By Dana Kinion

I have a boxer named Rosco.  He’ll be two years old the end of May.  I took him walking on the path along the river the other day; first time this year.  It’s one of our favorite things to do together.  We get some fresh air and exercise and we bond.  It seems he’s matured a bit over the winter.  I remember last year he practically dragged me along the path, but now he seems a bit more content to simply lead the way.  Oh don’t get me wrong, he still darts off the path to chase a rabbit, a squirrel, or a leaf, but those instances are beginning to decrease.  He is still very interested in people walking toward us, and especially other dogs.  He’s such a social guy and would love to take the time to smell and play with each new friend and they’re all friends!  So there are times I have to shorten his leash, remind him to “leave it”, and hold him at the side of the path while they pass.

My favorite part of the walk is toward the end.  By that time, he’s pretty tired.  I’ll call to him, “Rosco”, and he’ll turn and look at me with that perpetual smile of his, tongue hanging out. He’ll slow his pace to let me catch up, let me scruff up his head and walk beside me, at least for a moment or two.  Having him walk by my side is a nice feeling, like we’re real buddies.  I can’t wait for the time when he will decide every adventure is not worth pursuing.  When he realizes that every rustle in the grass is not a bunny and does not need investigated.  When he understands that each leaf that moves does not need pounced on.  I want him to contentedly walk at my side.  I want to be able to enjoy the walk together with him, and for him to realize that the adventures I allow him are the best, like getting a drink of water out of the gushing spout at the end of the trail, or walking in the river at the safe spots.

It’s beginning to remind me of my walk with Christ. Oh the rabbits I’ve chased!  Oh the leaves I’ve pounced on!  Oh how empty and useless!  There is real joy in not rushing ahead, not blazing the trail.  When I walk at His side, eyes on Him, letting Him show me what He wants me to see, there is true fellowship!  I learn so much more.  I look back on the times when He has had to shorten my leash and hold me at bay.  I’m thankful for His discipline in my life, but cringe at the fact that I wanted so badly to have my own way.  The closer I get to the end of the walk, the more content I seem to be to walk by His side and enjoy the walk with Him.  I’m learning that every adventure is not worth pursuing.  I can say “no” much more easily these days to things He doesn’t want for my life without feeling that I’ve missed out on something.  I like being able to look at Him along the way and have Him scruff up my head.  I do know that He loves me and wants me to walk by His side.  This life is but a breath, our time on earth so short.  I want to spend it bonding with my Master!  I can hear Him saying, “Heal, Girl!” and I’m happy to experience the adventures He has planned for me.

“Lord, who may abide in Your tabernacle? Who may dwell in Your holy hill? He who walks uprightly, And works righteousness, And speaks the truth in his heart; He who does not backbite with his tongue, Nor does evil to his neighbor, Nor does he take up a reproach against his friend” (Psa. 15:1-3).

Did you catch it? Two of the most destructive sins in a church often travel together- gossip and taking offense for another person. They are twin sins that keep God’s people and His church in turmoil. A gossiping church spread discontent and unforgiveness like a cancer consuming its unity in Christ.
One of the great characteristics of the body of Christ is to care about the burdens and sufferings of one another. However, as we seek to console and encourage friends or fellow believers that have been offended, we may be tempted to take up their offense against another. In sympathy, we may tend to take their part against the pastor, the church or whoever they blame for the offense. This is very unwise and an unscriptural thing to do, considering that they may be the cause of their own offense. His hurt feelings may be due to a misunderstanding, a difference of opinion, his own rebellious attitude, emotional instability — or he may be childish and immature. There are always two sides to a story, and only the foolish develops an opinion based on one side or without all the facts.
Sometimes offended persons will seek sympathy from naive, uninformed, listening ears. They go about pleading their case, pouring out their cries of injustice to those sincere, tenderhearted persons who will listen. Their goal is to seek out persons who will coddle them, support their opinion and take up their offense against the offending party. You should love and encourage a friend with hurt feelings, but reserve your opinion and avoid taking sides, lest you find yourself a partaker in other men’s sins, or you also become offended and hurt with the church or someone within the church. Scriptures command us to take our offense to the offender not gather support among sympathetic ears. By taking offense for your friend or fellow believer without directing them to seek reconciliation with the offender, you are enabling them in their ongoing sins of bitterness and unforgiveness. Christ like love demands reconciliation. Consider offering to go with them to the offender and do not take no for an answer. If they refuse to go with you to the offending party and continue to gather other “offended” friends around them, consider informing them that if they wish to continue the friendship, the particular offense is “off-limits” in your conversations together until they get help. The psalmist says: “faithful are the wounds of a friend.” Christ-like love compels us to walk in unity and forgiveness. Taking offense for someone else takes you and them in the opposite direction.

by Dana Kinion

As Christians, everything we do should taste like God, Christ, heaven.  Our words, actions, even thoughts should show that these are the most important things in our life.  In this way, we are giving those we come into contact with a taste of heaven through our lives.

Often we find that there are things in our lives that don’t taste like heaven.  It’s important that we get rid of them as soon as we become aware of them.  We should not be a contradiction in flavors.  The flavors of heaven don’t mix well with the flavors of this world.  When we try to mix love, patience, humility and moderation with gossip, intolerance, pride and excess, we are going to have a mess of flavors  that no one will want to take part in.

Honor God by living a life that shows off God’s beautiful attributes.   We are to exemplify Him.  We must not mar God’s image with the flavors of the world.  Spending time with Him will be sure that each life gets seasoned just the way He wants it.  Then, as others taste of our lives, it will be a blend of heaven’s flavors that will tend to draw others in for seconds.

As others taste of your life, and they do, let them taste and see that the Lord is good!

by Pastor Ron

It’s not uncommon today to linger before or after a church service for a cup of coffee and a little time to chat with fellow worshipers.  Some churches are even adding a Starbucks or a McDonalds to their church building in order to encourage their worshipers to stay.  Saddleback Church in California, the megachurch led by Pastor Rick Warren of Purpose Driven Life fame, has a facility called the Refinery that has restaurants, snack bars, a skate park, a volleyball court, and even a waterfall.  Many new church plants are starting out as coffee shops.  The opinion is that people are going to go somewhere after church, why not give them a reason to stay at church, share a meal and cultivate relationships.  Indeed, as Henry Brinton, a pastor in Virginia, in a recent article in USA Today said, “many churches are rediscovering the power of hospitality which goes back thousands of years- think of Jesus feeding 5,000 people by the sea of Galilee.”  Hospitality is the means by which many churches are attempting to re-enter the public arena in an era when the church is increasingly marginalized.

Coffee shops in churches are not without their critics.  Many feel that restaurants and coffee shops commercialize the church.  Often, detractors point to Jesus cleansing the temple of the moneychangers to prove their point.  Others, with a traditional view of the sanctuary being a sacred place rather than the individual, are outraged by coffee stains on the carpet.  For them, casual and worship do not belong together.  Church is a place of worship not community, community takes place away from church or at least minimally in a fellowship hall.  Citing a “high view of God,” these same critics point to the failures of more recent attempts of the mainstream church to be “seeker sensitive.”

In the midst of the debate there is a growing concern over the escalating isolation in our culture and people in general losing the ability to cultivate deep meaningful relationships.  Clearly, a cup of coffee or a shared meal is not a quick fix for the divisions we face in our churches and society.  Disagreements will continue.  But, as Christine Pohl, author of “Making Room : Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition,” says, “Through hospitality, we discover the ways we are both alike and different.  When we welcome other people into our lives, we create space in which each person’s gifts and insights can be shared.”  A cup of coffee can be a simple invitation to a fellow worshiper or visitor to take a time slow down and listen to another soul, a chance to speak into another person’s life of the hope of Christ.  A Cup of coffee at a coffee cafe in a church is not an answer to the unchurched or the uncommmitted, put rather a place that gives people permission to be human again.  We are about making disciples.  Making disciples is about intentional relationships intentionally following Christ together.  A coffee cafe in our church makes an immediate statement to visitors that we are about relationships and taking time to get to know one another as we worship together.  Like a church building, a coffee cafe can either be a place of welcome or an island of isolation.  It all depends on the heart of the believer.  I can either hold tight to “my cup of coffee” or offer a cup in Jesus name.  It is a choice.

By: Ron Lotz

Negativism is out, positivism is definitely in.  Speak of sunsets and moonbeams, of butterflies and ice cream cones, of sunshine, and heaven and a loving God waiting at the precipice of death.  Speak not of darkness or evil or even fallen men.  Evil is a matter of poor education or lost opportunities.  Humankind is basically good, just misguided.  We are adorable and lovable, once you get to know us.  Hell and brimstone are the mechanism of organized religion to intimidate and control the faithful.  We have outgrown such nonsense and boogy men.  Such is the sentiment of the time we live in.  Preachers are encouraged to speak of positive things and to be sensitive to the offenses of theseeker coming to the church doors.  Grace is the buzz word and hell a social blunder in the church setting.  In fact, modern man finds it difficult, if not impossible to accept the doctrine of eternal punishment.  Eternal punishment offends the sensibilities and threatens the self-esteem.  Don’t you know that God is love?, it is often said.  Is it fair for God to send someone to hell and eternal punishment?  This doctrine of eternal punishment becomes especially offensive when applied to the heathen, whom having never heard of the gospel, can hardly be blamed for rejecting it.

The fate of heathen is the tripping point for so many who have issue with a Holy God and eternal punishment.  There is an inherent sense of unfairness in our limited human logic for someone to be punished for an offense they are supposedly unaware of.  And yet, before addressing the fate of the heathen it will be helpful to discuss the lostness of man in general.  Three questions are applicable here.  Is man lost or is he not?^[1] If he is lost, is he lost in this life only or also for eternity?  If by chance he finds himself lost in the next life, will he have a second chance?

It is easy to ask these questions; it is not easy to answer them.  Indeed, man does not have the answers to these questions, nor is he capable of finding them for himself.  Man’s ultimate fate rests in the hands of God.  Whether he is saved or lost depends entirely on God and His mercy^[2].  If God declares man to be lost, then he is lost.  Left to his own intelligence and shut up to his own information, man has no way of knowing how he stands in the sight of God.  Being a resident of earth, and therefore limited to this realm, he has no knowledge of heaven- nor hell either.  It is therefore futile for him to speculate; it is dangerous for him to dogmatize.  Concerning his own fate, man knows only what God has been pleased to reveal to him.  It is an act of consummate folly for him to reject that revelation.

Is Man Lost? The Bible is the only book in the world that speaks to that point.  And the answer we get comes through loud and clear: Most definitely, man is lost.  That statement embraces the entire human race.  All men are lost.  Jews and gentiles, good men and bad, the pagans in America as well as the heathen in Africa- all have sinned and come short of the glory of God (Rom . 3:23).  All are children of wrath (Ephesians 2:3); all are under condemnation (Rom. 3:19); all have a destination with death(Rom. 5:12; Heb. 9:27).  Upright, moral decent men such as Nicodemus and Cornelius- all are lost and need to be saved.(John 3:3; Acts 11:13-14).

What does it mean to be lost?  The Scriptures portray a dismal, dreadful picture of man in his lost condition.  Man was made in the beginning by God for God, and God intended that man should find his highest happiness in fellowship with Himself. But man disobeyed.  With his eyes wide open and knowing full well the awful and inevitable consequences of his act, Adam put forth his hand and bit into the forbidden fruit.  Instantly something happened; sin came into his life and God went out.  From that day to this, man has wondered to and fro, throughout the earth, as a spiritual derelict.  He has sailed the seven seas; he has traveled to the ends of the earth; he has even visited the moon; he has conquered the wilderness and made the dessert to blossom like a rose; he has founded empires and dynasties; he has built cities and castles, he has heaped to himself riches and honor; but for all that his soul is an orphan still.  In His heart there is what Augustine called the God-shaped void that nothing on earth can ever fill. His spirit, like a restless bird, flits between deep waters and rough seas, searching for that which he cannot name, but desperately desires.  He is totally unable to find what Jesus called rest for the soul.  With vertical connection broken, all horizontal connections are at loose ends.  He is not only at odds with his Maker, but with his neighbor as well.

