Conclusion from Peru and Mexico

email from Randall Easter | 25 January 2008 | Randall Easter

[Manfred the Wonder Dawg]

January 25, 2008

ESV Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

In recent days I have spent time in Lima and Sullana Peru and Mexico City and I have discovered that people by nature are the same. Man has a heart that is inclined to selfishness and idolatry. Sin abounds in the remotest parts of the land because the heart is desperately wicked. Thousands bow before statues of Mary and pray to her hoping for answers. I have seen these people stare hopelessly at Mary icons, Jesus icons, and a host of dead saints who will do nothing for them. I have talked with people who pray to the pope and say that they love him. I talked with one lady who said that she knew that Jesus was the Savior, but she loved the pope. Thousands bow before Santa Muerte (holy death angel) in hopes that she will do whatever they ask her. I have seen people bring money, burning cigarettes, beer, whiskey, chocolate, plants, and flowers to Santa Muerte in hopes of her answers. I have seen these people bowing on their knees on the concrete in the middle of public places to worship their idol. Millions of people come into the Basilica in Mexico City and pay their money, confess their sins, and stare hopelessly at relics in hope that their sins will be pardoned. In America countless thousands are chained to baseball games, football games, material possessions, and whatever else their heart of idols can produce to worship.

My heart has broken in these last weeks because the God of heaven is not honored as he ought to be honored. People worship the things that are created rather than worshiping the Creator. God has been gracious to all mankind and yet mankind has hardened their hearts against a loving God. God brings the rain on the just and unjust. God brings the beautiful sunrises and sunsets upon the just and unjust. God gives good gifts unto all and above all things he has given his Son that those who would believe in him would be saved. However, man has taken the good things of God and perverted them unto idols and turned their attention away from God. I get a feel for Jesus as he overlooked Jerusalem or Paul as he beseeched for God to save Israel. When you accept the reality of the truth of the glory of God is breaks your heart that people would turn away from the great and awesome God of heaven to serve lesser things. Moses was outraged by the golden calf, the prophets passionately preached against idolatry, Jesus was angered that the temple was changed in an idolatrous business, and Paul preached to the idolaters of Mars Hill by telling them of the unknown God.

I arrived back at home wondering how I should respond to all the idolatry that I have beheld in these last three weeks. I wondered how our church here in the states should respond to all of the idolatry in the world. What are the options? First, I suppose we could sit around and hope that people chose to get their life together and stop being idolaters. However, I do not know how that could ever happen apart from them hearing the truth. Second, I suppose we could spend a lifetime studying cultural issues and customs in hope that we could somehow learn to relate to the people of other countries. However, the bible is quite clear that all men are the same. Men are dead in sin, shaped in iniquity, and by nature are the enemies of God. Thirdly, we could pay other people or other agencies to go and do a work for us while we remain comfortably in the states. However, there is no way to insure that there will be doctrinal accuracy or integrity. If we only pay other people to take the gospel we will miss out on all of the benefits of being obedient to the mission of God. Lastly, we could seek where God would have us to do a lasting work and then invest our lives there for the glory of God. The gospel has the power to raise the dead in any culture and we must be willing to take the gospel wherever God would have us take it. It is for sure that our church cannot go to every country and reach every people group, so we must determine where God would have us work and seek to be obedient wherever that is.

It seems that some doors are opening in the Spanish speaking countries below us and perhaps God is beginning to reveal where we are to work. There are some options for work to be partnered with in Peru and there could be a couple of options in Mexico. The need is greater than I can express upon this paper for a biblical gospel to be proclaimed in Peru and Mexico. Oh, that God would glorify his great name in Peru and Mexico by using a small little church in a town that does not exist to proclaim his great gospel amongst a people who desperately need the truth.

I give thanks to the LORD for allowing me the privilege of going to these countries and broadening my horizons. The things that I have seen will be forever engraved upon my heart. I will long remember the pastors that I spent time with in Peru and I will never forget Adolfo who translated for me in Mexico. I will relish the time that I spent with Paul Washer and the others. When I think of church I will forever remember being on top of that mountain in Sullana at that church which had no electricity and no roof. I am convinced that heaven was looking down on that little church on top of that mountain and very few people on earth even know that it exist. Oh, God I pray that the things of this world will continue to grow dim and that God’s people will be caught up in his glorious presence.

