Thoughts and Meditations

Personal comments made by David F. Reagan unless otherwise stated

October 31, 2006

George Washington, the Pitcher – “The painter Charles Willson Peale left us a story about Washington’s legendary arm strength, based on observing him in the throwing of a long heavy bar, in a game Peale was engaged in at Mount Vernon while waiting to paint Washington’s portrait. This was before the War of Independence: 

“ ‘One afternoon, several young gentle men, visitors at Mount Vernon, and myself were engaged in pitching the bar, one of the athletic sports common in those times, when suddenly the Colonel appeared among us. He requested to be shown the pegs that marked the bounds of our effort; then, smiling, and without putting off his coat, held out his hand for the missile. No sooner did the heavy iron bar feel the grasp of his mighty hand than it lost the power of gravitation, and whizzed through the air, striking the ground far, very far, beyond our utmost limits. We were indeed amazed, as we stood around all stripped to the buff, with shirt sleeves rolled up, and having thought ourselves very clever fellows, while the Colonel, on retiring, pleasantly observed, “When you beat my pitch, young gentlemen, I’ll try again.” ’ ” –from Washington’s God by Michael and Jana Novak (p.11). 

Baptist Preacher in Slavery – Henry Cunningham was the first pastor of the First African Baptist Church of Philadelphia, organized in 1809. However, Pastor Cunningham had been serving as the pastor of the Second Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia. The story of his move to Philadelphia is fascinating. “Rev. Cunningham was invited by Rev. Henry Holcombe, pastor of the First Baptist Church of Philadelphia, to accept the pastorate of the First African Baptist Church of that city. There was really only one problem. Reverend Henry Cunningham was still a slave! This had been true of George Lisle and John Jaspers. But such was not the case with Reverend Cunningham. The members at the Second Baptist Church in Savannah asked his master to allow him to go North and raise the money to purchase his freedom. The request was refused unless Reverend Cunningham could furnish security. 

October 30, 2006

Image of the Invisible God – “At Trafalgar Square in the city of London stands a statue of Lord Nelson. Resting atop a tall pillar, it towers too high for passerby to distinguish its features. For this reason, about forty years ago a new statue—an exact replica of the original—was erected at eye level so that everyone could see him. God also transcends our ability to see; the eyes of our understanding cannot discern features. But we have set before us an exact representation, ‘the image of the invisible God’ [Colossians 1:15]. To know God, we must look only at Jesus.” –from The Trivialization of God by Donald W. McCullough (p.63). 

Solemnity of the Office of Preacher – David Abeel (1804-1846) served as a Dutch Reformed missionary to China. The serious approach he took to the work of the ministry is seen in his journal entry of April 20, 1826: “Never before have I written under such peculiar circumstances. This day I have been licensed to preach the Everlasting Gospel of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. I feel impressed with a view of the solemnity and deep responsibility of my office. Oh, how unfit am I to undertake a work which involves such eternal consequences. Blessed be God, I do not go forth in my own name, I do not depend upon my own sufficiency. My strength and confidence are in the Almighty Being, who, I trust, has called me. 

“His promises are encouraging; and his faithfulness, though repeatedly proved, has never failed. It is my desire now, before I commence the duties of my office, to make a solemn and unreserved surrender of myself to the great Lord of the vineyard. My life, my health, my time, my talents, all that I have, I sincerely desire to consecrate to his service. Lord Jesus, take me, and make me thine. And now would I come to the determination, in my Father’s strength, to live a life of faith and holiness—to keep myself unspotted form the world—to live in the habitual commission of no sin—and to mortify the old man, with his affections and lusts. 

“Oh, how shall I preach to others that which I practice not myself. Oh, thou great God, I have no strength of my own, I look to thee for thy grace. Now I am thy servant, intrusted by thee with the office of the ministry; keep me, Oh keep me, from sinning in thought, word, or deed. Let me experience the power of godliness in my heart, and from this day walk in newness of life; and henceforth spend and be spent in thy service.” –from Memoir of the Rev. David Abeel (p.15-16).

October 27, 2006

English Fires of Persecution – “Hendrick Terwoort was not an English subject but a Fleming by birth and of a fine mind. Persecuted in his own land for his love for Christ, he fled and asked protection of the Protestant Queen Elizabeth, the head of the English Church. Terwoort ultimately discovered that he had misplaced his confidence, for Elizabeth had him roasted alive at Smithfield, June 22, 1575. 

“While in prison, Terwoort wrote a confession of faith that rejected infant baptism and held that a Christian should not make an oath or bear arms, that Anabaptists ‘believe and confess that magistrates are set and ordained of God, to punish the evil and protect the good,’ that they pray for them and are subject to them in every good work, and that they revere the ‘gracious queen’ as a sovereign. He sent a copy to Elizabeth, but her heart was set against him. At the age of twenty-five, Terwoort was put to death because he would not make his conscience Elizabeth’s footstool.” –from This Day in Baptist History by E. Wayne Thompson and David L. Cummins (p.255-256). 

Gods of Material Prosperity – “Gloria Copeland has written that ‘the Word of God simply reveals that lack and poverty are not in line with God’s will for the obedient… Allow the Holy Spirit to minister the truth to your spirit until you know beyond doubt that God’s Will is Prosperity.’ (She means the kind of prosperity that can be converted into hard cash—as in diamond rings, luxury cars, and big houses.) The chief business of her God is to ensure material prosperity. 

