restoring our biblical and constitutional foundations

Making a Mockery of the Great Commission

 David Alan Black  

Our business as Christians is to make disciples of all nations. That’s what we’re here for. By life or by death, by what we do and do not do, in body and in spirit, our business is to work for the expansion of God’s kingdom on earth.

It is easily possible for us to so focus on our own little communities of faith that we come dangerously close to making a mockery of the Great Commission. Such an attitude is a serious symptom. It reveals a growing disease of the spirit that could become an incurable malignancy. Churches that are in this in-grown state are not concerned about it. There is no doubt about the crisis but our conduct is not rising to the occasion.

Theoretically and theologically we may believe in the Great Commission, but our belief does not motivate much activity. The situation around the world is desperate, but we are not. We drug and dope our consciences and allow things to go on as things have always gone. A sense of urgency for world evangelization is fast disappearing from us.

Demas had to choose between Paul and this world (2 Tim. 4:10), and he chose the world. This is a choice that every Christian, and every church, has to make. In Matthew 9:35-38 we see that Jesus went and went and went to all the cities and villages, teaching, preaching, and healing. Wherever He went He left a trail of blessing. This same Jesus lives in all of us who know Him. This ought to make a difference.

I encourage all of us to go “all out” for Jesus. He deserves it. Let the dead bury the dead. It’s time to plow a straight furrow looking straight ahead.

November 6, 2009

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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Lying Presidents

Pieter Friedrich

President Bush lied us into war through false claims about how Saddam Hussein possessed CBW (Chemical and Biological Weapons) and could, at any moment, use them on the U.S. He lied us into war by telling us that Saddam was a threat to the United States, yet Saddam’s CWB were never found.

Mr. Bush is not unique in that he is both a president and a liar. A great many U.S. presidents have been liars (they are, after all, politicians), and President Franklin D. Roosevelt was one of the biggest.

FDR’s deceit has been obscured from public knowledge by 60 years of propaganda. If you have not heard it before, perhaps you would know like to hear the truth.

On December 7th, 1941, Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The average Joe will tell you the attack was a surprise attack, and an unprovoked act of aggression. That is not true. Pat Buchanan asks, “Why did Japan, an island nation smaller than Montana, attack the most powerful nation on earth? How did Hirohito and Tojo expect to win a war to the death with America that they must have known a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor would ignite?”

Here’s the real story, or as much of it as I can reasonably put before you in a brief essay:

In FDR’s Pearl Harbor Speech, given before Congress when he requested that Congress declare war on Japan, FDR invented the following lies.

Lie #1: “The United States was at peace with that nation….”

In his book, World War II: The Rest of the Story and How It Affects You Today, Richard Maybury wrote:

The Flying Tigers…were secretly created and financed by the USG for the purpose of fighting the Japanese.

At least three months before the attack on Pearl Harbor, 112 Flying Tiger pilots arrived at an air base near Toungoo, China, and began preparations to shoot down Japanese aircraft…. Most importantly, in 1941, Japanese rulers knew all about it. Japanese spies had found out about the Flying Tigers and had been watching them train. Also, Japan’s rulers knew that in March 1941, Congress had granted FDR permission to send money and equipment to the Chinese under the Lend-Lease Act.

In short, by launching the Flying Tigers, President Roosevelt declared war on the Japanese before the Japanese attacked the U.S. He gave the Japanese the legal right to bomb Pearl Harbor, and did not tell the American people or the commanders at Pearl Harbor.

FDR lied when he said that the United States was at peace with Japan. The Japanese forces in China were being attacked by U.S. planes. Indeed, under the Neutrality Act, which forbade the shipping of arms to “belligerents,” it was illegal for FDR to send planes to China…or to Japan, for that matter.

This site says, “Since invoking the Neutrality Act would penalize China, which was more dependent than Japan on American assistance, President Franklin D. Roosevelt chose not to identify the fighting as a state of war.” In other words, since invoking the Neutrality Act would put China at a disadvantage in its defense against Japan, President Roosevelt decided to “overlook” the Neutrality Act.

Lie #2: “While this reply stated that it seemed useless to continue the existing diplomatic negotiations….”

Pat Buchanan writes:

Japanese militarists wanted war but the government of Prince Konoye did not. He offered to meet FDR anywhere in the Pacific. The prince told the U.S. ambassador that if oil shipments were renewed, Tokyo was ready to pull out of Indochina and have FDR mediate an end to the Sino-Japanese war. FDR spurned the offer.

Japan then sent an envoy to Washington to seek negotiations. On Nov. 26, Secretary of State Cordell Hull rejected negotiations and handed an ultimatum to the Japanese: get out of Indochina and China.

Japan faced a choice: accept a humiliating retreat from an empire built with immense blood and treasure, or seize the oil-rich Dutch East Indies. Pearl Harbor followed. The Tojo Doctrine of pre-emptive war with Japan, as a back door to war with Nazi Germany.

In other words, the Japanese tried time and again to negotiate with the United States, and the U.S. government rejected every offer the Japanese presented. The reason it seemed useless to the Japanese to continue diplomatic negotiations was because the U.S. was diplomatically frustrating every step the Japanese took.

Lie #3: “I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan….”

As I mentioned before, the U.S. had already provoked Japan by sending the Flying Tigers to aid the Chinese. There was more, however.

To again quote from Richard Maybury’s World War II: The Rest of the Story and How It Affects You Today:

Another little-known provocation was B-17 bombers in the Pacific. At that time, the B-17 Flying Fortress was the toughest, most deadly long-range bomber in the world.

By November 1941, the entire factory production of B-17s was going to the Philippines, where their only conceivable target could be the Japanese.

The Japanese knew about this B-17 force in the Philippines and were greatly alarmed, as you can imagine.

