For Such a Time as This-Cover

Here is my new book cover proof. This design is from the publisher. I'll publish the final cover once they finalize it.

Softcover

To Burn or Not to Burn

According to local and international news reports, Dove World Outreach Church in Gainesville, FL is planning to hold a burning of the Quran on September 11, 2010. MSNBC, on their site, asks whether or not the incident is wise or not. According to the pastor of the church, Rev. Terry Jones, he is doing it to make a statement to Muslims. Per the MSNBC.com site, Rev. Jones said, “Instead of us backing down, maybe it's time to stand up. Maybe it's time to send a message to radical Islam that we will not tolerate their behavior.” Personally, I don’t see the benefit in it.

The White House and the Pentagon, along with the Vatican and Muslim clerics, are concerned about retaliation from Muslim extremists if this should happen. I don’t blame them. The first thing I would have thought of ‘how might this affect our US Soldiers in the Muslim world?’ I understand the need to make a statement. I don’t understand the need to do something so extreme and so extremely provocative. It is one thing to show your disagreement with Islam and the acts of extremists. It is another thing to become one yourself.

As I wrote in my book, Reflections of the Soul, Jesus never called for military or militant action to promote the Kingdom or the Kingdom’s agenda. Christ never called for Christians to bomb abortion centers, demean aborting mothers, harass the families of Gays and Lesbians, nor burn Qurans in public. This is not a demonstration of love. Instead, it feeds into their mindset that Christians are evil and not of God and must be eradicated.

As I read the comments, many of them read like this: “isn’t like Christians to be so intolerant though they preach love,” “this isn’t following the teachings of Jesus” and “It is distressing to see the intolerance and bigotry of these 'so called Christians'. What do they want another crusade?” Is there any wonder they call Christians, “kooks” and “nut-cases?”

Another thing I don’t agree with is the extreme response of other churches. The news report goes on to say, “At least two dozen Christian churches, Jewish temples and Muslim organizations in the city have mobilized to plan inclusive events — some will read from the Quran at their own weekend services.” I can’t speak for Jewish temples because I’m not Jewish, but I can say that Christian churches have no business reading texts from the Quran during their services, unless it is to show the contrasts between it and the Bible. Reading the Quran in church to promote it as a God-recognized religion is no better than reading pagan texts and promoting witchcraft as a God-recognized religion. Paul said, “For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? 15 And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? 16 And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? (1 Cor. 6:14-16)”

It is one thing to become all things to all people that you might win some; it is another thing to compromise your faith and your covenant with Christ in order to get along. The Bible says that we are to live in peace with all men, as much as it depends upon you, but we are not to compromise our doctrine for it. Remember the Church at Pergamos (Rev. 2:12-17).

America's Lost Legacy (Part 6)

A Church with Passion (Part Two)

There are several signs of a church with passion:

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  A church with passion is a witnessing church. Her members will be fervent about telling others about God and about what He has done for them because of the anointing that is upon them.
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  A church with passion is a ministering church. She offers ministries that meet her member’s needs and offer her members opportunities to apply their spiritual gifts.
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  A church with passion is a giving church. Her members will have been taught that everything belongs to the Lord and that they are stewards of His property. Therefore, out of gratitude, they will give back to Him the portion that is due Him.
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  A church with passion is a discipled church. Her members are taught the Word of God so they can apply it to their lives and not sin against Him. The church is to teach her members about God, His expectations of His people, and His plan for His people. They make themselves available to be taught by attending Christian education classes and small group Bible studies. In addition, they study the Word for themselves.
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  A church with passion is a discipling church. Jesus’ commandment to His Disciples was for them to make more disciples. His Disciples were to teach others what He had taught them. Church members are to learn the Word of God so they may be able to teach it to others, their families, in particular.
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  A church with passion is a fellowshipping church. The church in Acts was a fellowshipping church. Luke says this of the Jerusalem church: “…and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart.” The members of a passionate church do not forsake the assembly of themselves together.
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  A church with passion is a miracle-working church. Because of their passion for and faith in God, God rewards them with His presence and His power is evident in the lives of His people. Jesus said that if a person had faith the size of a mustard seed, they could do the impossible. People who are passionate about God will have strong faith and that faith will be manifested in miraculous ways.
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  A church with passion is a worshipping church. Because she is grateful to God for His salvation, His grace, and His mercy, she worships Him in spirit and in truth because the Father seeks such to worship Him.
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  A church with passion is a growing church. Luke goes on to say, “And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.” Who would not want to join a church that is excited about God , excited about each other, excited and secured in their eternal destiny, demonstrating the miracle-working power of God, and welcoming to all and judgmental to none?

