Connecting Points

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Today’s Topic:  A Sure Foundation

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 28:16  So this is what the Sovereign LORD says:  “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation; the one who trusts will never be dismayed.

I must refuse to let it bother me anymore. It is the reality of the culture in which we live. It is the fulfillment of Scripture about the last days. I do not condone it, but I must not let it become such a burden on my heart that it sucks the joy of Jesus right out of me. No matter what they say or do, I will not stop believing, living, and proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ as Savior of the world.

They may not do it, but why is that surprising? They have rejected the truth and exchanged it for a lie that they think pleases them. Why should I expect them to promote my beliefs when they stand so diametrically opposed to their own? So opposed, in fact, that they refuse any presentation of the truth to avoid any personal conviction. They call it tolerance, but it is so one sided. But I must not let that become my focus.

It would be easy to get very frustrated and attempt to change the system. That would be a mistake. That would take us all further away from change, not closer to it. Change will come only as the love of Jesus and the truth of salvation are presented constantly and unashamedly before the lost people of the world. When the followers of Jesus switch from telling the Good News to trying to change the policies of society, then society becomes more firmly entrenched in their error.

Last night I attended the “Christmas” program for one of my grandson’s elementary schools. The reason I reluctantly call it a Christmas program is that there was nothing about Christ in it. There were songs about Hanukkah. There was plenty of Santa Claus. But there was no Jesus – not even one Christmas Carol.

At first that made me very angry. The double standard of claiming separation of church and state and then including non-Christian religions in the program really bugged me. It would be easy for me to focus on that. But that would not change a thing. It would only cause arguments and defensive posturing, and really bring ill-repute to the Gospel message.

Instead, I must invest in those to whom the Lord has connected me. My grandson who sang one of the songs about Hanukkah needs to be instructed about and grounded on the sure foundation of Jesus Christ. The people sitting near me need to hear me proclaiming the love of Jesus not frustration with the school system. The world’s system does now and will continue to reject the truth of Jesus Christ.  That is not to surprise us, for it hated Jesus also. How much it bothers you depends on who or what you are living for?

So today, I will choose to focus on THE Foundation of all life – the Stone named Jesus Christ. He has been tested. He successfully passed every test. He can be trusted to get us through any and every test of our lives. He will never fail us. He will never forsake us. He will never leave us. When we trust Him and Him alone we will never be dismayed.

All around us every day are individual people who are searching for something to build their life on. But what are we saying to them about the foundation of our life when what they see is dismay over the condition of the world around us? The things that cause discouragement and anger in our lives may be different than theirs, but the reality of such attitudes reveals to them the truth that our foundation is no more trustworthy than theirs. Think about it.

Once again, and with more conviction than ever, I will choose to focus on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I know that Christmas is about Jesus coming to earth as the complete and eternal revelation of God in human form. I know that He came to save us from our sin. I know that He died on the cross to pay the penalty of death that I deserved. I know that He rose from the dead to offer and guarantee eternal life to anyone comes to Him humbly and asks. But the world does not know this stuff, and if they do they are choosing to reject it. It does not accomplish God’s purpose for us to get angry and complain about what the world doesn’t believe. We are to simply, and joyfully proclaim Jesus as Savior. We are not responsible for their response to us. We are responsible for our response to them.

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Monday, December 20, 2010

Today’s Topic:  Peace On Earth

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 11:10  In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious. 

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men…

The angels declared to the shepherds that God’s gift of THE Savior would bring peace on earth. But if our only understanding of peace is that it means the absence of war or political conflict, then we would have to conclude that God lied to us.

Peace culminates in social reform. Social reform does not create peace. Peace produces political stability and harmony, not visa-versa. Peace begins in the heart and extends outward into the activities of life. Personal peace will transform the world.

However, man’s pursuit of peace is futile. He has never found it in his own mind nor accomplished it with his own efforts. That’s because no matter what we do or think, we are permanently at war with our creator. Our very nature stands opposed to the Holy One of heaven. So try as we might, every effort to create peace of mind or peace in the world ends in failure because our hearts still ache from sin.