The Bible describes him as being dead in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1).  He has plenty of physical, intellectual, and community life; but he is completely devoid of spiritual life.  He is alienated from the life of God (Eph. 4:18), ignorant of the truth of God (Rom. 1:25), hostile to the law of God (Rom. 8:7), disobedient to the will of God (Titus 3:3), and exposed to the wrath of God (John 3:36).  He has been separated from God so long that he has become naturalized in the unnatural and actually loves darkness rather than light (John 3:19).

As a result of the Fall all men are now members of a sinful, fallen race.  Every man is born in sin and iniquity (Psalm 51:5). He enters the world with a corrupt, sinful nature and finds himself afflicted with an inborn, irresistible propensity to sin.  He takes to sin like an alcoholic to drink.  His body and mind he employs asinstruments of wickedness (Rom. 6:13) and his five physical senses are inlets and outlets for sin (Col. 2:21).  A hundred times a day he commits sins of omission as well as commission. He sins in thought (Gen. 6:5), word (Rom. 3:13-14), and deed (Rom. 1:29-32); and all his so-called good deeds are as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6).

Man is not a sinner because he sins; he sins because he is a sinner.  It is his job description.  It is just natural for man to sin as it is for a dog to bark.  It is part of his nature (Rom 7:18); it comes from his heart (Matt. 15:19); and his heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked (Jer. 17:9).  Or as Isaiah expressed it:

The whole head is sick and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness in it, but bruises and sores and bleeding wounds; they are not pressed out, or bound up, or softened with oil (Isaiah 1:5-6).

Nowhere is the lostness of man more vividly portrayed than in the three parables spoken by Jesus in Luke 15.  There we have the lost coin, the lost sheep, and the lost son.  J. Oswald Sanders says: The coin was helplessly lost; the sheep was heedlessly lost; the son was willfully lost.^[3] He does not know his way home.  Left to himself he will always travel the downward road, farther and farther into the far country of sin (Luke 15:13).  Not only does he willfully sin, but he does not even know where to begin to be unlost.  Man sits in the dark, covered in the filth of his own rebellion, and crushed under to the weight of his own condemnation before God.

If Man is lost, is he lost in this life only or also for eternity?

The question has meaning only if man possesses immortality.  If man’s existence is confined to this life and he dies and withers to dust like the rest of creation, it is senseless to talk about his being saved or lost for eternity.  Man’s destiny is linked with his origin.  According to the Biblical account, The Lord God formed man of the dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being (Gen. 2:7).  Man is the only earthly creature who is said to have been made in the image of God (Gen. 1:26).  As such he must possess immortality.  The Bible nowhere tries to prove the immortality of the soul any more than it tries to prove the existence of God or the Trinity, for the simple reason that both ideas are part of the innate consciousness of the human race. There is no tribe, however primitive, that does not have some consciousness of a Supreme Being and some hope of life beyond the grave.  Life beyond death is a universal concept and hope for everyone who draws breath.  Doubtless, this is what the writer had in mind when he wrote: He (God) has made everything beautiful in His time; also He has put eternity in man’s mind. (Ecc. 3:11).

The Bible clearly teaches that there are two destinies for every person.  One involves everlasting happiness in the presence of God and the holy angels (Luke 15:10; Rev. 22:3-5; I Thess. 4:17); the other involves everlasting misery in the company of the Devil and his angels (Matt. 25:41).  The New Testament speaks of two gates – one straight and the other wide; two ways- one broad and the other narrow; two destinies- one life and the other destruction (Matt. 7:13-14).  In the day of judgement the sheep will be separated from the goats (Matt. 25:31-46), the wheat from the tares (Matt. 13:36-43), and the Good from the Evil (John 5:29).  And in the resurrection there will be a separation between the just and the unjust (Acts 24:15).

The theology of everlasting punishment, though taught in the Scriptures, is challenged by many today.  The chief argument with this Biblical truth is twofold.  First, the very idea is said to be offensive to the postmodern mind.  No person in his right mind, would consign his worst enemy to hell.  Secondly, it is impossible to reconcile everlasting punishment with the all-embracing love of God.  It must be acknowledged that the idea of everlasting punishment is offensive to the postmodern mind.  In fact, the idea is offensive to both postmodern and modern mind.  The reply is, so what?  Is eternal punishment the only Christian doctrine that is unacceptable to the humanistic, naturalistic, relativistic, politically correct, postmodern mind.  The Christian must choose between the popular view and the mind of Christ; after all it was Christ who first taught this terrible truth.  He is the one who is responsible for the doctrine of eternal punishment.  If the postmodern is opposed to eternal punishment in a literal Hell, then they are not only in conflict with the doctrine but with Jesus Christ as well.

The word Gehenna occurs twelve times in the New Testament; eleven times it came from the lips of Christ.  It was not John the Baptist or the apostle Paul who first coined those awful words we would prefer to drop form our present day preaching: place of torment, the unquenchable fire, the worm that does not die, outer darkness, weeping and gnashing of teeth. These are not the wild, irresponsible words of some flaming evangelist who goes up and down the country preaching hellfire and brimstone in an attempt to scare people into the kingdom.  These words, terrible as they are, fell from the lips of the gentle savior- the man who gave His life and shed His blood that men might be forgiven.

We cannot evade the issue.  Jesus taught the doctrine of everlasting punishment.  He claimed to be the Way, the Truth, and the Life; and we accept His claim.  He knew the truth (John 2:24-25), He taught the truth (John 18:37), He lived the truth (John 1:14), He was the truth (John 14:6).  Jesus Christ is the King of Truth.  He cannot lie.  What He says must be true.  Whether we understand it or not, whether we like it or not, is really beside the point.  It makes no difference to the truth of any statement that comes from Him. If He said it, it must be true.  Otherwise the concept of lordship of Christ becomes meaningless.

It might not be out of place to remind ourselves that all we know about eternal life and heaven we learned from Christ. Likewise, all we know about death and judgement we obtained from the same source.  What right have we to accept His teaching on the one and reject it on the other?  If He is an authority on heaven, He is also an authority on Hell.

Some people talk as if love were the only truth Jesus ever taught.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  Jesus did come teaching love.  Indeed, He Himself was the ultimate expression of God’s love (John 3:16).  It is true that God loved the world and that Christ died for all.   It is true that God is ready and willing to reconcile the rebel, forgive the sinner, and receive the prodigal back from the far country.  But what if the rebel spurns God’s love and persists in his rebellion?  What if the sinner refuses forgiveness?  What if the prodigal elects to remain in the distant country?

Jesus taught the love of God as no one else has ever done.  He also spoke of sin, wrath, death and judgement.  He recognized that there is such a thing as willful sin and He did not hesitate to declare that if men will not accept the mercy of God they shut themselves up to the wrath of God (John 3:36). Christianity has two symbols, the cross and the throne.  One speaks of love, the other of judgement.  Every man must make his own choice.  God does not force His will on anyone.  But, the man who rejects God’s love exposes himself to His wrath; and the one is indistinguishable with the other (Acts 17:30-31; Romans 2:3-5; II Thess. 1:7-10).

Must Almighty God, Ruler of heaven and earth tolerate rebellion in His universe forever?  To ask the question is to answer it.  Christ’s picture of the final judgement is completely realistic.  He was too good and too honest to fool us.  What He told us about the judgement to come is the simple, naked, unvarnished truth of God; and we amend or reject it at our own hazard.

We do not preach the wrath of God because we like to, but because Jesus taught it.  Being followers of Christ, we have no choice.  What preacher does not understand the feeling of C.S. Lewis when he wrote: There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this hell, if it lay in my power. . . . . .I would pay any price to be able to say truthfully:All will be saved.’^[4] That is the crux of the matter.  It clearly does not lie in our power to remove hell or any other doctrine from the anthology of Christian truth.  If Jesus Christ is Lord of all life, it compels us to destroy arguments and every proud obstacle to the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ (II Cor. 10:5).

Those who reject Christ’s teaching about everlasting punishment insist that the words He used are not to be taken literally.  According to them, they are symbolic and no longer mean what our predecessors  of a cruder generation thought they meant.  Be that as it may.  If they are merely symbolic, it must be unspeakably awful to require such symbols to express it.  Take the most liberal view, place on these biting words the most compassionate arrangement they can possibly bear; one cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, deny the fact that they describe a form of punishment more severe than any human being would wish to bear.

Is there a second chance after death?

Again,  we are totally dependent for on the New Testament for our information.  There is nothing in the teaching of Christ to suggest the possibility of a second chance after death.  In fact, in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31) the very opposite is clearly taught.  The rich man in hell made two requests to Abraham.  One was that Lazarus be sent to cool his tongue with water.  The other was that he might be sent to the rich man’s family to warn those still on earth to the reality of his torment.  Both requests were denied.  In denying the first request Abraham explained the impossibility of any such arrangement saying, Son, remember that you in your lifetime received your good things and Lazarus in like manner evil things, but now he is comforted here and you are in anguish.  And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed in order that those who would pass from here to you may not be able and none may cross from there to us (Luke 16:26-27).  It is clear from this passage that death seals the fate of both the believer and the non-believer.  Repentance is possible only in this life; after death there is only remorse.  The author of the book of Hebrews says: It is appointed for men to die once and then the judgement- not probation (Hebrews 9:27).  This brings us to the inevitable progression of objections to the heathen and eternal states.

The Heathen and Eternal Destiny

But what about the heathen who have never the gospel and, therefore, cannot be charged with having rejected it?  It is their fate that has caused the most controversy.  And it is this area that the final objections to eternal punishment rest.  The doctrine of everlasting punishment is bad enough when applied to the gospel-hardened sinner who deliberately rejects the gospel.  But, what happens to those in non-Christian countries who never had a chance to accept Christ?  The objections are often framed like this: Is it fair to punish them for rejecting a Christ of whom they are completely ignorant?  Many of them are seeking souls and doubtless would believe if they had an opportunity.  Are all these people going to be forever lost through no fault of their own?

In order to answer these specific charges, it is first necessary to discuss the condition of the heathen in general.  The central passage in the Scriptures relating to those who have never heard the gospel is found in the first three chapters of the book of Romans.  Again, the viewpoint of the book of Romans reveals clearly specific truth regarding the heathen:

Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.  Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,  And changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. (Rom. 1:21-23)

In their progressive apostasy the heathen did not lose all knowledge of God.  They retained a knowledge of God’s eternal power and deity which reached them through creation (often termed general revelation).  For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: (Rom. 1:20)

Also, the revelation of God through creation is supplemented by another revelation through nature.  Speaking to the primitive people of Lycaonia, Paul said, Nevertheless he left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness (Acts 14:17).  Modern man with his food stamps and welfare programs was not the first to discover the connection between food and happiness.  God knew it all along and made provision for both.  Farmers the world over realize how susceptible they are to the whims of the weather: but behind the weather is God, the Creator and Sustainer of the world of nature. Nearly every heathen society has some kind of ritual whereby it celebrates a good harvest.  It is a pity that the thanks offerings on such occasions are usually made to the earth gods, not the God of heaven and earth.  But the recognition is there.  God has not left Himself without witness.

There is still another form of revelation given to the heathen- the human conscience.  The heathen have neither the light of the law nor the light of the gospel; but they do have the light of conscience.  Paul says. For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the mean while accusing or else excusing one another; (Romans 2:14-15).  Conscience is by no means a perfect instrument, and it can be abused to the point where it fails to function properly; but it still remains the inherent regulator within the human heart.  No man is so far debase that his conscience ceases to function.

This brings us to the critical question: On what basis are the heathen to be judged?  At this point there is a great deal of confusion in thinking.  The popular argument goes something like this: There is only one way to be saved and that is through faith in Christ; the heathen, having never heard of Christ, cannot exercise faith; consequently he is doomed to everlasting punishment for something quite beyond his capability. This line of thought is based upon a false assumption that has no support in Scripture.  The assumption is that all men will be judged on the same basis- namely, for failing to believe the gospel.  The second chapter of Romans makes it plain that all men will not be judged on the same basis.  Rather, they will be judged according to the light they received.  In that chapter there are three groups: the Jew, with the light of the law, the Gentile and the light of the gospel, and the heathen with the light of conscience.  No man will be judged by light he did not possess.  Every man possess some form of light and he will be judged by that light and by no other. The greater the light the weightier the responsibility.  The man who all his life lived in the sound of the church bell but never entered the church door will have the hardest time of all.  He will be judged in the blazing light of the full revelation of God’s saving grace in Jesus Christ (II Cor. 4:4).  He had Christian friends and neighbors.  He possessed, or could have easily acquired the Bible, which is able to make him wise unto salvation (II Tim. 3:16).  In his own home, on the radio or television, he could have heard the gospel on any given Sunday.  What excuse does such a man have for failing to surrender to Jesus Christ?  If he goes to hell, he will have no one to blame but himself; and his remorse will be ever so much more when he remembers the hundreds and thousands of opportunities for salvation that he passed up.