And, the USG knew they were alarmed. Japan’s secret messages about the B-17s were being intercepted and decrypted.

General MacArthur in the Philippines had requested 250 maps of targets in and around Tokyo.

We don’t know if the Japanese knew about these maps, “but we do know they told their attaché in Berlin to ask the Germans for data about the effects of British B-17s on German cities.”

But B-17s and Flying Tigers were not the only provocations Japan suffered. “In March 1941,” says Maybury, “President Roosevelt secretly ordered U.S. warships to begin sailing 6,000 miles across the Pacific to encroach on Japanese home waters, including the Bungo Strait. He called these invasions ‘Pop Up Cruises,’ because the Japanese never knew where the U.S. warships would appear. This would be equivalent to Japan sending warships into Chesapeake Bay in Virginia, or Puget Sound in Washington State.”

Maybury says: “We know…that (1) they knew the Flying Tigers were working for the USG, (2) they could see B-17s arriving in the Philippines, (3) they knew what B-17s could do and (4) they knew Japan was the only conceivable B-17 target in that area.” To add to that, the Japanese had cruisers and destroyers from the U.S. Navy sailing around in Japanese home waters.

As Maybury asks, “if you were them, what would you have done?”

Earlier, I presented you with a question from Pat Buchanan. I now give you his answer to his own question: “It was not Japan that sought war with us, but FDR who sought war with Japan.”

The pre-Pearl Harbor provocation of Japan was not over, however.

Buchanan writes:

In 1931, Japan occupied Manchuria as a defensive move to secure her northern flank from Stalin who had seized Outer Mongolia and Sinkiang. Manchuria was as critical to Japan as Mexico is to us.

In 1937, following a clash on the Marco Polo Bridge outside Peiping, Japan and China went to war. For four years they fought, with Japan controlling the coasts and China the interior. For three years of this war, America saw no vital interest at risk and remained uninvolved.

But when Japan joined the Axis and occupied Indochina, FDR sent military aid to Chiang Kai-shek under lend-lease and approved the dispatch of the Flying Tigers to fight against Japan. He ordered B-17s to Manila to prepare to attack Japan’s home islands. He secretly promised the Dutch and British that, should Japan attack their Asian colonies, America would go to war. Japan was aware of it all.

In July 1941, FDR froze Japan’s assets, shutting off her oil. Adm. Richmond Kelly Turner warned FDR it meant war.

Indeed, when Israel’s oil supply was imperiled by Nasser’s threat to close the Straits of Tiran to ships docking in Israel, the Israelis launched their own Pearl Harbor, destroying the Egyptian air force on the ground before invading the Sinai and ending the oil threat to Israel’s survival.

Nevertheless, knowing it meant war, FDR cut off Japan’s oil. Thus was the Japanese empire and national economy, entirely dependent on imported oil, put under a sentence of death.

Deliberate Provocation

There were some people who, even 60 years ago, saw through FDR’s deceit. Aakash Raut writes, “On December 8, 1941, former President Herbert Hoover wrote to friends, ‘You and I know that this continuous putting pins in rattlesnakes finally got this country bitten.’” (For more information from Raut about Pearl Harbor, see his site, “Did FDR Know?”)

To argue that FDR did not knowingly provoke the Japanese into attacking Pearl Harbor is ridiculous. J.R. Nyquist says, “In 1986 I had the opportunity to ask President Roosevelt’s son, James Roosevelt, about the strategy the U.S. government had followed in 1941. James had worked on his father’s staff at the time, and openly admitted that Japan was provoked intentionally with the embargo (Japan had almost no other sources of oil).”

“Did FDR truly believe China’s integrity was a vital interest?” Buchanan asks. “Hardly. Once war broke out, China was ignored. The Pacific took a back seat to Europe. U.S. forces on Corregidor were abandoned. Aid to Churchill and Stalin and war on Germany took precedence over all.”

Why did FDR lie us into WWII? Raut says, “FDR provoked the attack on Pearl Harbor, intentionally putting an end to ‘the madness of the 1930s.’ The New Deal was a failure (though you don’t learn that in school), and was becoming increasingly unpopular with the public. FDR needed a war to rescue his disastrous policies, and salvage the dignity of his arrogant presidency.” Buchanan says that, “Provoking war with Japan was FDR’s back door to the war he wanted—with Hitler in Europe.”

The idea of a war was unpopular to the American public. A Gallup Poll at the time showed that 88 percent of Americans opposed U.S. involvement in the European war. FDR and his advisors believed something needed to be done to sway public opinion, and believed the way to do this was by provoking the Japanese into what would be perceived as an unprovoked attack on American ships or military installations.

We were lied into war before. There’s little reason to believe it can’t happen or hasn’t happened again.

October 29, 2003

Eighteen-year old Pieter Friedrich lives in a small town in the California Sierra Foothills. He is an amateur political analyst, a writer, a classical liberal, a juris naturalist, a paleo-conservative, a strict constitutionalist, and, foremost, a Christian. He is currently enrolled in Michael Masterson’s Accelerated Program for Six-Figure Copywriting and hopes to work as a freelance copywriter, among other things. He is heavily involved in pro-life activism as a member of Sacramento Teens for Life. He may be reached for comment here or at his website.

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Loving God – and Our Neighbors

 David Alan Black 

One of the perversions of the Gospel I think needs eliminating today is the emphasis upon personal evangelism to the detriment or exclusion of any social emphasis. I do not question the fact that salvation is personal and individual, but it is far more than that. However, for many evangelicals the emphasis on the personal and individual has increasingly made salvation individualistic. The whole of the Christian experience is thought to be one’s personal relationship to God – often to the exclusion of one’s relationship with others or to the culture in general.

