A Sordid Biblical Picture of Modern America

“For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet” (Romans 1:26-27).

Paul is not indulging in a lot of fanciful speculations nor presenting baseless theories. He is showing how the heathen nations had reached the lowest degree of moral degradation. When people cease to respect God, they will not long respect their own bodies. They give themselves up to passions of dishonor. Their women become abusers of their own bodies. The men indulged in the debasing practice of sodomy. We are told that this was a common practice among the prominent men of Greece, and also the Romans. When the greatest men of a nation descend to the lowest conceivable form of immorality, it shows how powerless education and philosophy are to save men from the deepest depths of moral pollution.

R. L. Whiteside

Little Word – Big Meaning

Jesus once said, “We must work the works of him that sent me…” (John 9:4). Must refers to that which is necessary, indispensable, required, or obligatory. What are some things we must do (emph. added in all quotes)?

• We MUST Believe in God: “And without faith it is impossible to be well-pleasing unto him; for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that seek after him” (Heb. 11: 6). Belief is the necessary beginning point in anyone’s relationship with God. This belief implies belief in His Word and in His Son. The context of this passage indicates that the belief God requires is one that is active in obedience to His will (cf. James 2:14–26). 
• We MUST Be Born Again: “Ye must be born anew” (John 3:7b). Jesus had earlier stated of this second birth, “Except one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God!” (v. 5). Birth of water refers to baptism in water, in which act one is cleansed of his sins by the blood of Christ (Acts 22:16; Revelation 1:5). Birth of the Spirit refers to the spiritual begettal by the Holy Spirit through His Word. One is “…begotten again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, through the word of God…” (I Peter 1:23). The new birth simply refers to one’s hearing and believing the Gospel, resulting in baptism (Mark 16:16). Salvation is not possible apart from this new birth.
• We MUST Worship in Spirit and Truth: “God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24). Worship in spirit means our spirits hearts-minds must be involved, sincerely engaged. Worship in truth means in harmony with, according to the Truth of God’s Word, particularly the New Testament (the authority of the Old Testament perished with Jesus on the cross [Colossians 2:14; Hebrews 9:15–17; 10:9–10]). God does not accept whatever men choose to offer Him in worship (Genesis 4:4–5; Hebrews 11:4). He accepts only those acts of homage He has authorized; all else is “vain worship” (Matthews 15:9; Colossians 3:17). 
• We MUST Be Judged by the Son of God: “For we must all be made manifest before the judgment-seat of Christ; that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (II Corinthians 5:10). None shall escape or avoid the Judgment; it is an appointment we shall all keep (Hebrews 9:27b). The standard of judgment for all who have lived since the cross will be the New Testament of Christ (John 12:48). Those who are wise will prepare for, rather than ignore this Great Day.

Dub McClish

It is Hard to Convince Your Children

It is hard to convince your children that the work of the church is really important when you are not taking an active part in the work of the church.

It is hard to convince your children that faithfulness to the church is the most important loyalty in life when you permit them to forsake services to engage in other activities.

It is hard to convince your children that the church is the body of Christ when you are indifferent to the welfare of the members of that body.

It is hard to convince your children that they are to respect the church when you constantly complain and criticize the efforts of those who care enough to be doing something.

It is hard to convince your children that the church is the world’s most important institution when you give so little to finance the church’s work.

It is hard to convince your children that they can believe God’s Word if you do not believe Him enough to place the kingdom of God first in your life.

It is hard to convince your children that it is important to love your enemies when you hold grudges and have wrong attitudes toward those who do you wrong.

It is hard to convince your children that we must obey the laws of the land when we lie on our tax form and disregard speed limits.

It is hard to convince your children that it is important to teach others the gospel when we have never attempted to talk with our neighbors or friends about the truth.

It is hard to convince your children that we must stand against false doctrine and immorality when we remain silent when error is being propagated or practiced.

Author Unknown

He Preached Him Into Hell

He was a member of the church. He said so when questioned about his religion.

He was a member of the church but he could not be counted on to attend the services. He worked six days a week, and he had to visit sometimes, when could he go except on Sunday. He worked hard and needed some recreation, and Sunday was the only time he had for recreation.