But God so loved us, that He sent His One and Only Son Jesus to solve the sin problem. Jesus paid the price for our sin on the cross, suffering the total wrath of God against everything that stood opposed to His holy nature. Then He rose from the dead and conquered the consequences of sin forever. Anyone – absolutely anyone – who believes in Jesus Christ and repents of their sin is forgiven and the sin nature of man is replaced with the Son nature of God. Hallelujah!

For those who are in Christ Jesus there is peace. Through Jesus Christ we have peace with God and the peace of God that surpasses all understanding, no matter what is going on in the world around us.  

The peace of God gives us hope – hope in the promise of peace on earth. And peace is coming. I think the eleventh chapter of Isaiah is required reading at Christ and throughout the year. When Jesus came the first time, He came to provide an entrance for sinful man into a peace relationship with our Creator. We now await His second coming when He will bring peace around us on the earth. If you are looking for peace around you before discovering the peace of God within you then you will be consistently and permanently disappointed. But when we know the peace of God within us, we patiently wait in certain hope of Jesus bring peace on earth.

Read carefully the description of peace on earth in Isaiah 11 –

Righteousness will be his belt and faithfulness the sash around his waist. The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the hole of the cobra, and the young child put his hand into the viper’s nest. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea. In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious. 

That is the hope of everyone who knows the peace of God in their heart today. Do you? You can. You can stop the frustrating and futile pursuit of peace because it is already available to you through Jesus Christ who will save you from your sin if you ask Him. Won’t you ask Him today? You can experience the peace of God when you have been brought to peace with God through Jesus, the Savior of the world.

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Friday, December 17, 2010

Today’s Topic:  Left Out

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 11:1-3  A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him—the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD—and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.

Early in December my wife and I were trying to decide if we should buy an artificial, pre-lit Christmas tree. It was a hard decision. I love the real tree, and so does she, but it is getting so expensive every year to buy one. A very nice artificial tree would pay for itself in 4 years with the real tree savings. But we just couldn’t force ourselves to spend that much money up front. So we bought a real tree again, which smells and looks wonderful, but we are going to watch the closeout sales on the artificial ones and if we can get the right tree at the right price we just might do it. (There’s one we want at Menards so if anyone sees them go on clearance before Christmas call me right away.)

Anyway, while we were looking at trees, we were also picking up other Christmas gifts. One of the items we were looking for was a stable for the display of one of my wife’s nativity sets. She collects them and has a variety of them from all over the world and different places we’ve visited. The hand carved one we got from Swaziland is very special and she wanted a stable to display it.

We were in particularly “red” department store and didn’t see any nativity sets or stables or mangers. We decided to ask a clerk where they might be. His response shocked us but is truly indicative of the spiritual state of things in America. He said, “We don’t have any. We didn’t even order any this year for our stock.”

Imagine that – Christmas without Christ. What’s left? Mas? What is mas? Well let me tell you what mas is in different languages.

In English, mas is a symbol used in astronomy. So? Well, if we leave Christ out of Christmas we may see and study the stars but miss the Star that leads us to Christ.

In Iceland it means chit chat or small talk, which describes the depth of relationship we experience with people and with God when Christ’s love is left out.

People in Indonesia know mas as gold, which becomes the pursuit of everyone who leaves Christ out of Christmas. We learn to trust human resources rather than God. We become takers not givers.

The Italians use mas as an acronym for a motorized attack ship – a torpedo boat. War will be the result leaving Christ out of culture.

Finally, in Danish, the word mas means trouble. As a verb it means to crush. When we choose to leave Christ out of Christmas we are inviting the troubles of this world to crush us. Without Christ there is no wisdom or understanding. Without the Messiah there is no direction for life – no counsel. Without the humanly powerless baby in a manger we will never experience the limitless power of His eternal presence. If we reject the Child that was given to us at Christmas we will perish for lack of knowledge.

But add Christ to mas, and in any language it means hope. It means salvation. It means life. Look at what the prophet says about the Messiah Jesus Christ. The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him—the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of power, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD—and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.

In Latin the word mas means man. Christ the man, the Son of God. Without Christ all hope is in man. With Christ man’s hope is in the Savior of the world. Life without Christ leaves us hopeless. Life with Christ gives us everything we need – for today and for eternity. Don’t leave Christ out of Christmas.