October 26, 2006

Defining Revivals – “Revivals, then, are seasons when Christians are waked to a more spiritual frame, to more fervent prayer, and to more earnest endeavors to promote the cause of Christ and redemption; and consequent upon this, seasons when the impenitent are aroused to the concerns of the soul and the work of personal religion. They are times when the Spirit of the Lord again moves on the face of the waters, and the freshness and beauty of the new creature come forth. Nature itself seems more full of God; the very words of Scripture seem thereby invested with a new light and glory and fullness and meaning. As Edwards says: ‘All things abroad, the sun, moon, and stare, the heavens and the earth, appear as it were with a cast of divine glory and sweetness upon them.’ ” –from Handbook of Revivals by Henry C. Fish (p.13).

God’s Power in Resurrection – “As the finding out the particulars of the dust of our bodies discovers the vastness of his [God’s] knowledge, so to raise them will manifest the glory of his power as much as creation; bodies that have moldered away into multitudes of atoms, been resolved into the elements, passed through varieties of changes, been sometimes the matter to lodge the form of a plant, or been turned into the substance of a fish or fowl, or vapored up into a cloud, and been part of that matter which hath compacted a thunder-bolt, disposed of in places far distant, scattered by the winds, swallowed and concocted by beasts; for these to be called out from their different places of abode, to meet in one body, and be restored to their former consistency, in a marriage union, in the ‘twinkling of an eye’ (1Corinthians 15:22), it is a consideration that may justly amaze us, and our shallow understandings are too feeble to comprehend it. 

“But is it not credible, since all the disputes against it may be silenced by reflections on Infinite Power, which nothing can oppose, for which nothing can be esteemed too difficult to effect, which doth not imply a contradiction in itself? It was no less amazing to the blessed virgin to hear a message that she should conceive a Son without knowing a man; but she quickly answered, by the angel, with a ‘Nothing is impossible to God’ (Luke 1:34, 37). The distinct parts of our bodies cannot be hid from his all-seeing eye, wherever they are lodged, and in all the changes they pass through, as was discoursed when the Omniscience of God was handled; shall, then, the collection of them together be too hard for his invincible power and strength, and the uniting all those parts into a body, with new dispositions to receive their several souls, be too big and bulky for that power which never yet was acquainted with any bar?” –from Existence and Attributes of God: Volume Two by Stephen Charnock (p.90).

October 25, 2006

John Weatherford – “The amazing story of Pastor John Weatherford of Chesterfield County [Virginia] represents a classic illustration of the church-state intolerance prevailing at that time. Weatherford, a father of fifteen, spent six months in the county gaol [in 1773] for ‘preaching without a license.’ However, his oppressors soon discovered that they had more on their hands than they had bargained for. So many locals started getting converted below the grates of Weatherford’s cell that the magistrate ordered a twelve-foot wall be erected directly in front of the preacher’s window. However, they quickly learned, to their chagrin, that out of sight was not out of range! When Weatherford’s faithful congregation assembled for ‘church,’ a handkerchief on a pole would be raised as the signal that they were ready for the Sunday sermon. The man of God then proceeded to throw his voice through the grates, over the twelve-foot impediment. Such an unorthodox ‘worship service’ was known back than as ‘denying the prison bounds.’ 

“Pastor Weatherford was eventually released after a lawyer by the name of Patrick Henry paid his fine. Today, a giant memorial bearing witness to the preacher’s ordeal can be viewed less than twenty feet from the site of the incarceration itself. His final resting place is not so easy to find, however. A small, worn headstone bearing the sole inscription, ‘J.W.’ stands by itself in an obscure clump of trees in the middle of a field about a mile from the road behind the Shockoe Baptist Church in Java, Virginia.” –from How Satan Turned America Against God by William P. Grady (p.140).

God’s Justice Sometimes Unseen – “When a person is hurt through the loss of someone close to him, he sometimes strikes out at God and tries to deny His power. The danger in that is clear; we are too ignorant to judge God for what appears to be a failure. A pastor visited a family whose son had been killed in an automobile accident. He heard the mother lash out at him, ‘Where was your God when my boy was killed?’ He quietly responded, ‘The same place He was when His Son was killed.’ 

“If we were to take a stick and put it into a glass of water, it would seem to be crooked. Why? Because we look at it through two mediums—air and water. It is the same with our understanding of God. His various characteristics, such as justice, seem crooked to us. The wicked seem to prosper and the righteous suffer. It seems that unfair events take place all the time. The problem is not with God but with us. We view God’s proceedings through a double medium of flesh and spirit. Therefore, it is not that God’s character is bent, it is that man is not competent to judge.” –from The God you Can Know by Dan DeHaan (p.28). See Genesis 18:25.

October 24, 2006

No Majority Opinion – Martin Luther said: “Do we have a right to defy the whole world, to boast that only our cause is right? We must conclude: I know that my cause is right, though the whole world may say otherwise. Do not think: I shall stay with the majority, for the fact that the greater part of mankind is in darkness is nothing new.” –quoted from AMG’s Encyclopedia of World Religions, Cults, and the Occult (p.5).

