Somewhere Up There...

Although outside time, in eternity past, upon the heavenly Throne sat Father, Son and Holy Spirit. How those three in one Godhead love each other! Absolutely flawless, and prior to the Crucifixion, it was and always have been utterly impossible for any brief interruption to mar this ongoing love relationship. How joyful each of these "persons" were, each putting the welfare of the other two above his own. Therefore it can be said that because of the eternal love relationship existing between the three, God is love, not just merely the source of love. 

The reality of this eternal Trinity is so massively different from Allah of the Islamic faith, or even the Jehovah of the Watchtower Society of Witnesses, both sources depicting their God as once existing alone in the Universe before any form of creation having taken place, and incapable of love until such objects of his love came into being. Perhaps this Unitarian form of God must have felt cold and lonely from time to time in universal space and in need of a companion. At last, Jehovah of the Watchtower creates a companion for company, the archangel Michael, who would one day incarnate to become the Witnesses version of Jesus Christ. Between these two - a big God and a little god - the rest of creation got underway, spanning thousands if not millions of years. This began with the creation of all the other angelic hosts before the physical creation of all heavenly bodies including the Earth. Finally the six "days" of creation, each of a thousand years apiece, began as described in the first chapter of Genesis.

Having associated with Jehovah's Witnesses during my earliest years as a Christian believer (and nearly becoming one of them), I was able to see the commitment they had for their faith. This includes going out in all weather conditions to knock on doors in their attempt to convert, despite their full expectations of a hostile reception and having the front door slammed shut at their faces. Books, only published by the Watchtower Society, were read and studied in a group discussion, normally at a home of a Witness. And their topic was always the same - a Unitarian God, his created son Christ Jesus who was inferior to his Father, his impalement on a wooden stake (therefore not crucified), their denial of a physical resurrection, and a very dubious probational salvation offered for those who endure to the end. All this with their insistence that all churches, along with all human governments with their federal and civic institutions, are of the Devil and will all be destroyed in the coming global Battle of Armageddon. Dare to leave the organisation and eternal death by annihilation is guaranteed. With such theology, this "Maybe Salvation" was the final straw needed to repudiate the Watchtower Society entirely.

Oh, what a difference this Unitarian God is to the truth and reality of the Trinity! From eternity past, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, all equal in the divine Godhead, enjoyed a love lavished between each other. It is a truth well beyond human understanding. Because of his omniscience, "before the foundation of the world" or from eternity past, he already has the Lamb's Book of Life, with all the names of everyone who will be saved written within. Yet he also knew that there will be many, many more who will be born, live and die without ever knowing their Creator. The same with his angelic hosts. God was about to create them with the full knowledge that one of them will be filled with pride and rebel, with up to a third of the entire host rebelling with him. Because from eternity past he knew all along, for me it is all a mystery. A mystery I will never get round to solve, due to my own finitude.

But with awareness of this divine foreknowledge, I have a desire to think of the likelihood that a conversation like this had taken place within the Trinity before anything was made:

Father: You both know that soon after we had created the angelic host, one will lead a rebellion.

Holy Spirit: Yes we do know. But not until after our creation of mankind's first parents.

Father: By not having physical bodies, the fallen angels will be entirely outside of redemption, neither would they want to be redeemed anyway. But after mankind has fallen through the sin of just one man, due to their genome inherited from father and mother alike, the whole of humanity will still be within redemption.

Holy Spirit: This will mean that one of us must become one of them, to be born as one of them, to have the same human genome, to live and identify as one of them, to minister to them and finally to allow them to kill as a human sacrifice to atone for their sin. And then to rise again, physically.

Father: All of this is perfectly true. Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?

Son: Here am I. Send me.

Father: Yes my beloved! Indeed, you may go. And a great joy will be set before you when you see multitudes without number redeemed, and you will be exalted above all things! Okay, let's begin with Creation, our host of angels first! And all three in the Godhead rejoiced exceedingly.

And yes, I can find a portion of Scripture which seems to back such a conversation, and I love the Authorised Version of Zechariah 2:6-11 because this is the only version that I know of which has God laughing: 

Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north, saith the LORD: for I have spread you abroad as the four wings of the heaven, saith the LORD.

Deliver thyself, O Zion, that dwellest with the daughter of Babylon.

For thus saith the LORD of hosts; After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye.

For, behold, I will shake my hand upon them, and they will be a spoil to their servants: and ye shall know that the LORD of hosts has sent me.

Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion: for, lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the LORD.

And many nations shall be joined to the LORD on that day, and shall be my people: and I will dwell in the midst of thee, and thou shalt know that the LORD has sent me unto thee.

Zechariah 2:6-11 KJV, also Isaiah 6:8.

Here is the LORD of hosts sent by the LORD of hosts! Perhaps this is the greatest rebuke which could be given to the Watchtower Society. God sent by God. Imagine that. And therefore we have the Son crucified, buried, and resurrected, now ascended to heaven, only to return to deliver the house of Israel and establish his Kingdom in Jerusalem. Of course, Easter does not mean anything to them. To them, it's a pagan holiday with no bearing on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

Really, after Adam and Eve had sinned, God was not obliged to make any move towards redemption. Instead, to satisfy infinite justice, every single person ever born must die and be eternally lost, separated from God forever. It is hard to imagine the likes of Abel, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, along with all the prophets suffering eternally in Hell, along with the apostle Paul, all the other 1st Century disciples, together with us today - eternally separated from God.  But he made the first move towards redemption anyway because of his love and mercy. 