The heathen on the other hand will not be judged so severely.  But he will not walk freely into heaven.  He had the light of creation, prudence, and his conscience.  And he will be judged by that light.  If he is finally condemned, it will not be because he failed to believe the gospel, but because he failed to live up to the light he had.  In that case, he too must bear the responsibility for his own destiny.  God does not consign him to hell; he goes there because that is where he belongs.  If the heathen then is judged by the light he received, how will he fare?  The question is often asked: Does anyone live up to the light they receive?  The teachings of Scripture and the testimony of missionaries leave no room for hope in this regard.  If the first chapter of Romans is an accurate picture of the heathen world, the individuals who make up that world are not likely candidates for salvation.  The concept of the noble savage exists only in the mind of the skeptic.  Moral failure is a universal reality.

The gospel clearly says: Everyone who calls upon the Lord will be saved (Romans 10:13).  Do we have the right to substitute the name of Buddha or Krishna for Christ?  Absolutely not!  There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12).  Jesus said, I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but by me (John 14:6).  Paul says, For no other foundation can anyone lay that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ (I Cor. 3:11).  Again he says, For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus (I Timothy 2:5).  The above statements are clear.  They admit only one interpretation.  All other passages which are less clear and which are capable of more than one interpretation must be exegeted in the light of these statements. This is the Truth of the New Testament.  This is the principle upon which all believers, both domestic and foreign, must operate.

In light of Romans 2:6-7, however, we must not completely rule out the possibility, however remote, that here and there throughout history there may have been the odd person who got to heaven without the full light of the gospel.  In that rare case, God is the sole Judge.  He is sovereign in the exercise of His grace.  We are not called upon to pass judgement in such cases- if indeed they ever occur.  God is just above all else and will not condemn a man unjustly.  All who end up in hell will be there because they deserve it.  All who awaken to the joy of heaven, will be there by grace and grace alone.

^[2]The term lost means to be separated from God spiritually.

^[3]J. Oswald Sanders, What of the Unevangelized?  London.  Overseas Missionary Fellowship, 1966.

^[4]C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain. MacMillan, New York.  1962.

By: Ron Lotz

I The Missionary God

If I had to define the plan of salvation in five words or less, I would borrow from the Scriptures four words which sum up all of theology and explode onto the written page with resounding affirmation of the love of God- In the beginning God.^[1] Before the creation of the universe, before the creation of the world, before the creation of you and I, God is and there is no other.  And though there are various logical arguments for a belief in God, the Bible, with authority,  assumes the existence of God.  By the very definition, God is pre-existent and not dependent on anyone or anything.  He is the prime motivator of all that is or ever will be.  For God to create, He must exist prior to anything else.  Thus, Genesis begins with an introduction to God by pointing out more than seventeen times His role, His attribute, as creator.

It is as creator, possibly more than any other attribute, that the Scriptures give us a glimpse of the heart of God and how He does and will react with His creation.  Whereas, the Bible indicates that God is spirit in nature, He is not some inanimate, impersonal force or entity.  God is a person.^[2] A. W. Tozer aptly puts it: Ain the deep of His mighty nature He thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires, and suffers as any other person.  And as a person God interacts.   God interacts with Himself through the eternal relationship of His Triune nature.  Jesus said that He and the Father are one, whatever the Father wills He reveals it to His Son.^[3] Jesus also said of the Holy Spirit that He (Jesus) would send another (parakletos) or the same as Me and when He comes He will glorify Me and reveal Me to the world.^[4] The Bible also indicates that there was an interaction of relationship in the creation of the world.  In other words, all three persons of the Trinity were present, active, and interactive during the creation process.^[5] Hence, because God is a person, he is also relational- He moves through relationship.  God’s relational nature is a direct result of His love. God is love.  Love reaches out.  Love interacts. Love risks.  Love desires a recipient of its attention.  When God created the universe ex nihilo, He acted according to His divine nature and interacted with His creation.^[6] Because God is love, He reaches out and reaches down to His creation and desires to interact with it. Prevenient grace says that before man can reach out to God, God must first reach out to man. God does reach out to man.  God will reach out to man.  God is a God of love and a missionary God- He reaches out.  Love compelled God to create and love persuaded Him to walk with Adam in the garden in the cool of the evening.^[7] God did because God is at heart a missionary, after all, in the beginning God.

II. The Dilemma of the Human Race

So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.  And God blessed them, . . . . . And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.          Genesis 2:27-28; 31

If love compels God to interact with His creation, then the way God interacts is with purpose.  It does not take a person long to discover that this creation we humans relate to is a world of order and design, from the lowly yet sophisticated protein to the vastness and expanse of the solar systems.  God has created a world that is dependent upon Him and each creation has design and purpose.  This purpose was laid out carefully before the creation began; it is the reason God has moved and continues to move in the  world as He does.  In the beginningnot only implies that God first seeks out His creation, but also He moves with a purpose. There is a reason God created the world.  There is a reason God created the plants and animals, fish and fowl.  The world was created for the wonder and enjoyment of His greatest creation- human beings.

Created in the Image of God

Genesis tells us that God created world by speaking it into existence.  All of the wonders of the Universe, all the wonders of this terrestrial ball were created from nothing.  And yet, when God wanted to create a being in His own likeness, God created this hallmark of His love out of the substance of the created world. Perhaps man was created from the dust to remind him, as he looks from his lofty perch, of his lowly beginnings and his dependence on creator God.  Environmentalists have problems with the Biblical view of man’s origins.  They would have mankind somewhere stuck in the primordial ooze and too destructive for his own good.  According to humanists and environmentalists, the human race (a demeaning term) must pull himself up by his own bootstraps and assume his place alongside his brother, the monkey.  Don’t give me none of that Image Deo stuff thank you very much.  Is it any wonder then that evolution reduces man to mere animal, resulting in a society that wonders why its humanity acts like the savage and lives by the code of tooth and claw.  The Bible places humankind into its rightful context, less than God, more than ape, and stewards of all we survey.

We were created in the image of God and placed on this earth to discover and oversea the creation God entrusted us with.  But what does it mean to be created in the image of God?  Does it mean we are mini gods?  Hardly, God makes it clear that He alone is God and He will not share His glory with anyone or anything.^[8] When we say that man is created in the likeness of God, it means just that, likeness, to be like, similar, not the same.  God is a person and has personality. Each human is a person.  We have conscience of being.  As Rousseu has said: I think, therefore I am. We reflect God in personality.  We reason (intellect), feel (emotion), and choose (will).

We can communicate and fellowship (when regenerated – II Peter 1:4) with God and are relational by nature.  God declared humankind good indicating a moral nature.  We are like God in function. Genesis 1:26 connects the ideas of sharing God’s image with sharing His rule or sovereignty over creation.  Humankind, after creation, was placed in a place of honor over all the creation.  There is even, perhaps some sense in which we reflect God in form.  Although God is a Spirit and not a body (John 4:24), our physical form was designed by God as an appropriate means to reflect Him.  When redeemed humanity fellowships with God for eternity, it is in our transformed spiritual, yet physical bodies, we will worship in.  Humankind reflects the Triune nature of God in our physical make-up.  I Thessalonians 5:23 describes humans as having a spirit (pneuma), soul (pseuche), and body (carne).  And whereas, the soul is often used interchangeably in the  Old Testament, the New Testament seems to indicate that the soul can be divided.^[9] Our tripartate nature functions independently, yet interdependently.  Modern science has offered us window into the independent, interdependent nature of our being.  It is possible to keep the body alive apart from the soul or the will and emotions.  We know that the mind and emotions live beyond the grave.  The rich man, according to the Scriptures, looked up from Sheol in torment,recognized Lazarus, and remembered his unsaved brothers.^[10] It is the Bible that tells us the Spirit is dead or separated from God and yet our physical body lives and breathes.^[11] Still, it takes all three functions of mind, body and spirit to complete the person.   Humankind is eternal.  When the Bible talks about death, it speaks of it in terms of separation. The first death is separation from the physical world. The second death is eternal separation from God. Death is not annihilation, as some believe.  Jesus even said three times in Mark 9 that those who reject life in Christ will go to a place where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched. And last of all, like God, Adam and Eve, the first humans, were created good.  In fact God called Adam and Eve and all of His creation very good- without sin.  But this was about to change.

The Cause of Sin

The fall of humankind was a specific historical event.  According to the Scriptures, God placed Adam and Eve in a garden and told them they were to be fruitful and multiply.  God told Adam and Eve that they could eat of any of the fruits of garden except for the fruit of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  It is apparent from Scripture that Adam and Eve were to tend the garden and love in relationship with each other and their creator.  Jesus made reference to Adam and Eve in Matthew 19, indicating that they were indeed actual people and not mere myth.  Since God gave them a choice as to what to eat and not to eat, it is evident that Adam and Eve were created with a moral will.  According to Genesis, disobedience to God’s command regarding the tree of Good and Evil would result in death. There was no other temptation in the garden.  The temptation, the test, was simply a choice to obey or disobey God- obedience would guarantee relationship, disobedience the severing of relationship, or death.

Now the temptation came in form of a being who was already in disobedience to God.  Satan, according to Isaiah, was a very important angel who rebelled against God and fell from his place of honor around the throne of God.^[12] God allowed Satan to enter the garden and tempt Adam and Eve to disobey. Satan came into the garden disguised as a serpent and preyed on Eve as she came near the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Satan’s approach then and now was to take the words of God and twist them in order to throw doubt in the mind of those, in this case Eve, who hear them.  First Satan questioned God’s goodness (Did God really say you must not eat of the tree Gen. 3:1). Eve’s reply reveals this subtle ploy when she adds to what God said by stating that not only were not to eat of the tree (God’s words) but that they were not even allowed to touch it (Eve’s words).  In other words, God is not good because He is withholding things from you, good things, things you want, things you need.  Next Satan then denies God’s justice (You surely shall not die Gen. 3:4).  In other words, there are no consequences for disobeying God, in fact you will be like God and you can then determine for yourself what is right and what is wrong. Genesis 3:6 then indicates that Eve doubted God, believed Satan, ate the fruit, and sin entered the creation.  Eve, now acting according to her new nature, sought out Adam to corrupt him and cause him to fall- and he did.  This sin was unique in that Adam and Eve sinned without a sin nature.  They sinned by choice only.  The rest of humankind is now sinful by nature and by choice.

The Nature of Sin and Its Consequence

And , the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?       Genesis 3:9

The first reaction of Adam and Eve in their new status as gods was to hide from their creator, the one who made them and was in the habit of joining in fellowship with them in the cool of the evening.  Sin’s effect was immediate.  Adam and Eve immediately separated themselves from God.  Death, the lackey to sin, followed on sin’s heels into a now fallen world.  In order to fully appreciate how far Adam and Eve had fallen from favor with God and to fully understand the consequences of their sin on them and their offspring, it is beneficial first to explore the nature of sin.

What does sin look like?  Is it a compilation of misdeeds, like a celestial debit account with God? This is often the view by many.  According to some, sin is merely a clumsy stumble on an otherwise good nature.  But this not how the Bible views this progeny of disobedience.  Sin, in the Scriptures, encompasses all that is the opposite of good, the opposite of God.  Sin is not an entity, nor a personality, like the Holy Spirit, but rather, Sin is a force, a corruption that acts upon the creation formed by God. Sin finds it expression through the life of God’s creation.  Sin is not a part of God, as some pantheists claim, nor does sin come from God.  God is perfect and cannot sin (James 1:13).  Perhaps the most credible account of the  origin of sin is that sin springs from created beings who are less than perfect.  Somehow sin is born when created, good beings turn from a perfect, holy God. Whatever the source of sin, its effect is swift and sure.  Sin is universal.^[13] When Adam and Eve sinned, sin not only entered the creation, but somehow became a part of it, so that the Bible tells that all of humankind is now born sinful.^[14] And not only is humankind born sinful, but also all of nature is under the curse and penalty of sin.^[15] Man sins now because it is his nature to sin.^[16] But what does it mean to sin?