Last Gasp of the “Gaspee” – “According to what we learned in school, the next most significant event in America’s quest for liberty [after the Boston Massacre of 1770] was the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773. However, that affair pales in comparison to a rarely told incident provoked by a band of patriotic Baptists eighteen months earlier. John Brown of Rhode Island (a brother of Nicholas Brown, after whom Brown University was named), was a devoted member of the First Baptist Church in Providence. He was also a successful merchant and owner of twenty vessels. Dr. Cathcart writes: 

‘John Brown might be said to have begun the Revolution himself. In 1772, a British armed schooner called the “Gaspee” came into Narragansett Bay to carry out orders from the British Commissioners of customs in Boston, with a view to prevent violations of the revenue laws. The “Gaspee” was a continual annoyance to the mariners and ship-owners, with whose business she interfered. On the 9^th of June, 1772, she ran aground on Namquit, below Pawtuxet. Mr. Brown heard of it, and he immediately ordered eight boats to be placed in charge of Captain Abraham Whipple, one of his best ship-masters, and he put sixty-four armed men in them. At about 2 A.M., Mr. Brown and his boats reached the “Gaspee;” two shots were exchanged, one of which wounded Lieutenant Duddingston. “This was the first British blood shed in the was of Independence.” The crew and officers left the “Gaspee” very speedily, and Whipple blew her up. Mr. Brown was the last man on board.’ 

October 23, 2006

Fortune-Telling in Islam – According to The Unseen Face of Islam by Bill Musk (p.62): “Practices of divination or fortune-telling are widespread and much sought after by ordinary Muslims. Often such practices are undertaken privately, even secretly. Sometimes, however, far more public displays of divinatory powers are made. In 1993, a medium calling himself ‘Yellow Saint’ held a séance in the stadium in Turkistan. The following year, a rival named ‘White Saint’ drew 15,000 people over a week of stadium séances in Qazali. Seen by some as charlatans, these two mediums are revered by many young Kazaks for their divinatory powers that tend to be applied to processes of healing.”

Power of the Published Word – “Just before China was taken over by the communists, one communist officer made a revealing statement to a missionary, John Meadows. ‘You missionaries have been in China for over a hundred years, but you have not won China to your cause. You lament the fact that there are uncounted millions who have never heard the name of your God. Nor do they know anything of your Christianity. But we communists have been in China less than 10 years, and there is not a Chinese who does not know… has not heard the name of Stalin… or something of communism… we have filled China with our doctrine. 

“ ‘Now let me tell you why you have failed and we have succeeded,’ the officer continued. ‘You have tried to win the attention of masses by building churches, missions, mission hospitals, schools, and what not. But we communists have printed our message and spread our literature all over China. Someday we will drive you missionaries out of our country, and we will do it by the means of the printed page.’  

“Today, of course, John Meadows is out of China. The communists were true to their word. They won China and drove out the missionaries. Indeed, what missionaries failed to do in a hundred years, the communists did in ten. One Christian leader said that if the church had spent as much time on preaching the Gospel as it did on hospitals, orphanages, schools and rest homes—needful though they were—the Bamboo Curtain would not exist today. The tragedy of China is being repeated today in other countries. When we allow a mission activity to focus on the physical needs of man without the correct spiritual balance, we are participating in a program that ultimately sends people to hell.” –from Revolution in World Missions by K. P. Yohannan (p.117-118). See Psalm 68:11; Acts 5:28.

October 20, 2006

Eternal Existence of God – “That God appears at time’s beginning is not too difficult to comprehend, but that He appears at the beginning and end of time simultaneously is not so easy to grasp; yet it is true. Time is known to us by a succession of events. It is the way we account for consecutive changes in the universe. Changes take place not all at once but in succession, one after the other, and it is the relation of ‘after’ to ‘before’ that gives us our idea of time. We wait for the sun to move from east to west or for the hour hand to move around the face of the clock, but God is not compelled so to wait. For Him everything that will happen has already happened. This is why God can say, ‘I am God,… and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning’ [Isaiah 46:9-10]. He sees the end and the beginning in one view.” –from The Knowledge of the Holy by A. W. Tozer (p.46). 

Seditious Baptist Books – “The year was 1664, and the young man standing before the judge for sentencing was a Baptist minister named Benjamin Keach, only twenty-four years old. A few weeks earlier he had published a little book, entitled The Child’s Instructor; of, a New and Easy Primer, to be used for the religious instruction of children. Copies of the book had sold rapidly, and one had fallen into the hands of the local justice of the peace. Horrified by Keach’s printed statement that ‘believers, or godly men and women only, who can make confession of their faith and repentance,’ were the only fit subjects for Christian baptism, the justice of the peace had Keach seized and jailed until a speedy trial could be arranged. The evidence had been placed before the jury and he was soon found guilty.  

“Thus Benjamin Keach was called to the bar, and the judge passed sentence as follows: ‘Benjamin Keach, you are here convicted, for writing, and publishing, a seditious and schismatical book, for which the court’s judgment is this, and the court doth award: That you shall go to gaol for a fortnight without bail or mainprize; and the next Saturday, to stand upon the pillory at Ailsbury, in the open market, for the space of two hours, from eleven of the clock to one… And the next Thursday, to stand in the same manner and for the same time, in the market of Winslow; and there your book shall be openly burnt, before your face, by the common hangman, in disgrace to you and your doctrine.’ 

“The sentence was carried out to the letter, but to the judge’s surprise, young Keach used his time in the pillory to preach to the throngs in the marketplace. When he was forced to stop speaking by the sheriff, his young wife stood beside the pillory and continued her husband’s sermon.” –from The Forgotten Heritage: A Lineage of Great Baptist Preaching by Thomas R. McKibbens, Jr. (p.16).

October 19, 2006

From Fear to Ferocity – The coming of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost brought entirely new life and power to the apostles. “Instead of ignorance, they had the knowledge of the tongues; and they that were scarce well skilled in their own dialect, were instructed on the sudden to speak the most flourishing languages in the world, and discourse to the people of several nations the great things of God (Acts 2:11). Though they were not enriched with any worldly wealth, and possessed nothing, yet they were so sustained that they wanted nothing in any place where they came; a table was spread for them in the midst of their bitterest enemies. Their fearfulness was changed into courage, and they that a few days before skulked in corners for fear of the Jews (John 20:19), speak boldly in the name of that Jesus, whom they had seen put to death by the power of the rulers and the fury of the people: they reproach them with the murder of their Master, and outbrave that great people in the midst of their temple, with the glory of that person they had so lately crucified (Acts 2:23; 3:13).