Oh how I am thankful for God's mercies! And that is what Easter is all about. Not about chocolate eggs, bunnies and decorated buns, but about the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I guess that was the plan of God all along. To be glorified through redemption. For the whole creation to thunder praises to him for his undeserved mercy and grace, with not a single stroke of work done by anyone, other than by Jesus Christ himself, to earn this salvation. 

The idea that the Lamb's Book of life was composed "before the foundation of the world" (Revelation 13:8), makes ridiculous any ideas that a true Christian believer could lose his salvation and be lost again. Instead, I can see that the omniscience of God being the proper reason for believing in Eternal Security of the Believer. Once saved always saved. This is not arrogance or self assurance, this is the grace and the power of God, whose foreknowledge cannot be contradicted or able to undo.

But it still remains a mystery. All around me I see people who do not know the Lord. And this is a country which has the Christian Constitution, along with its Defender of the Faith and head of the Anglican Church, with the Archbishop of Canterbury being the top guy of the Christian faith in England. Yet the majority of the population does not know God. Indeed, this is indeed sad, and such observation has made any idea of a heavenly book sealed from before Creation rather unpalatable to believe in, to be labelled a Calvinist, to carry the idea that the reason why these people don't know the Lord is because their names are not in God's unalterable Book of Life, and therefore concluding that God has never called them. These are issues I have grappled with, and I'm still grappling with these issues at present.

Feeling sad for them gives the impression that I do love my fellow countrymen, even if I don't agree with their culture. The culture of social class division and favouritism, at the same time revelling in national pride and optimism through self effort whilst glorifying past imperialistic achievements. Much of all this based on Darwinism, with it's past (and sometimes present) Master Race mentality. Then the British bulldog spirit standing in the way between the average Brit and faith in Jesus Christ. Yet whilst I dwell on these spiritual barriers, I tend to forget that God is not obliged to save anyone. But he saves anyway, lavishing grace and mercy for his own sake.

Maybe that is where my way of thinking is awry. I'm basing my heart on my fellow man's benefit instead of God's glory. The whole purpose of salvation through unmerited grace and mercy is to bring glory to God throughout all creation, and particularly to the angelic host after the heavenly rebellion. Yet the question remains, which I once prayed desperately to God:

Why, O Lord, did you create us in the first place if all that awaits is eternal condemnation? 

Especially concerning Psalm 139, where the author specify how he was "knit together in the womb" by God, as with every pregnancy, only to be born to live a life without ever knowing God, then to suffer eternal separation. Nothing seems to make any sense. I couldn't help but feel a sense of cruelty within this whole shenanigan. Especially when I imagine with horror my nearest and dearest suffering forever in hell, a strong possibility had she been born in a non-Christian country.

However, there are three national holidays we observe here in the United Kingdom: Christmas, Easter and Whitsunday. Christmas is to do with the birth of Jesus, Easter to do with his death, burial and Resurrection, and Whitsunday is to do with the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, although it is unlikely that many here in the UK knows what Whitsunday is supposed to be about. Three Christian festivals in a year, in my mind at least, cannot be mere consequential. This seems to tie in well with the original three Hebrew festivals specified in the Old Testament: Pesach (the Passover,) Shavuot (Pentecost, the feast of Weeks), and Sukkot (Tabernacles). Always in threes, which looks to be aligned with the three persons of the Trinity - Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Through these holidays, is God trying to tell us something?

Contrary to believing in strict Calvinism (chosen by God's sovereignty to be saved rather than by human choice, advocated by John Calvin, a 16th Century French theologian), Scripture does indicate human choice. For example, in Luke 24:47, the resurrected Jesus informs his remaining disciples that "repentance and remission of sins must be preached to all nations everywhere, starting at Jerusalem." Then in Acts 17:30, Paul instructs the population at Athens "that in the past God winked at ignorance, but now he commands all men everywhere to repent." Then there is the testimony of Peter, who writes, "but the Lord is long-suffering to us, not willing that anyone should perish, but all should come to repentance" (2 Peter 3:9). Those three verses strongly indicate human choice. And to repent simply means a change of mind about Jesus Christ. 

Back in those days, Jesus was known to many. But the Jews wanted a political deliverer from the burden of the Romans. When he refused to deliver politically, he was seen as an impostor, possibly a madman. For the Jew to repent, he had to change his mind from believing him to be an impostor to believing in him as the risen Christ, God come in the flesh. I as a non-Jew had to change my mind from thinking Jesus as some remote teacher who lived long ago to being the Son of God who died and rose from the dead.

I'll end here with one of the most famous verse in the Bible, which reads:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16.

Wishing you a happy, God-blessed Easter.

A Source of Unneeded Terror

Simon, who has a level of Autism Spectrum Disorder, or ASD, has been a Christian believer for quite a number of years. But having being brought up in the Catholic faith, and becoming deluded with it by the time he reached his late teens. Then one day while killing time in the library, he was suddenly converted after finding a Bible on one of the shelves. Having placed it on a nearby reading desk, it fell open towards the end of the book, on one of the pages with the sub-heading, St John. This is what he read:

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; that the world through him might be saved. 

John 3:16-17.

