to God by his Spirit.  We are able to connect with God by his Holy Spirit and receive comfort and direction.  2 Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new." (NKJV)

When we ignore God's law, we actually take ourselves and our society ever closer to the time in history when each one did what was right in their own eyes.  It is a time of anarchy and power struggles as a "might makes right" attitude dominates the scene.  Before the Great Flood the world was an extremely violent place as competing views of what is bad and good clashed.  We see this today as societies fall apart and the rule of law and order ceases to function.  Perhaps you are reading this and thinking about the parts of God's law that you disagree with.  To you it seems so logical to say, this can't be good. Therefore either this is all made up or God is bad.  Either way I don't have to listen to him.  But think about it this way.  If we really are bent towards selfishness and bad to some degree or another, then it stands to reason that there will be some "good" things that we don't like.  Precisely because they point out the parts of evil that we like.  Which seems more probable to you?  Are you innately good or do you have a nature bent towards some areas of sin?

Would the world really be better off without Christians?

An idea that is growing in acceptance every day is that Christians are all bigoted, sexist, homophobes and the world would be better off without them.  Granted, most who think or say this kind of thing do so passively.  It represents what they truly believe, but they would never think of trying to "get rid of Christians."  That said, there are some who expouse such beliefs with vitriole and fervour.  These will make statements that are no longer passive but quite active.  "Those Christians want to go to heaven?  Then we ought to send them there."  I don't want to get into the prevalence of either the passive or the active in this group.  Rather I want to honestly ask if the underlying basis of these statements is true.

In an issue like this that can be highly emotional, it is easy to cherry pick the evidence in order to make your view emotionally favorable.  However, I believe this is intellectually dishonest and only leads to me feeling good about the delusion I think is true.  When one looks at history with as unbiased eyes as possible (believe me, I understand that can be a quagmire) it is hard to argue against the statement that Christianity radically affected the course of what we call the Western world, but mainly refers to Europe and America.  It would be easy to go through history and pick out leaders and groups under the banner of the Church that have lived very sexist, bigotted, and homophobic lives not to mention a whole batch of other things.  But to be fair we could find many examples to the contrary.  I think it is more valuable to go to the source of Christianity, and its founder, Jesus.  Jesus taught and commissioned several men who were to serve as his voice in this new group, the Church.  Then we can better understand the impulse that is behind Christianity, which is far more important than analyzing side currents and dead water that are not a part of the main stream.  I will not restate arguments that have been stated far more eloquently by others.  For some good reading you should check out Dinesh D'souza's What's So Great About Christianity, 2007. 

The Law and Christianity

Many Christians do not understand the relationship between the Old Testament Law of Moses and believers in Jesus, much less those who reject Christianity.  So we need to respond with some grace in this issue.  Many people like to point to laws in the old testament of the Bible and challenge, "Do you believe this is the word of God?"  Though Christians do believe that the Old Testament is the Word of God, they do not believe that it should be enacted as the law of America.  I realize some groups within the Church do advocate this, but my point would be that they do not properly represent the main thrust of Christianity and I will do so by going back to the first century when this all began.

In Galatians 3 one of Jesus' apostles (men commissioned metaphorically to build the Church) explains to Christians how they should view the Law of Moses.  Paul draws on an analogy that would have been readily understood by most in his day.  It is that of a child who is tutored in the home until he comes of such an age that he can work with his dad in the family business as an adult son who will one day inherit the family business and estate.  In this passage Paul explains that Israel is the young child and the Law of Moses was the tutor.  Now think about your time in school.  Teachers often have rules and deadlines that are not necessary from the stand point of merely learning the subject, but they are necessary from the stand point of preparing the child to function in the adult world.  Thus the deadline is quite artificial, but it serves to teach a child diligence and nip the inherent procrastination that sabotages the dreams and plans of many a man.  Such is the Old Testament.  We can cherry pick passages in the Bible and say, "it is against reason to think that this is Truth."  However, when you step back and look at the Law of Moses as a tutor then more and more things make sense.  God did not send the law to teach how to have a perfect society, rather he sent it so that Israel would recognize Jesus when he came.  Jesus was the ultimate teacher, their Messiah who would lead them into their adulthood.  Don't get me wrong.  The Law was good in the same sense that a pipe wrench is good.  It helps when it is used properly for the right job.  The law taught Israel just how sinful they (we all) really are.  It taught them the true predicament in which they were stuck, unless God did something to help them.  Even the Old Testament testifies to the fact that it is the Word of God, it also testifies that the law is pointing to ultimate truth so that we can understand it when it comes.  King David says it this way in Psalm 51, 

"You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; 
   you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. 
¹⁷ My sacrifice, O God, is^[b] a broken spirit; 
   a broken and contrite heart 
   you, God, will not despise."