“Peter, that was not long before qualmed at the presence of a maid, was not daunted at the presence of the council, that had their hands yet reeking with the blood of his Master; but being filled with the Holy Ghost, seems to dare the power of the priests and Jewish governors, and is as confident in the council chamber, as he had been cowardly in the high-priest’s hall (Acts 4:9), the efficacy of grace triumphing over the fearfulness of nature. Whence should this ardor and zeal, to propagate a doctrine that had already borne the scars of the peoples’ fury be, but from a mighty Power, which changed those hares into lions, and stripped them of their natural cowardice to clothe them with a Divine courage; making them in a moment both wise and magnanimous, alienating them from any consultations with flesh and blood? As soon as ever the Holy Ghost came upon them as a mighty rushing wind, they move up and down for the interest of God; as fish, after a great clap of thunder, are roused, and move more nimbly on the top of the water; therefore, that which did so fit them for this undertaking, is called by the title of ‘power from on high’ (Luke 24:49).” –from Existence and Attributes of God by Stephen Charnock (Volume Two; p.70). 

Sun of His Glory – “The sun can be used to illustrate God’s glory most vividly. Though the sun is the source and fountain of light, there is little good in gazing at the sun, unless one desires to be blinded. No one ever had his sight improved as the result of looking directly at the sun. We use the sun’s light to search things out, but there is no searching of the sun itself; our eyes are too weak. How much less can we search out the sun’s Creator; before whom the multitudes of suns are like the grains of sand in the desert.” See 1Timothy 6:16. –from The God You Can Know by Dan DeHaan (p.27).

October 18, 2006

One Will of the Trinity – “The Persons of the Godhead, being one, have one will. They work always together, and never one smallest act is done by one without the instant acquiescence of the other two. Every act of God is accomplished by the Trinity in Unity. Here, of course, we are being driven by necessity to conceive of God in human terms. We are thinking of God by analogy with man, and the result must fall short of ultimate truth; yet if we are to think of God at all, we must do it by adapting creature-thoughts and creature-words to the Creator. It is a real if understandable error to conceive of Persons of the Godhead as conferring with one another and reaching agreement by interchange of thought as humans do. It has always seemed to me that Milton introduces as element of weakness into his celebrated Paradise Lost when he presents the Persons of the Godhead conversing with each other about the redemption of the human race.” –from The Knowledge of the Holy by A. W. Tozer (p.28). 

October 17, 2006

Both God and Man – “The major difficulty of the incarnation [the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh] is, of course, the relation of the divine to the human in the historic Jesus Christ. Paul must certainly have been aware of the problem that would be raised by his great Christological statement [Philippians 2:5-11], yet neither he nor the other New Testament writers make any attempt to solve or explain it. The writers of Holy Scripture are content to state the fact of the two natures in Christ without attempting to render their doctrine comfortable to human reason.” –from When God Became Man by George Lawlor (p.15-16). 

What Foolish Nonsense? – “When commerce had been established with the Fiji islanders, a merchant who was an atheist and skeptic landed on the island to do business. He was talking to the Fiji chief and noticed a Bible and some other paraphernalia of religion around the house. ‘What a shame,’ he said, ‘that you have listened to this foolish nonsense of the missionaries.’ 

October 16, 2006

Though We Grieved Him – The Jewish Midrash states: “One gentile asked Rabbi Joshua ben Karha, saying to him: ‘Do you not admit that the Holy One, blessed be He, foresees the future?’ Rabbi Joshua said to him, ‘Yes.’ The heretic said to him, ‘but it is written: “It grieved Him at His heart’ (that He had made man) [Genesis 6:6]?” Rabbi Joshua said to him, ‘Was there ever a son born to you?’ The heretic said to him, ‘Yes.’ Rabbi Joshua said to him, ‘And what did you do?’ The heretic said to him, ‘I was happy and made everyone joyous.’ Rabbi Joshua said to him, ‘And did you not know that his end would be to die?’ The heretic said to him, ‘At the time of joy, let there be joy, at the time of mourning, mourning.’ Rabbi Joshua said to him, ‘So are the works of the Holy One, blessed be He. Even though it is revealed before Him that their end would be to sin and to be destroyed, He did not refrain from creating them, for the sake of the righteous who are destined to arise from them.’ ” So the statement, “At the time of joy, let there be joy, at the time of mourning, mourning,” became an old Jewish saying. –from The Encyclopedia of the Sayings of the Jewish People by Macy Nulman (p.9). 

Created by His Word – “God created the world by a word, by a simple act of his will. The whole creation is wrought by a word; ‘God said, Let there be light;’ and ‘God said, Let there be a firmament.’ Not that we should understand it of a sensible word, but understand it of a powerful order of his own will, which is expressed by the Psalmist in the nature of a command (Psalm 33:9): ‘He spake, and it was done; he commanded, and it stood fast;’ and (Psalm 148:5), ‘He commanded, and they were created.’ At the same instant that he willed them to stand forth, they did stand forth. The efficacious command of the Creator was the original of all things: the insensibility of nothing obeyed the act of his will. 