Social scientists and scholars for centuries have tried to comprehend what the immorality man commits against his fellow man looks like and label it. However, immoral men trying to describe the cause and cure for fellow immoral man is much like one fish telling another fish why he cannot breathe on dry land.  Our authoritative word and understanding of sin must come from the same source from where we also learn of sin’s origin- the Bible. The Bible not only tells what sin is, but it also tells us what sin looks like- its character, its nature.

The nature of sin can be described in three basic terms: sensuality, selfishness, and displacement. The ten commandments are an outline of these three essences. God begins with the first essence, that of displacement- you shall have no other gods before Me. Sin attempts to replace God with other people, other things.  The replacement may be a philosophy, a spouse, an effigy, or even oneself.  The second essence is selfishness.  Selfishness is a pre-occupation with the self- Keep the Sabbath, set aside time for God, honor your father and mother, serve your family not yourself.  The final essence is that of sensuality or the giving in to the senses, allowing the physical nature to dominate and dictate- lust, greed, rage, etc.  Out of the essence of sin is spawned the sins that are so evident in our society.  But sin not only has an essence, it has a character or a description of its nature.

The Bible describes sin in various terms.  In the Old Testament sin can mean perversion (AVAH) or the twisting and distorting of something that God created as good (sex, marriage, parent/child relationship).^[17] Sin can also mean wickedness (RAH) or moral and spiritual evil.  RAH carries with it a sense of wanting to do harm to others.^[18] Closely associated with RAH is CHAMAS.  CHAMAS carries with a will to do violence or damage, especially in human relationships.^[19] One of the affects of sin upon God’s creation was, whereas the creation was good and at peace, it is now violent and fraught with bloodshed.  Many scientist believe that until the Fall, God’s creatures were vegetarian in nature.  It is noteworthy, that one of the signs of God’s restoration and redemption of His creation is a cessation of bloodshed. . . Aand the Lion will eat straw like an Ox (Isaiah 65:25).  Another meaning for sin is that of a transgressor (PASHA) or one who goes against God or the laws of God.^[20] There is also corruption (RASHA) or wickedness.  RASHA is one of the more important meanings for sin in the Old Testament because it denotes something that is part of our nature, ingrained, innate- We have sinned and have acted perversely and wickedly (I Kings 8:47).^[21] But perhaps the best meaning of sin is that of missing the mark (CHATAH).  The Old Testament uses this meaning for sin more than 600 times and probably best describes our condition in reference toward God.^[22] It was God’s desire that humans were to be good. We now fall short of that mark- there is none righteous, not even one (Psalm 14).  God’s plan was for humankind to be His sovereign rulers over His creation, the exclamation point to creation.  He gave us a place of honor, a place of glory.  We now have fallen short of the mark- all have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23).  It was God’s design that we live in eternal harmony and fellowship with almighty God.  We now have missed that mark- ... and they hid their face from God(Genesis 3:8).  This is the character of sin.  Sin destroys. Sin kills.  Sin separates.  Sin keeps us from being what God intended us to be.  But sin also has consequences.

When Adam and Eve sinned there were immediate and eternal consequences, not only for them, but also for all of humankind that would follow.   Immediately, Adam and Eve were cast out of the garden and the world was then cursed because of sin. No longer would they experience the joy of walking with their God free from sin.  All their progeny would be born in sin.^[23] Human beings, once emulating the Glory of God would now find the image corrupted by sin- our minds, our emotions, our will, our bodies.^[24] No more would the earth yield its fruit willingly.  Instead, work, which was once a joy, would now become a burden.^[25] Pain and misery would now be a part of the creation.  Eve would give birth in pain.  Pain would be an ever present part of life, not only physically but also relationally.^[26] Worst of all, humankind would now die.  Spiritual death (separated from God) had already happened, but now the human race would also experience physical death (separation from the creation).^[27] Humankind would be born dead to God and dying from God’s creation.  In fact, all of God’s creation would now be in the process of dying or wasting away.  The clock of time began to tick then, in the garden,  and now all of life would be measured by it judicial tone.  But even in the midst of all these hopeless consequences of sin, God infused hope. God was not surprised by what Adam and Eve did, nor was He left impotent.  Before Eve even thought to disobey, God was then moving into place His plan to redeem back His creation and His people.  Because God is a missionary God, a God who seeks us out before we even think to seek Him, He was already proclaiming the promise of One who would come to deliver us from our sin.

. . . .it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.           Genesis 3:15

III.       God’s Response and  Christ’s Work

God often visits us, but most of the time we are not home.

- Joseph Roux

If the love of God compels Him to seek out His creation relationally, it is His grace, His unfathomable grace, that continues to seek a fallen creation that wants nothing to do with God.  When sin entered the creation and the hearts of Adam and Eve, it not only brought separation, but also sin killed humankind’s natural affection for God (Romans 3:11-12).  Humankind, created to know God and worship Him, now turned their collective attention inward. Adam and Eve ran and hid from God and their offspring are running still.  But God, because He is a God who seeks us out, immediately sought out Adam and Eve and gave them a promise that One was coming who would destroy Satan and sin and redeem the creation, including humankind.

God’s Plan for Man

The Bible is a testimony of God’s promise to Adam and his offspring.  The Old Testament records the result and reaction of sin.  It records God’s intervention, sometimes directly, other times through chosen men and women, to slow down the ravages of sin.  But most of all, the Old Testament records the promise of the coming of the Messiah, the deliverer, or the savior.  Prophecies were told of how He would come.  Born of a Virgin (Isaiah 7:14; Gal. 4:4).  Pre-existent, yet born into the covenant of Abraham through the tribe of Judah.  Descended from the lineage of David (Luke 1:31-33).  Born in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2).  Born to set all of humanity free from the bondage of sin.

Because sin so permeates humans, because the disease afflicting all of humanity is so final, the Savior sent by God required a unique solution.  Since through Adam, sin entered the human race, the Messiah or savior must be without sin.  This disqualified all humans born through natural procreation.  The law required nothing short of perfection, so He must be sinless.  And yet, to redeem humanity, the Savior must also be human. The solution was for God to descend to earth, become human, and rescue His creation.  The fulfillment to the promise was Jesus Christ- the God-Man.  Jesus Christ, the second part of the triune God, came in the flesh, to ransom humanity from the ravages and the penalty of sin.  Jesus was no less God in His humanity nor no less man in His deity- all the Godhead dwelled in Jesus bodily.^[28] God entered His creation, walked among humankind, and experienced what it means to be human- pain, suffering, hunger, fatigue, and even death.  The deity of Christ was veiled by His humanity, like a glass of milk obscured by a red, see- through coating upon the glass; the milk is not evident until the milk is poured out (Phillipians 2:7).  Deity took on humanity in order for God to redeem humankind.  This was the promise made to Adam and the good news for his offspring.  Just as through one man (Adam), sin entered the world, so too, through one man (Jesus) all the world might be saved through Him (Romans 5).   God’s plan to redeem humankind through Jesus Christ, gives us a glimpse of His holiness and the reason for the necessity of the cross.  Like a solar eclipse God’s holiness and His judgement for the creation is especially evident against the contrast of our sin.

Holy, according to the Scriptures, means to be set apart, not like any other.  God is Holy.  He is not like any other thing and therefore without sin.  God cannot sin.  Because of His nature, He cannot and will not tolerate sin going unpunished (Job 34:10). God’s law established from the beginning what the penalty for sin would be- death.  If a person sins they must pay for their sin or sins with their own life.  All who sin must die (Genesis 2:17; Romans 6:23). Humankind violated God’s law in the garden of Eden and permanently implanted the sin nature in the human race; hence all men are under the condemnation of death for their sins (Romans 3:10-20).  God’s promise to Adam was to save him from the penalty and the consequences of sin.  But God could not break His own law and remain God.  The penalty for sin must be paid.  All those guilty of sin must die.  Humankind was in a hopeless situation. Man wants to live.  God’s holiness requires that he die for his sins.  God promised to redeem His creation.  No person on earth was qualified.  But God again, acting according to His nature, offered hope, where hope was gone and fulfilled His promise through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. One man died for the sins of all humanity.  This is the good news of the Gospel.  This is the reason for a hill called Golgotha and an old rugged cross.

The Significance of the Crucifixion

The march of history from the time of Adam until the coming of Christ looked for this promise.  All of history since the first coming of Christ looks back to claim this promise.  The central moment of history, the apex of time was played out on a hill far away where stood an old rugged cross.  Salvation is only understood in light of the cross.  God’s missionary heart is especially evident under the shadow of the cross.  God’s promise to all of humankind can only be understood through the meaning of the cross. Because we could not save ourselves, Jesus Christ died in our place to satisfy the requirement of the Law and God’s holiness.^[29] This was the meaning of the cross, the fulfillment of God’s promise to redeem humanity from their sin.  The cross is a testimony of this promise and a proclamation of our salvation. The cross was necessary.  It fulfilled the prophecies foretold of Christ’s death, thus completing the covenant to the children of Israel.^[30] The cross, because of the Roman Empire’s obsession with details, guaranteed the recording of Christ’s death and its authenticity.  The cross, because of its place and significance  in history, assured the greatest possible audience to hear the good news.  And the cross, because it held the perfect sacrifice, purchased our salvation.  As a popular hymn phrases it, I owed a debt I could not pay, He paid a debt He did not owe. Jesus Christ died for me so that I would not have to die eternally.  John the Baptist said it best,Behold the Lamb of God which takes away the sins of the world. (John 1:29)   It is a simple message with a complex meaning.  But what exactly was accomplished through the death of Jesus Christ on the cross

Of Salvation and the Atonement

Salvation is both simple and complex.  In simple terms, Jesus Christ died for our sins.  However, several elements are present in the meaning behind the death of Christ.  Whereas the simple act of His death was once and for all, what was accomplished in His death was anything but simple.  But one central truth is most evident and all other truths connected with the death of Jesus Christ hinge on this reality- that of atonement.  When Adam and Eve sinned and hid from God in the garden, God took the skins of animals and covered their shame (Genesis 3:21).  Shame is the realization that I no longer measure up to the standard of God’s holiness (II Corinthians 3:4-4:7).  Blood was shed to cover Adam and Eve’s shame and sin.  This was not by mere convenience of the proximity of animals in the garden.  God took the blood of an innocent animal to cover the nakedness and sin of Adam and Eve for a reason.  The covering of sin with the blood of the innocent was the pattern God established to foreshadow the coming Jesus Christ, innocent and pure, to atone or cover the sins of humankind.  The sacrificial system was established by God in the Old Testament to establish the pattern of the shedding of blood to cover sins.   Noah, when he and his family exited the ark after the flood offered a blood sacrifice to cover their sins and establish a new covenant with God (Genesis 8:20-21).  When God wanted to make a new covenant with Abraham, he commanded Abraham to sacrifice clean animals and halve them with a path between the halves.  God and Abraham both walked through the blood to seal the new covenant ( Genesis 15).  The pattern was established that only the blood of the innocent can atone or cover the sins of the guilty.  But God made it very clear in the Old Testament that the blood sacrifice of bulls and rams was only a temporary measure to cover sins .  The blood of rams and bulls were offered on credit looking for the day when the Messiah, Jesus Christ, The final and complete Lamb of God would die for the sins of the world once and for all ( Psalm 40:6; Hebrews 10).  Scripture makes it clear that the blood of Jesus Christ shed at Calvary atones or covers the sins of all who will receive God’s forgiveness through Jesus Christ.^[31] The atonement was not a partial covering, but a complete covering (Hebrews 2:9; Isaiah 53:6).  The atonement offered by Jesus Christ was both general and specific.  The atonement was general in that it was offered once for all.^[32] The atonement was specific, in that it is only available to those who receive Jesus Christ as Savior (Colossians 1:14, 19-22).