I know from my own experience how important it is to have people in your life who are enthusiastic about their faith. I grew up in a Christ-loving home. I was taken to church every Sunday but that isn’t where Christ stopped. He was praised in the home. He was talked about in the home. The Bible was read in the home. When I was baptized, my Aunt Josephine bought me my first Bible. I was so proud of it and I read from it often.

          I did not come from a church that emphasized personal Bible study or Quiet Times (daily devotion). Though we did have Baptist Training Union (BTU), it was not the same. Even though there were many activities for youth at my church, I was encouraged by my Sunday school superintendent, James Chatters, to be involved. I was asked to serve as the Associate Superintendent of Sunday school, and thus my ministry career began. I didn’t understand real spiritual growth until I went off to college and I saw other young people seeking after the Lord with earnest. At the Baptist Student Union (BSU), under the leadership of Arliss Dickerson, I was given the opportunity to serve and to put into practice that which I learned in private study. I was around other young people and we became a family. We put on events. We ministered together. We worshipped together. There was no gender, no color, but Christ was all. Now, I realize how important all those people and organizations were to my spiritual development.

  

If we are to save our nation, we must return to our passion for God. We must remember from whence we have fallen and repent. We must turn our backs on worldliness and return to holiness. We must praise Christ in our churches and in our homes. We must model Him before our families and our colleagues. We must reach out to our children and our youth with the Gospel and challenge them spiritually. We must reclaim this lost generation. When we do that, we will start raising a generation of godly people who will make godly decisions based on godly wisdom. This is how we will turn our nation around. This is how we will become, not a Christian nation, but a nation of Christians, once again.

America's Lost Legacy (Part 5)

A Church with Passion (Part One)

God told the church at Ephesus that they had left their first love. They were once hot for God. They were once on fire for Him. They had great zeal and great fervor for Him, but now, they’ve cooled. He encouraged them to return to their first love. When church members returns to the zeal and enthusiasm they once had for their Lord, they will again be able to positively affect and influence their families for the Kingdom. Godly children become godly adults who will use godly wisdom to affect positive change in their families, on their jobs, in their churches, in their communities, and in their nation.

When the Church returns to her first love, she, too, will be able to affect positive change. Jesus told the church at Ephesus to remember from whence she fell. She was to remember the love and zeal she once had. She was to remember the power and strength she once had. She was to remember the favor of God she once had. Once she remembers where she fell from, she is to repent and go back to it. To repent means to die to a sin or a sinful way of life. For what does she have to repent? She is to repent of allowing worldliness to enter into her. She is to repent for compromising with the world. She is to repent for her disobedience to the commands of Christ. She is to repent for her idolatries. The church at Ephesus was to repent and die to the life she was now living, the sins she was not committing, and to return to God. She was to turn her back on what she was now doing and return to her zeal and her passion for her first (and only) Love.

To those churches that do not repent, He “will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place.” That means that He will remove His blessing from her. He will write Ichabod on her. He may even kill off her members or just let the church die off through natural attrition. He may even give them over to a strong delusion that they may believe the lies of false teachers. If a church repents of growing cold towards Jesus, then He will restore her. He told the Ephesian church, “‘To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.’” He would bless those who repent with eternal life.

America's Lost Legacy (Part 4)

A Lost Opportunity

This lack of zeal is not always on the parents. There are boring churches out there with boring (stiff) services. Church is supposed to be about a dynamic people worshiping a super-dynamic God. God is living and His word is alive. Worship should be live, electric, and participatory. The presence and the power (the anointing) of God should be felt. The Word, which brings conviction, should be preached. God’s word is not always a feel-good message. It usually  is about illuminating and expounding on who God is and what His expectations are for His people. The fact that we are so far removed from God’s perfection and that we fall far short of His expectations should bring conviction which leads to repentance, and repentance leads to change.