Salvation is both personal and social. Since sin is personal, each individual is guilty of sin and must be forgiven for his sin, not someone else’s. However, salvation is also social. Jesus is Lord of all. Politics, education, economics, the arts – all these are included under His divine Lordship. Thus Christians must come to understand that although salvation is individual and personal, the kingdom of God is far broader than just our personal salvation experiences. The point here is that the social Gospel is an integral and necessary part of the Gospel.

For example, I can say (and I say it with regret) that I have led people to Christ without any follow up whatsoever. That is, I failed to emphasize the Lordship demands of Christ in a way that would have encouraged them to get involved in a local body of believers where they could be taught “to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you,” including Jesus’ love command. In Wesley’s preface to his 1739 Hymn Book he wrote, “The Gospel of Christ knows no religion but social, no holiness but social holiness.” Therefore we must face the question: for the one who has a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, is it really possible to serve Him without displaying a genuine love and concern for others?

As player-coaches, elders must encourage their flocks to be all that God is calling them to be in the world – people who are truthful, loving, and caring, trying to change conditions that are not in harmony with God’s will, and seeking to meet the needs of others – physically, emotionally, spiritually, economically, educationally. We need to “play the music” before non-believers will “hear the words.” We must do everything possible, through love and good deeds, to show them the love and goodness of God and help them to see that proper human relationships are possible only through a proper relationship with Christ. Indeed, it is Christ’s love that frees us from our sins to truly love others (John 8:36-38; Gal. 5:13).

This is not a new program to promote. This is just living out our Christianity – cleaning out shut-ins’ gutters, raking their leaves, sawing their fallen limbs after an ice storm, having an “open door” policy at our homes and offices, gently but firmly defending the faith in our homes and in the public square, loving our unsaved neighbors enough to confront them with their lostness, etc. With joy we are to go all out with both emphases – to love God with our whole hearts, and to love our neighbors as ourselves.

In these troubling times, I believe that Christians have a greater opportunity than ever to engage their culture and seek God’s sovereign intervention in the affairs of men.

December 11, 2004

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. He is the author of Why I Stopped Listening to Rush and numerous other books.

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The Love of Teaching

 David Alan Black 

As I begin my twenty-ninth year of teaching this week, I thought I’d jot down a few miscellaneous thoughts about education. The reader should be warned that I offer no help to anyone who is looking for the “Seven Keys” to successful teaching. Jesus alone is the Master Teacher. But, for what they are worth, here are the rules of the road I strive to follow.

Christian education is likeness education. We teachers impact our students more by our character than by our communication. Is this not true? People learn best by example, not by direct instruction. “Actions speak louder than words.” This is how the Savior taught – He chose 12 men to “be with Him,” then He poured His life into them. As a teacher I must move from being a mere “dispenser of information” to a mentor and organizer of the learning process.

My job is to serve my students, not vice versa. My goal is to meet my students’ needs, not for them to meet mine. Effective teachers understand their pupils and discern what causes their difficulties. Now this has several important implications, not least that we should be more student-oriented than subject-oriented. Classes must be interesting – each and every one of them! As someone once put it, “There is no such thing as a boring teacher. If he’s boring, he’s not a teacher.” Students have a right to want to come to class, to be dismissed on time, to have their papers graded by their prof (and not by a proxy), to get their work back promptly, to be trusted with take-home exams, to have teachers with open door policies, etc.

Strive for life change, not just knowledge. The Bible was not given for our information but for our transformation – every word, everywhere! Let us, then, focus on learning and not just on teaching.

Less is more. O, how true this is! We can “talk much” and “teach little.” If this is so, why not concentrate on the essentials? Far too many teachers engage in “content dump.” In seminary I had a prof who employed the “You sit still and I instill method” of teaching. All the while we kept asking ourselves, “What good is all of this?” Far better to focus on the irreducible minimum that must be understood and then mastered. Even Jesus said, “I have many more things to say to you, but they are too much for you now” (John 16:12)!

Emphasize relevance over rote memory. Much of my studying in seminary had one goal: to pass the next test. As soon as the test was over, the information I had “learned” was quickly forgotten, of course. Why do we remember certain phone numbers? Because we understand their value. It’s the same with teaching. There’s nothing a student hates more than busywork!

Challenge students to think for themselves. The fill-in-the-blank approach to learning tends to produce students with simplistic answers to complex questions. In my own college and seminary experience I was, more often than not, taught what to think rather than challenged to think for myself. A wise teacher gives students the tools necessary for their own personal reading and study of the Scriptures.

Above all, students need to see in us “the meekness and gentleness of Christ” (2 Cor. 10:1). The key to effective teaching is an incarnational model, based on Philippians 2:5-11. May we let Christ’s mind be our own and in humility count others as more important than ourselves! Whenever we teach let us keep in the forefront of our minds the infinite worth of our students and the tremendous privilege it is to serve them.

The Magi said, “We have seen His star.” But they also did something about it. They came to where He was. Likewise, we must come to Him – all of us, whether teacher or student – in repentance and faith and love. Just as the Wise Men worshipped Him, so we must bow down before Him and confess Him as Lord and give Him our very best gifts – academic and otherwise.

If you too are returning to the classroom this fall, may the Master Teacher bless you in every way.

August 16, 2005

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. If you would like to know more about becoming a follower of King Jesus, please feel free to write Dave.

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Los Diez Mejores Libros para el Estudio del Griego Nuevo Testamento

 David Alan Black  

Por lo que vale la pena, ofrezco aquí una lista de algunos de mis libros favoritos sobre la gramática griega del Nuevo Testamento. Espero que esta lista pueda incentivar en algún  lector el interés de aprender el idioma y aprenderlo bien. Estoy plenamente consciente que este catálogo será obsoleto tan pronto como se publique. También se excluyen de mis publicaciones propias en el campo, no porque creo que están mal escrito, sino porque su autor es irremediablemente especializado.

