Revelation changes expectations

It has always puzzled me that the disciples were so unprepared for Jesus’ resurrection. No one seemed to foresee it. It wasn’t as if Jesus had not told them on various occasions what would happen but somehow the truth just hadn’t sunk in.

No one was waiting at the tomb in anticipation of Jesus walking out alive. The disciples were hiding away in Jerusalem and even the women who did visit the tomb went to prepare a dead body with no expectation of a risen Lord. In fact when they did see Jesus, they could hardly believe it and when they told the disciples they thought it was just nonsense (Luke 24: 11). Only Peter and John actually went to the tomb.

Cleopas and Simon on the road to Emmaus could not make sense of what had happened either and even when Jesus walked with them and explained the Scriptures they did not realise they were talking with Jesus till ‘their eyes were opened and they recognised him’ Luke 24: 31. In fact when they hurried back to Jerusalem to tell the others and Jesus appeared in the room they thought he was a ghost. Even when Jesus showed them his scarred hands and feet and he ate some fish, they were still not convinced.  It was not until ‘he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures’ (Luke 24: 45) that they got it.

They needed revelation – their minds opened to what had been prophesied and what they had been told. The disciples had seen Jesus crucified, they had seen his body taken down from the cross and placed in a tomb so their experience said he was dead. They therefore did not expect resurrection even though they had been told about it. Even when the evidence was presented to them, they still could not believe it till Jesus himself opened their hearts and eyes to what the Scriptures said.

We too need this revelation because, like the disciples, our past experiences can shape our expectations. However when we do not live by our experiences but by what the Bible says, we can live victoriously even in the midst of the most difficult times. With revelation of God bringing life to the Scriptures we no longer expect the defeat and failure of past experiences but we live in the expectation of God’s goodness, kindness, love, mercy and grace.

The Bible no longer becomes theoretical but an amazing book full of the endless possibilities of what God can and wants to do in our lives and in the lives of those around us. Our expectations change when we believe and act on what the Bible says.

The disciples certainly had very wrong expectations of Jesus’ resurrection but under the revelation of God and the anointing of the Holy Spirit, they turned from frightened men and women into world changers and powerful ministers of the Gospel.

If we let our future expectations be based on our past experiences not on the Word, we will always be disappointed which can lead to frustration and even cynicism. Instead we need the Holy Spirit to open our minds to the wonders of what God is doing so with an expectation of God’s goodness we will see great and wonderful things.

For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ. And so through him the ‘Amen’ is spoken by us to the glory of God. 2 Corinthians 1: 20

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. 2 Peter 1: 4

Oh hell!

Hell is a topic rarely mentioned these days even in Christian circles apart perhaps from the expletive ‘What the hell!’.  This is a terrible oversight on behalf of those who know or should know that hell is the default destination of mankind after death. 

I suspect that all the hellfire and damnation preachers from past times have given hell such a terrible reputation, a reputation it completely deserves, that it seems one doesn’t speak about it in polite company, rather like the drip on the end of Uncle Harold’s nose that nobody mentions.

Jesus had no such qualms. He had a lot to say about hell. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus said, ‘Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad the path that leads to destruction and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life and only a few find it.’ Matthew 7: 13 -1 4.

That knocks on the head universalism; that everyone is going to heaven. It is my belief that the Church and Christian’s reticence to talk about heaven and hell has led to many of the theories of our eternal destination readily expressed but none of which mentions hell.

Most people hope they are going to heaven and believe either that their good works balancing out their bad works (not sin – please) will mean God is bound to let them into heaven. Alternatively the atheistic view is that when we die, that’s it – curtains. We exist no more. For there to be any form of afterlife means the person of God has to be included and he is the creation of Man, not the other way around. Time and space do not permit reincarnation and other theories.

Everyone knows what they believe or at least hope for when they die but few have any credible, authoritative basis for that belief. The Bible is clear about the afterlife – it is either heaven or hell -  but few want to talk about it, let alone believe what it says. Unfortunately that all too often includes Christians.

If anyone dares to admit they maybe they are hell-bound, usually with a self-deprecating shrug, it will be depicted, in their minds at least, as a place where all the old sinners congregate to party, swapping hair raising stories of their Godless exploits over a few drinks.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Unfortunately the Bible depicts hell as ‘a blazing furnace where there will be gnashing of teeth’ (Matthew 13: 42 and 50). In fact the term ‘weeping and gnashing of teeth’ is referred to six times in Matthew alone. Jesus’ words – not mine. No mention of parties. In fact it is when one sinner repents that there is rejoicing and that is in heaven (Luke 15: 7 and 10).

All references to hell in the Bible talk of weeping, torment, eternal punishment, fire or blazing furnace. In fact in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus that Jesus told (Luke16: 19 – 31), the rich man was fully conscious of his torment and punishment. What’s more is that, according to Jesus, this punishment is for eternity (Matthew 25: 46).

The Bible says of those who die without Jesus in 2 Thessalonians 1: 9 ‘They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power.’  God is the source of everything good therefore hell without God must be the absence of all things good – no love, no community, no fellowship, no friendship. Misery loves company but hell will be misery alone. Hell will be a place of ‘utter inactivity and insignificance – an eternal non-life of regret’. It will be place of punishment for sins with no relief. That reality should break our hearts.