Churches should offer opportunities for children and youth to be involved. This is their church, too. The church should not only provide opportunities for them to exercise their spiritual gifts, it should also provide ministries to which the children can belong. The church is a community; it is not a building. It is a place where each member can belong and feel like they do belong. The Bible says that God places each member in the Body as He sees fit. Children and youth should be trained, taught, and mentored. They should also be allowed to serve.

Youth need something to do. They get into trouble when they have too much free time. Idle hands and minds are the devil’s playgrounds. Churches should offer youth the opportunity to be a part of a group where they can learn and worship with others like them. They need other maturing youth to help hold them accountable. They need programs and events in which to participate—dances, parties, games, camps, competitions, and ministry events—things that will allow them to put into practice that which they’ve learned.

America's Lost Legacy (Part 3)

The Lost Passion

Children and youth have no zeal for God or the things of God because their parents don’t. It is true that parents and churches have to compete with worldly entertainment, but if parents would teach their children while they are young and if parents would exhibit an enthusiasm for Christ before their children, their children would grow up with a stronger desire for God and the things of God. This is what it means to raise your children in the fear and admonition of the Lord. Parents are to teach their children the Word and model before their children the Word and they are to do so with passion.

When children think about church, they think boring. They think this for two reasons. First, their parents think church is boring and because oftentimes it is boring. Children more often than not go to church because their parents make them go. Their parents go because they think of going to church as a duty to do, a task to be completed, more so than out of a love for God. This is made evident to the child (to the world and to God) by their lifestyle outside the church. If they loved God and had a passion for God, then they’d do the things approved of by God. They would be eager to assemble themselves with like-minded believers. They’d witness more. They’d minister more. They’d attend prayer meetings and Bible Studies regularly. They certainly would arrive at church on time. Parents’ actions loudly declare to their children their true level of commitment to God and their true feelings for Him. Not only would they do the things that please Him, they would do them with excitement.

Parents underestimate the effect their lifestyle and witness have on their children. They are to model Christ and Christ was zealous about God and His Kingdom. Christian parents should be as well. Instead, they make going to church as appealing as sitting through a five hour lecture by a CPA on the intricacies of tax law. They make going to church as interesting as watching water boil. This is because church is not exciting to them. It’s just another thing to do. But if parents spent their time away from church teaching and ministering to their children, they would go to church with enthusiasm because of the drawing power of the Word. At church, they would be empowered and equipped to minister during the week. On the Lord’s Day, they’d go to church with eagerness because of their desire to share what the Lord had done for them and through them during the week.

What about parents who merely send their children to church but don’t go themselves? What message does that send to the child? These parents might tell them that they need to go so they can learn about God, but the child will wonder, ‘why?’ They will want to know what benefit is in it. What’s the purpose of their going to church? How will learning about God help them in life? Why do they need to go but their parents don’t? Don’t their parents need God? Don’t their parents need to know about God? Their parents may tell them that they don’t need to go because they already know about God. (Of course, the truth of the matter is the parents don’t want to know about God and they are sending their children because they see the church as a free baby-sitting service.) So, as these children see their parents cussing, drinking, fornicating, and doing God-knows-what-else, these kids are going to ask themselves, “How is knowing about God going to help me?” It’s no wonder that when these kids come to church they don’t get anything out of it. Nothing they learn is reinforced in the home. In fact, the opposite is true. The things that are reinforced or modeled are the things they should not do, but these will be the things they will do. Though the seed is sown, it doesn’t take root because actions speak louder than words.

America's Lost Legacy (Part 2)

The Lost Generation

I read an article the other day from CNN.com, called “More Teens Becoming ‘Fake’ Christians.” The article spoke on the subject of teens being false Christians in the church mainly because of false teachers teaching ‘easy believism’ and ‘cheap grace.’ They have become subscribers to the Joel Osteen and Robert Schuller philosophies of “I’m ok, you’re ok.” The article said that these youth believed that God wanted them to “feel good and do good.”

How did these young people go so far astray? It is because of us—the adults. First, they were taught false doctrine by followers of false doctrine. They latched onto these doctrines of demons because it tickled their ears and gave them something they could believe and make them feel good.

I believe there is also another reason for this shift. It is because the people of God have lost their passion for God. God’s people don’t have the zeal for Him they once had. They have succumbed to the cares and pressures of the world. Look at Sundays. Ballparks should shut down because of church. Ballparks should close during the times of worship due to lack of demand. Instead, churches are cancelling services for ball games. We have lost our passion for God; therefore, we no longer teach our children the truths of God.