“Creation is therefore entitled a calling (Romans 4:17): He ‘calleth those things which be not as though they were.’ To create is no more with God, than to call; and what he calls, presents itself before him in the same posture that he calls it. He did with more ease make a world, than we can form a thought. It is the same ease for him to create worlds, as to decree them; there needs no more than a resolve to have things wrought at such a time, and they will be, according to his pleasure. This will is his power; ‘Let there be light,’ is the precept of the will; and ‘there was light,’ is the effect of his precept.” –from Existence and Attributes of God by Stephen Charnock (Vol. II, p.42-43).

October 13, 2006

Ideal Preacher – “John Bunyan’s ideal for the preacher can be seen in some of the vivid characters he portrayed in his famous allegory The Pilgrim’s Progress. On the journey toward Mount Zion, Christian stops at the house of Interpreter, where is shown: ‘the Picture of a very grave Person hang up against the Wall, and this was the fashion of it. It had eyes lift up to Heaven, the best of Books in his hand, the Law of Truth was written upon his lips, the World was behind his back; it stood as if it pleaded with Men, and a Crown of Gold did hang over his head.’ 

“Such a man, Interpreter explained to Christian, ‘is the only Man, whom the Lord of the Place whither thou art going, hath authorized to be thy Guide.’ When, in the nineteenth century, a statue of Bunyan was erected in Bedford, the sculptor depicted Bunyan with his eyes lifted up to heaven, the best of Books in his hand, and as if he was pleading with all humanity to come to Christ. Thus, at least in the sculpture, Bunyan fulfilled his ideal of the preacher. 

“Such a vision of the preaching task was doubtless fulfilled in Bunyan’s own life. His eyes were, indeed, lifted up to heaven: ‘ When I have been in Preaching, I thank God, my heart hath often… with great earnestness cried to God that he would make the Word effectual to the Salvation of the Soul.’ It was to God that Bunyan looked for his whole strength. He also had ‘the best of Books in his hand.’ His constant companion was the Bible.” –from The Forgotten Heritage: A Lineage of Great Baptist Preaching by Thomas R. McKibbens, Jr. (p.14). 

Sufferings and Glory – “These are the two heads, whereunto all the prophecies and predictions concerning Jesus Christ, under the Old Testament, are referred, namely, his sufferings, and the glory that ensued thereon (1Peter 1:11): “Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow.” So when he himself opened the scriptures unto his disciples, he gave them this as the sum of the doctrine contained in them: “Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:26). The same is frequently expressed elsewhere: Romans 14:9; Philippians 2:5-9. –from The Glory of Christ by John Owen (p.116).

October 12, 2006

Do Your Best – Billy Sunday, well-known as a fiery evangelist, had a tough beginning in life. After his father died, his mother remarried only to see her second husband die too. After some time, in 1872, she was so impoverished that she had to turn the care of her sons over to strangers. Billy, then ten, was sent to the Soldiers’ Orphans Home in Glenwood, Iowa. But God used even this sad departure for His good. “It was Mr. and Mrs. S. W. Pierce, the superintendent and his wife, who made the orphanage a success. Mr. Pierce was a strict disciplinarian. He taught Billy to organize his days, do things on time, keep his uniform neat, and have a perpetual shine on his shoes. Mr. Pierce also assigned each boy a job. ‘What I learned there,’ said Billy, ‘opened the door in after years that had brought me where I am—I was taught to do my best. Do your best, that’s all an angel can do. No one does his or her duty unless he does his best. More people fail from lack of purpose than from lack of opportunity.’” –from Billy Sunday and the Redemption of Urban America by Lyle W. Dorsett (p.12). 

October 11, 2006

Scrapping Baptists; Princeton 1; Baptists 4 – Hopewell Bible School was established in 1756 in Hopewell, New Jersey, by Pastor Isaac Eaton as a training school for Baptist preachers. “The school took in boarders as well as day students. The boarders lived as members of the Eaton family and were James Manning, David Howell, John Stites, David Jones, Isaac Skillman, Stephen Watts, and Samuel Jones himself. These names were to become well known in Baptist life in America. The most famous perhaps was James Manning who became president of Rhode Island College. But they all were to become men of influence and standing. 

“On 1 October 1757 several of the scholars went to visit the nearby college at Princeton. Manning and Howell intended going there ‘as soon as they are fitted.’ On their way home to the Eatons, they encountered a group of Princeton students. The Princeton men mocked their dress ‘which was rather plain compared with their own’ and set upon them. The future Baptists put up a manly fight. In the words of Samuel Jones, ‘Manning who is the boast of our school for his strength of arm and agility in movement, struck out with both fists and knocked over two of our assailants at once.’ David Howell poked his combatant in the stomach with his cane while David Jones ‘who is quite famous as a boxer, though small in size, upset the heaviest fellow…’ Samuel, who was a big youth, did not become too actively involved. However, he did suffer a ‘severe blow to my nose (which is quite prominent) and the blood flowed very profusely.’ 

“The Hopewell scholars acquitted themselves well against the ‘Philistines’ as David Jones called them. Afterwards they agreed that Manning ‘who is a real Christian young man and is loved and respected by all the school’ should explain the matter to Mr. Eaton. As a result of their altercation with the Princeton students, Samuel believed ‘more than I ever did, in original sin and the devil.’ ” –from Transatlantic Brethren: Rev. Samuel Jones (1735-1814) and His Friends by Hywel M. Davies (p.80-81). 