Some of course, including well meaning Christians, cannot possibly believe that an all-loving God would send anyone to hell. That, with the greatest respect, shows no understanding of either God or ourselves and trying to take the moral high ground with God is total arrogance.

What is incredible is not that God sends anyone to hell – and he doesn’t, they send themselves  – but that God should let any man into heaven.

God is divine, majestic, omniscient, transcendent, pure, spotless and holy. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. Man, aside from God is sinful, rebellious, arrogant, wicked, malicious, envious – in fact everything that God is not.

Why on earth would God have anything to do with his sinful creation? Why would he remedy man’s sin by sending his Son Jesus to die for people like you and me? Because He loves us. There is no other reason that would make any sense. He wants us with him in heaven for eternity. In fact as Randy Alcorn says in his definite book Heaven, ‘Consider the wonder of it. God determined that he would rather go to hell on our behalf than live in heaven without us.’

So Jesus holds out this wonderful promise of eternal life and when we accept it, acknowledging that we are sinners in need of a Saviour and asking God to forgive us our sins, he not only takes away our sins but he transforms us into the likeness of His Son. We become glorious (2 Corinthians 3: 18 and Philippians 3: 21).

You see hell is where mankind is going unless they take hold of God’s amazing gift of eternal life in heaven with him. As Christians we need to find ways to again express the reality of heaven and hell to a generation with a high level of entitlement for whom the very idea of going to hell is a complete antithesis.

Perhaps we need a glimpse of the eternal torment and punishment of hell to make us more effective in reaching out to a lost and broken world.  Teresa of Avila was still traumatised years later after her glimpse of hell. In the past, people were frightened into the Kingdom. Now maybe we need to love people with a love so strong, so powerful, so transforming, so kind and so gracious that people clamour to know the God who loves us so they too can know him.

Hell is real and it needs to become real and dreadful to Christians and non believers alike. Let no one be able to say, like the rich man in the parable in Luke 16 that they didn’t know. A choice must be made and Christians being silent on the issue is tantamount to sending someone on a known road to destruction.

God’s gracious offer of eternal life in heaven is open to all – but it has to be spoken about, asked for, and taken.

God's Word is not chained

This is my gospel, for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained. 2 Timothy 2: 9

Paul wrote these words to Timothy at the end of his life but they still resonate today. You cannot chain, silence or stifle God’s Word, the Bible. The most oppressive empires, regimes, governments and even societies down the centuries have all tried and failed. The Bible, the Word of God, the life giving and active word cannot be chained or silenced.

Persecuted Christians in Eritrea 

I love the story in God’s Smuggler of Brother Andrew from the Netherlands taking Bibles into Communist Eastern Europe in the fifties and sixties. He found himself with a Romania pastor who spoke no German or Dutch and of course Brother Andrew spoke no Romanian. So they conversed together using the Bible. They showed one another a verse and then they looked it up in their own language. ItB started with Brother Andrew saying:

I Corinthians 16: 20 All the brethren greet you. Greet one another with a holy kiss.

The Romanian pastor replied: Proverbs 25: 25 Like cold water to a weary soul is good news from a distant land.

Brother Andrew: Philemon 4 – 7 I always thank my God as I remember you in my prayers, because I hear about your love for all his holy people and your faith in the Lord Jesus. I pray that your partnership with us in the faith may be effective in deepening your understanding of every good thing we share for the sake of Christ. Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, brother, have refreshed the hearts of the Lord’s people.

And so on. God’s word cannot be chained. The Bible has all the answers to life, the universe and everything.  That is why the Bible is still in print thousands of years after being written and still in great demand in every country in the world especially where Christians face great persecution. Believers are still risking their lives to take and distribute the Word.

Countries facing the greatest religious persecution 

From North Korea, the country where Christians face the most extreme persecution all across southern Asia (Chine and India), through the Middle East and North Africa to even Colombia in South America believers suffer for their faith. Islam not Communism is the great persecutor these days.  What these Christians crave most of all is Bibles.

There is a well-known Christian organization that sends aid, Bibles and other Christian literature to countries in great need. In one situation they use drug smugglers to take the Bibles into a country where it is banned. The smugglers take drugs one way but on the return trip through the mountains the mules have no cargo. The society has negotiated a deal whereby the mules are loaded with Bibles and when the organization hears from local pastors that the Bibles have safely arrived, they pay the smugglers. Ethically it sounds a bit dubious but lets face it – smuggling Bibles into these countries is illegal so how it is done isn’t really an issue. 

The hunger for God’s word in these nations is immense and the demand far outweighs the supply.

Bible study

In the West we are spoilt – everyone of us has so many Bibles that supply far outweighs demand. We have every available resource to accompany the Word and teaching is easily accessed through the internet let alone through book stores.

The organization Bibles Unbound says that believers in countries facing great persecution ask for two things – our prayers and that we send Bibles. 

Next time we open our Bibles, pray for those who have no Bible but would love one and let us value and treasure ours as the life giving Word of God – active and powerful that just cannot be chained.