Simon had a more positive feeling about God than he did before he read that passage. He believed that this Jesus, the son of Mary, played a significant role in his salvation, and began to put his trust in him. It was quite a contrast to the Jesus Christ of Catholicism. As he once perceived this long-haired, bearded, Italian-looking fellow to be continuously angry, and constantly critical of the behaviour of those he met and communicated, it was impossible for this lad to see any love within the heart of the man who called himself the Son Of God. If it wasn't for his virgin mother persistently interceding on behalf of sinful mankind, nobody would get into Heaven. To add to this, even the favourites of this Jesus languished in Purgatory, a temporary but a very real Hell where even the smallest of sins committed when alive had to be purged out before being let into Heaven. This purging involved physical suffering to an intensity never experienced by anyone on earth. With threats such as this, little wonder he became disillusioned with his former faith.

Purgatory of Catholic Catechism

Although he was encouraged by the Scripture, his new-found faith raised questions. Mainly this: Why weren't many more believed, if that is all it takes to be saved? And how can he be so sure that he was saved? Has God really acquit him from his sins? Was his faith strong enough, or pointing in the right direction for it to have taken effect? Then a few years later, Simon was browsing on the Internet at home, and came across the most terrifying video that could ever be made. It had its origins from the works of Jack Chick, an American who was famed for his miniature evangelistic cartoon strips and his emphasis on a physical Hell. The video struck terror into Simon's heart, and as he lay in bed that night, he was silently praying while his wife lay asleep beside him.

If this is to be our eternal destiny after death, then why, oh why, did you create us in the first place? Then he turned to see his wife sleeping soundly, and he felt as if another, an even larger spear piercing his heart even further. The very thought of his wife suffering such an eternal fate not only intensify his fear of her welfare, but also a sense of pleading sorrow. How he loved his wife and felt so devoted to her. And even if there were times she might have been cold or disagreeable to him, he could never, never confine her to such eternal suffering! All these emotions, strong as they were, were from the fact that he was never fully freed from Roman Catholicism, and remained locked in the image of an angry God whose wrath was manifest in a critical Jesus Christ as he ministered here on earth some two thousand years previously.

As he walked through the city streets, Simon observed the daily crowd going on their business. He watched young families, especially mothers escorting their infant offspring. At a cafe, he even watched a mother slowly spooning semi-liquid food into her baby son's mouth. All bound for that dreadful place after death? Then as he walked further along the street, he spotted some Hindus and further on, some Muslims. He began to visualise the huge crowd of Muslims, thousands of them, in and around the Kaaba, the head mosque at the Saudi Arabian city of Mecca. And also the multiple thousands of Hindus assembling at the Ganges River in the far east. And were they all heading for that fiery place under their feet, simply because they are following the wrong religion and showing devotion to it? Then at times when he had to visit his doctor, his dentist, or allowed to be served by the checkout attendant at the supermarket. Then all the men and women he watches daily on television. News anchormen, reporters, chat show hosts and their guests, actors, singers, comedians. Then, worst of all, sitting at table with his agnostic parents and atheist brother. Then his mother wonders why he has no appetite.

But it was the sight of the young mother and her son at the cafe which sent shivers down his spine. All throughout the Hindu world, the Muslim world, as well as the Western world, children are constantly being born to parents who know little or nothing about salvation in Christ. This grieved Simon even more. It was a dreadful anomaly from what meant to be perceived as the God of love who sent his Son to atone for their sins. Simon couldn't help thinking: How effective was the atonement Christ made on the cross? If the apostle wrote that in Christ, God has reconciled the world to himself, not imputing their tresspasses against them (2 Corinthians 5:19), and that he that loves not knoweth not God, for God is love (1 John 4:8) seems to blatantly contradicts this fiery Hell as portrayed in the video, yet it is as if nearly the entire human population are heading towards it, as the video shows, a constant rain of lost souls unceasingly falling into the fires below. Simon reasoned that "not knowing God" is a bit like not knowing Fred Bloggs. How can he love Fred if he doesn't know him? Furthermore, would Fred send him to fry forever, because Simon failed to love him? Such thoughts spun in his head.

If Simon loved his wife so much, he couldn't bear see his wife suffer, not even for a moment, let alone eternally. He then reasoned that the Christian faith, like all religions, is based on fear. Fear of punishment. For Simon grew to believe that the reality of this fiery Hell has prevented him from loving God as his Heavenly Father, because he finds it difficult to love a deity who is capable of condemning billions to relentless torture. Instead, in fear he makes an effort to stay clean. But there is a problem. Although he is happily married and very devoted to his wife, in the church where he attends, there is another female whose presence arouses his sexual desire. He see her there nearly every week, and he goes home and to bed fantasising her with himself, arms entwined. He even uses the fantasy to help him sleep. But he also knows that this is wrong. And it is this aroused desire which makes him doubt his salvation and dreading what could happen if he died right there and then.

Then, as Simon lays on his bed, he ponders: What right has he to be an inheritor of eternal glory when there are so many around him who are not so fortunate? Pretty frightening too, is the thought of being born as a Muslim or Hindu, or from a remote jungle tribe cut off from civilization as we know it, or for that matter, from atheist but well educated parents. So much distress, how can such a mountain of burden be borne solely on one human heart? After all, does this Jesus Christ have any love in his heart, knowing that such a huge percentage of the human population is perishing? Or does he cry out Woe! Woe! Woe! - as he did one day at the Pharisees? But furthermore, how can he prove that this Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ, the Anointed One, the Jewish Messiah, is the Way to eternal life? And not Mohammed or any of the Hindu or Buddhist deities and their scriptures? 