He was a member of the church, but he just could not get to Bible study on Sunday morning. He needed the extra hour or two of sleep more than he needed to study the Bible. He attended the worship most of the time, and he felt that was enough.

He was a member of the church, but he did not come on Sunday night. He had to rest to be ready to go to work on Monday. He had already attended one time and that was enough except for the preacher and a few over zealous people. He had eaten the Lord’s Supper, and that was the only thing that was really important anyway.

He was a member of the church, but he never came to mid-week Bible study. He could not find where the Bible said anything about mid-week Bible classes. He said he was tired on Wednesday night and needed the rest and requested people not to bother him by calling on him to invite him.

He was a member of the church, but gave very little of his money to the cause of the Lord. The church supported the preaching of the gospel, but not with his money. The church helped orphans and widows, but not with his money. After all, he owned a home, a new car, a television, and took a vacation each year and it took all of his money to live on.

He was a member of the church, but he never invited anyone. He said that he thought that was what the preacher was paid to do. If he was sick and no one visited him, it hurt his feelings. He complained of the church not visiting people.

He was a member of the church, but he never tried to teach anyone else. In fact, he did not know where to find the Great Commission. If someone asked him a question about the Bible he had to call the preacher to find the answer. The truth is he just did not like to talk with other people about the Bible.

He was a member of the church, but he died. I conducted the funeral. I said, “He was a member but he was careless in his attendance. He was a member of the church, but he did not think Bible study was important, and so he never came. He was a member of the church, but he never gave as he prospered. His funeral is being conducted in a building paid for by others. He was a member of the church, but he never visited the sick. He was a member of the church, but no one gathered here today has he taught the truth. He has now gone to judgment to meet his God, and all he can say to God is: ‘I was a member of the church.’ All that I can say about him is that he was a member of the church.”

While these are not the words that I used, it is the substance of what was said. The service was over, and as I stood at the door waiting for the men to take the casket and place it in the ambulance, I heard someone say, “He preached him straight into hell.” But I deny that I did so. All I did was to tell the truth about his life. All that he claimed while he lived was that he was a member of the church. Why should I insult his family and his friends and his body by saying he was more? I could not claim for a dead man what he refused to claim for himself while he lived.

This is not fiction—it happened.

Franklin Camp

The Basis of Christian Unity

Simply believing as others believe will not bring about unity if such beliefs are not based on the Bible’s teachings. Unity in the body of Christ, the church of our Lord, is a goal for which every sincere and faithful follower of Christ diligently seeks and fervently prays. Why those who profess His name and adhere to His standard should all be one is a matter clearly taught in the Scriptures and therefore, unquestioned by those who respect His will and who confess allegiance to His cause (I Corinthians 1:10; Ephesians 4:1-6). However, its realization has in large measure eluded us. Why? The reasons are many, chief among them being the view that unity must be reached on the basis of agreement in certain prescribed areas, one’s soundness being determined by one’s mental assent to the views common to the faction to which one belongs.
This concept, characteristic of all parties among us, is basically and fundamentally unsound because unity in the body of Christ does not necessarily result from agreement among those who constitute any faction or all of them together.

It should be obvious to all that men may, and often do, agree fully on all matters they regard as essential yet are far, very far, from being one in Christ. Unity—conformity to views—may exist out of Christ as well as in Him, but this is very far from being the unity for which the Savior prayed in Gethsemane.

Unity in commitment to a cause is not a necessary consequent of faithful discipleship; agreement on certain creedal matters as a condition of acceptance in fellowship is to resort to a human, not a divine, standard of soundness.

Paul perceived that there were those who would seek to establish their loyalty to party in this manner, and wrote:

For we are not bold to number or compare ourselves with certain of them that commend themselves: but they themselves, measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves with themselves, are without understanding (II Corinthians 10:12).

Christ is the source of our lives as He is also the sphere of our total religious faith and spiritual activity. As the branch withers and dies when separated from the True Vine (John 16:1-6), so the members of His body—the church—subsist and are one in Him only as they partake of His spirit, accept fully His teaching, and conform wholly to His will (Luke 6:46). This done, unity with Him prevails and, in consequence, with all others in His body with like motivation.