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Thursday, December 16, 2010

Today’s Topic:  Unending Peace

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 9:7 Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his Kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

Warning! I am NOT trying to start a political debate this morning, but would like to make one observation based on the last 50 years of my life: the bigger government gets the more problems we have. Big government means either big tax burden or big debt. Big government means less personal liberty. High taxes, huge national debt, and less personal freedom will result in political unrest that brings social injustice and violence.

However, that does not have to be the case. There are two factors that determine if big government succeeds or not – justice and righteousness. Not legislative justice or legal righteousness imposed upon the citizens, but rather moral justice and ethical righteousness emanating from the heart of those in leadership and manifested in every political action they take. Unfortunately, no such leader exists today, and never will until Jesus Christ returns to reign as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

When Jesus comes back to re-establish the Kingdom promised to King David of Israel, we will have a political leader who is also spiritually perfect. He will rule with perfect justice because He is perfectly righteous.

But prior to His return, Satan himself will try to accomplish that kind of reign. He will attempt to duplicate what Jesus is about to do. He will fake a resurrection. He will indwell a human, whom He will set up as the political king of the world and then demand that the world worship him as God. Everything He does is a counterfeit of the Truth. And the world will follow him – right to destruction.

But to us a Child is born. To us a Son is given. The government of the world is promised to Him, and it will be big government. Jesus can pull it off. No one else ever could or ever will. Every political leader is ultimately bound to the injustice or unrighteousness of his own heart or the hearts of those with whom he serves and leads. But Jesus needs no approval from anyone else. He needs no compromises to accomplish his agenda. He accepts no back-stroking and never participates in back-stabbing. He is righteous to the core, and is just to everyone.

As a result, His government will have no limits, and will always – that’s right, always – be at peace. There will be no political adversaries. There will be no kingdoms to conquer or that will attempt to conquer His. There will be no social unrest. There will be no wars, no crime, no taxes, no need for a social security trust fund, and no corruption. No earmarks on legislation, because there will be no need for laws to be passed. Jesus will propose and enforce every law, and every citizen will accept those laws because they will be written into the very fabric of their heart as they surrender to the reign of One they can completely trust.

WOW! What a contrast to today. But rather than try to change today, we should be praying for the return of Jesus and working to bring as many people into His kingdom as possible. Many who are alive today will never see such a kingdom. They will pass into a Christ-less eternity because they reject the King today. We have a huge mission. It is not to change our government. Our mission is to introduce people to the One and Only King so they can live eternally under His reign.

Let’s get to work.

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Today’s Topic: What’s In A Name?

Today’s Text: Isaiah 9:6 …and He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

According to a story in the publication Christian Reader, a little church in the country had a problem with the reading of the liturgy one Sunday. The person who put together the church bulletin every week frequently used technology to make the work easier. She would take computer shortcuts when possible using the “global search” feature. One week, technology backfired when she commanded the computer to change the name of the Scripture reader from “Will” to “Murray.” The reader’s name came out fine, but the “global search” did its job a little too thoroughly: in the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy will be done in earth” became “Thy Murray be done in earth”!

There is a lesson in that mistake that is deeper than the obvious ones about proofreading and not taking shortcuts.  Can my name be associated with the will of God? When people say my name, do they think of Jesus Christ? When people observe my behavior do they see the grace and holiness of God? Does my name really mean anything?

So far, in just three short prophecies in the book of Isaiah, the coming Messiah has been given specific five names and one intimated name. He will be called Immanuel, or God with us. He will be the great light that shines in the darkness. He will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. The names of the Messiah mean something.