I approach Simon and asked him if watching the video has edified him. He tells me that just the opposite of edify is to terrify, and that has what the video has done for him. He also explained that any love he had for God has been replaced by a deep fear of him, together with an apparently justifiable case that if God has reconciled the world to himself, not imputing their tresspasses against them, how is it that God has prepared such a terrible place for lost souls? I try to explain that the Lake of Fire was never intended for mankind, but was prepared for the Devil and his angels, according to Matthew 25:41. It was never God's intention for any man or woman to go there. Then by testifying that the way to life is through Jesus, I opened the Bible to Isaiah 53, and read out to him these words:

He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted. 

But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us turned to his own way, and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Isaiah 53:3-6.

I then asked him, "Who have met such credentials?"

Simon replied, "None other than Jesus."

I then advised him never again watch such videos on the Internet, or watch or read anything that does not edify, because unless the material builds up your faith and brings out your love for the Lord, then more than likely, such material is not from God - even if it looks fully orthodox and Biblical. For Jesus died to atone for our sins, to bring us peace, and that we can enjoy life, not tremble in terror. After all, no living person has ever been to Hell, nobody knows what it really looks like. 

"But what about those who do not know the Gospel?" Simon asked.

Well, according to Paul's letter to the church in Rome, he wrote that his voice has gone out to all the earth, his words to the end of the world (Romans 10:18). And that was quoted from Psalm 19:4 which reads:

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.

There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.

Their voice go out to all the earth, their words to the end of the world.

Psalm 19:1-4.

The love of Christ is beyond comprehension...

And the Gospel of John opens with the assurance that the true light which shines into every man was coming into the world (John 1:9). Simon then concluded, 

"If a man in Hell asks, 'Why am I here?' then I could answer by asking, 'Why did you reject such a loving God?'"

Then Simon turned and walked away.  

God's Promises Will Stand.

A few days ago I requested an appointment to see a Doctor at our local surgery, for two issues. The first was that of a development of a bruise on my upper arm, a solid black circle about an inch in diameter, which had formed for no apparent reason, since being over the bicep area, a site unlikely to receive any blows or other forms of external injury. Despite the total lack of pain accompanying the bruise, my wife was more alarmed at the site than I was, and pleaded me to see the G.P. The other issue was at the base of the left foot, just above the ankle, when around mid-afternoon onward, a sharp searing pain envelopes the joint, making the use of the ladder at work very difficult indeed, as well as having to limp along instead of walking properly.

Perhaps there is that masculine trait in me about not wanting to see the doctor. Basically, I have that hunch about wasting the G.P's time, when he has other patients with far more serious complaints to deal with. Yes, I have read posters about people crowding the Accident and Emergency department of a hospital, even for something as trivial as a headache, but wasting valuable N.H.S. resources is something I was determined to stay clear of. After all, I don't want either myself or others around to see me as a whiny wimp who runs to the Doctor every time I cough, belch or fart. But the reason for my wife's concern about the bruise was because I take an anticoagulant medicine on a regular daily basis, which I must for the rest of my life, or risk suffering a stroke. On the leaflet which comes with every packet of pills, under possible side effects, I was warned to see a Doctor straight away if bruising occurs, short of an external injury. I suppose there was something about not visiting the Doctor, despite my wife's pleas. Perhaps it was not wanting to receive a telling-off from such a professional, instead to be told to man up, don't be so whiny, and stop wasting his time.

Like about twelve months previously, when I woke up about two or three o'clock in the morning gasping for air, like a man who had just ran a foot-race and crossed the finish line. This, together with rumbling of the chest and feeling of a drowning sensation, which threefold symptom repeated itself night after night for a couple of weeks. Back then, my dear wife persuaded me to visit the Doctor, even when I believed it was nothing more than a bug which would eventually get fed up and leave. But she won the argument, and I reluctantly went, only to be eventually diagnosed with a heart problem and in need of an operation to put it right. Whiny indeed!

So it came as not a surprise when I called at the surgery's reception, only to be told that there was no appointment available that day, and all time slots were fully booked up. And that was not even on a Monday or a Friday when the surgery is particularly busy. Instead, by submitting my mobile phone number to Reception, the Doctor would contact me as soon as possible. And so he did. He called me in to have a blood test done straight away, for I might have gone over the limit with the anticoagulants, making my blood "too thin" - hence the cause of the bruising. As for my foot problem, I gave an accurate description of the symptoms as I possibly could have done. He seemed rather familiar with the complaint, for he came back with Arthritis as the cause of the problem. Arthritis! The "old man's illness" as it is so traditionally believed. What amazes me was that as recently as eighteen months previously I was considering the possibility of working right up to my seventieth birthday, as I felt on top of the world, even though milder symptoms of arthritis in the feet were already being felt. But back then, I thought all these were a passing phase. 

Things look so different now. With such a recent cardiac procedure, a lifetime on medicine, and now arthritis in the feet to contend with us well, I have arrived at the crossroads for early retirement. But not just for my health's sake but that of my wife as well. During the three months convalescence, one thing which has added further joy and strength to our marriage was my role of carer, and I won't beat about the bush here, but I thoroughly enjoyed it, and the return to work I saw more of a set back rather than progress. Maybe, as one of our church elders had put it; it is time for me to retire from work to spend more time together, and to enjoy the rich blessings God has for us. However, for what I can see and have experienced over the last few years, our Doctor's surgery has always been very busy, with patients of all ages, gender, and social class packing the waiting room in front of Reception.