Scripture indicates that God’s wrath is reserved for those who remain in their sin.  Because God is holy, He must judge and deal with sin.  The Old Testament clearly illustrates the wrath of God reserved for those who rebel against God.  Perhaps one of the clearest instances of God’s wrath is the sin of Aachen in Joshua chapter seven.  God told the children of Israel that the first city and all of the plunder was to be an offering to the Lord and therefore off limits to the children of Israel.  Aachen disobeyed God’s commandment and took some of the spoil of Jericho for himself.  The Scriptures indicate that God’s wrath was poured out on Israel because of Aachen’s sin.  In fact, God’s wrath was only appeased when the guilt of Aachen was exposed and the children of Israel judged and stoned Aachen and his family.  Aachen was an example to Israel and others that rebellion against a holy God will draw His wrath.  Another instance of God’s wrath, reserved for those who sin, is found in Job 42:8. Job’s three friends were commanded by God to bring sacrifices before the Lord to prevent or appease God’s wrath against them, because of the their misrepresentation of God before Job.  In fact the peace offering depicted in Leviticus 3 was a sacrifice to restore fellowship with God and appease or hold back God’s wrath.

Some have the notion that God’s wrath reserved for sin is only found in the old Testament, but the New Testament also indicates that God’s wrath will be poured out on all those who are in rebellion against God because of their sin.^[33] Clearly, the death of Christ not only atoned or covered our sin, but His death also appeased or satisfied God’s wrath against sin.  Propitiation or the appeasing of God’s wrath is a part of what we receive from the atoning act of Christ.  God’s wrath reserved for you and I was instead directed against the Son of God.  I John 4:10 says: Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. One misguided Baptist minister, in response to the crucifixion made the statement: I want nothing to do with the notion of a bloody God beating up on His boy!  This minister did not understand the depths of God’s love.  God loved us so much that He was willing to take upon Himself the beating that was awaiting us if we did not repent.  He was bruised for our iniquities.  Jesus Christ turned away God’s wrath from all who believe on Him. (Isaiah 53).

Wrapped up in the atonement is also the notion of substitution.  This simply means that Christ died in the place of sinners.  The Greek preposition antimeans in the place of something or someone.  It is used with this meaning in a passage where Jesus is giving an interpretation of His own death (Matthew 20:28).  Jesus said His death was to be a ransom or payment in the place of many.  Peter and Paul also pick up on this them and clearly indicate that Jesus’death was a substitution- He died in our place.^[34] The cross was our ransom from the grip of death and the resurrection was the exclamation point to prove that He had the power not only to ransom us but also power over death itself.

Sin separates.  Sin separated humanity from fellowship and communion with God.  Another provision afforded those who believe is our reconciliation with God.  Christ’s death reconciled us or brought us back into relationship with God.  We who were once alien are now a part of the family of God (II Corinthians 5:19) This reconciliation was physically demonstrated at the death of Jesus by the rending of the veil over the entrance to the Holy of Holies in the temple at Jerusalem (Luke 23:45).  The veil was torn so that we who receive Jesus Christ may approach the throne of grace before almighty God and relate to Him.

But perhaps the most significant accomplishment in the cross of Christ for Western culture is the reality of our justification.  Paul lays out this truth in Romans.  Romans indicates that God established the Law in the old Testament, not in order that we might be saved through it, for the Law of God cannot save us, but instead, the Law was established by God to act as a mirror reflecting the iniquity of our hearts (Romans 3: also Acts 13:39). God presented the Law to Moses to show the people what His standard would be.  Because the standard was perfection, the Law shows us our total inability to keep the Law and our evident guilt before God.  All are guilty.  All have sinned.  All deserve punishment. The death of Jesus Christ fulfilled the requirements of the Law.  Jesus paid the penalty for sin. Justification means that we are declared righteous before God- just as if we had never sinned.  Just as through Adam all are guilty of breaking the law of God, through Christ, all those who are in Christ, are declared not guilty, because Christ lived up to the standard of the Law.  Because Christ fulfilled the Law and was thus declared righteous, He gave us His righteousness.  The righteousness of Christ wasimputed to us who believe.  The demands of the Law have been fulfilled in Christ (Romans 5:9).  We are righteous not because of what we did, but rather we are righteous because of what Christ did.

All this and much more was accomplished through the death of Jesus Christ.  We have been adopted into the family of God, forgiven for our sins, cleansed from sin, granted eternal life in the presence of God, and rescued from the consequences of sin- eternal separation and punishment.  In fact salvation means literally the act of being snatched from or removed from the path of destruction as a result of our sin.  All that Christ has done for humanity, He offers freely to all who will receive it.  Love compels God to do this.  Love motivates God to pursue us.  Salvation is a gift available to all.  It cannot be earned.  It must be received.  But what does it means to receive salvation?  What does it mean to be saved?

IV.            Reasons, Responses, and Rejections

The provision of salvation for all of humanity is God’s part of salvation.  There is nothing we can do to earn salvation nor can we save ourselves.  Jesus Christ died for our sins ( I Corinthians 15:3).  Jesus Christ was buried and rose on the third day, alive forever more.  Jesus Christ appeared to many witnesses to assure His disciples that the salvation He offers, the promise to save, is true and believable (Acts 1:1-3).  Jesus commissioned His disciples to go out and share this good news of salvation offered to all ( Matthew 28:18-20).  This is God’s part of the process.  God’s Spirit seeks out the individual and begins to convince him or her of their need for God. The Bible tells us that man is totally depraved and no one seeks after God.^[35] It is God’s spirit that convicts us of our sin (John 16:7-11).  It is God’s Spirit that regenerates our spirit when we respond to the prompting of the Holy Spirit.  Most evangelicals agree on this points for the most part.  However, when we begin to talk about our response to the good news of Jesus Christ, misunderstanding and disagreement occurs.  What is required for a person to be saved?  Some say it is faith alone that saves a person.  According to them, all a person has to do is intellectually assent to the reality of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and His ability to save them.  Other evangelicals assert that repentance is necessary prior to faith, in order for a person to be saved from their sins.  All other issues of salvation, on our part, the response to the message, seem to emanate from these two points- faith and repentance.

Reaction to the Message

What is required  for a person to be saved?  Faith and faith alone.  Ephesians tells that by grace a person is saved (God’s part) through faith (our part) it is the gift of God (Ephesians 2:8).  Salvation is free to all who have faith.^[36] But what does it means to have faith?  Theologians, such as Zane Hodges and Charles Ryrie, insist that all that is required for salvation is for a person to intellectually embrace the gospel message.  According to those who hold to this definition of faith, repentance and confession follow the act of faith.  For those with this definition of faith, to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ means to understand and agree with the truth of the Gospel message.  A faith alone gospel presentation generally follows this pattern: only believe; God has a wonderful plan for your life; Jesus loves you and wants to become a part of your life. But does this definition of accurately describe what is involved when a person believes or faiths.  Hebrews 11:6 tells us that they that come to God must believe that He is and that He is the rewarder of those who diligentlyseek Him. ^[37] The Reformers taught the we are saved by faith alone, but the faith that saves in never alone- it is accompanied by repentance and a changed life.  It is not enough to merely agree with what the Bible says is true.  The Bible also says that the devil believes in God and trembles (James 2:19). Does this mean that Satan is saved?  Jesus said in Matthew 7:21 that : not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Evidently, a faith that saves, according to the Scriptures, requires more than intellectual assent. This would be in keeping with the proper definition of faith.

In the Bible, faith and believe are used interchangeably.  In fact both words have the same Greek root of pith.  Pith means literally to bind to oradhere to.  Like glue or tar adheres to a surface.  It is the imagery of clinging to something for life as opposed to merely holding onto for comfort or convenience.  It is the picture of a drowning man binding himself to the mast of a ship in order to keep from dying.  This is how faith is used in the Scriptures.  Faith is not merely believing in the message of the Gospel (though this is an important aspect), but rather believing in whom the Gospel message is about.  It is yielding to the Lord Jesus Christ.  It is clinging to Jesus.  It is putting ones trust in Jesus Christ and obeying Him.  When Jesus wanted to convey the truth of what it means to have faith in Him, he often used the imagery of marriage to convey this truth.  In marriage, the bride gives herself to the groom.  The bride loses her life and independence, in exchange for the life of the groom. The bride places her trust in the groom.  This what is meant by faith alone.  The sinner must trust Jesus Christ.  The sinner must give up his/her life (independence) in exchange for eternal life.  This is what James was referring to when he said : show me your faith by your works (James 2:14-20).  In other words, there should be evidences present in your life that indicate you have indeed placed yourself into the hands of Jesus Christ.  Salvation is not merely an addition to your life, it is a radical change in who you are or as Jesus said to Nicodemus: you must be born again to enter the kingdom of God.  (John 4). Perhaps the most telling passage in regard to what true faith is all about can be found in the gospel of John.

John 2:23 tells us that Jesus was in Jerusalem for the Passover celebration and many people believed in His name.  Sounds like salvation.  But the passage goes to tells us that Jesus would not entrust Himself to them, because He knew their hearts. What?  Here we have people believing in Jesus’name and yet Jesus would not entrust Himself to them. The key to this passage is found in verse 23. Evidently the people were believing in the signs Jesus performed but were not willing to entrust themselves to Jesus like His disciples had done. Verse 25 alludes to this when it says that Jesus knew their hearts.  Jesus reemphasized this truth that faith requires trust, not mere intellectual assent, after the miracle of the feeding the 5000 with the loaves and fishes in John 6.  Jesus told His disciple, using the bread as the analogy, that eternal life comes from believing or placing ones trust in Him.  The Jews wanted what Jesus could do for them- fulfill their needs, give them bread.  Jesus wanted His disciples to see that true fulfillment comes from trusting in Him.  This was made clear at the end of His teaching when He said: some of you do not believe.

So faith involves not only intellectually agreeing with the truth that Christ died for our sins, but also faith involves placing our trust in Jesus Christ.  It is believing that He (Jesus) is able to do what He promised to do, namely, forgive us our sins, change our hearts, and give us eternal life in Him.  This is why repentance is necessary before faith is possible.

Regarding Repentance and Redemption

Repentance is not some addendum to faith.  A clause added on at the last minute.  It is not, Oh, by the way, now that you have received Christ, you really should repent. Repentance is an integral part of salvation.  John the Baptist was sent by God, to Israel, to prepare them for the coming of Jesus, the messiah.  John’s message was repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of your sins (Mark 1:4). Jesus’ first sermon, following His baptism and temptation, was repent for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand (Matthew 4:17).  Peter and the Apostles’ first sermon after the ascension of Jesus Christ, after declaring who Jesus was and what He did, was a call for repentance.  The Bible indicates that the crowd was pierced to the heart by the proclamation of the gospel and they asked Peter what they should do? What was Peter’s reply?  Just believe in Jesus?  All you have to do is receive this free gift of salvation? No!  Peter’s response to them was repent and be baptized (Acts 2). Lest anyone should think this was merely one instance, Peter again, in the next chapter, after healing the lame man, preached again repentance as necessary before salvation was possible. Forgiveness is only possible where repentance is offered.  A person must not only believe that Jesus died for their sins, but they must also recognize that they are indeed sinners in need of a Savior.  Perhaps the most powerful of God’s redemptive love that Jesus told was the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15.  Not only does the story reveal the heart of God, but it also demonstrates for us what God considers necessary for a son to be reconciled to his father, whether earthly or heavenly. When the son realized his folly and was suffering the consequences of his sin, notice his response toward his father.  With his intellect he reasoned, Father I have sinned against heaven and before you (Luke 15:18).  The son recognized his sinful condition and forsook it- I . . . am no longer worthy to be your son (Luke 15:21).  It is a clear picture of how God receives back into His fellowship, His fallen creation in humanity.  Repentance requires a recognition of wrongness.  This is what the word repentance (metaneo) means.  It means to change one’s mind about previous actions, attitudes and opinions.  It means a change in mind about sin, about God, and about oneself.

Repentance involves a change in mind about sin.  A person must see for what it is, exceedingly sinful.  Sin is not a right or a privilege, instead it is rebellion against a holy God.  Repentance in regards to sin, understands that sin is not only against other people but that it is primarily against God.  The Psalmist stated it best when he said: Against Thee only have I sinned and done what is evil in Thine sight(Psalm 51:14).  Repentance over sin requires that a person commit to putting away sin from his or her life.  One poet illustrated this so succinctly:

Tis not enough to say, I’m sorry and repent and then go on from day to day just as I always went. Repentance is to leave the sins we loved before, and show in earnest grieve by doing them no more.