• Immanuel – God Himself, with no degree of diminished Deity, becomes completely human to relate to us and redeem us.
• The Light of the World – showing people the way out of the darkness of sin and into the eternal glory of the Father
• Wonderful Counselor – Jesus is an extraordinary consultant. That’s what it literally means. No matter what is going on in our lives, Jesus not only knows it, but He understands it because He pre-approved it for our good and for His glory. He will help us to understand and accept it as a gift of His love if we will seek His wisdom and not live according to our own understanding. (See Proverbs 3:5-6).
• Mighty God – He is able to manage and/or conquer anything in our lives. Years ago a dear older woman in our church who is now with the Lord gave me a little sign to put on my desk. It said, There is no problem so great that God cannot handle it. Jesus personally brings the eternal power of God to us.
• Everlasting Father – With no beginning and no end, Jesus comes to us as the complete and personal revelation of Jehovah. He is the great I Am. And as Father, he created us, then re-created us in His own image when we were saved, and now provides us with protection and provision. He alone is worthy of our love and respect as Abba, Father, our spiritual Daddy!
• Prince of Peace – He is Lord! He is the supreme ruler of all eternity, and the product of His reign is peace. Even though for a time now the world does not accept Him as Sovereign, and we must live in the realm of the enemy, in our hearts we have set Christ apart as Lord and know the indescribable and unfathomable peace of God. We have been placed into an eternal relationship of peace with God through Jesus Christ our Lord, so that we now know the peace of God in our hearts.

May God use this very brief outline of these names of our Blessed Redeemer Jesus Christ to challenge you to think deeper about His Names and what they represent to us. May it also stimulate us to think deeply about what our name means to others, and whether or not we are trying to make a name for ourselves or living up to the new name we have been given in Christ Jesus.

Pastor John

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Thursday, December 09, 2010

Today’s Topic:  To Us

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 9:6 For to us a child is born, to us a son is given,

To us. To us. Twice stated as the direct objects of the verbs. To us a child is born. To us a son is given. To us!

I am fascinated by the word “us”. What a significant word. I am not sure I can adequately express the thrill I feel when I use the word to describe my relationship with God. Maybe this story will help. I found this old story in a magazine years ago and it spoke profoundly to me today. It is from the memoirs of Margery Tallcott.

When our son Pete was six, it was a Depression year and the bare essentials were all we could afford. We felt we were richer than most people, though, in things of the mind and imagination and spirit. That was a comfort of sorts to us, but nothing a six-year-old could understand.

With Christmas a week off, we told Pete that there could not be any store-bought presents this year—for any of us. “But I’ll tell you what we can do,” said his father with an inspiration born of heartbreak. “We can make pictures of the presents we’d like to give each other.”

For the next few days each of us worked secretly, with smirks and giggles. Somehow we did scrape together enough to buy a small tree. But we had pitifully few decorations to trim it with. Yet, on Christmas morning, never was a tree heaped with such riches! The gifts were only pictures of gifts, to be sure, cut out or drawn and colored and painted, nailed and hammered and pasted and sewed. But they were presents, luxurious beyond our dreams: A slinky black limousine and a red motor boat for Daddy. A diamond bracelet and a fur coat for me. Pete’s presents were the most expensive toys cut from advertisements. Our best present to him was a picture of a fabulous camping tent, complete with Indian designs, painted, of course, by Daddy, and magnificent pictures of a swimming pool, with funny remarks by me. Daddy’s best present to me was a watercolor he had painted of our dream house, white with green shutters and forsythia bushes on the lawn.

Naturally we didn’t expect any “best present” from Pete. But with squeals of delight, he gave us a crayon drawing of flashy colors and the most modernistic technique. But it was unmistakably the picture of three people laughing—a man, a woman, and a little boy. They had their arms around one another and were, in a sense, one person. Under the picture he had printed just one word: US. For many years we have looked back at that day as the richest, most satisfying Christmas we have ever had.

US! God sent Jesus to make “US” possible. How hopeless we were when the “us” only included you and me and a few friends. But God sent Jesus to “us” so we could join His “US”. We have received the greatest gift we could ever get when we accept God’s gift of Jesus who personally places us into the eternal “US”.

To us a child is born. To us a son is given. We needed it. We admitted it. We repented of our sin. We were forgiven for our sin. We received God’s Gift, and now – just think of the wonder of this – now we are included in God’s glorious “US”. He accepts us. He honors us. He changes us. He lives in us. We are God’s “US”!

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Wednesday, December 08, 2010

Today’s Topic:  The Light Is On

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 9:2 The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.

Ted Koppel, in a speech to the International Radio and Television Society, said this:

What is largely missing in American life today is a sense of context, of saying or doing anything that is intended or even expected to live beyond the moment. There is no culture in the world that is so obsessed as ours with immediacy. In our journalism, the trivial displaces the momentous because we tend to measure the importance of events by how recently they happened. We have become so obsessed with facts that we have lost all touch with truth.