And where we live is at a typical middle-class suburbia. We have neighbouring streets where not only every home is a detached house with private front and back gardens, but with average ownership of two to three cars. Around here people are generally well-off, and have professional careers, yet the number of busy surgeries dotted around the district testifying that the health of our nation isn't that great. And we are not even the worst. Nearer to London there was a media report on one surgery that was so busy, that patients literally queuing up outside the doors, with a hope of seeing a doctor face-to-face on the same day. Not to mention Accident and Emergency departments of all hospitals across the land where the average waiting time is four hours per patient.

It makes me ponder why, in such a rich country, there is such a high rate of illness and the need for treatments. Even I can testify of a two-week delay with my own cardiac procedure, due to the intensive care ward being chock-a-block, and therefore receiving two cancellation notices, each a week apart, prior to the operation. As I have mentioned in earlier blogs, the combined emotion of worry, anger, and fear are the "big three" health-wrecking emotions, together with the feeling of frustration, along with the British perception of sharing emotional talk as weak and unmanly. Uncertainty of the future is one of the major cause of anxiety, as in my case, as well as not being sure which direction our present Government is leading our country.

Fear is the biggest enemy to health, and it comes with various levels such as terror, worry, and anxiety. Fear of the future - the fear of job loss, prolonged unemployment, illness, the threat of poverty, ending up in a Civil Court over a dispute about benefits, failure in mortgage or rent payments, or anything which threatens our peace. All these can make a strong person end up as a hospital patient. As retirement is very close to my mind at the moment, would our present Government move the goalposts, forcing me to work for an income until a later age? Would they do away with Housing Benefit, a wonderful godsend for those tenants struggling with high rents? And so-to-speak, would our leaders snap a whip across my back to get me to work into old age, even while physically impaired, so that the rich can be spared from paying too high taxes, if any taxes at all? Should I feel pity, if not deep anxiety for my daughters' future? What kind of a world are we handing over to them?

Yet despite all this doom and gloom, there is a wonderful source of hope!

One of our wedding songs sang during the church ceremony was Father God. The first verse goes like this:

Father God I wonder how I managed to exist without the knowledge of your parenthood and your loving care? Now I am you son, I am adopted in your family, and I can never be alone 'cause Father God, you're there beside me.

This was sang by us and by the congregation at our wedding, and to me at least, it's one of the most assuring songs ever written, and it is my wife's favourite. The chorus goes:

I will sing your praises! I will sing your praises! I will sing you Praises! For evermore -

And this is repeated as many times as one desires.

And this song is based on the surety of God's promises, as well as through day-to-day living. One of the best examples of this took place in the Garden of Eden, at the dawn of history. Immediately after the Fall of Adam and Eve, God passes judgement (Genesis 3:14-19) which contains the promise that the serpent's head will be bruised by the seed of the woman, who in turn will have his heel bruised in the process - verse 15 - which is a good description of the Crucifixion, death and Resurrection of Jesus Christ. Then the calling of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, through whom the seed is promised. The institution of the Jewish Passover further endorses this promise, which comes up repeatedly throughout prophecy, such as Psalm 22, Isaiah 53, and Zechariah 9:9, and many more. God's promise to restore Israel as a nation in the future from this point of time is assured, particularly in Isaiah chapters 11 and 66, Jeremiah chapters 30 and 31, Ezekiel chapters 36 and 37, and Zechariah chapters 10 -14. All of these promises, and many more, are solid-rock certain, they will be fulfilled. Therefore if God is all sovereign, and he is fully omniscient as well as omnipotent and omnipresent, then surely not only does he have the whole world in his hands, but the very exact number of days we have has already been determined by him. He knows our thoughts, our feelings, our joy and our anxieties. He already knows what we will say and do in the future even before any of them come to pass.

As one of the sermons I have listened to in recent weeks, God knows best, and everything which happens to us works for the good for those who love him, that is to say, for every believer. But this does not leave us without any choice. For Peter himself writes in his letter:

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you 1 Peter 5:7.

That is a promise that I should look upon in times like these. God cares for me. So if I want to retire two years before the official age, why shouldn't I? Why shouldn't I revel in the goodness and blessing of God while caring for my lame wife, and adding further strength, romance, and sparkle into our marriage? I think God has already said "Yes" to such a move. Signs seem to point to this. So why not? Should I accept "slave status" from the present Government simply because I happen to be working class, poorly educated, and a mere average earner, as opposed to being a rich company executive or a celebrity? No, I won't accept such a status! Instead, I'll go by what God has said of me, that as a true believer, I am his, I am adopted into his family, and I can never be alone to face a cruel world. It can be said that the world may go as far as kill my body, but it can never change my mind.

Sliding Back To The 19th Century?

At least a quarter of the British population are now happy, mostly the English living in the South of the country, particularly the Home Counties - the leafy suburban, doughnut-like area surrounding the capital, but in a rather ironic sense, London itself has less than 25% happy, so I have read, due mainly to a large percentage of immigrants living and working there, along with the ethnic minority. When considering the 75% or so, who did not vote Conservative in the last General Election just a few weeks ago, and this includes all those who abstained from voting altogether, as well as all those, including myself, who voted for a representative from another political party, our present occupant of number 10 Downing Street got in there due to a small majority over one main rival party, but by no means over all the parties combined. It's the first past the post polling system. With such a system in place, it seems that the resulting victory for the Tories was something of a fluke.