The Bible supports this conclusion. The Book of Joshua describes how God led the children of Israel up to and into the Promised Land. Before crossing over the Jordan River, God had the Israelites place memorial stones in the Jordan River to serve as a reminder to all generations of His faithfulness and His providence. It was to remind the present and future generations that God brought them across the Jordan and into the Promised Land. Then, the change came.

The Book of Joshua concludes with the conquest of the land of Canaan and the dividing of the land among the twelve tribes. The Book of Judges begins where the Book of Joshua leaves off. It not only shows the dividing of the land, it shows the people of God losing their zeal for Him. God told them to go in and utterly (completely) destroy all the inhabitants of the land. He told them that if they did not do this, the Canaanite gods would become a snare for them and lead them away from Him. However, when the Israelites entered the Promised Land, they disobeyed the Lord and did not kill all the inhabitants, but kept some alive to serve as slaves. The Book of Judges begins with God chastising the Israelites for their disobedience. He told them that because they did not do as He commanded them, He would not drive them out of the land but would let them remain and they would become a thorn in their sides. He also told them that their gods would be a snare to them. Instead of obeying God, they did what they wanted to do, what was right in their own eyes.

Their loss of zeal for God not only led to disobedience in ridding the land of its inhabitants, it also led to idolatry. As God said, the gods of the inhabitants became a snare, a temptation, to them. This led to disobedience in the area of discipling their children. Idolatry caused the Israelites to forget the Lord their God. This is proven in Judges 2:10 which says, “When all that generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the LORD nor the work which He had done for Israel.”

Like the Israelites of old, when we lose our zeal toward God, when we grow cold toward Him, we will fail to teach our children about Him. We will fail to tell them about Him and about what He has done for us. Because we have cooled in our passion for Him, we no longer see Him as relevant, as a necessity. God knew this would happen. This is why He told the Israelites, “Now therefore write ye this song for you, and teach it the children of Israel: put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the children of Israel. 20For when I shall have brought them into the land which I sware unto their fathers, that floweth with milk and honey; and they shall have eaten and filled themselves, and waxen fat; then will they turn unto other gods, and serve them, and provoke me, and break my covenant (Deut. 31:19-20).”

Parents do not want to raise their children in the fear and admonition of the Lord anymore. They say that they are too busy or it’s not their job. They justify their actions by saying, “I don’t want to impose my religious belief upon my children. I want them to make their own decision.” That is a lie straight from the devil. I know it is a lie from the devil because, first of all, the devil has no problem imposing his values upon our children. Through a secular-humanist education system, an anti-God media, and demon-influenced entertainment, he indoctrinates our children into ungodliness. In education, he teaches them that they evolved from nothing and may or may not evolve into nothing. Therefore, life is meaningless. Through the media, he tells them that those who worship God are fanatics who kill women and children to carry out their religious agenda. He shows them persecuting homosexuals, who only want to be treated as equals, and attacking the dignity women because they exercise their God-given right to abort their children. He uses entertainment to demean women, promote promiscuity, and introduce generations to the occult. Satan is systematically imposing his agenda upon our children. He leads them to believe that there is no God, and if there is, He doesn’t care about what they do.

This is what they learn in school, through entertainment venues, and sometimes, in the church. Then we wonder why people kill, steal, rape, embezzle, molest, and blaspheme without any fear of reprisal or consequence. They’ve been taught their whole lives that they don’t have to account to anyone. They’ve been taught this in the home, in the schools, and in the courts. At most, what they get is a slap on the wrist. There are no severe or eternal consequences for their actions. The live like the Rich Fool of Luke 12 who said, “eat, drink, and be merry,” because when life is over, it’s over.

Secondly, God expects you to impose your will upon your children. Your children were entrusted to you by God. They are His but you are their stewards, their caretakers. God just loaned them to you for season. God expects you to share your passion for Him with them. They will, in the end, make their own decisions but you should stack the deck in God’s favor. After Jesus finished speaking with the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4, she went out and found everyone she could and told them that she had found the Messiah and invited them to come and see. When they arrived, the Bible says, “And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, “He told me all that I ever did” (John 4:39).” But after Jesus remained with them for two days teaching them, they told the woman, ““Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard Him and we know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world” (John 4:42).”