Guilty. In varying degrees we all are. We have succumbed to the Satanic deception that there is no bigger picture. We cannot see that we are playing bit parts in an eternal plan of an Almighty God. Instead, we see only the drama of our current situation. We would be greatly blessed to resolve that.

The prophecies concerning Jesus in the Bible proclaim the bigger picture. Today’s prophecy of the coming Messiah must be read and understood in the context of the cultural era in which it was given by God. Let’s carefully read the context. It starts in the previous chapter where Isaiah is declaring his trust in the God of the bigger picture.

I will wait for the LORD, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob.  I will put my trust in him. Here am I, and the children the LORD has given me. We are signs and symbols in Israel from the LORD Almighty, who dwells on Mount Zion. When men tell you to consult mediums and spiritists, who whisper and mutter, should not a people inquire of their God? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living? To the law and to the testimony! If they do not speak according to this word, they have no light of dawn. Distressed and hungry, they will roam through the land; when they are famished, they will become enraged and, looking upward, will curse their king and their God. Then they will look toward the earth and see only distress and darkness and fearful gloom, and they will be thrust into utter darkness.

What a picture of the consequences waiting for people that live for the immediate. Maybe it’s already happened where you live. Distress. Anger. Despair. Hopelessness. The pursuit of the immediate with no faith in the truth of a bigger picture leaves us wondering and wandering.

But read on as chapter nine begins.

Nevertheless, there will be no more gloom for those who were in distress. In the past he humbled the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the future he will honor Galilee of the Gentiles, by the way of the sea, along the Jordan—The people walking in darkness  have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.

I love that word nevertheless. It proclaims hope. True hope. What do I mean by that? Well, true hope does not depend upon my activity. Real hope does not consider the failure of my past but the grace of my God. It is incredible to see in this passage that there are no requirements placed upon people for the earning of their freedom. The burden of self-fulfillment and self-accomplishment is removed by God’s free gift. The darkness of despair in the shadow of death is dispelled by the Light of the Lord’s love in Jesus.

When mankind was incapable of change, at just the right time in history (Galatians 4:4), God sent to us a gift we did not deserve and could never afford. His love for us conquered our rebellion against Him when Jesus came to save us from the sin that had overwhelmed us.

That’s incredible! I have found the Light! Now I can see the bigger picture, and it has brought me peace.

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Monday, December 06, 2010

Today’s Topic:  He’s Here

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 7:14  Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

For the next few weeks, I want to do something a little different in the book of Isaiah. Instead of proceeding through it verse by verse, let’s go through it prophecy by prophecy, looking at the treasures that are there in regards to the coming Messiah. This will be a special time of preparation for our celebration of His birth.

The first prophecy given to the people by the prophet Isaiah is found in chapter seven verse fourteen. It says,

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

One of the fascinating things about Messianic prophecies is that many of them are in the context of the current circumstances of that day’s culture. If the people had spiritual perception, they could understand the prophecy in light of God’s eternal purpose. But if they were spiritually dull, living according to the mind of the flesh, they would see only the immediate application. In this way, God protected the integrity of the prophet in the eyes of the people, for his words were always able to be proven true, either short-term, or, as we now see from the other side, long-term.

The immediate context of today’s prophecy about Jesus has the Lord God trying to convince Ahaz, the king of Judah, to trust Him with the outcome of a war. (If you want to read a further explanation of this with a personal application go to (https://lifelinkdevo.wordpress.com/2010/07/08/whos-really-in-control/) God offers Ahaz the chance to ask for a sign that proves how God is in control. Ahaz refuses, so the Lord, through Isaiah, says that He will give Ahaz a sign anyway.  In that current cultural context, the prophecy would be fulfilled through the prophet Isaiah, who would marry a young woman (see chapter 8) and they would have a son. But according to Matthew 1:23, the angel that appeared to Joseph to announce that Mary would have a baby states that this would be the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy.

There are several connecting points I want to share, and then I would love to read your comments of what this means to you.