Although it is of my opinion that capitalism, and the freedom of choice which goes with it, is a better system than socialism with its bureaucratic red tape strangling the life out of it, what I have seen arising from so called "pure capitalism" is greed, and that on a brutal scale. Our recent political history is riddled with corruption, with our cross-party Members of Parliament having their snouts in the trough in the name of "Expense Allowance" - a purse sustained by the tax-payer, therefore a benefits system with a posher-sounding name. Meanwhile, those in the banking industry in particular had their reputations stained by announcements of huge bonuses, so huge some of them were, that it would take literally a hundred years to make on my income! Right-wing newspaper journalists shower praise on these executives for exhibiting "talent" - despite a number of cases of bad or shoddy performance - and so it is held that without them the economy of the whole country would go to pot, so whichever Government is in power, whether Conservative, Coalition, or Labour, such would be terrified to reel in such payments, as this, as they believe, would drive the industry overseas, robbing our nation of the very backbone of its existence.

So to me, as I see it, a limited level of socialism acts as a restraint against capitalistic greed, and also acts as a guard against exploitation of workers, particularly manual workers, by their profit-minded bosses. However, our national mentality deplores the red tape which makes private enterprise stumble over seemingly unnecessary obstacles. Therefore one of our Prime Minister's manifesto promises is to free up businesses of this dreadful "red tape" which make day-to-day running so unnecessarily difficult. On the face of it, this proposal looks fair, and well thought out. But in reality, it is removing any rights for the workers, ushering in the "hire-and-fire" mentality of the bosses without any real consideration of the worker's welfare.

It would be like going back to Victorian times, as one recent BBC docu-drama so explicitly demonstrated. To film such a programme, a group of celebrities, of both genders and of different ages, was brought back in time to the Nineteenth Century, when the vast majority of the population worked long hours to the ground, often in stinking filth and similar rat-infested environments, just to eat and keep a roof over their heads. There were a number of cases when payment of wages was withheld by their employer or site owner if the end product fail to satisfy, and that despite the hours of hard graft put in by those workers in their attempt to produce it. Little wonder the Trade Unions came to existence under Christian conviction, along with the newly-formed Labour Party. Would this revived Victorian work environment and ethic be the final destiny, over the generations, if the Tories continually have their way?

And although our politicians love to get their hands on Expense Allowance to lace their already high incomes, at present the minister for the Department of Work and Pensions is committed to reduce benefit handouts to the barest minimum, if not abolish them in its entirety, if this fellow gets his way without opposition. Over the last few months, I have found one benefit, the Employment and Support Allowance, a wonderful Godsend while recovering from a major cardiac procedure. It took away any threat of impoverishment while we saw this period of convalescence to that of a sabbatical. Here I won't beat about the bush. We both thoroughly enjoyed the sabbatical. It has added further strength to our marriage, gave extra comfort to each other, and gave me opportunities to remain active - walking, cycling, fulfilling outdoor chores, as well as creating opportunities to take my lame wife out of the house to board the train to various historic venues or destinations of natural beauty. I tend to see this period of convalescence more of a life-changing phase than that of the operation itself. Really, there was no time for boredom.

And yet there was reported earlier in the week of one shocking incident concerning this minister of the D.W.P. That was when some leaders of the European Union expressed anxieties about the way our welfare system is being needlessly attacked, so it appeared to them. The minister laughed and declared his intention to continue with the cuts. It is this ferocious arrogance of this Catholic ex-military schoolboy which has sent shivers of terror down my spine. Here is a man who had never faced the prospect of unemployment, nor had he ever done a day's manual labour. Instead, he sees the ill, the incapacitated, and the lame as burdens on the state economy, and are pushed to find work against their will. Furthermore, there are many employers who are not keen to take on such disabled workers, and as such, there was also a report of a rise of suicides among them. This minister is also the one who stereotype the benefit claimer as a leeching lout, workshy and determined to let others support him, without any knowledge on why such a claimant had ended up in such a situation, and that each person is unique, and has his own set of circumstances. I can't help but see such a politician as a brutal Victorian who not only has a lack of any trace of compassion, but given a chance, would have children return to the mine shafts and operate heavy machinery in old-style cotton mills. What I also find shocking is his lack of respect for the elderly, insisting that they should retire later in life, and remain at work instead. Then to add a sting to his tail, he wrote a novel, The Devil's Tune, which had received critical reviews, but fortunately, it was not published on paperback. This very book seems to be the epitome of this minister's character.

This "Britain Working Together" nonsense is also the reason why our Prime Minister wants to introduce thousands of free childcare facilities across the nation. What fails to dawn in him is the importance of mother and child bonding. The mother is the infant's most important person to be with, and the natural bonding between mother and child is what give the offspring the best start in life, including doing well at school, landing a fine career, and with a greater likelihood of staying clear of drugs and crime. But no. Instead, our state leader's obsession with young mothers returning to the office would mean that many a toddler would be left reaching out his hands for his mother and screaming, as she dumps him into the hands of strangers, while she drive off to the office, in a hope of climbing the career ladder.

Sorry to say this, but there is something abhorrent and deeply sinister about our Government's manifesto, and at first it looks to be a mystery on why so many had placed his cross on the Conservative candidate at the polling booth. But according to one report, it was not because there was no suitable alternative, neither was it done out of public admiration. Rather, the many who abstained from voting altogether, if they voted for the main rival party, they would have kept the Tories out of power. Also the masses of the undecided on whom to vote for, at the last moment placed his crayon on the Tory candidate's box for no other reason but to "play safe." The present Government does not reflect the nation's desires, not by at least 75%.

So as I am now considering early retirement, most likely at age 63, mainly to care for and to look after my wife full time, the next few years does pose a lot of uncertainty, perhaps even threatening. But this is where the truth of the Gospel steps in. Romans chapter eight is a good start. Here is a promise that neither life or death, nor angels or demons, neither the present or the future, nor any (Tory) powers, neither height or depth, nor anything in creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord, verses 38-39.