Entonces, los Diez Mejores Libros para el estudio del griego Nuevo Testamento (en ningún orden particular):

1. Mounce, William D. Basics of Biblical Greek: Grammar. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1999.

Los principios de gramática de Mounce sigue siendo tal vez el libro más utilizado como introductoria del griego Nuevo Testamento. Hablando como autor de un libro sobre principios de Griego, estoy alegre de que la gramática de Mounce ha tenido el reconocimiento que tanto merece y mis mejores deseos para su continuidad, ya que el libro es una gran ayuda  a los estudiantes en todas partes del mundo. No importa cualquier libro que usted use, pero tendrá que poseer esta gramática también.

2. Wallace, Daniel B. Greek Grammar beyond the Basics: an Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament.Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2008.

La gramática intermedia de Wallace es una  aventura. Es absolutamente imposible describir la profundidad de este libro. Yo prefiero recomendarlo a usted y luego le dejare que descubra en el interior del libro magníficos tesoros. Las implicaciones pedagógicas, sin embargo, son tales que no estoy de acuerdo con ellos sin poner en peligro lo que es más querido para mí como un maestro—la simplicidad. Podría ser  un buen servicio si un día el libro podría ser reescrito y se coloca en un estante ligeramente inferior. Oh, espere—esto ya seha hecho!

3. Robertson, A. T. A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research.Nashville: Broadman, 1923.

Rara vez me sintió tan miserablemente incompetente como cuando tome por primera vez este libro. Casi se considera como una “autobiografía mental.” Robertson trato de mostrar el efecto, de una nueva  ciencia creciente, de la profunda transformación que la lingüística moderna había traído en la manera que los estudiantes  se acercaron al griego del Nuevo Testamento. La mayoría de los profesores modernos de griego dan al libro un elogio, para después, lo ignoran. En mi opinión, esto es un gran error. Yo requiero de este libro en mi curso avanzado de gramática griega, incluso los estudiantes de nivel intermedio que están dispuestos a trabajar se beneficiarán de ello.

4. Blass, Friedrich, Albert Debrunner, and Robert Walter Funk. A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Christian Literature.Chicago, IL: University of Chicago, 1961.

En el sitio de Amazon, Dan Wallace escribe:

BDF sigue siendo la gramática griega del Nuevo Testamento, incluso después de cuatro décadas. Es en el proceso de  revisión (revisado por un comité de ocho miembros), pero la revisión tomo varios años más para completarla. Creemos que fue necesario revisar BDF porque supone que el lector medio ha tenido mucho contacto con el griego clásico antes de trabajar en el Nuevo Testamento. Esto es parte de la razón de que BDF es tan difícil de usar: la mayoría de los estudiantes NT no han tenido contacto con el griego clásico hoy en día. Otra razón es su naturaleza mística, abreviaturas Teutónicas, y la omisión de la gramática “normal.” Sin embargo, incluso con estas limitaciones, todo exegeta responsable del Nuevo Testamento debe tener una copia de esta mina de oro de información.

No digo más.

5. Cotterell, Peter, and Max Turner. Linguistics and Biblical Interpretation.London: SPCK, 1989.

En cierto sentido, este libro podría ser llamado Popularización. Su objetivo es llevar la lingüística al alcance de la gente educada en general en lugar de dejarla en poder de una comunidad cerrada y misteriosa. Los autores han seleccionado a los pensadores en esta área que tienen el buen juicio, y sus propios comentarios son precisos y claros.

6. Silva, Moisés. Biblical Words and Their Meaning: an Introduction to Lexical Semantics.Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994.

 Este libro es un refugio de la radicalidad de una generación anterior de maestros del Nuevo Testamento que creían en  “Espíritu Santo” Griego. La intuición exegética de Silva le afirmaba bien para escribir un libro sobre lexicografía. Este libro me empuja actualmente a profundizar en la lingüística a mí mismo, y cuando finalmente  produje  mi propio libro sobre lingüística fue Silva quien accedió a escribir el prefacio del mismo.

7. Porter, Stanley E. Verbal Aspect in the Greek of the New Testament: with Reference to Tense and Mood.New York: P. Lang, 2003.

 Este libro, que sufre de gigantismo, merece un lugar destacado en mi lista, ya que abrió una “lata de gusanos” importante que hoy conocemos como el debate sobre el aspecto verbal. Usted no debe esperar claridad de parte de Porter, pero usted debe leer este libro. Porter me impresiona como alguien que tiene el dedo en el corazón del problema, aunque no estoy de acuerdo con muchas de sus conclusiones.

8. Zerwick, Max. Biblical Greek. Rome: Pontifici Instituti Biblici, 1963.

Cuando estaba en el seminario me introdujeron a este libro y viví con el día y noche. A pesar de su prefacio imprudentemente aventuroso, el libro lleva a cabo en gran medida lo que se propuso hacer: introducir al lector en todas las categorías del griego Nuevo Testamento y en una manera comprensible. Realmente es una pieza de primer orden de trabajo.

9. Windham, Neal. New Testament Greek for Preachers and Teachers: Five Areas of Application.Lanham: University of America, 1991.

¡Qué agradable sorpresa cuando mire por primera vez  este libro! Cubre seis áreas diferentes para leer el Nuevo Testamento griego, incluyendo la morfología y los casos griegos. Por qué no ha atraído más atención  más allá de mí. Creo que es uno de los libros más subestimado de nuestra generación, y me gustaría muchísimo ver leer  a los estudiantes este libro del griego Nuevo Testamento.

10. Decker, Rodney J. Koine Greek Reader: Selections from the New Testament, Septuagint, and Early Christian Writers.Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Publications, 2007.