The truth is the faith that saves is vastly more than simple intellectual assent to a body of teaching; unless it is characterized by love, deep devotion, and commitment without reservation to Him; unless the heart, the mind, and the soul are wholly His; unless one’s thoughts, purposes, and plans all converge in Him is there unity with the Head and consequential unity with all other members of His body (I Corinthians 12:12). Where the one is wanting, the other is impossible.

To seek unity on the ground of common belief in party tenets alone promotes sectarianism and produces more division in the body of Christ. James wrote, “the demons also believe, and shudder” (James 2:19). These demons were of common faith and thus united in their convictions, but the unity resulting was far from that which God intended for His people. One’s views may harmonize fully with those of the party yet be far short of that unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, which Paul approved.

Each factious group among us today began, is maintained, and persist solely on the basis of agreement in a narrow and restricted area of allegiance to a hobby and sectarian view acceptable only to the group which holds it, but which effectively operates as a barrier to fellowship with others of like precious faith in all other areas of teaching and practice! How unutterably sad must this situation be to Him who earnestly prayed that His followers might all be one.

Guy N. Woods

We Believe in Good Days Ahead

Much of our bulletin work and a good portion of our pulpit work has to do with warning brethren of evils all around us. We never make an apology for this, noting that a goodly amount of the Bible deals in negative material. The profitableness of the Bible is said to be in the area of reproof and correction, as well as doctrine and instruction in righteousness (II Timothy 3:16). The young preacher Timothy was told to use the Word in reproving and rebuking, as well as exhorting (4:2). So, we have in the past, and will in the future, devote considerable space and time to warning brethren.

As a preacher, I would rather face the brethren in judgment, having warned them repeatedly (and having been called a “negative” preacher), than to face them and see them lost, and have them ask me, “Why didn’t you point out these dangers?” We find Ezekiel stressing that when the wicked are warned, then the person giving the warning has “delivered thy soul” (Ezekiel 3:17-19). We are, and must be, constantly in the business of keeping our own heads pure from other men’s blood (Acts 20:26).

The church, in its history, has weathered many storms. When the calm returns, we may be a smaller brotherhood, but we will be a stronger one for the hardships we have experienced. For all of our warnings concerning liberalism, modernism, permissiveness, worldliness, and apostasy, if the world stands, we confidently believe in good days ahead. The church may be smaller in size, for having lost many to these evil forces, but it will be a faithful and spiritual body. God has always had a pruning process, whether in response to His commands regarding discipline, or in the natural order of things whereby men leave us due to having already left us in spirit (I John 2:19). Nevertheless, in the turmoil used by Satan to take men away, the body of Christ is cleansed.

One reason we believe in good days ahead is the conviction that men can tire of their own filth, in time. That can happen in a nation. A society can cut loose its moorings into an abyss of degradation and depravity. Given time, though, it can happen that finally the basically good people can sicken of the filth around them, and come to say, “That’s it! No More!” They can begin to take corrective action.

We believe such will take place, if the world stands, in the church of the Lord. Already in some places brethren have decided that gimmickry is not spirituality, and some are crying out: “Why can’t we have Bible in our classrooms and from the pulpits?” They will—those with real spirituality that is—come to see what is really the work of the kingdom, and also to see that the church is not a “fun house” where everything is geared to our pleasure. Rather, men who are spiritual learn to take their pleasure in the things pleasing to God. Many will see loved ones lost forever, and many parents will perhaps be shaken in realizing that they have lost their children, before there is that awakening. But, in time, it will come. Once more we declare that men finally can sicken of their own filth, and then will move toward cleansing. We believe good days, while perhaps yet years away, will come. Finally, brethren will realize what has been said all along, “the gospel is the power of God unto salvation!” (Romans 1:16).

Bill Jackson

Still the Bestseller

In 1794 Thomas Payne wrote The Age of Reason, in which he made an attack against the Bible and then boasted that after his book has circulated for fifty years, the bible would be so discredited it would be exhibited in museums as a curious object of a former superstitious age. More than three times fifty years have passed, Thomas Payne is almost forgotten and his book is scarcely known. Yet, the Bible continues to be the bestseller. Truly it must be from God!

Author Unknown