Elsewhere the Bible says that he who makes his refuge in God will be happy and blessed. Psalm 125 is one example of the promise to those who has faith in him:

Those who trust in the LORD are like Mount Zion, which cannot be shaken, but endures forever.

As the mountains surrounds Jerusalem, so the LORD surrounds his people both now and for evermore.

Psalm 20 is also worth reading, exhorting us to call upon God when distress comes, and he will fulfill our desires. For the believer, such as myself, there is a God in Heaven who is compassionate, and even laughs at the plans our Government wish to fulfill. Those who are true believers are as firm as a mountain when it comes to security. As it is impossible to move a mountain from its place, so the one trusting in the Lord cannot be moved either. And I can testify that God has never failed to take care of me, even during my teenage years when I didn't know him.

In Heaven, the apostle John sees the risen Jesus Christ as KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS. This is wonderful assurance. Who am I to fear, if we have such a God we can trust. Human plans will fail, but the perfect plan God has for us will stand forever. 

O.S.A.S - And Hebrews 6:4-6.

One of the best things about blogging on the Internet is that I can express my thoughts on issues closest to my heart and know that someone, somewhere will read and I hope, feel edified. Therefore to share on the love, goodness and mercy of God through Jesus is a wonderful privilege, and blessed be to God for giving me the grace to glorify him here on this site.

 

And one of my core beliefs is knowing that once I'm saved, I have been regenerated in my spirit, I am going through sanctification of my soul, and one day I will have a glorious, immortal body - very much like the risen Saviour has now. All this gotten through grace, I guess, an acronym in the English language for Gift Received At Christ's Expense. It is the righteousness of Christ which is imputed to my life account; my own righteousness is as filthy rags, like a shrivelled leaf blown away by the wind. There is absolutely no way I can have fellowship with the Lord in Heaven based on my efforts. Without Jesus Christ, I have absolutely no hope. Therefore if he is to save me from the well-deserved separation in Hell, he would have to save me fully and completely, without any works or merit on my side. Therefore, common sense in itself should testify that if God has started a work in me, he will finish it. The very omniscience of God, who foreknew me and predestined me to conform to his Son, ought to guarantee that once saved always saved - a work of God, with whom the Holy Spirit within is himself a guarantee.

The Omniscience of God is what I believe to be the strongest argument for Once Saved Always Saved. It means that God is all-knowing. There is absolutely nothing which can happen that will take God by surprise. If you are a believer in Jesus Christ, then God already knew this long before you were ever born. Long before conception, God not only had each day of your life numbered, but every single deed carried out, every single word spoken, every thought passing through your head, every other person you met, every friend, every foe, all your family members and your parents - all were written in his book long before even your father and mother were born. If you read the prophetic section of the Old Testament, you will see all this come out.

For example, why not read Isaiah chapter 53, and notice that the futuristic prophecy of God's Servant atoning for Israel's sins was written in the past tense, as if these things had already occurred. Or read the whole book of the prophet Daniel. Read about the terrible visions he had about the empires which were still to arise to dominate the Jews long after the prophet's death. Read in particular chapters 10 and 11, and with the rise of the Greek Empire, four sub-kingdoms were to arise after the premature death of Alexander the Great. Read of the conflict between the Northern and Southern kings, with so much intricate detail, that it reads like a newspaper. When I read this, I stood back in awe, speechless.

What a tremendous display of God's omniscience! And why did God take so much trouble  to foretell the ins and outs of a future empire which arose long after the death of Daniel? Could it be because when the prophet died, Israel was still dominated by the Mede/Persian Empire? And during the Greek Empire which was to follow, had God already known that no part of the Bible would be written during that period? Then on the personal side, knowing God to be omniscient, as well as omnipotent, and his omnipresence is an encouraging thought during times when the chips are down, or when afraid, fearful of the future, or when I wish things were better than they currently are. King David must have realised this too, for he penned Psalm 139.

Yet in light of all this, there are many Christian believers who think that one must hold faithful and remain obedient to God in order to "stay saved" - normally known as Arminians, but sometimes this kind of theology is called Conditional Security. In other words, falling away could well mean the loss of salvation. Now if this was true, then the gift of salvation we now have in Christ as believers, would not be a gift at all. Instead we would all be on lifetime probation. In the world of business and employment, a candidate applying for a post is normally given a probational period set by the employer. It may be for a month, or up to three months. During this period, the boss watches carefully the candidate's performance. If he is satisfied, then the candidate is offered the job and becomes a full time employee. But if not satisfied, the company will give him his marching orders. That is what probation in this context is about. Conditional salvation is very much like that. And they would quote a number of verses in the New Testament to prove their point.

And the verses quoted most often by Arminians is Hebrews 6:4-6, which reads:
It is impossible for those who have been once enlightened, who has tasted the heavenly gift, who has shared in the Holy Spirit, who has tasted of the word of God and the powers of the coming age, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.

Then Hebrews 10:26-27, 39 may also be taken into consideration:
If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgement and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God...
But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but those who believe and are saved.

If these verses prove that a believer can lose his salvation due to falling away from the faith, or by committing a serious sin, or leading a not-so-godly life, then indeed, the Arminians were right after all. It would have meant that no Christian alive is eternally saved, and that every believer is on a lifelong probation, not knowing the verdict until after death. Furthermore, God himself is watching every move, every work the believer performs, because the Almighty needs to know whether the believer is worthy enough to enter Heaven, therefore denying God's omniscience. That is, God does not know how the believer will perform, and he can be taken by surprise.