Humanist Gospel – You can tell the humanist gospel because it refuses to admit that the basic problem of humanity is not physical, but spiritual. The humanist won’t tell you sin is the root cause of all human suffering. The latest emphasis of the movement starts by arguing that we should operate mission outreach that provides ‘care for the whole man,’ but it ends up providing help for only the body and soul—ignoring the spirit… 

“Watchman Nee, an early Christian native missionary, put his finger on the problem in a series of lectures delivered in the years before World War II. Read some of his comments on such efforts, as recorded in the book Love Not the World… 

“Over a century ago the Church set out to establish in China schools and hospitals with a definite spiritual tone and an evangelistic objective. In those early days not much importance was attached to the buildings, while considerable emphasis was placed on the institutions’ role in the proclamation of the Gospel. Ten or fifteen years ago you could go over the same ground and in many places find much larger and finer institutions on those original sites, but compared with the earlier years, far fewer converts. And by today many of those splendid schools and colleges have become purely educational centers, lacking in any truly evangelistic motive at all, while to an almost equal extent, many of the hospitals exist now solely as places merely of physical and no longer spiritual healing. The men who initiated them had, by their close walk with God, held those institutions steadfastly into His purpose; but when they passed away, the institutions themselves quickly gravitated toward worldly standards and goals, and in doing so classified themselves as “things of the world.” We should not be surprised that this is so.’ ” –taken from Revolution in World Missions by K. P. Yohannan (p.102-104).

October 10, 2006

The King is a Mortal Man – Thomas Helwys was an English Baptist in a church in the Netherlands early in the seventeenth century. About the year 1611, he led part of this church back to England and located at Spitalfields, just outside the London city walls. “Convinced that he must bear witness to the gospel in spite of danger, Helwys brashly wrote a strong defense of freedom of conscience and planned to present a copy of it personally to James I. In his case, such an idea was not impossible, for Helwys was no ordinary citizen. He came from an aristocratic family who moved easily among nobility. His cousin, Gervase Helwys, had been knighted by King James in 1603 and later appointed lieutenant of the Tower of London. Thomas had been educated at Gray’s Inn, one of the elite schools in London intended chiefly for the education of the sons of the nobility and gentry. He had seen Queen Elisabeth as she visited Gray’s Inn, and some of his old school chums were in Parliament and other high places of government. 

“Thus, Thomas Helwys led his little Baptist congregation to the very walls of danger and was willing himself to stand before the king. Yet it was not to be. King James was absolutely determined to refuse dissent; therefore, Thomas Helwys had to be content to open the cover of his book, The Mistery of Iniquity, and pen his appeal to the king: 

“ ‘The King is a mortall man and not God, therefore hath no power over ye immortall soules of his subjects to make lawes and ordinances for them and to set spirituall Lords over them. If the King have authority to make them spirituall Lords and lawes, then he is an immortall God and not a mortall man. O King, be not seduced by deceivers to sin so against God whom thou oughtest to obey, nor against thy poor subjects who ought and will obey thee in all thinges with body, life and goods or els let their lives be taken from ye earth. God save ye King. Tho. Helwys.’ 

“Such an appeal, as innocent as it appears today, was enough to have Helwys thrown into Newgate prison, where he died sometime before 1616.” –from The Forgotten Heritage: A Lineage of Great Baptist Preaching by Thomas R. McKibbens, Jr. (p.5-6). 

Early Baptists in Philadelphia – “A statue of George Whitefield may be seen on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania as a memorial to the multitudes that came through the ‘Philadelphia Door.’ Needless to say, the average pothead student wouldn’t know that Whitefield was the inspirer and original trustee for the Charity School, which later became the University of Pennsylvania. (The same could be said of Whitefield’s co-laborer, William Tennent, whose Log College later developed into Princeton University.) 

“Although Philadelphia was noted for its Quaker-inspired religious diversity, Whitefield pointed to a Baptist preacher as the city’s true spiritual leader. The Anglican evangelist acknowledged: ‘I went and heard Mr. Jones, the Baptist minister, who preached the truth as it is in Jesus. He is the only preacher that I know of in Philadelphia, who speaks feelingly and with authority. The poor people are much refreshed by him, and I trust the Lord will bless him more and more.’ 

October 9, 2006

Five Faces of Hinduism – “In the Hindu paneverythingism there is a high development of the fact that there is no ultimate difference between cruelty and non-cruelty. This can be seen clearly in the person of Kali. In all the Hindu representations of God, there is always a feminine figure. Sometimes people say there is a trinity in Hinduism because there are three different faces shown in a bas-relief. But this is only because they do not understand that it is only a bas-relief. There are really five faces in a Hindu presentation—four around, if you have a free-standing figure, and one on top, looking upward, even if you cannot see it or even if it is not actually carved. There is no trinity in Hinduism. 

“Not only is it not three but five, but even more important, these are not persons, they are only manifestations of the final, impersonal god. But one of the manifestations is always feminine, because the feminine must be there as well as the masculine. But interestingly, enough, the feminine Kali is also always the destroyer. She is often pictured as having great fangs, with skulls hanging around her neck. Why? Because finally, cruelty is just as much a part of what is as is non-cruelty. So you have Vishnu taking his three constructive steps, but on the other hand you must always see Kali, the one who tears down, the one who destroys, the one who is ready to devour your flesh and tear you to pieces. Cruelty is as much a part of all that is, as in non-cruelty.” –from He is There and He is Not Silent by Francis A. Schaeffer (p.24-25). Read John 4:22; Acts 17:22. 