Después de haber enseñado griego por 34 años puedo decir con convicción que nada es más importante que el dominio del griego Nuevo Testamento que manteniendo nuestros estudiantes en el texto. El libro por Decker es simplemente el mejor libro de texto disponible en la actualidad. Las lecturas son interesantes, y las notas son a la vez precisas y útiles. Decker se extenderá a  sus alumnos sin romperlos. El libro es también muy fácil de usar para el alumno independiente.

Obviamente, por la composición de esta lista de lo que creo que los libros esenciales para los estudiantes de la gramatica griego del Nuevo Testamento, no tengo ninguna intención de imponerles a los duros castigos. Yo sólo puedo hablar personalmente, y – hablando a título personal –  he encontrado en cada uno de estos libros una lectura fascinante y útil. Supongo que usted también lo hará. Al igual que todos los libros, que contienen omisiones imperdonables, y muchos pagan muy poca atención al estilo Inglés. Pero todos tienen una cosa en común: se va a destruir su presunción. El pecado de muchos seminaristas es lo que los antiguos griegos llamaban hybris – arrogancia en medio de la prosperidad. Yo soy parte de la culpa si mis estudiantes se gradúen con la cabeza llena de conocimientos y un corazón lleno de orgullo. No conozco nada que disipar nuestros egos inflados como ver lo mucho que no lo sé. Todos somos maestros imperfectos, pero podemos ser perdonados si  por lo menos tratamos de advertir a los estudiantes contra la complacencia auto satisfactoria.

De todos modos: ¡Feliz lectura!

24 de noviembre 2010

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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Lord of the Voting Booth

 David Alan Black

I have never believed in the doctrine of baptismal regeneration – the doctrine that teaches that water baptism is necessary for salvation. I must say, in sorrow, that adding baptism to faith in Christ is a return to works. Yes, I most certainly do believe that as Christians we should have water baptism. But the Scripture makes it adequately plain that the reception of the Holy Spirit comes into our lives when we cast ourselves completely on the finished work of Christ as He died on the cross for us. It is at that point that water baptism should occur as the outward sign of the inward reality. As Romans 8 says, if we do not have the Spirit of Christ, we do not belong to Him.

Having said this, I must also emphasize the great importance of water baptism. The New Testament speaks positively of water baptism, and so must we. After all, as Christians we are to obey the commands of Christ, and His very first command is “baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Indeed, so closely united in the early church were the spiritual reality and the external seal that in Ephesians 4:5 Paul could speak of “one Lord, one faith, one baptism” (not “two baptisms,” since “un-baptized believer” was an oxymoron in the primitive church).

To me, this baptism means associating oneself with a Bible-believing fellowship of Christians who profess Jesus as their only Lord and Savior. In early Christianity, in fact, baptizing was an act of “pledging allegiance to Jesus,” if you will, proclaiming Him as “Lord” (1 Cor. 12:3). This wasn’t a glib symbol, like the neon sign saying “Jesus Is Lord” I recently read about. In his book Mere Christianity C. S. Lewis puts it this way:

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg – or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronising nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

This is a salutary reminder. All too often in evangelical circles there is a strong tendency toward a Gnostic understanding of Jesus. We are ready enough to proclaim His lordship in terms of our soteriology and possibly even our ecclesiology, but in the social and political realms our lives are hardly affected by His authority. Not so in the early church. To proclaim Jesus as Lord had tremendous political implications, for it meant a clean break with Emperor worship and everything associated with it. Thus, I would say that there can be no question of blind allegiance to any political leader or political party for that matter, as if allegiance to Christ permitted a divided focus.

Of course, I need not tell my readers that the matter is complicated by the fact that many evangelicals espouse big tent politics and its corresponding compromises with evil. The decisions you make are, of course, between you and the Lord. However, I am quite sure that as we Christians return to life within the structure of Scripture, under the leadership of the Holy Spirit, the Lord Jesus can cause us to follow Him more radically. At the very least let us not claim that Jesus is Lord unless He is our Lord in the voting booth just as much as He is in the choir loft.

August 30, 2004

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. His latest book is Why I Stopped Listening to Rush: Confessions of a Recovering Neocon.

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The Lord’s Supper, Then and Now

 David Alan Black  

Recently I received a copy of a book calledThe Lord’s Supper, edited by Thomas Schreiner and Matthew Crawford and written by and for Baptists. The essayists in this book address themselves to the question of the meal our Savior commanded us to observe – and to the reawakening of the church and of Christians to their responsibility to take seriously the practices of the earliest believers. I especially feel that the final essay is of great importance. In his chapter entitled “The Lord’s Supper inthe Context of the Local Church,” Ray van Neste of Union University discusses ways in which Baptist churches can improve their observance of the Lord’s Supper. Among other things, he suggests that the Supper should be celebrated joyfully, that it should be a weekly observance (rather than quarterly or monthly), that its administration should not be left only to certain ordained individuals, and that the practice of using one loaf maintains an important symbolism of Scripture.

This is indeed timely advice. A biblical observance of the Lord’s Supper is both a great privilege and a pressing need today. To be a Christian in the early church was to be a regular participant in a common meal focusing on the absent yet soon to be returning Savior. What a contrast between the early church and the church of our day, which tends to be so traditional, so lacking in simplicity, so “us-centered.” Far too many of us view the Lord’s Supper as a sacrament to be observed infrequently in a funereal atmosphere. Be sure of this: the church today cannot rid itself of its anthropocentrism until it recaptures something of the Christocentricity of the Lord’s Supper. There is immense ignorance today of what the Lord’s Supper truly entails – ignorance which is all the more difficult to overcome because the Scriptures have taken a back seat to convention.

