There was a response to an article I posted yesterday, which cannot go unchallenged. In my article I stated that I had been a militant atheist before becoming a Christian. The response was along these lines:
Militant Muslims: Fly aircraft into buildings
Militant Christians: Bomb abortion clinics
Militant Atheists: Write provocative articles.
With the greatest of respect, I have to disagree.
Militant Muslims: Launch Jihad
Militant Christians: Launch the Crusades
Militant Atheists: Produce Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. Deaths? Around 200 000 000.
Of course it doesn’t end there; how could it?
A few years ago there was a discussion amongst a group of theologians at a church gathering, and they were discussing the wedding at Cana in Galilee, where Jesus turned water into wine. Some were saying it was ‘new wine’, in other words, grape juice, where others said it was the best wine, according to the steward, so it was the real McCoy.
One of the congregants said to them, ‘You think that’s a miracle? Come to my house and I’ll show you how Jesus turned beer into furniture.’
Redemption. That’s what it is, and what Jesus does best. Who cares if it was grape juice or wine? What I, and many others like me, care about, is the fact that Jesus restores broken marriages, heals broken homes and reaches out, through His people, to the downtrodden, the hopeless, the helpless and the ineffably sad.
KP Yohannan, the President and founder of Gospel for Asia, has spent his life caring for the poorest of the poor in Asia, the sort of poverty of which we cannot even dream. He and his teams have built schools, hospitals, and homes for these people. They have dug wells, called Jesus wells, so that the people in the area could get fresh, clean water.
There is no condition to receiving medical treatment, free education or clean water. You will hear the Gospel preached it you go to these places, but you do not have to respond. Many people respond, especially the untouchables, because they’ve never been shown love before.
Why does KP Yohannan do it? Because he loves Jesus. No more and no less. Jesus told us to feed the poor, clothe the naked, house the homeless, and that is exactly what they do. Their reward? The satisfaction of doing Jesus’ will.
The Moravian Brotherhood was a missionary organisation that was started in 1727 by Count Zittendorf. Their mission was to reach the lost for Christ, in which they succeeded admirably. Two cases are going to be mentioned here, as they are to me the most staggering and praiseworthy.
One of the Moravian Brotherhood sold himself into slavery in the West Indies, so that he could bring Jesus to the slaves. Give them hope in a hopeless situation. He died a slave, but gave hope to thousands, who before that had no hope.
Another case involves two of the Moravian Brotherhood entering a leper colony, knowing they could never leave, as leprosy was still thought to be highly contagious. They took Christ to the lepers, in the same way Jesus Himself touched the leper and healed him. Whether or not any lepers were healed is not on record: what is a matter of record was that those two died in the leper colony.
Out of love for Christ.
Jackie Pullinger was a young girl who wanted to be a missionary, but lacked the necessary qualifications, so she arranged to get herself to Hong Kong and entered the ‘walled city’, an area so dangerous that the police refused to go in there.
She believed God had called her there, and she followed His prompting. Hundreds of heroin addicts were delivered from their addiction and led to Christ as a result of her work. She received no funding from anyone for several years, and did what she did for one reason: her love of Jesus.
Angus Buchan, a man who could have been rich, chose instead to devote his life to God and gave his farm to his sons, where he lives rent-free. He has hosted four Mighty Men conferences, the last of which drew upward of two hundred thousand men.
Hundreds of women have written testimonies of getting back new men; men they were ready to divorce, because of alcohol abuse, neglect of their families, gambling problems and many more. Why did he do it? Because he loves Jesus, and led those men to the same place.
As to my son’s (so-called) healing, I’ll give you another story, this one more incredible. A lady in our church, with whom we became quite friendly, as we regularly sat in the same row, was very short-sighted. She wore glasses with lenses like bottle bottoms.
One Sunday, as we took our usual place, I noticed she wasn’t wearing glasses and asked when she’d got contact lenses. She told me she hadn’t
The previous Sunday, the pastor had called people up for prayer for healing. She decided to stay in her seat and pray from there. After the prayer was over, she took off her glasses and put them in her bag. She drove home in faith. Quite literally. She could make out shapes, but that was it.
Next morning she went to work; she was a graphic artist. She drove to work in faith as well. As she switched on her light table, everything came into focus. This was not misdiagnosis, as some people think was the case with my son, or not a serious case, as again with my son.
Her eyesight had been steadily deteriorating all her life, and was restored almost instantly.
Why am I going to all this trouble to invite more ridicule? Because Jesus is more important to me than life, and I want to share Him, and if one person hears this message and receives it, all the ridicule heaped upon me will be worth it.
Regardless of the so-called lack of evidence for Jesus, those who live for Him and in Him, know Him as a friend in time of need, someone who will never let them down, and the acts of the people mentioned are not even beginning to scratch the surface of the work done for the glory of God and the love of Jesus.
I trust this message blesses those who read it: if it doesn’t, there’s nothing I can do about it.
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