The Muslim Qur’an and Intercession – “The Qur’an is careful in its defense of God as the sole arbiter of human affairs. Although it refers to vow fulfillment (sura 76:7), it does so in the context of such vows being made by individuals to God. The Qur’an emphasizes the importance of not appealing to intermediaries between man and God: ‘those whom they invoke besides God have no power of intercession’ (sura 43:86). The insistence upon direct submission of the individual to the all-powerful, all-knowing God leaves little room in the world of formal faith for saints and other intermediaries. The famous incident of ‘the satanic verses’ clearly disallowed any approach to intercessors other than Allah: the original verses, whispered into Muhammad’s ear by Satan, promoted the acceptability of involving three local deities in appeal on human’s behalf; these ‘satanic verses’ were quickly excised and replaced by verses 19-23 of sura 53. All that might be allowed by the Qur’an (sura 53:26) is the possibility of angels acting as intercessors by God’s special permission…  

October 6, 2006

Man’s Happiness or God’s Glory? – “God did not create man and the world so that He would be happy. Nor can everything in the world be explained as designed to bring man happiness. Man’s happiness in this life is not God’s chief concern. Rather it is His own glory which He desires to achieve and exalt… 

“To be sure, God’s purpose includes man’s salvation and happiness. But the primary and ultimate purpose of all that God has and is doing is to display His own glory and to solicit glory and praise from man through it all (Isaiah 43:7; 60:21; Ezekiel 39:7; Romans 11:36; 1Corinthians 15:28). Though the purpose and ways of God will not always be understood, we must humbly acknowledge that He does all things well and unto the praise of His own glory (Ephesians 1:5, 6, 9, 12, 14; 3:9-10).” –from The First Fundamental: God by Robert P. Lightner (p.41). 

Adam’s Redemption – “When Adam had sinned, and thereby eternally, according unto the sanction of the law, ruined himself and all his posterity, he stood ashamed, afraid, trembling, as one ready to perish for ever under the displeasure of God. Death was that which he had deserved, and immediate death was that which he looked for. 

“In this state, the Lord Christ in the promise comes unto him, and says: Poor creature! How woeful is thy condition! How deformed is thy appearance! What is become of the beauty, of the glory of that image of God, wherein thou wast created? How hast thou taken on thee the monstrous shape and image of Satan? And yet thy present misery, thy entrance into dust and darkness, is no way to be compared with what is to ensue; eternal distress lies at the door. 

“But yet look up once more, and behold me, that thou mayest have some glimpse of what is in the designs of infinite wisdom, love, and grace: come forth from thy vain shelter, thy hiding place; I will put myself into thy condition; I will undergo and bear that burden of guilt and punishment, which would sink thee eternally into the bottom of hell. I will pay that which I never took; and be made temporarily a curse for thee, that thou mayest attain unto eternal blessedness. To the same purpose he speaks unto convinced sinners, in the invitation he gives them to come unto him.” –from The Glory of Christ by John Owen (p.114-115). Read Isaiah 53:4-6.

October 5, 2006

Humility Shows the Servant’s Heart – Charles Spurgeon “lived out Jesus’ teaching: ‘Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). He saw no need to hide his light under a bushel. But, he did seek to maintain a proper relationship of his ego with an unreserved submission to the lordship of Christ. Spurgeon believed, like John the Baptist, “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30). The greater his relationship to Christ, the more confident he became in the Lord’s work. At the same time, he realized the need to reduce focus on himself. 

“Humility demonstrates a servant’s heart. It shows a willingness to listen, to learn, and to admit when one is wrong. Spurgeon did not fear the confidence that is tempered by humility: ‘There is a confidence in one’s own powers which must ever be of service to those who are called to eminent positions, provided the confidence is well-grounded, seasoned with humility, and attended with that holy gratitude which refers all honor and glory to the Giver of every good and perfect gift.’ ” –from Spurgeon on Leadership by Larry J. Michael (p.46-47).

Prepare to Meet thy God! – Martin Madan (1726-1790) “was a member of a noteworthy family and independently wealthy. Though proficient in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, his principle study had been law, and he was, in his early twenties, already a practicing London lawyer with some promise. One night he was idling with some of his companions in a coffee house when the group hit upon an idea for some novel diversion. One had heard that John Wesley was preaching nearby. Madan, a noted mimic, was urged to go to hear Wesley and then to return and imitate his ‘manner and discourse’ as a crown to the evening’s entertainment. 

“Off went Madan in pursuit of amusement, but just as he entered the hall Wesley was declaring his text, ‘Prepare to meet thy God!’ [Amos 4:12] and Madan was somewhat sobered by the force of it. He sat down and grew more sober still as the preacher exhorted his audience to repentance. When he returned later to his ‘midnight modern conversation’ at the coffee house, he was asked whether he had ‘taken off the old Methodist.’ He replied, ‘No, gentlemen, but he has taken me off.’ From that time he left his old friends and sought means of growth for his newly awakened spiritual life…This same Madan…was a timely instrument in the rescue and conversion of his cousin, the would-be legal clerk and later poet and hymn writer, William Cowper.” We still sing Cowper’s hymn, “There is a Fountain Filled with Blood.” –from English Spirituality in the Age of Wesley by David Lyle Jeffrey (p.16-17).

October 4, 2006

God’s Hand in the Life of a Child – In 1862, William, a Civil War soldier wrote home to Iowa to his pregnant wife. If the child was a boy, he was to be named William Ashley. Five weeks later, on December 22, Private William died of pneumonia and was buried in an unmarked grave in Missouri. 

Private William’s wife struggled in a two-room cabin to take care of three children. The baby, Billy, was sick from birth and was too weak to sit up or walk for the first three years of his life. About this time, Billy began to strengthen and became more and more healthy but other troubles came. His mother remarried and had two more children—a boy and a girl. However, when the girl was three, she died from burns suffered in a bonfire accident and soon Mary’s husband also died. 