I. Howard Marshall, Professor Emeritus of New Testament at the University of Aberdeen, writing in 1980,summarizes the biblical teaching about the Lord’s Supper. Among his conclusions are the following:

1.     The Supper should be celebrated frequently, if possible each Lord’s Day.

2.     There is no New Testament evidence that would require “ordination” to administer the elements.

3.     Since the Lord’s Supper is a meal, the appropriate setting for it is a table, not an altar.

4.     The New Testament envisages the use of one loaf and a common cup.

Is it too much to hope that our churches today might return to this biblical model? How can we start to overcome our lethargy? We can only do this, as I have said, when we return to a commitment to obedience. Wherever the church honestly faces its task to be scriptural in all its dealings, believers will discover new ways and means of restoring modern practices to their ancient models. Acts 20:7 underscores this point. Here Luke speaks of a meeting of the church in which the focal point was not a sermon but a common meal. This was apparently the common practice of the early church whenever they gathered on “the Lord’s Day.” Today we gather for “worship” and occasionally tack on the Lord’s Supper almost as an addendum. I imagine this would have appeared very strange to New Testament eyes! The early church knew nothing of worship services or worship centers or worship teams or worship folders. Nor were the earliest gatherings of Christians “top heavy,” leaving the ministry to a handful of selected professionals. Theirs was a one-class society – all saints, all priests, all members of the Christian brotherhood with Christ as their only Head. This is why, I surmise, the Lord’s Supper was so important to them. The Supper offers us an occasion to focus on our Great High Priest, the church’s only Senior Pastor (see 1 Pet. 5:4). Moreover, it seems that the Lord’s Supper was a full meal in New Testament times. Indeed, if we ask ourselves what the word “supper” means, we find that the Greek word used is deipnon, which generally refers to the chief meal of the day. Such is its meaning consistently in the pages of the New Testament. Would it be too radical to suggest that the way in which the Lord’s Supper was observed in the early church – as a full meal – could also be replicated today?

The Lord’s Supper is the Cinderella at the Christian Ball. Nobody has perceived this better than Steve Atkerson in an essay titledThe Lord’s Supper – Rehearsal Dinner For The Wedding Banquet of The Lamb, which is not as well known as it should be. I find it very persuasive. Steve nicely summarizes all I have said in this brief essay:

In summary, the Lord’s Supper is the primary purpose for which the church is to gather each Lord’s Day. Eaten as a full meal, the Supper typifies the wedding supper of the Lamb and is thus forward looking. It is to be partaken of as a feast, in a joyful, wedding atmosphere rather than in a somber, funeral atmosphere. A major benefit of the Supper as a banquet is the fellowship and encouragement each member experiences. Within the context of this full meal, there is to be one cup and one loaf from which all partake. One whole loaf is to be used, not only to symbolize the unity of a body of believers, but also because God will use it to create unity within a body of believers. 

This is the heart and center of the matter – the exaltation of Jesus Christ as Savior and Head of the Body. It sounds so simple; but when we are honest with ourselves it is surprising how we have failed to give Christ the “preeminence in all things” (Col. 1:18). I know of no reason why we should not follow the Scriptures in these matters except for inertia and fear – fear that it might be too radical, fear that our sacred traditions might get trampled upon. But such fears are absolutely groundless.

Ray van Neste is correct when he conclude his excellent chapter with these words (p. 390):

We need this celebration. Our God thinks so, or He would not have commanded it. We need to return to thinking deeply, carefully, and pastorally about how to reinvigorate our practice of this wonderful ordinance for the good of the church and the glory of God.

So ends this superb book on the Lord’s Supper. May it inspire us to greater obedience!

February 9, 2011

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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The Lord’s Day Still Belongs to the Lord

 David Alan Black 

It’s called the “Lord’s Day” for a reason: the day belongs to Him. The early church luxuriated in His presence, but we are eager to get home and watch our asinine, ephemeral games, much like the ancient Romans watched the spectacles in the arena. What a grand set of men we are – giving the Lord all of one hour on Sunday morning when He deserves the entire day.

In the Baptist Faith and Message, the article on the Lord’s Day remained unchanged from 1925 to 1963 (although the word “being” was added in 1963 for clarification). The 1963 statement reads as follows:

The first day of the week is the Lord’s Day. It is a Christian institution for regular observance. It commemorates the resurrection of Christ from the dead and should be employed in exercises of worship and spiritual devotion, both public and private, and by refraining from worldly amusements, and resting from secular employments, works of necessity and mercy only being excepted.

The 2000 revision reduces the third sentence by half and adds a fourth sentence. Here are the last two sentences concerning the Lord’s Day in the BFM 2000:

It commemorates the resurrection of Christ from the dead and should include exercises of worship and spiritual devotion, both public and private. Activities on the Lord’s Day should be commensurate with the Christian’s conscience under the Lordship of Christ.

This sounds like “liberty,” but will not many use it as an excuse for license? Our early Baptist founders all shared the same convictions about the Lord’s Day – that it was a day set aside in its entirety for worship and spiritual devotion. The very motto of a Christian should be, “Christ above all.” The success of our whole life, and of our weekly labors, will be directly proportionate to the priority we give to the things of the Lord on His Day.

The man who cannot give the Master of the Universe more than half a day on Sunday will not give Him more than that throughout the week. The great Baptist Spurgeon said it best:

God’s day is dishonoured by those who are not thankful to him. God has, in great mercy, given us a day, on day in seven, wherein to rest, and to think of holy things. There were seven days that God had in the week. He said, “Take six, and use them in your business.” No, we must have the seventh as well. It is as if one, upon the road, saw a poor man in distress, and having but seven shillings, the generous person gave the poor man six; but when the wretch had scrambled to his feet, he followed his benefactor to knock him down, and steal the seventh shilling from him. How many do this! The Sabbath is their day for sport, for amusement, for anything but the service of God. They rob God of his day, though it be but one in seven. This is base unthankfulness. May not many here confess that they have been guilty of it? If so, let no more Sabbaths be wasted; but let their sacred hours, and all the week between, be spent in diligent search after God; and then, when you have found him, the Lord’s-day will be the brightest gem of all the seven, and you will sing with Dr. Watts,—

“Welcome, sweet day of rest,
That saw the Lord arise;
Welcome to this reviving breast,
And these rejoicing eyes!”

