The Crash of 2008 (2) :Peace Amidst the Storm

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The Crash of 2008 (2): Peace Amidst the Storm

As the worldwide financial crisis develops, one word keeps recurring: PANIC.

If not stated that strongly, the emotion millions now feel is variously called fear, anxiety, or worry, and it comes with scary questions: What is going to happen to me and my family? How will I have enough money to live on? Where will I live? Is my job safe? Can I get another job? What about retirement? Is all hope gone with the wind?

Without knowing the answer to any of those questions, I do know that we can live without fear. Indeed, we can have peace in the midst of this ferocious storm. How?

Reflect upon the past

How has my foolishness contributed to my current fear? Have I lived beyond my income, acquiring more than I could afford, going into debt, failing to save? Do I dwell in a house that is too big and too expensive? Am I driving a luxury car, wearing designer clothes, and surrounded by costly technical toys? Have I been eating out at too often, or taking vacations I can’t really afford?

Where have I set my hope for happiness and security? On my 401(K) plan? The fortunes of my company? My investments?

Have I neglected my family in the race to make money?

In my self-indulgence, have I been like the millions of others who have failed to remember the poor?

What about God? Where has He been on my list of priorities? Have I been “too busy” to read the Bible, pray, or go to church?

In short: What have I placed at the center of my life? Possessions, power, prestige, and pleasure, or people? Most of all, Have I sought happiness and fulfillment in this transitory world, or in knowing the Maker of the universe?

Rely on God

Now is the time to turn our trust from bankers, stock brokers, CEOs, union bosses, politicians (above all!), and anything that they can promise or provide. Nor can we put confidence in ourselves and our own intelligent choices – look where that has gotten us!

There is one upon whom we can rely, however: God. He has made the universe and everything in it, including us. He cares enough for us to have sent His Son Jesus to live, die, and rise from the dead in order that our folly, faults, and failures may be forgiven, and we can have friendship with God again.

Through Jesus, God the Father has told us to pray for our “daily bread,” has asserted that He knows our needs before we even ask, and has promised to provide for those who trust in Him (see Matthew 6:19-34, for example). We are of more value than the birds and the grass of the field, over whom He looks with watchful eye, and He will surely care for us as well as He cares for these little creatures.

He has ordered us to be content with what we have, and not to be greedy for more, but to believe His promise never to fail us or forsake us (Hebrews 13:5). Many times in the Bible, God has told us not to be afraid, but to trust in His loving care for those who love and believe in Him (See Psalms 23, 34, 37; Philippians 4:6-7; etc.).

Re-order our priorities

But there are conditions to meet if we are going to enjoying peace with God and serenity in the middle of financial turmoil.

Jesus says that we should “See first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these [material] things shall be added to you” (Matthew 6:33). That means to put God first in our lives – to read His Word daily, pray to Him often, worship Him in church, and follow His commands, relying on His strength to do so.

Conversely, we are urged not to lay up for ourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust corrupt and where thieves break in and steal, but to lay up treasures for ourselves in heaven, where nothing can touch them. How? By giving to the poor and to the work of the church and by placing our trust not in our own financial assets but in God’s provision.

We must have a “single” eye, focused on God’s Word and His will, not on the things of this world. Even as we work to provide for ourselves and our families, we should do so as unto God, serving Him as our ultimate Boss, seeking to glorify Him and to benefit others, not just to make a living (See Ephesians 4:28; 6:5-9). Since we can’t be loyal to more than one master at a time, Jesus warns us to serve God and not Mammon (the god of wealth and all it represents).

Now is the time to spend more time in Bible reading, meditation, and prayer, not less, as we listen not only to God’s promises to provide for us but also to His commands.

Maybe we need to turn off the TV and spend time with our family members and housemates; give away some of the stuff that fills our storage rooms; eat simply, and at home.

Reach out to others

Remember, you aren’t the only one in this mess! Literally billions of people are being stunned by daily news of default, bankruptcy, market declines, and lost jobs.

This would be a good time to extend a helping hand to those in greater need than we are; to ask our neighbors how they are doing; to pray for the poor, the confused, the desperate.

Rejoice!