Late in life, Billy wrote of his life in The Ladies’ Home Journal. “It begins with the words, ‘I never saw my father.’ In the first few pages of this revealing memoir he recalls ten deaths in addition to that of his father. Four aunts and an uncle died of tuberculosis, and then a grandmother he dearly loved succumbed to the same disease. Billy was six years old when she died. ‘I would leave her coffin,’ he recalled, ‘only when forced to do so. The second day after the funeral my mother missed me. They called and searched everywhere; finally my dog picked up the scent and they followed my tracks through the snow to the grave, weeping and chilled through with the cold November winds. For weeks they feared I would not live.” Billy, whose full name was William Ashley Sunday, would later be known as the popular evangelist Billy Sunday. Never discount what God can do with a life. That little bruiser of a boy in your Sunday School class may be the next Billy Sunday. That girl from a broken home may be a missionary to China. –information and quote taken from Billy Sunday and the Redemption of Urban America (p.7-8). See Psalm 68:4-6; 146:9. 

Baptist Belief in Restored Israel – Vavasour Powell (1617-1671), a Welsh evangelist, graduated from Oxford University and was ordained as an Anglican priest. However, his personal studies in the scriptures led him to become a Baptist. Around 1660, Powell published A Confession of Faith in which he emphasized millenarian views. “With respect to the Jews, he believed they would be restored to Israel ‘suddenly and strangely.’ Further, he held they would subsequently rebuild Jerusalem and there ‘exercise the first and chiefest power on earth.’ ” –from A Genetic History of Baptist Thought by William H. Brackney (p.30-31). See Romans 11:25-26.

October 3, 2006

Put the Food Where the People Can Get It – “Some preachers, though they know a great deal, do not teach much, because they use such an involved style. Recollect that you are addressing people who need to be taught like children; for, though they are grown up, the major part of our hearers are still in a state of childhood as to the things of God; and if they are to receive the truth, it must be made very plain, and packed up so as to be easily carried away, and laid up in the memory. Therefore, brethren, give forth much holy instruction. Some give little instruction because of their involved style; but many fail for other reasons, and mainly because they aim at something else. Talleyrand defines a metaphysician as a man who is very clever in drawing black lines upon a black ground. I should like to draw black lines upon a white ground, or else white lines on a black ground, so that they could be seen; but certain preachers are so profound that no one understands them... 

“May God rend away from our thought and style everything which darkens the light, even though it should be like a costly veil of rarest lace! May we use great plainness of speech, that gospel light may shine out very clearly from our ministry!” –from An All-round Ministry (p. 170-171) by C.H. Spurgeon. See 1Timothy 3:2; 2Timothy 2:2. 

Singing With the Lord – “Zephaniah 3:17…says, ‘The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.’ 

“God Almighty is in the midst of us! He will save and rejoice over us with joy! God is happy if nobody else is and He will rest in His love. ‘He will joy over thee with singing’ – the eternal God is singing! That’s why I want our congregations to sing. I don’t require that they sing on pitch – just that they sing with joy and enthusiasm. 

“I don’t mind if the piano is out of tune, or if one fellow is singing a little step behind the next fellow – that doesn’t bother me. But the lack of warmth and enthusiasm makes me question the experiential life of Christians. The Christian Church has God in it and wherever God is, God will joy over His people with singing. The singing of the Church reflects the great God singing among His people.” –from The Attributes of God, Volume Two (p. 191) by A.W. Tozer.

October 2, 2006

Age Divisions in Church – “Any belief or practice that causes the members of a local church to separate into groups on any pretext whatever is an evil. At first it may seem necessary to form such groups and it may be easy enough to show how many practical advantages follow these divisions; but soon the spirit of separateness unconsciously enters the minds of the persons involved and grows and hardens until it is impossible for them to think of themselves as belonging to the whole church. They may each and all hold the doctrine of unity, but the damage has been done; they think and feel themselves to be separated nevertheless. 

“One place where evil manifests itself is in the practice of dividing the church into age groups. As far as I can discover neither the Hebrew worshippers of Old Testament times nor the church of the New Testament ever divided into age groups to worship the Lord. The practice appears to have come in with the modern vogue of glorifying youth and downgrading age as something a bit disgraceful. And this, incidentally, followed the children’s rebellion of the last half century, which rebellion was foreseen by the apostle Paul nineteen hundred years ago. 

“This age-youth division has gone so far in some churches that the old and the young glare at each other from different parts of the church and can have no spiritual fellowship whatsoever. If all are true Christians the basic unity has not been destroyed, but the spirit of unity has, with the result that the Lord is grieved and the church weakened. Yet much current religious education aids and abets division.” –from God Tells the Man Who Cares (p. 50-51) by A.W. Tozer. 

Best Hope of the Atheist – “The best an atheist can hope for is that death ends it all–a hope, which Shakespeare reminds us, flies in the face of conscience and is denied by the universal instinct of mankind. Nor can the man who refuses to believe in God find any purpose or meaning to his own life except in the attempt to make life better for future generations; and their only purpose, in turn, can be to contribute to the happiness of generations yet further in the future, all of whom are heading for atheism’s oblivion. Nor does reincarnation offer a better hope: It merely represents a recycling of that which is ultimately doomed. For one day, according to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the universe will have run down like a clock. Suns and stars will all have been extinguished and the schemes, dreams, and accomplishments of mankind will be like sand castles washed out into a cosmic ocean of nothingness. All existence will be as though it had never been and will thus bear the final stamp of meaninglessness written across the universe itself.” –from Whatever Happened to Heaven (p. 19) by Dave Hunt.