Readying for The Bethel Bible Course Awards Banquet 2001

Readying for The Bethel Bible Course Awards Banquet 2001

PRIDE is the ultimate downfall of us all, and is what brought Lucifer tumbling ignominiously out of an exalted state in the heavenlies into an uneasy interlocution throughout the earth under his new name of Satan. The fact that he brought the whole of mankind down with him is no surprise, since his first targets (and thus, victims) were Eve and then Adam; they were after all, the only human beings around at the time. Unfortunately, not only mankind was undone by Satan, but the entire Creation, which to this day “groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.” (Romans 8:22)

It seemed timely for me to go back and revisit my spiritual experiences of that period when I was a truly broken man attempting to put his shattered life back together. James declares “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” (James 5:16)

It turns out that there were many “fervent prayers of righteous men and women” winging their way to the throne room of heaven on my behalf in those days, and today going on twenty years later, I have no doubt that that is still the case. More to the point however, is that I now use heaven’s direct mail apparatus to lift my own prayers to the throne room on behalf of others who are experiencing the same despair.

The plain fact of the matter is that none of us can defeat the devil alone. As is very evident from what Jesus revealed to Peter (Luke 22:31-34) without Christ’s intercession on our behalf, we are all defeated .. In his Psalm of sobs, the 51st David declares “Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit. Then will I teach transgressors thy ways; and sinners shall be converted unto thee. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise (verses 12, 13, 17)

And you will be very happy ...

And you will be very happy …

As a segue` into C. S. Lewis and a segment from Mere Christianity, I leave you with this raison d’etre from W. Graham Scroggie: 
Abounding life is just the fullness of life in Christ, made possible by his death and resurrection, and made actual by the indwelling and infilling of the Holy Spirit. It is not the will of God that we should be as fruitless trees, as waterless clouds, or as savor-less salt, but that we should fulfill the highest functions of our Christian calling. Christ’s promise is that he will slake the thirst of all who come to him, and his purpose for those who come is that “out of their vitals shall flow rivers of living water.” 
~ (C) 2011 Cloud by Day, Fire by Night – Dennis G Hurst

C. S. Lewis on atheism...

 

We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain. (For he saith, I have heard thee in a time accepted, and in the day of salvation have I succoured thee: behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation.) ~  2 Corinthians 6:2

“Why is God landing in this enemy-occupied world in disguise and starting a sort of secret society to undermine the devil? Why is He not landing in force, invading it? Is it that He is not strong enough?

“Well, Christians think He is going to land in force; we do not know when. But we can guess why He is delaying. He wants to give us the chance of joining His side freely. I do not suppose you and I would have thought much of a Frenchman who waited till the Allies were marching into Germany and then announced he was on our side.

“God will invade. But I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in our world quite realize what it will be like when He does. When that happens, it is the end of the world. When the author walks on to the stage the play is over. God is going to invade, all right: but what is the good of saying you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting away like a dream and something else — something it never entered your head to conceive — comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left?

Creation rules...

Creation rules…

“This time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every creature. It will be too late then to choose your side. There is no use saying you choose to lie down when it has become impossible to stand up. That will not be the time for choosing; it will be the time when we discover which side we really have chosen, whether we realized it before or not. Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side. God is holding back to give us that chance. It will not last forever. We must take it or leave it.

“Every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowly turning this central thing either into a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature: either into a creature that is in harmony with God, and with other creatures, and with itself, or else into one that is in a state of war and hatred with God, and with its fellow-creatures, and with itself. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other.”  ~  C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

I’m at a loss for words, there’s nothing to say
I sit in silence wondering what led me to this place
How did my heart become so lifeless and cold
Where did the passion go?

When all my efforts seem like chasing wind
I’ve used up all my strength and there’s nothing left to give
I’ve lost the feeling and I’m numb to the core
I can’t fake it anymore.

Here I am at the end I’m in need of resurrection
Only You can take this empty shell and raise it from the dead
What I’ve lost to the world what seems far beyond redemption
You can take the pieces in Your hand and make me whole again, again

You speak and all creation falls to its knees
You raise Your hand and calm the waves of the raging sea
You have a way of turning winter to spring
Make something beautiful out of all this suffering

Here I am once again I’m in need of resurrection
Only You can take this empty shell and raise it from the dead
What I’ve lost to the world what seems far beyond redemption
You can take the pieces in Your hand and make me whole again, again

You have a way of turning winter to spring
Make something beautiful out of all this suffering
Here I am once again I’m in need of resurrection
Only You can take this empty shell and raise it from the dead

I’m in need of resurrection, only You, only You can raise me from the dead
You can take the pieces in Your hand and make me whole again, again….

Face of Jesus by Richard Hook

Soli Deo Gloria!