Repentance involves a change in mind about God.  To the unrepentant sinner, God is viewed as a distant benevolent figure unconcerned or mildly concerned with His creation.  Or perhaps God is viewed as some celestial big bully or policeman keeping people from enjoying life.  When the Holy Spirit begins to convict the heart of the sinner, he or she begins to see God for who He is.  God is Holy and will not tolerate sin or rebellion.  God’s judgement is sure and unavoidable.  God’s love offers salvation in spite of ourselves.  And finally, repentance allows us to see that God’s offer of salvation is our only hope.  When repentance enters the heart of a sinner, he or she will throw themselves upon God’s mercy and cling to the hope of the message of the cross.

Last of all, repentance requires a change in mind about the self.  Pride seems to be at the center and at the heart of sin.  God hates pride.  Before a person can reach out to the Holy Spirit’s convicting power, he or she must recognize that the need God.  They must recognize that they need to relinquish control of their life.  Pride must be crushed before penitent tears fall.  When the Holy Spirit convicts, there must be godly sorrow for being sinful.  Charles Spurgeon sums the need for a proper recognition of our sinful self when he said:

The Holy Spirit does not come to make sinners comfortable in their sins, but to cause them to grieve over their sins,.  He does not help them to forget their sin or to think little of it, but He comes to convince them of the horrible enormity of their iniquity. . . .This work is most necessary, because without it there is no leading men to receive the gospel of the grace of God.

Salvation is only possible by faith.  Faith is only possible when a person recognizes the hopeless situation they find themselves in because of their sins and change their mind and will and reach out toward God.  When the repentant sinner reaches out, God gives them the faith to trust Him to save them, cleanse them, and forgive them.  Salvation is available for all, but only possible for those who repent and believe.  Repentance is every bit a gift from God as faith is.  The gift of salvation is not an indulgence to sin, but rather a remedy for our sin. Cheap grace and faith apart from repentance leaves the sinner with false hope and still in their sin.  A penitent faith allows the heart to receive the cleansing, forgiving  gift of Jesus Christ, who is salvation and eternal life.  Eternal life and forgiveness of sins is found in a person.  The person foretold by God when Adam and Eve first sinned.  The person promised to come in the Old Testament.  The person who came and fulfilled the Scriptures, died in our place, rose again, and seeks out the sinner to save- The God-man Jesus Christ.

Rejection and Results

Salvation is the message of the good news that Jesus Christ died for us so that we do not have to die.  Jesus Christ became sin for us, so that our sins might be forgiven.  Jesus Christ reconciled us back to God so that we might have fellowship with Him. All this God offers freely and without reserve.  But what about those who reject God’s provision of Jesus Christ?  Did the death of Christ guarantee that every person will be saved?  As we have discussed, salvation is based on the acceptance or rejection of Jesus Christ.  In fact, Revelation tells us that those who put their trust in Jesus Christ have their names written in the Lamb’s (Jesus) book of life.  At the end of time only those whose names are written there will live with God eternally (Revelation 20:12).  But what happens to those whose names are not written in the Book of Life.  Revelation does not keep us ignorant, but clearly tells us that the destiny of those who refuse to place their trust in Jesus Christ is hell or the lake of fire (Revelation 20:15).  Hell is a place set aside by God for those who rebel against Him.  God must judge sin.  God will judge sinners.  Jesus spoke of hell as an actual place.^[38] The story of the rich man and Lazarus gives some details about what hell is like (Luke 16).  It is a place of torment (16:23). It is a place where fire and decay never cease (Matthew 3:12).  Not only is the fire eternal, but hell itself is forever.  Jesus indicates that it is a place to avoid at all costs (Matthew 18:8).  The Scriptures also indicate that those reject Jesus Christ deserve hell. God is just to send them there.  God’s desire is that no one should perish in hell (John 3:17).  Every possible provision has been made.  God has done all that He can do to save humanity.  God’s love for us compelled Him to take upon Himself our sins, to die in our place, to remove our sin.  For a person to reject Jesus Christ and His atoning death, is to agree with God that he or she wishes to stay in their sin. Since God must judge sin, He has no other alternative but to judge the sinner.  Since hell is the place reserved for sin, it is also the place reserved for sinners.  All those who end up in hell will be there willingly. Part of the good news of Jesus Christ is that we do not have to go to hell.  A way of escape has been provided for us in Jesus Christ- all that is required is to trust in Jesus and He will deliver His people from death and destruction in hell.

In the beginning God created man.  God sought His creation out to commune and have fellowship with man.  Even when man separated himself from God, because of sin, God, the missionary God, sought out man and provided a way for him to be forgiven of his sins and restored into fellowship with God.  God did, because, more than any other attribute, God is love.

Love seeks out.  Love is willing to suffer for the recipient of His affection.  Love compels the lost man to be find, even when the lost man does not want to be found.  Love forgives, even though we do not deserve forgiveness.  Love is possible for you and me, because love is Jesus Christ.

And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation;  And hast made us unto our God kings and priests:

Revelation 5:9-10

^[2]John 4:24

^[3]Luke 10:22; John 10:38; John 14:10-11

^[4]John 14:6; 14:26; 16:13-14

^[5]Genesis 1:2; John 1:1-4; 10; I Cor. 8:6; Colossians 1:16; Hebrews 1:2; 9:26

^[6]Hebrews 11:3

^[7]Genesis 3:8

^[8]Isaiah 45:22; 46:9; Ezekiel 28:9; Hosea 11:9

^[9]Genesis 2:7; Job 27:3; Hebrews 4:12

^[10]Luke 16:20-31

^[11]The spirit seems to be the part of our being that relates to God and the    soul is the part of our being that relates to other humans and the created world.

^[12] Isaiah 14:12-20

^[13]Genesis 6:5,11; Psalm 14, 53; Romans 3:9-12;

^[14]Romans 5:12-14; Ephesians 2:3

^[15]Romans 8:19

^[16]Genesis 8:21

^[17]Genesis 19:15; Proverbs 12:8; Job 33:27; Jeremiah 11:10

^[18]Genesis 19:7; Proverbs 21:10

^[19]Jeremiah 22:3; Zephaniah 3:4

^[20]I Kings 12:19; Hosea 14:9; Isaiah 46:8

^[21]see also Job 10:7; Nehemiah 9:33; Daniel 12:10.

^[22] The Greek form of this word is hamartano and is used more than 250 times in the New Testament.  I Cor. 3:16-17

^[23]Psalm 51:5

^[24]Romans 1:28; 1:26; 7:20

^[25]Genesis 3:17

^[26]Genesis 3:16; I Corinthians 11:3; 14:34; Ephesians 5:24,25; Titus 2:3-5;

Peter 3:1,5,6.

^[27]Ephesians 2:3; Romans 5:12

^[28] Jesus’  humanness: Matthew 26;12; Hebrews 4:15

Jesus’ Deity: Hebrews 1:8;13:8; I John 5:7; Matthew 18:20; 28:18;

John   1:1-18; Luke 7:48.

The complete Divine -Humanness: Hebrews 1:3; 4:15.

^[29] Galatians 3; Romans 10:4; Colossians 2:14; I Peter 1:13-16

^[30] Hebrews 9:17-10:18

^[31]Luke 2:30-31; Galatians 4:4,5; Ephesians 1:3-13, 17-22; 2:4-10.

^[32] Hebrews 7:27; 9:24-28; I Peter 3:18

^[33] Romans 1:18; 2:5; Ephesians 2:3; 5:6; Colossians 3:6

^[34]II Corinthians 5:21 and I Peter 3:18

^[35] Romans 3:10-18; I Corinthians 2:14; II Corinthians 4:3-4; Ephesians 2:1-3.

^[36] Nearly 200 times faith or belief is stated as the single requirement for salvation  in the New Testament (see John 1:12; Acts 16:31).

^[37] Emphasis mine

^[38] Matthew 7:13; 10:28; 22:13

However, God is not only holy, He above all else is love, and therefore His ultimate desire for human beings is for them to be restored to full, loving fellowship with Him.  But there is a barrier- sin.  For complete unity of heart, two persons must be in harmony of spirit (Amos 3:3).  They must have the same purposes, the same way of life.  If one is sinful and the other holy, how can there be fellowship? The barrier must be removed if humans are to be able to fellowship with God.  The removal process of the sin barrier is called sanctification and the process comes in three stages: positional, experiential, and complete sanctification (glorification).  Each work is accomplished on the part of God as an act of His grace.

Positional sanctification takes place at the point of salvation.  It is our standing with God, set apart from the penalty of sin by the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ. When a person accepts the substitutionary death of Christ as payment for their own personal sins, they are set apart unto God; they become God’s own possession (I Corinthians 6:20). Their position moves from sinner to saint, unrighteous to righteous, profane to holy (Romans 6:15-19).  Christian are holy because Christ is holy, His righteousness becomes our righteousness.  The reality of our position in Christ is accomplished in basically three ways.

First we are forgiven.  The result of sin, eternal punishment, is done away with.  The debt of sin, death, is removed and God’s wrath is turned away because of the Cross.

The second reality is our justification. Justification is a legal term Paul uses in the book of Romans to explain the reality of our position before God a the point of salvation.  Because of sin, each person stands guilty before a holy God.  Justification means that someone else paid the penalty of our sin.  Jesus Christ took our place on the cross and paid the penalty for our sin.  When we repent and receive forgiveness by grace through Christ the guilt is removed.  Our guilty record is deleted.  God no longer views the Christian as a weak, stubborn, and failing sinner.  God views the Christian as clean, pure and holy- just as if the Christian had never sinned.  It is a judicial position.  The transaction between the Father and the Son, substitutionary atonement, declares the sinner forgiven and restored in right standing before God.

Third, the forgiven, justified sinner turned saint is regenerated or set free from the controlling authority of a sinful disposition.  Some make this part of sanctification part of the experiential aspect of our standing with Christ, since it is a condition experienced more than perceived as a legal standing such as justification.  However, I prefer to place this aspect of sanctification under the positional nature of sanctification since it is an integral part of the initial salvation experience and results in a position that is the condition of every true believer.  The change at the point of salvation is so radical that Jesus compares it to birth (John 3) and Paul compares it to death (Romans 6).  This not to say that the individual losses identity or personality; there is a continuity of human personality.  However, in regeneration there is a passage into a totally different dimension of human existence.  Sin is the prevailing characteristic of a person separated from God.  Sinners sin because it is their job description, their nature.  They do not have the power to choose consistently the right nor can they change their disposition.  When a person accepts the forgiveness of Christ and the union with the Holy Spirit, the process is reversed.  A new life-force, the presence of the Holy Spirit, is introduced and enables thebeliever to overcome his sinful disposition. Obviously, Christians may not act this way, but it is their true nature and potential.  In these three ways, every believer has been sanctified by the atoning death of Christ (Hebrews 10:10) and has been made holy (Ephesians 4:24).  Thus, in keeping with the meaning of the word sanctify, each believer is set apart and can be rightly called a saint (I Corinthians 1:2; 6:11).  As alluded to earlier, not all believers act saintly, but they are indeed positionally released from the condemnation due from their sins and the bondage of a sinful disposition.  Sanctified is the completed, positional condition of every true believer.

The second element of sanctification isexperiential sanctification. Experiential sanctification is the realizing or working out one’s official position in daily life.  Holiness means more than a legal standing with God, it means salvation also from sinful attitudes and actions.  We are called on by God to complete or perfect the measure of holiness we have (II Cor. 7:1).  This process is available to all who are by God’s grace set apart from sin to God’s ownership.

Finally there is complete and permanent sanctification, often called glorification.  This occurs when the believer is totally transformed into the likeness of Jesus Christ (I John 3:2).

Though there are three stages in God’s process of making unholy people holy, sanctification ordinarily deals with the experiential aspect of the process.  How may the believer experience freedom from sinful thoughts and actions?  Why is it that the average Christian is not very saintly nor perceptively free from the grip of sin?  Why does the average Christian not reflect the character of Christ?  Why does the average believer live much like his non-believing neighbors and rely pretty much on the same resources?  Why are our churches not holy?