Yes, I said, Rejoice! There’s something good about times like these. People come together. Old values are revived. The really important things return to their proper place in our hearts. Most of all, God has “room” to work, now that we really need Him. When the Israelites were between Pharaoh’s chariots and the Red Sea, God told them to stand aside and watch Him work a mighty deliverance for them.

In fact, most of the miracles in the Bible took place when people were at their wit’s end, with no resources, nothing to turn to – except God! That’s when He has a chance to demonstrate both His power and His love.

Maybe something good will come out of this awful Crash of 2008.

Is this experience from God?

My friend also had another question, which I shall seek to answer:

(2). Many of my Christian friends told me that they were touched by Holy Spirit.  How do we know the power touches someone is from the Holy Spirit and not from other beings, such as angels or the staff of God?

Another good question! Many Christians do claim that they have been affected “touched,” “filled,” “baptized,” etc.) by the Holy Spirit, but how do we know whether our experience is from God’s Spirit and not some other source?

A famous theologian named Jonathan Edwards once wrote a whole book on this subject, called Religious Affections (emotions, experiences). He pointed out that much of what seems to be from God may not actually be. After all, the Bible says that Satan and his demons (evil spirits) can work miracles, so a supernatural healing or other miracle is not necessary a work of God.

Furthermore, speaking with other tongues, which is commonly used as a sign of the work of the Holy Spirit, can come from another source also – either our own voice production or the work of some other spirit.

Strong emotions, too, don’t necessarily come from God. You can be really “happy” or excited, but that could simply result from your reaction to something you are thinking or some stimulus in your environment. I once had some sort of mystical experience of “peace” and “unity with the whole world” during and after listening to Beethoven’s 7^th Symphony!

If you are in a crowd, and they all go crazy over something, you can be overcome with powerful feelings that derive from the influence of the mood of the people around you. Both Hitler and Mao Zedong had that influence on large gatherings of devoted followers, and something like that seems to happen to many young people at rock concerts.

You can have a strong impression that something is true or right, but it may be very false and very wrong. These “clear” “messages” may seem to come from God, but they could be the work of the devil, who knows very well how to deceive us.

People in religious meetings are sometimes overcome by joy, or ecstasy, or dread. None of these is necessarily a product of the Holy Spirit’s work in our hearts. Likewise, falling down as if dead – sometimes called “being slain in the Spirit” – can happen to people for all sorts of reasons, and is not necessarily a work of the Holy Spirit of God.

Okay, so how can we know whether an experience comes from God? There are several ways of evaluating religious experiences:

Does it make me love God more – his holiness, justice, mercy, truth, and all his other excellencies?

Does it make me trust God more? Does this experience lead me to believe more in what the Bible says, to rely on his promises, especially the spiritual promises in the New Testament, even if everything else around me seems to deny the Scriptures?

Does it make we way to obey God more? Does it cause me to think that all his commands (meaning primarily those in the New Testament, not all the food laws in the Old Testament) are good and right and true, and that I must seek to follow his revealed will, no matter what the cost?

Does it make we want to hope more in God and in the grace that will come to me when Christ returns?

Does it make me hate sin, and falsehood, and everything that is wrong?

Does it make me love God’s people – other Christians – and want to be with them and serve them and work with them to advance God’s kingdom?

Does it make me more aware of my own sins and need for God’s mercy, and does it cause me to rejoice more in the sheer grace of God that has reached down to someone as unworthy as I am?

Does it cause me to focus my attention on Jesus Christ, the Son of God and only Savior? Or does it turn my eyes towards something or someone else? All that comes from the Spirit of God will bring honor and glory to the Son of God, as revealed in the Bible.

Is this experience in any way contrary to the will of God as revealed in the Bible? Does it make me want to read the Bible more and meditate on the Scriptures? Or does it distract me and cause me to yearn after other emotional experiences?

These are some of the tests we can use to ascertain whether what we have experienced has come from the Holy Spirit or from some other source.

Is the Bible true?

