Surprise and Disguise

The first time I was in USSR, about 40 years ago, when Russia was truly textbook communist, most of the people on the streets, drunk. I said to my guide, ”If I had to live in this God-forsaken place, I would try to “escape” the realities of this place with drunkenness.” Modern man has no way of knowing when his fellow man began to escape the realities of his existence in time and space through the barrier of pretending. The human mind is marvelous beyond comprehension, dreaming-thinking. We first come into contact with the tooth fairy, then the man in the moon, jack frost, even old mother goose. Pretending is as much a part of a child's life as breathing, catalyzed by fairy tale stories.

Later, particularly with boys, action figures, Superman, Batman, Spider man, Iron Man. Until recently, teenage boys put money into games called Pacman, etc. Then, captivating boys, girls, even men and women, the lizards and sorcerers of Harry Potter... God help us. With nanotechnology, adult boys sit for hours playing video games. In fact, video games have become part and parcel of military preparedness. It is so much easier to bomb, kill, and destroy in an impersonal way, unmanned drones. Through WWII, the bayonet made warfare very personal just as the saber-sword made warfare so totally, horribly personal in previous wars.

The greatest controversy in today's church is the trustworthiness of the Bible. 75% of young people who trusted the Bible in their youth, leave the church and religion after going to college. As many have told me, looking back, we realize that most of the people on the pews were just pretending. What would you have if you did hot have the Bible?

I have little patience with those who disparage Mormonism or the Jehovah Witnesses or Catholicism. In my long life of active church conviction, I have found that most Protestants do not know what they believe, especially Baptists, and most could care less. At least these others have an understanding of what they believe, do not hide from it, are willing to walk the streets telling others and, as with Catholics, Mennonites, Amish, wear distinctive clothing. The church was chosen by God to carry His message of sin's ruin and Christ's redemption. The world has taken over the pulpits and the pews. If you do not possess the plumb-line, the authority of God, what do you have?

The cross of Jesus Christ is the focal point of all history. Most people perhaps having a definite desire for belief, stumble at the foot of the cross, never willing to commit totally. At this time of the year, Christmas-New Years season, a time for evaluation, we think of the shepherds, 1A.D., the poorest most depraved people on earth, Bedouins, sordid lives, more like animals rather than humans. Can we even imagine the splendor-grandeur of the millions of angels, heavenly hosts, who announced to them the birth of the son of God. The shepherds believed, without reservation, and told others. The magi, traveling for perhaps several years, large entourage, long distance, after meeting the Christ-child, were not the same, started traveling a different way. The Judaism scholars, priests and prophets, knew about Isiah's and other prophesies, and yet, did not believe, nor did King Herod. God does not wear a watch, own a calendar, but with Him everything is timed. The Jews, even the early church, depended on the reading of scripture from others, audible, the grandeur of words. The ear makes space into which understanding flows.

Exactly 400 years ago, this year, King James of England appointed 54 of the world's best scholars to translate the Holy scripture (King James Bible, 1611). The 54, three groups - one at Oxford, one at Cambridge, one at Westminster. Original manuscripts, Hebrew and Greek scholarship, all coming together to produce a Bible unsurpassed in accuracy, poetry, grandeur. There are 6,000 vocabulary words in the King James Bible compared to a 20,000 word vocabulary of Shakespeare, enabling the poorly educated to understand. Greek and Hebrew notes of these scholars were destroyed in a Whitehall fire but, like the notes of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence, enough notes were preserved to authenticate. From 1650 to 1950, the King James translation was the hallmark-genuine scholarship, then started other translations. I was attending the first Methodist church, Memphis, TN, 1952, when a preacher bragged about reading the Revised Standard version of the Bible for the first time.

The Bible, Holy word of God, beyond compare as the “answer book” for everything man encounters. God's word is forever settled in heaven. (Psalm 119:89)