Oh, what a delight to worship the King of kings! Come, then, off with sloth and indifference! Let us forsake our worldly “amusements.” We shall be exalted by the Lord only when we humble ourselves. The Lord’s Day still belongs to the Lord, and He is still worthy of our fullest adoration and praise.

February 8, 2005

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com. If you would like to know more about becoming a follower of King Jesus, please feel free to write Dave.

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Looking at Hinduism

Becky Lynn Black  

Have you ever taken a road trip?  What’s the first thing you decide?  Where to go!  Even if all you plan to do is drive around and return back home, you’ve decided where to go.

Then you plot the way of getting there.  You submit yourself to the truth of a map.  If the map says “Turn right on Hwy 735”, then you turn right onto Hwy 735.

Finally, you accept the reality of the limitations of your vehicle.  You know that if the tires are worn, you better have a spare one.  You accept that your vehicle will not run if there is no gas in the tank.

As I’ve studied Hinduism, it seems to me that those who believe in this system of philosophies are taking road trip to an unknown destination, they have no authoritative plan to get there, and they deny the limitations that accompany humanity.  Furthermore, they know that if they don’t get to wherever they are supposed to get to before the end of their life, then they have to start all over again in a new life.

Judaism can point to the escape from Egyptian bondage in about 1300 BC, Christianity can point to Jesus Christ in the year 33AD, Islam can point to Mohammed in the early 7th century AD, but there is no single person or year that indicates the origin of Hinduism.  It is a sort of ‘coming together’ of different philosophical views rather than a fixed set of beliefs. Because its origins are so distant and vague sometimes it is called the “oldest living religion.”  The name “Hindu” is a reference to the people living across the Indus River, which begins in the highlands of Tibet and flows through northern India and down through Pakistan; it is the name foreigners gave to the Indian people.  Whereas other major religions may have several “branches” or variations, Hinduism takes diversity to a new high with thousands of variations.

Buddhism (which developed about 500 years before Christ lived on earth), grew up side by side with Hinduism….each influencing the other in the development of deities, rituals and philosophies.  As it is today, here are the basic ideas of Hinduism….

1. Karma.  This is the idea that action and reaction are opposite and equal.  This means that for every choice I make today, there was something in my past, or there is something in my future, that is equal and opposite.  All of Life is connected.  It’s not only connected, it’s repetitive (circular).  So following the end of the current life comes life in another form and the choices of this life affect the events of the next life.  This is one of the teachings of Hinduism that breeds such hopelessness.  Its followers cannot point to exactly what they did in a past life that is responsible for their horrible state in this life (so they cannot learn from it), but they are certain that whatever it was it justifies their situation today.  So, in a sense, they feel that they brought bad things on themselves by their choices in a previous life.
2. Freedom of belief.  Since Hinduism is at its core a synthesis, a conglomeration of various belief systems, supposedly there is a great tolerance of other belief systems.  Certainly some Hindu leaders (like Gandhi) were peace-lovers. However, this toleration has a limit.  Some Hindus have shown religious violence against other religions.  And some say that Hindu nationalists present the greatest challenge to Christians, far more than extreme Islamists.  A simple reading of the news reflects horrible atrocities done Hindu against Hindu.  The tolerance of Hinduism seems to stop where personal desire starts.
3. Man’s primary purpose.  Hinduism teaches that man’s primary purpose is the realization of his oneness with the god, the ultimate Brahman, the source of all things.  And it teaches that all of man’s problems come when he fails to connect to this oneness.  How does a good Hindu connect with God?  Through developing his inner spiritual life, that spiritual essence within, so that wisdom, peace, joy and harmony flow against the current of the material world.  How the Hindu defines his god varies greatly.  Basically, they can choose whatever god-form they want.  Listen to how one Hindu described his Hindu religion: Hinduism does not dictate what a person should think about God, that is considered a personal view, ‘Mata’ (opinion) or ‘Pantha’ (road). That is why Hindus may be polytheists, monotheists, monists, or even atheists. Even in one family, persons may hold different views. In my family, I am an atheist, but all others are polytheists….Each creature is free to choose his own path. All creatures take several births, depending on his effort, until they understand GOD and they merge with HIM.  A Hindu teacher described the god of Hinduism like this: Hinduism believes that there is only one supreme Absolute called “Brahman”. However, it does not advocate the worship of any one particular deity. The gods and goddesses of Hinduism amount to thousands or even millions, all representing the many aspects of Brahman. Therefore, this faith is characterized by the multiplicity of deities. The most fundamental of Hindu deities is the Trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva – creator, preserver and destroyer respectively. Hindus also worship spirits, trees, animals and even planets. 

This sounds like the people at the Areopagus in Athens!  Paul preached to them about their “unknown god”..the one true God, Jesus Christ..in Acts 17:22-31: “Men of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious. For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: to an unknown god. Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. ‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’ Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by man’s design and skill. In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead.”

4. Sin.  In Hinduism, sin is not the breaking of a firm moral code (as with Islam and Christianity).  Rather it is any action or thought or value that disrupts the harmony and peace between living things.  And ancient Hindu sage explained: In the eighteen puranas of Vedavyasa, two sentences are important: To help others is merit, sin is to trouble others.  Social calm is very important in Hindu culture.  For this reason the caste system was developed; every person had a place in society, and each was to move only within his particular sphere.  Submission to the caste system of social order has spiritual repercussions. “Sin” is refusal to comply with social order.  Hence, there is much peer pressure and intimidation in the Hindu culture.  Hinduism is a way of life dominated by a conglomeration of philosophies.  Only today is the concept of individual rights, of women’s dignity, and of children’s needs beginning to be recognized.