• When we read Scripture, we will benefit from always looking for references to Jesus. The Bible is the inerrant written revelation of God to us, but it always points to the living revelation of Jesus Christ. Hebrews 1 states, In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. The written Word always leads us to the Living Word.
• Isaiah married a young woman and they had a child according to natural procreation. Joseph was engaged to be married to a virgin who was found to be with Child by the Holy Spirit of God. The virgin birth of Jesus is absolutely essential to believe because it eliminates the nature of sin from the humanity of Jesus, therefore making Him the sinless sacrifice for our sin.
• His name will be Immanuel, which means, God with us. While being born into human existence, Jesus maintained His eternal deity. I cannot comprehend this mystery, but I praise God for the faith to believe what Jesus said – I and the Father are one. I praise God for the testimony of the Apostle John who wrote under the divine influence of the Holy Spirit of God and said, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

For me this is the perfect way to start this season. The truth that Jesus, the eternal Son of God, came to earth to be one of us so He could save me, is overwhelming. I am grieved in my heart by the words of the atheist’s billboard I saw in the paper which says, You know it’s a myth. This is the season for reason. How sad. How pathetic. To deny the historical record is one thing, but to deny the spiritual truth is devastating. It has eternal consequences.

Jesus is the Reason for the season. True reason can come to no other conclusion. God came down from glory and dwelt with us to redeem us from our sin. I praise God He has redeemed me!

Pastor John

Connecting Points

Friday, December 03, 2010

Today’s Topic:  False Security

Today’s Text:  Isaiah 28:16  So this is what the Sovereign LORD says: “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation; the one who trusts will never be dismayed.

In Isaiah 28 the people of Israel are being addressed by the Lord through the prophet about their pursuit of worldly living at the expense of spiritual things. They have become so intent on living according to the desires of the flesh that they even believe they are able to hold their fate in their own hands by making a deal with death. (Isaiah 28:15) In response, God tells them that their covenant with death is based on a lie, and that there is only one source of truth. God tells them about the Precious Cornerstone who we know to be Jesus.

I want to give you two stories today and let them illustrate the lessons we can learn from this historical example. May the Holy Spirit make His unique application to your understanding.

In the book Lessons from a Father to His Son (Nelson, 1998), Missouri senator John Ashcroft writes: [My father told me], “John, I’d like you to fly this plane for a while.” I was eight years old at the time, blue-jeaned and T-shirted and wide-eyed at the world. My father was an amateur pilot. I looked around me at the spartan interior, which was nothing at all like the multitudinous controls, gauges, and computerized equipment in planes today. The control stick looked like a broom handle and came up between my legs.

“What should I do?” I shouted back to my father, who was seated behind me.

“Just grab the stick and push it straight forward.”

“Okay.” I took hold of that stick and did as I was told. Immediately the plane went into a straight bombing-raid dive toward a farm on the outskirts of Springfield! My stomach came up to my throat and I lost all sense of time or place as fear gripped my insides. I let go of that control stick in a millisecond, and Dad pulled the plane back up.

He had a good chuckle, and I had a good lesson: actions have consequences. I learned in a particularly vivid—in fact, terrifying—way that my decisions and actions could imperil my future.

There are no deals to be made with death. Every action has a consequence.

Then there is this story from Chuck Swindoll:

On Sunday, believers arrived at a house church in the Soviet Union in small groups throughout the day so not to arouse the suspicion of KGB informers. They began by singing a hymn quietly. Suddenly, in walked two soldiers with loaded weapons at the ready. One shouted, “If you wish to renounce your commitment to Jesus Christ, leave now!”

Two or three quickly left, then another. After a few more seconds, two more.

“This is your last chance. Either turn against your faith in Christ,” he ordered, “or stay and suffer the consequences.”

Two more slipped out into the night. No one else moved. Parents with children trembling beside them looked down reassuringly, fully expecting to be gunned down or imprisoned.

The other soldier closed the door, looked back at those who stood against the wall and said, “Keep your hands up—but this time in praise to our Lord Jesus Christ. We, too, are Christians. We were sent to another house church several weeks ago to arrest a group of believers.”

The other soldier interrupted, “But, instead, we were converted! We have learned by experience, however, that unless people are willing to die for their faith, they cannot be fully trusted.”

How you respond in the face of persecution reveals whether or not you are standing on the Rock, for the one who is will NEVER be dismayed. Jesus is the only source of true security.

Pastor John