The result of all this is more akin to fear of punishment rather than a selfless love for God. Over the last forty years of being a Christian myself, I have noticed that Arminians tend to be stronger prayer warriors, more zealous in Bible study, more enthusiastic in evangelism and handing out tracts, more dedicated in door-to-door (particularly with Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons, who are both Arminians) and during services, louder in praise and speaking in tongues - as proof that they are Spirit-filled. All these things are good in themselves, of course. But if the fear of likely punishment or the possibility of being shut out of Heaven is in the believer's heart, he would make certain that all these works - and more - are all there. The conclusion to all this, at least on what I can make out, is that Arminianism is more likely to be self centred rather than centred on God's glory and his Kingdom. Yet Hebrews 6:4-6 and 10:26-27 are the most oft-quoted verses to disprove eternal security.

Hebrews 6:4-6 points out five phases a person can go through. These were:
1. Having been enlightened.
2. Tasted the heavenly gift.
3. Shared in the Holy Spirit.
4. Tasted the Word of God.
5. Tasted the powers of the world to come.

I find it interesting to note here that the word tasted appears in three out of the five above statements. There is a difference between tasting and drinking. To drink is to consume entirely, but as for tasting, the first picture that comes to mind when tasting something is wine-tasting. Here a small sample of the wine is sucked into the mouth, swivelled over the tongue, than spat out into a spittoon. This is a very good analogy of a person joining a church without being born again and regenerated in the spirit. Over the years, I have communicated with quite a number of people, mostly working school leavers or college undergrads, who attended church for a while, made friends with the regular members, then disappear. When asked how they feel in the spiritual area, they have shown utter hostility towards anything to do with God and the Bible. And I recall at least one of them actually exhorting me with a Scripture verse back in the 1970s when I was going through a period of doubt. Now, if I was to meet him, he would slam the door to my face, demonstrating his heart hardened into rock.

If the theology of conditional salvation does seem to have a point, it's most likely item #3 - Shared, or made partakers of the Holy Spirit. They would argue that if a person shares in the Holy Spirit, then he must already be converted. I don't think so necessarily. First of all, John 1:9 says that Jesus is the true light that shines into every man born into the world. Secondly, in John 16:8, Jesus says that after his Resurrection, the Holy Spirit will convict the world of sin and judgement. However, when an unbeliever enters a church, he will feel the greater presence of the Holy Spirit among God's people, as 1 Corinthians 14:23-25 so demonstrates.

It is possible for an unbeliever to be convicted by the Holy Spirit and still remain unconverted. If this were to occur, the unbeliever's heart will harden to such an extent, that it would be impossible to bring such an individual back to the point of repentance, no matter how fervently a believer may persuade him. On the other hand, I had attended baptism services where the candidate had testified that he or she had grown up in a Christian home, then deviated from the faith for many years, before coming back and submitting himself for baptism. During all this time away from the faith, was such a person saved? Yes, I believe he or she was saved, and remained saved throughout all that time. This was evidenced by a heart which never hardened to the point that it became impossible to come to repentance. The same can be said of a devout believer who serves God for many years, then comes across a crisis in life which would turn him away from the faith, whether temporary or more permanent. Has he lost his salvation from that moment on? The very omniscience of God should answer that one. If his salvation was so forfeitable, then through his foreknowledge, God would have called him home while his faith was still strong.

As for the case of Hebrews 10:26-27, I think the same idea is taught, maybe with the addition that the whole of the letter was addressed to the Jews. The very title, which is translated, To the Hebrews, suggest that the letter was addressed to all the Jews, whether believers in Jesus Christ or not. The whole letter is about how the one sacrifice of Jesus Christ made on the cross was better than all the Temple ordinances which foreshadowed the Atonement made by Jesus Christ. If a person rejects the Gospel, and then returns to the Temple ordinances, then it becomes necessary for the Lord to be crucified all over again. This is what the verse 26 is talking about, which the King James Version brings out more accurately:
For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins.

The one "sin" sometimes referring as the unpardonable sin, is rejecting the Gospel after hearing it, and returning to Temple ordinances. With the sacrifice of Jesus already accomplished, the one who rejects the Gospel not only sins against the Holy Spirit, but will be accountable for all his sins, as they cannot be forgiven unless the Lord Jesus goes to the cross all over again. A good example of this kind of attitude is found in Acts 3, where Peter and John heals a lame beggar, then uses this miracle to demonstrate the Atonement and Resurrection made by Jesus. The members of the Sanhedrin who witnessed the miracle had rejected the Gospel, demonstrated by their imprisonment of the apostles.

Finally, I have included verse 39, as this is still in the context of 10:26. It talks about shrinking back and are destroyed rather than believing and are saved. When reading this, I get a picture of a strong tower, like in Proverbs 18:10, which reads:
The name of the LORD is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are safe.

Ancient cities in the Middle East were normally walled and had a tower which served as both watch tower and refuge for the citizens of the city. When the city was threatened by an enemy army, its citizens ran into the tower for protection. I can imagine someone running into this tower and is safe. But another person runs to the tower but stops short of it, and walks away. As a result his life remains in danger. This is a good analogy of someone who was brought by the Holy Spirit to the point of repentance, but turns away just short of it. His heart would begin to harden, and it would then be impossible for him to return to that same point of repentance.

Oh, the foolishness of some.