A friend in Taiwan sent me this email with questions from a non-Christian about the Bible. I thought that perhaps others might also be interested, so am including her questions and my response in the (longer than usual) blog entry, starting with my friend’s encouraging greeting:

My goodness Wright! Your blog is a “page turner”! (still going through The Lord’s Healing Words in fits and spurts…)

If you have time, could you give us advice about something? K. has a friend from long ago who is seeking truth. She is a highly intelligent lawyer who asks a lot of good, probing questions about Christianity. When my family came to visit, she and my Dad got into a conversation about Christianity. They have continued their dialog by email. She just sent Dad two questions typically asked by non – Christians. I’ll cut/paste her email:

Dear

The following two questions may be offensive, but they really troubled me:
(1). Is every word in the Bible from God? How do we know that the Bible is the word of God?

Is it possible that some content in the Bible was the work of human beings based on their interpretation of God’s teaching? The author may honestly believe all the content is inspired by God; but how can we be sure that it is really consistent with God’s will? If it is God’s will, how can some of the content has become out of date? And some seems to be not reasonable or not loving?

Messages can be mis-communicated easily due to human errors. We don’t even know exactly what happened around us now or what happened 10 years ago because people recorded it can always view something from various aspects; how can we be so sure about history written more than 2000 years ago and passed on generation by generation?

My question can boil down to one: how can we make sure all the rules we are required to follow as specified in the Bible lead to the right way to attend to God’s glory?

WD: Good questions! And you are right to boil the first of them down to one: How can I be sure that what the Bible says I should do will “lead to the right way to attend to God’s glory?”

We don’t have time or space to discuss this first very large and basic question in detail, but here are a few sentences for starters:

Many people have the same questions. If fact, this is the fundamental question about Protestant Christianity, for we claim to derive all the content of our faith from the Scriptures and not from church traditions (like the Roman Catholics) or human reason (like liberal Protestants) or from direct “revelation” from God’s Spirit (like some charismatic Christians).

Second, many scholars over the centuries have investigated these matters, and have come up with some plausible answers, though not with absolute proof in the full inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible. Dr. Carl Henry, for example, wrote a full four volumes of his six-volume masterpiece, God, Revelation, & Authority, to try to show that belief in the full accuracy and truth of the Bible is reasonable. Many shorter books support the same position.

Specifically, they say that:

(1) The Bible itself claims, in hundreds of both direct and indirect ways, to be the very words of God. To assert otherwise is to call into question everything else that the Bible says.

(2) Most apparent contradictions in the Bible can be resolved with careful study, though a small number cannot.

(3) Archaeological and historical research has demonstrated that the historical accounts of the Bible are accurate and trustworthy.

(4) Contrary to popular belief, science has not disproved the truth of the Bible. In particular, Darwinian theory has recently been shown to lack scientific proof, or even much evidence. Read Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box; Michael Denton’s Evolution: A Theory in Crisis; Philip Johnson’s Darwin on Trial; or Jonathan Wells’s Icons of Evolution for confirmation of this statement.

(5) If there is a God, and if he created us in his image, then it is reasonable to believe that he could also communicate clearly with us, using the writings of men whom he specially chose and guided to record his will and his ways accurately.

(6) Some things (such as the destruction of the nations living in the Promised Land by the invading Israelites) do seem unreasonable or unloving to us. In those cases, Christians first seek to understand what is meant by those passages, and then confess that we just don’t have enough information or wisdom to comprehend everything God does or says.

But, we believe he is good, because Christ died for us, and that he is powerful, because God raised Christ from the dead, so that we could be forgiven and come to know God as our loving Father.

(7) Which parts of the Bible, in particular, do you consider “outdated?” Do you not rather mean that they are out of sync with some modern prejudices? Who is to say our generation is right and the Bible is wrong? What standard are you using?

(8) Finally – and I know this is all very brief – we find out whether what God has told us is right by trusting his promises and obeying his commands. Only as we step out in faith to rely on his promises to forgive those who repent of their wrongdoing and trust in Christ, and to supply all that we need to serve him; and only if we attempt, relying on his power, to do what he tells us, will we experience the goodness and rightness of what the Bible teaches.

I should add that millions of Christians have done just that over the past two thousand years, and have testified to their experience that the Bible is really the Word and words of God, and that living by its teachings really works.

I hope this helps a bit.