Yes, sacrificing an animal is a crude, reprehensible thing that no rational modern person would think we should do.  However, its function in the Bible was not to be the final word or ultimate truth about how our sins and faults can be dealt with.  It was so that we could understand what Jesus was doing when he let himself be crucified on a cross.  Bloody? Yes.  Shocking and horrific?  You betch ya.  I think that is God's point.  We just don't believe our sin is that bad.

Another example would be slavery.  Does the Bible teach slavery?  No!  Slavery was a part of the economic system of that day.  The Old Testament limited and restrained the universal practice of slavery.  Would such a practice be less or more in history if it were not for Christianity?  The Law came into a world that had divided along many different social distinctions (Race, Gender, Age, etc..).  It came to prepare intellectual children for the coming ultimate truth of the Jesus.

Welcome to Adulthood

Back in Galatians 3:28 Paul points out many of these old social distinctions and tells Christians that they should no longer remain divided over them.  He was not saying they were not real and had no differences, but that they should no longer be divisions among us.  We should not be divided by race, but neither should we pretend like there are absolutely no differences among races.  We should not be divided by gender, but neither should we pretend that there are no differences between the genders.  In the New Testament false prophets and rebellious children are no longer executed (secret: they more often than not weren't even executed under the Law due to the fact that Israel disregarded God's Law quite frequently).  However, being a false prophet or a rebellious child are still serious things that if not dealt with by the individual will lead to an eternal death.  So Christians are able to embrace the Law as good, not because we want to enact a sacrificial system in America, but because we understand it is the tutor.  We are adults now that Jesus has given us the ultimate truth.  We no longer need to follow the instructions of the tutor.  However, we do need to remember the principles that it has taught us.

Christians are not to live by the old social distinctions and filters like most of the world does.  We are to love every race, respect every gender, help every age, etc...  Our actions for another should have nothing to do with these distinctions.  The only distinctions that ultimately matter is whether or not a person has put their trust in Jesus.  Even in this distinction, Christians are not to divide and hate those who do not trust Jesus.  Rather we are to love them and lay our life down like Jesus did in order to win them over to belief in Jesus.  It was a radical concept that is still reverberating in the world today.

Most arguments against God or Christianity by atheists will point out things about God and say, "How can a loving God allow evil in the world."  But we must recognize that this is a distinctly Christian question.  The Romans and Greeks didn't struggle over how the gods could allow evil in the world.  The gods were often the source of the evil.  It was Christianity that taught our Father in heaven is actually Good.  Sure this raises thorny issues, but to argue in such a way is to undermine your own argument.  I'm not saying that proves Christianity is true.  I'm am saying that if Christianity had never happened the world would be in far worse shape with far baser questions on our mind.

It was the commands of Jesus and his apostles that commanded Churches to drop racial hatred.  It was the commands of Jesus and his apostles that directed men and women to work together as complimentary equals.  It was Jesus and his apostles that raised the value of children and the elderly, and the barbarian up to the civilized.  It was Christianity that came alongside of the poor, sick, orphaned, and widowed and said these are valuable; we must help them.  All are equal before God, is not the mantra of the Romans or Greeks.  It is the radical idea of Christianity that brought a world of little Hitlers that worshipped strength, erotica, and death, to its knees.  It is interesting that in today's world we see the resurgence of the pagan mindset.  

Are we headed back to a time when life was not sacred, but cheap?  Are we headed into times when the fetus is aborted, the young is abandoned, the gladiator is glorified, the peasant is abused, and the powerful are worshipped and exalted?  Are we not nearly there?

Homosexuality

I've left this for last because it is something that even the New Testament condemns as sin.  However, this does not mean that Christians are homophobes.  No where are we told to fear homosexuals.  Rather by extension of the General command to the specific we know that we are to love them.  Love does not mean agreement nor acceptance as virtuous.  A Christian should in no way speak hatefully, nor act abusively toward someone who self-identifies as a homosexual.  But neither should Christians be bullied into declaring this lifestyle as virtuous.  Homosexuality is seen as a severe sin, not so much because of its sexual nature, but because of its rejection of the obvious created design.  God is the creator.  You may reject that Jesus is God.  This is an intellectual disagreement.  But when a person so rejects the obvious truth of created design, you are left with no rational ground upon which to appeal.  This kind of choice destroys the very foundation of Truth because it exalts the will of the individual over the top of all evidence to the contrary.

This is why Christianity can never equate homosexuality with the civil rights issues of slavery.  They are not the same thing.  In fact white people were doing what homosexuals do, when they exalted their will over top of the evidence that black people were not subhuman, but every bit as much human as them.

I do not mean this as an attack against those who are in the homosexual lifestyle or have inclinations in that direction.  Rather, it is to help us see that Christianity is often condemned by the very virtues it created.