The answer can be found in the Scriptures. Scripture recognizes a basic difference among Christians.  It distinguishes between carnal (of the flesh) Christians, Christians who behave like unconverted people, and spiritual Christians,  Christians whose life is dominated by the Spirit of God ( I Cor. 3:1-3).^[2] All Christians are indwelt by the Holy Spirit at the point of salvation.  In fact, the believer, at the point of surrendering to the message of the Gospel receives all of the Holy Spirit, he is indwelt completely.  The Spirit is a person, not a force, and therefore, when the Holy Spirit comes into the life of the new believer and quickens or brings to life the spirit of the new believer, the Holy Spirit resides in the spirit of the believer completely.  The issue subsequent to the point of salvation is a matter of control; whether or not the Holy Spirit has complete control of the individual’s mind, will, and life.  The Bible uses other terms to distinguish between the Christian who is being controlled by selfish passions and desires and the Christian controlled by the Holy Spirit.  All Christians are indwelt by the Holy spirit (Romans 8:9) but some Christians are filled with the Spirit. The Bible speaks of both mature Christians and immature Christians (Hebrews 5:11-6:3).  This distinction is not merely a difference in degrees of growth, but more that Christians’ lives manifest qualitative differences: some Christians have a life pattern of defeat whereas others have a life pattern of spiritual success or victory. This distinction in the Scriptures have fueled ongoing debate as to how to differentiate the two distinctions.  Are church members living in sin saved or are they lost?  Can you lose your salvation?  Have they been truly saved?  Have they lost their salvation?  I have opinions, even convictions, to these questions. However, the length of this paper does not allow to adequately deal with this divisive aspect of the evidence of the Holy Spirit.  It suffices to say that if a person is truly saved, then they are secure.

The Bible leaves a healthy tension in this area of theology in regards to salvation.  The issue of eternal security is important, but the Bible consistently deals with people where they are and only rarely answers the theoretical problems that divide us as believers, especially in the area of eternal security.  Rather than bogging down in the mire of once saved always saved verses falling from grace, it is more pertinent to understanding the experiential aspect of sanctification to deal instead with repentance.  For the saints who desperately want to please God, Scripture gives an abundance of reassurance.  No power can ever separate us from the love of God (John 10:28-29; Romans 8:31-39) and they will complete the race successfully, by His grace (Phil. 1:6).  However, for those who continually and deliberately reject the known will of God, Scripture gives a fearful warnings:

Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?  Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.  A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.  Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.  Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.  Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.  Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?  And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

Matthew 7:16-23

Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him….. He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil……  Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.  In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.  We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.                                              I John 3:6,8,10, and 14

These passages and many others show clearly that the position the Scriptures take in addressing the sinner is that of repentance as the only option.^[3]

^[2] The Greek for flesh in the New Testament iscarne. It is used basically defined three ways: 1) meat, as in the flesh of animals.  2) the human body, tissue, sinew, muscles, and skin.3) the fallen nature of humankind.  The nature that is dominated by the emotions and the senses and the selfish desires.

^[3] e. g. Matthew 23; 25:31-46; John 15:2; Hebrews 3:6-19; 6:1-8; 10:26-31.

By: Ron Lotz

A.                The Reality of the Second Coming

Many Scriptures indicate clearly that Christ is to return.  Jesus Himself promises that he will come again.  In His great address on the end times (Matt. 24-25) He says, Then will appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory (Matt. 24:30.  Several other times in this same speech he mentions the coming of the Son of man (vv. 27,37, 39, 42, 44).  Toward the end of the discussion we read: When the Son of Man comes in His glory and all the angels with him, then He will sit on His glorious throne (Matthew 25:31). All of the teaching in this speech, including the parables, presuppose the second coming.  Later that week in His hearing before Caiphas, Jesus said, But I tell you, hereafter you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven (Matt. 26:54).  While Matthew records more on the second coming, than do the other Gospel writers, Mark, Luke, and John also include some of Jesus’ comments on the second coming.  We find in Mark 13:26 and Luke 21:27, for example, almost identical declarations that the people living in the last days will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with power and glory. And John tells us that in the upper room Jesus promised His disciples, And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and I will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also (John 14:3).

In addition to Jesus’ own words there are numerous other direct statements in the New Testament regarding His return (Acts 1:11; 3:19-21).  Paul wrote of the second coming on several occasions.  He assured the Philippians, that our commonwealth is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will change our lowly body to be like His glorious body, by the power which enables him even to subject all things to Himself(Phil. 3:20-21).  This passage, in a book not specifically eschatological, is particularly significant.  It shows the practical effect which the second coming will have upon us.  But perhaps Paul’s most direct statement is in I Thessalonians 4:15-16:

For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

Other statements are found in II Thessalonians 1:7, 10; and Titus 2:13.  But the references are not limited to Jesus and Paul. Many other New Testament writers mention the second coming (Hebrews 9:28; James 5:7-8; I Peter 1:7, 13; II Peter 1:16; 3:4, 12; I John 2:28).  Clearly, the second coming is one of the most widely taught truths in the New Testament writings.

While the fact of the second coming is clearly stated in Scripture, the time of Christ’s return is not.  Indeed, the Bible makes it clear that we do not know and cannot ascertain that exact time when Jesus will return.  Although God has set a definite time, that time has not been revealed.  Jesus indicated that neither He nor the angels knew the time of His return and neither would His disciples (Mark 13:32-33, 35; Matthew 24:36-44).  Apparently, the time of His return was one of the matters to which Jesus was referring when, just before His ascension, He responded to His disciples’ question whether He would now restore the kingdom to Israel with: It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by His own authority (Acts 1:7).  Instead of satisfying their curiosity, Jesus told the disciples that they were to be His witnesses worldwide.  That the time of His return is not to be revealed explains Jesus’ repeated emphasis upon its unexpectedness and the consequent need for watchfulness (Matt. 24:44, 50; 25:13; Mark 13:35).

Whereas, the timing of the second coming is not certain, the characteristics of the event are clear.   First, Christ’s second coming will be personal.  A few years ago in all the major papers in the United States a full page ad was taken out asserting that the Christ was here already and that he would be appearing to the nation soon.  The ad went on to state that this person had the Spiritof the Christ and would be leading us into all wisdom and knowledge.  One can almost hear the words of Jesus echoing in the background, Although many will come in that day and say”here is the Christ,” but do not believe them (Matthew 24).  The Scriptures make it  clear that Jesus Himself will be coming again, not some representative on His behalf.  This personal appearing of Christ, is simply assumed throughout Biblical references to His return.  Jesus says, for example, AI will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also (John 14:3). Paul’s statement that the Lord Himself will descend from heaven (I Thess. 4:16) leaves little doubt that the return will be personal in nature.  The word of the angels at Jesus’ ascension, This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven (acts 1:11), argues conclusively that His return will be just as personal as was His departure.

There are those who claim that Jesus’ promise to return was fulfilled on Pentecost through a spiritual coming.    Since Pentecost,  Christ has indeed been with and in each believer from the moment of new birth on.  However, several considerations prevent our regarding this spiritual presence in the believer as the full meaning of the coming which Jesus promised.  The statement again in Acts chapter 11, clearly states that Jesus will return in the same manner that He left.  Jesus took definite pains to assure the disciples that He was physically alive and not merely spiritually alive ( i.e.  ate fish, had the disciples touch Him, etc.)

Finally, the second coming will be both visible and unexpected.

Matthew 24:30 says, And they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.  Although the second coming will be preceded by several signs- the desolating sacrilege (Matt. 24:15), great tribulation (24:21), darkening of the sun (24:29), they will not indicate the exact time of Jesus’ return. Consequently, there will be many for whom His return will be quite unexpected.  It will be as in the days of Noah (Matt. 24:37). Although Noah spent some time in the construction of the ark, none of his contemporaries, except for his own family, prepared themselves for the flood.  People will be feeling secure, but sudden destruction will come upon them (IThess. 5:2-3).  Jesus’ teaching suggests that because of the long delay before the second coming, some will be lulled into inattention (Matt. 25:1-13; II Peter 3:3-4). When the parousia finally occurs, however, it will happen so quickly that there will be not time to prepare

(Matt. 25:8-10).

B.                The Relationship between the Imminence of Christ’s Coming and World Missions

Central to the doctrine of the Second Coming is the imminent return of Christ.  As was mentioned previously, scripture indicates that the second coming will be unexpected and sudden, but could it occur at any time or are there some prophecies which must first be fulfilled?  Imminent means that a certain event will occur.  It is not guesswork or wishful thinking but rather infallible and sure.  The coming of Jesus for His church could happen at any moment.  The term used to encapsulate this notion of a sudden and unexpected return of Christ for His church is the word imminent.  The word carries with it a sense of impending or nearness.  Like the lightning strike of an approaching storm, it is unpredictable as to a time but sure in its reality and swiftness.  In relation to Christ’s return, imminent can be likened to the birth pangs of labor.  Christ’s return is preceded by reliable signs and prophecies.  It is definite and soon, but the exact time is uncertain.  In light of this we must be prepared at all times for that possibility, lest we be caught unawares.  Several arguments support this notion of imminence.

First, Jesus urged His disciples to be ready for His coming, since they did not know when it would take place (Matt. 24-25).  If there are other events which must take place before Christ returns, it is difficult to understand why He spoke of the time as unknown, for we would know at least that the return will not occur until those events have transpired.  Second, there is a repeated emphasis that we are to wait eagerly, for the Lord’s coming is at hand.  Many passages indicate that the coming would be very soon and perhaps at any moment (Rom. 8:19-25; I Cor. 1:7; Phil. 4:5; Titus 2:13; James 5:8-9).  And finally, Paul’s statement that we await our blessed hope (Titus 2:13) requires that the next event in God’s plan be the coming of the Lord.  If the next event were instead to be the great tribulation, we could hardly have hope and anticipation.  Instead, fear and apprehension would be our reaction.  Since the return of our Lord is the next event on God’s timetable, there is no reason why it could not happen at any time.

When examined closely, however, these arguments are not fully persuasive.  Do the commands of Christ to watch for His coming and the warnings that His return will occur at an unlikely time and without clear signs necessarily mean that it is imminent?  There has already been an intervening period of almost two thousand years.  While we do not know how long the delay will be,  nor consequently, the precise time of Christ’s coming, we can still know that it is not yet.  Not knowing when it will occur does not preclude knowing certain times when it will occur.

Further, Jesus’ statements did not at the time they were expressed mean that the second coming was imminent.  He indicated through at least three of His parable (the nobleman who went to a far country, Luke 19:11-27; the wise and foolish virgins, Matthew 25:5; and the talents, Matthew 25:19) that there was to be a delay.  Similarly, the parable of the servants (Matt. 24:45-51) involves a period of time for the events to prove their character.  In addition, certain events had to transpire before the second coming; for example, Peter would grow old and feable (John 21:18), the gospel would be preached to all nations (Matt. 24:14), and the temple would be destroyed (Matt. 24:2).   If these events had to occur before Jesus would return, the second coming could not have happened immediately.  His saying, Watch and You do not know the hour, is not inconsistent with a delay to allow certain events to happen.  This is not to say that it is inappropriate to speak of imminence.  It is, however, the complex of events surrounding the second coming, rather than the single event itself that is imminent.  Perhaps we should speak of this complex as imminent and the second coming as impending.

The imminence of the Lord’s return is the reason for the urgency in missions.  If Christ’s return could happen at any moment, then it is imperative that as many as possible hear the gospel and be saved.  Additionally, Jesus said that the gospel must be preached to all nations and then the end would come (Matt. 24:14).  Whereas, we do not know the time of His return, Jesus intimates that His church plays a key role in determining how soon He will return.  Christ’s return will be hastened when His church reaches the unreached and the gospel is preached unto all nations.

C.                The Certainty of a Premillennial Second Coming of Christ

Over the years there has been considerable discussion in Christian theology regarding the chronological relationship between Christ’s second coming and certain other events.  In particular this discussion has involved two major questions: Will there be a millennium, an earthly reign of Jesus Christ and will the second coming take place before or after that period?

The Scriptures clearly indicate that Jesus Christ will establish a one thousand year earthly reign.  The key passage for this Premillennial view is

Revelation 20:4-6:

And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.  But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.  Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.

Here is evidence of a thousand year period and two resurrections, one at the beginning and the other at the end.