To summarize and compare the religion of Hinduism with Truth as we know it in the Scriptures…

• There is no absolute sin or moral code in Hinduism; anything that disrupts is a “sin”.  The idea of God being absolute righteousness and man being born in a depraved (sinful) condition is foreign to this religion.  It does not share our concept of sin with a price tag.  The need for a Savior is a new idea to them.  Though they try to remove the concept of absolute sin from their conscience, the Scriptures say that God has placed this awareness in every human being. Read Romans 1:16-23…”I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.” The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

So Hindus are not looking for a release from the burden of their sin through a Savior, or Messiah, or a Prophet. Hindus wash in the River Ganges, they mutilate their bodies, they revel in pleasures….trying to always connect with their self-described god, but never coming to the full knowledge of the Truth.  Who will tell them of the Savior?

• Any form of spirituality is OK in Hinduism….as long as it doesn’t disrupt society.  Each person can concoct their own god and find their own way to experience their god.  Ultimately everyone’s god is part of the one great god.  The Scriptures teach us, however, that Truth is absolute; it does not change from person to person, nor from generation to generation.  The Word of the Lord lasts forever.  If we reject that Truth and make our own laws, each person doing what is right in their own eyes, there is a great price to be paid.  God is not mocked; whatever a man sows is what he will reap.  When he sows rejection of the Truth, he will reap destruction.  Can God be God if he is simply a concoction of man’s desire and imagination?
• Hinduism teaches that resident in each creature is a speck of god, and his purpose in life is to have a fuller realization, a greater connection with this god.  If that connection cannot happen in one lifetime, then it requires a 2nd lifetime, and a 3rd, and a 4th, ad infinitum. The creature will continue to have re-births until he connects adequately with the god, and is then launched into Nirvana (heavenly bliss and freedom).  The burden of connection rests with the creature.  Yoga, meditation, chants, rituals…anything is allowed if it helps the creature to connect with his god.  In Hindu temples this could even include the ownership of young girls and boys. Amy Carmichael’s ministry was largely to rescuing these innocent lives from these things.

Can you see the hopelessness of Hinduism?  Can you see the failure to deal with the sin nature of man?  Hinduism is largely a philosophical matter, a playing with the mind, an adjusting of spiritual realities to fit individual desires.

Though Hinduism has been strong in the regions of India for thousands of years, it did not come to the USA until the 1960s.  During this time in our history, our young people were looking to overthrow the restraints of society.  They did not like “the establishment”.  They did not want restrictions on relationships with the opposite sex.  They discovered the ‘liberating’ highs of drugs brought back from Vietnam.  And to go with all this so-called freedom, they looked to Hinduism as a viable religion for them.  Today you can find Hindu temples scattered across our country.  But there is a country where about 80- of the population is locked into the hopelessness of a vague collection of philosophies, searching for a god of their own making, never knowing how to find him, and knowing that their spiritual life will go in circles for generations if they fail to merge with him.  In recent weeks 10 million of these precious souls came together at the River Ganges to bathe as a spiritual exercise in their attempt to merge with their gods.

Who will introduce them to the God who became Man in order to be man’s mediator?  Who will show them the way off their spiritual treadmill?  Who will lead them to the only successful Treatment for the ache in their souls, an ache that comes from sin in the true concept of it? 

How many minutes did it take you to read this article?  It took me 7 minutes.  During the time it took me to read this article, 238 new babies were born into a Hindu family in India….and 70 people following Hinduism in India passed into eternity without a Savior.

(Next report: the Peniel Gospel Team.)

February 10, 2013

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Loafs and Fishes

 David Alan Black  

Yesterday Nathan got up about 75 bales of hay, and just in time because the Lord Jesus blessed us with a nice steady rain shower last night. The apostle Paul once said that the hard-working farmer ought to have the first share of the crops, but I’m sure this hay will be sold, and for a good, but fair, price. And all because of the goodness of God – and the diligence of Nathan. No wonder Paul saw the ideal Christian as a hard-working farmer.                                                                      

Speaking of the farm, I don’t fish myself, but we’ve stocked the pond with plenty of bass, and visitors to Bradford Hall get a fair catch whenever they cast out their lines. I suppose we’ve all heard lots of fishing jokes, but one of my favorites has a little boy saying, when asked what his favorite part of the Bible was, “The part where everybody loafs and fishes.” The wider application, of course, is to our churches, where so many of us owe so much to so few (apologies to Sir Winston). I wonder: How can we stand idly by when there’s a world to be won and so many needs to be met?

We say we are too busy waiting for the Lord Jesus to return to get our hands dirty in worldly affairs. But clearly the best way to look forward to His coming is by quietly and diligently doing our duty in our daily jobs and ministries. This indeed is one of the great truths of Paul’s Thessalonian correspondence: while we are waiting for the Second Coming we are to mind our own business and go on working with our hands. The certainty of Christ’s return is no excuse for laziness. In fact, one of the best demonstrations of genuine Christianity is that it produces workers not spongers, tradesmen not truants. The lazy Christian has no right to sit down to dinner, said Paul, and he was right!

Friend, it is our Christian duty to work hard so as not to be a financial burden on others and so that we may help those who cannot be as independent as we are through no fault of their own. If we refuse to work, we should not eat, says Paul. Can we not apply this principle to the work of the church? Why should 10 percent of the congregation do 100 percent of the ministry? The Christian ethic is an ethic of mutual service, in which the obligation to serve falls on every believer. No Christian is without his or her responsibility in this regard.

Loafing and fishing is a poor substitute for joyful duty and pleasant obligation!

May 3, 2007

David Alan Black is the editor of www.daveblackonline.com.

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