Why Christians are still here.

If only Christians would actually listen to Jesus.  You may not be a shocked that the rapture didn't happen on May 21, 2011, as Harold Camping said it would.  However, are you shocked that he had support from an apparently large number of people?  By now we shouldn't be.  Harold Camping is a false teacher at best and needs to quit pushing his mathematical schemes for the consumption of believers who are weak-minded.    Instead of the boy who called wolf, we have here the old man who cried shepherd.  Though Harold may be done with his predictions this will happen again.

The sad thing here is that the world looks on and scoffs at the fact that Christians actually believe that Jesus will come back from heaven and judge the earth.  I know there are some groups within Christianity that have so "spiritualized" the meaning of the Bible that there is no future prophecies to happen.  But true Christianity has always held that there is a day of judgment set for this world.  When people predict a date for Christ's coming and then fail, it encourages unbelievers in their rejection of the Bible's claims.

Romans 2:21-24 "You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? ²² You who say, “Do not commit adultery,” do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? ²³ You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonor God through breaking the law? ²⁴ For 'the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you,' as it is written.” (NKJV)

Watch and be Ready

Believers need to quit jumping on every wild prediction concerning prophecy that comes along and start listening to Jesus and the Bible.  If I were to sum up Jesus' take on his own second coming it would be this, "“But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only."  (Matthew 24:36 NKJV)  For the rest of that chapter and also chapter 25, Jesus continues to harp on the fact that believers will not know the time of his coming.  He warns them to be ready so they won't be caught off guard.  Harold Camping will say that he is not contradicting the words of Jesus, but in the end he is.  It reminds me of Eve in the garden, "Did God really say...."  Did Jesus really say we wouldn't know the day or the hour?  Somewhere along the line Mr. Camping's exalted view of his Biblical knowledge became detached from Jesus.  He was more confident in his own calculations than the Bible and more importantly Jesus.

Harold is right about one thing.  Believers should not be caught by surprise.  Not because they have the date, but because Jesus has warned and even commanded us to live our lives in such a way that we are always ready for his coming.  We see this supported again as Paul speaks to the Christians of Thessalonica in 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11.  Paul tells them they shouldn't be caught by surprise.  However there is no prediction of a day nor a indication that God will reveal to them the date before it happens.  The reason for this is because Paul is not writing about his ideas and thoughts.  He is giving them the world of the Lord Jesus.  

So what does it mean to be ready and watching?  Well it doesn't mean trying to determine the date through mathematical gymnastics.  Nor does it mean selling all your possessions and moving to a compound in Montana, California, or wherever, and sitting on a hill looking into the sky.  In the parables that Jesus taught on this subject is always about those who are doing the work of the master versus those who quit working for the master and start doing what they want.  Paul adds the metaphors of being awake and being sober.  You can't go to work if you don't get out of bed and if you show up drunk you will be a danger to yourself and others and you won't get your job done.  Being ready is living this life awake to what God wants us to do and sober about our actions each day.  So what do we watch?  We watch and guard over our own soul and its faith in Jesus.  The temptations of this world can draw us away through our own lusts from being faithful to the task that Jesus has given us.

So what is our task? 

1. To believe in Jesus as the Son of God, means of removing our sin, and the Truth of God. John 6:29
2. To love and encourage other believers. John 13:34
3. To proclaim Jesus everywhere we go and make disciples of those who believe. Matthew 28:19,20

A Day of Judgment is Coming

Harold Camping has not proven the Bible wrong.  Rather, he has proven himself to be operating proudly in his own flesh.  The Bible warns us that there is a day of Judgment set for this world.

Acts 17:30-31, "Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent, ³¹ because He has appointed a day on which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance of this to all by raising Him from the dead.” (NKJV)

2 Peter 3:5-7, "But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water. ⁶ By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. ⁷ By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly." (NIV)

Peter warns that scoffing at the idea of a judgment will be quite common in the last days.  They reject any evidence of a global flood, not because it doesn't exist, but because their lusts demand so.  The earth and the heavens are reserved for a fiery judgment.  Just because it has been 2,000 years doesn't mean it will never happen.  In fact, I find it interesting that Peter mentions that to God a 1,000 years is like a day and his patience means salvation to more people.  Sceptics like to cherry pick verses and say the disciples thought Jesus was coming in their day.  The truth is they knew that he could come in their day, but they also knew from Jesus parables that it would longer than most would think and that they would be tempted to quit believing.  Why would Peter mention a 1,000 years being the same as one day to God?  Primarily because the Holy Spirit led him to do it, but also because he knew it could be beyond his life.  He was actually following Jesus' words.  He was watching and ready.

Are you watching and ready?