We must now address the question of which millennial view to adopt.  There are strong biblical grounds for rejecting postmillenialism.  Postmillenialists believe the preaching of the gospel will usher in a thousand years of peace as people receive the gospel and become part of the kingdom of God.  According to them, the kingdom will be realized and then Christ will come when the world has become the kingdom of God.  Jesus’ teaching regarding great wickedness and the cooling off of the faith of many before His return seems to conflict quite sharply with postmillennial optimism.  That a clear depiction of an earthly reign of Christ without His physical presence is nowhere found in Scriptures seems to be another major weakness of this position.

This leaves us with a choice between amillenialism and premillennialism.  The issue comes down to the biblical references to the millennium- are there sufficient grounds for adopting the more complicated Premillennial view rather than the simpler amillennial conception?  It is sometimes contended that the whole Premillennial conception rests upon a single passage of Scripture, and that doctrine should not be based upon a single passage.  But, if one view can account for a specific reference better than can another; and both views explain the rest of Scripture about equally well, then the former view must certainly be judged more adequate than the latter.

We note here that there are no biblical passages with which premillennialism cannot cope or which it cannot adequately explain.  Nor is the premillennialist view based solely upon one passage in the Bible.  Intimations of it are found in a number of places.  For example, Paul writes, For as in Adam all dies, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.  But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at His coming those who belong to Christ. Then come the end, when He delivers the kingdom of God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power ( I Cor. 15:22-24).  It appears that just as the first coming and resurrection of Christ were distinct events separated by time, so will there be an interval between the second coming and the end. We should also observe that while the two resurrections are spoken of explicitly in Revelation 20, there are other passages which hint at either a resurrection of a select group (Luke 14:14; 20:35; I Cor. 15:23; Phil. 3:11; I Thess. 4:16) or a resurrection in two stages (Dan. 12:2; John 5:29).  In Philippians 3:11, for example, Paul speaks of his hope of attaining the resurrection from the dead. The phrase literally reads, the out-resurrection out from among the dead ones. Accordingly, the Premillennial view is the more believable one.

D.               The Events Surrounding the Rapture of the Church

Whereas, all evangelicals agree that the second coming of Christ is imminent and premillennial, and that Christ is returning for His bride in an event known as the rapture, the second coming in relation to the tribulation period is fraught with varied views and opinions.  Will the rapture occur before or after the tribulation?  Or will the rapture occur sometime during the tribulation period? What is meant by being kept from wrath?

By far, the most popular view of the rapture today is what is know as a pre-tribulation rapture of the church.  According to this view, Christ will come for His saints; afterward He will come with His saints.  The first stage of Christ’s coming is called the Rapture.  The word rapture does not occur in the Scriptures, but, like the word Trinity, the concept is there.   Rapture means asnatching away and refers to the exit of the church from the earth before the wrath of God is poured out during the tribulation period. There are several distinctive ideas held by pre-tribulationalists.

The first concerns the nature of the tribulation.  It will indeed be a great tribulation.  Whereas some other end times writers emphasize the difficulties and persecutions experienced by the church throughout its history, pretribulationists stress the uniqueness of the tribulation.  It will be quite unparalleled within history.  It will be a period of transition concluding God’s dealings with the Gentiles and preparing for the millennium and the events which will transpire therein.  The tribulation, according to pre-tribulation rapture theorists, is not to be understood as in any sense a time for disciplining believers or purifying the church.

A second major idea of pretribulationism is the rapture of the church.  Christ will come at the beginning of the great tribulation to remove the church from the world.  This coming in a sense will be secret.  No unbelieving eye will observe it.  The rapture, according to pretribulationists, is pictured in I Thessalonians 4:17: Then we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with the dead in Christ in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord. Note that in the rapture Christ will not descend all the way to earth, as He will when He comes with the church at the end of the tribulation.

Pretribulationists maintain that there will be two phases in Christ’s coming, or one could even say two comings.  There will also be three resurrections.  The first will be the resurrection of the righteous dead at the rapture, for Paul teaches that believers who are alive at the time will not precede those who are dead.  Then at the end of the tribulation there will be a resurrection of those saints who have died during the tribulation.  Finally, at the end of the millennium, there will be a resurrection of unbelievers.

This all means that the church will be absent during the tribulation.  That is the point of the rapture, to deliver the church from the tribulation.  We can expect deliverance because Paul promised that the Thessalonians that they would not experience the wrath which God will pour out upon unbelievers: For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ (I Thess 5:9); Jesus . . . . delivers us from the wrath to come (I Thess. 1:10).

But what of the references in Matthew 24 which indicate that some of the elect will be present during the tribulation?  According to those who hold to a pre-tribulation rapture view, we must understand that the disciple’s asking what would be the sign of Jesus’ coming and of the end of the age (24:3; Acts 1:6) occurred within a Jewish framework.  And accordingly, Jesus’ discussion here pertains primarily to the future of Israel.  It is significant that the Gospel uses the general term elect rather than church, body of Christ, or any similar expression.  It is elect Jews, not the church, who will be present during the tribulation.  However, the elect is not a term used exclusively for the Jewish believers.  In several passages, the church as a whole is referred to as the elect(Romans 8:33; Col. 3:12; I Peter 1:1; II John 1:1).  But perhaps the most telling passage is found in Revelation 7.  In this vision John the apostle is asked who the multitudes are before the throne of God.  The angel replies: These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb (Rev. 7:14).  Notice, these are those who went through the great tribulation.  What of their identity?  Are they Jewish believers?  Notice again that the passage says these are of every kindred, tribe, tongue, and nation.  When the Bible refers to the nations it is always contrasting the Jews with the gentilenations.  Therefore, the millions before the throne are Jewish and non-Jewish believers.

Finally, according to pre-tribulation rapture theorists, as has been mentioned earlier, the Lord’s return is imminent.  Since His return will precede the tribulation, nothing remains to be fulfilled prior to the rapture.  Indeed, many precedents for the beginning of the tribulation period can be seen today: the faith of many growing cold and wickedness is increasing.  His coming for the church, then, could occur at any time, even within the next instant.

Jesus urged watchfulness upon His hearers, since they did not know the time  of His return (Matt. 25:13).  The parable of the ten virgins conveys this message.  Just as in the time of Noah, there will be no warning signs (Matt. 24:36-39).  The wicked knew nothing until the flood came and took them away.  The coming of the Lord will be like a thief in the night (Matt. 24:43).  Or like the master who returns at an unexpected time (Matt. 24:45-51).  There will be a sudden separation.  Two men will be working in the field; two women will be grinding at the mill.  In each case, one will be taken and the other left.  What clearer depiction of the rapture could there be?  Since it can occur at any moment, watchfulness and diligent activity are very much the order.

There is another basis for the belief that Christ’s return is imminent. The church can have a blessed hope (Titus 2:13) only if the next major event to transpire is the coming of Christ.  If the Antichrist and the great tribulation were the next items on the eschatological agenda, Paul would have told the church to expect suffering, persecution, anguish.  But instead he instructs the Thessalonians to comfort one another with the fact of Christ’s second coming (I Thess. 4:18).  Since the next event, to which the church is to look forward with hopeful anticipation, is the coming of Christ for the church, there is nothing to prevent it from happening at any time.

Much of the pre-tribulation rapture view is important to eschatology, especially the importance of imminence and being ready for Christ’s return, however, the bulk of pr-tribulation rapture views, rest on only a few obscure passages , specifically in I Thessalonians.

Finally, there will be at least two judgments.  The church will be judged at the time of the rapture.  It is there that rewards for faithfulness will be handed out.  The church will not be involved, however, in the separation of the sheep and goats at the end of the millennium.  Its status will already have been determined.

The term for “pastor” in the New Testament is synonymous with the word “shepherd,” “elder,” “Overseer,” and “Bishop.”  The term means “to have spiritual authority over the church body.”  In every case that the word is used in the New Testament it refers to male leadership.  God has ordained that the leadership of His church is to be male.  This does not mean that women do not have a place in ministry in the church.  Women have always held an important place in ministry starting with the ministry of Jesus.  In Luke 8:1-3, women participated with the disciples in public ministry with Jesus.  They gave witness to the resurrection as the Lord Jesus commanded the women in Matthew 28:1-10.  They participated in the establishment of the Church as the Holy spirit filled all of the believers in Acts 2, and as a result they announced the great things that God had done.  The growing church in the book of Acts modeled the fulfillment of prophecy that His Spirit would be poured out on all people, men and women, old and young, to tell forth God’s message (Acts 2:15-18).  Other examples of women involved in ministry include the daughters of Philip who prophesied (Acts 21:9); Dorcas who served (Acts 9:39-41); Lydia who opened her heart and home (Acts 16:40); Priscilla who taught Apollos (Acts 18:24-28); and Phoebe who the apostle Paul addressed as a servant, minister, or deacon (Romans 16:1-2).

However, when it comes to discerning what the Bible has to say about women as elders, bishops, or pastors, the Word of God is our guide and Jesus Christ is our model.  When Jesus chose the twelve disciples, He chose them as males.  Many, who desire to serve as women pastors, or who attend churches pastored by women, tend to use the cultural dynamic equivalent argument by saying that Jesus was in a male dominated culture and therefore had to choose men.  Those who use this argument need to remember that Jesus was never bound by culture or traditions.  Jesus often broke or violated cultural and religious taboos.  Some examples are shucking grain on the Sabbath (supposedly violating the restriction against work on the Sabbath).  Jesus response to the Pharisees objections were that the Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath.  Jesus also associated with the outcasts of society- touching lepers, forgiving prostitutes, dining with tax collectors.  It is well documented that some of His ministry support came from the wife of a Roman gentile public official.  Since Jesus was not bound by culture or tradition, He laid the foundation for His church from the beginning as He desired it to be organized, and from the beginning He chose His elders or pastors to be male.  The apostle Paul, also one who was not bound by tradition or culture, and in keeping with the teachings of Jesus,  had an opportunity when addressing Timothy as to the role of a pastor, to set a precedent, and allow for both women and men as pastors.  Instead, Paul affirmed Jesus’ example, and designated that pastors are to be male (I Timothy 3:1-7).

The setting apart for ministry is called ordination.  There is a biblical precedent for setting apart men for special work for God.  Those set apart were expected, both by God and His people, to instruct, protect, motivate, and equip God’s people to know and glorify God personally and corporately by obedience to His will, including evangelizing those who were not God’s people, thus participating in building and advancing God’s kingdom.  An example of ordination in the Old and New Testament is the appointment of Aaron’s sons as priests (Exodus 28-29, Leviticus 6-9); in Jesus’ words regarding His choosing and appointing the twelve (John 15:16); in appointment Paul and Barnabas for missionary work; in the appointing of elders in the churches led by Paul and Barnabas (Acts 14:23); and in the appointment of elders by Titus at Paul’s direction (Titus 1:5).  Once again, these men “set apart” for ministry were solely male.  The only place in the Bible where women served as leaders, was during the time of the Judges.  I believe it is significant that this time in Israels’ history was characterized by the writer of Judges as a time “where everyone did what was right in their own eyes” (Judges 17:6).  Historically, the problem with women assuming the role of pastor has coincided with a decline in competent and strong male leadership, as I believe we are seeing today.  Does this mean that women pastors are not sincere? Does this mean women pastors cannot love and minister to their congregations?  Does this mean that women pastors are not a competent or professional as male pastors?  To all these questions I would answer no, instead I would assert that those who are ordained and serving a women pastors are outside the counsel of Scripture and God’s ideal for His church, and this is a very precarious place to be.  The Christian and Missionary Alliance recognizes that women are often called to full time ministry as missionaries, teachers, and even associate ministers.  We, the Christian and Missionary Alliance, call this consecrated for ministry.  This means women are welcome to participate in the works of ministry in every area, including teaching the Bible, except in the area of pastoring a church or holding positions of leadership in the denomination such as District Superintendent, President or Vice President, since these are also positions that carry the weight of elder/ pastor.    The C&MA recognizes the contribution of women for and to ministry but cannot ordain what the Bible has chosen to be silent on.  Those who argue for ordination of women and consequently women pastors use obscure texts relating to women in ministry and commit gross errors in biblical interpretation to justify their positions.  Women and Men are equal before God in gifting, talents, value, and esteem but God has given to each different roles within the church for His purposes and those roles work best and for the greatest good when they are used in God’s way for His glory.