Because of the truth: Pastor: J. Randall Easter II Timothy 2:19 "Our God is in heaven and does whatever He pleases."(Ps. 115:3) "He predestined us according to the good pleasure of His will."(Eph. 1:5) Those who have been saved have been saved for His glory and they are being made holy for this is the will of God. Are you being made holy? Spurgeon says, "If your religion does not make you holy it will damn you to hell."

[kosta50]

"A priori" is deductive, so from what are you deducing your belief?

Personal preference. "Makes sense," as you'd say. It's more like a matter of taste.

The reason I say that your faith is "baseless" is that you admit that it is blind

Of coruse it's blind; faith requires that leap of faith in order to exist. A rumbling volcano is the reason; it produces fear and a foreboding power. The leap of faith is that there is a "god" in the volcano.

We look at the universe and realize what is around us (I am not sure how many believers really do, but that's another story), and they say "wow!" It's overwhelming and humbling. This causes us to ask the question we can't answer: "Who or what made it?" Obviously someone or something that existed before all this existed, which some call "God." From there on, it is God who made all this. But this is just what we believe. It doesn't mean that's what it is. It's a blind faith and it's reached by a leap of reason, but it is not baseless, that is, for no reason whatsoever.

You don't wake up one day and say "I believe" for no reason. Something you experience leads you to make that leap and call it faith. It doesn't mean it's true. But of course every believer, no matter what variety, will tell you his belief is true.

I can't imagine a person bothering to have faith if he wasn't willing to claim it was true

That's the intransigence of religion. No one can admit to being wrong. That's why some consider religion the source of prejudice and backwardness.

[kosta50]

But even 2,000 years later the Church does not come close to evangelizing "all nations"

Did God put a timeline? Look how long it took before the Hebrews received the Law. Look how long it took from that moment to the appearance of Christ. We could just as easily argue, form the reformed point of v view, that it took 2,000 years because God wanted it to take that long and that you have no business speeding up the clock. :)

IF you believe in an all-powerful God, then how can you say He loves everyone equally, if something as important as Heaven vs. hell for eternity is largely decided by luck? You can't

And if you believe in a transcendent God then why does it matter if it took 2,000 years; His salvation should be timeless.

And if you believe in predestination and God's plan then it must have been planned to take this long...

We're already there. My own pastor just got back from a mission trip to China.

China? Why not go to Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan and Israel where a conversion would be good in that Islamic fundamentalists would no longer threaten Israel and would cease supporting terrorism and the Jews would find brotherly love with former Muslims in Christ? :)

After all, isn't it the Evangelicals who love Israel because they expect the Jews to convert to Christ? Are your pastors trying to evangelize the Jews and Arabs? I think they are a lot closer to Christ, being Abrahamic, then the Chinese.

But China, being oppressive and all that, allows missionaries whereas Saudi Arabia and Israel have much less tolerance for the same.

[kosta50]

Weren't you the one who on this very thread chastised me by noting that the Gospels are NOT ALL in fact eyewitness accounts? I'm glad to see you've come around to seeing beyond the technicalities

Two authors of the Four Gospels were eyewitnesses, but all four Gospels are written as eyewitness accounts of Jesus' ministry. Two of them were obviously 2nd (3rd, 4th, etc.) hand accounts of someone's witness.

And we take the OT to be God's Holy and inspired word

Whatever you wish to call it; if you are a Christian then the OT must conform to Christ of the Gospels, not the other way around.

[Forest Keeper]

FK: "That is the classic dilemma with "leap of faithers". There just ARE no answers to these issues. For those who hold to historic Christianity, there are plenty of answers."

Yeah, "historic" Christianity (what 16th century?) has plenty of answers such as : "if God wanted man to fly, He would have given him wings!" ...

Actually, that couldn't be further from the truth. My faith believes that God is in control of everything and there is no such thing as luck (as opposed to other faiths). Therefore, we would say that if God wanted man to fly then He would have granted him the inspiration of a flying machine. He did, at exactly the time He had predestined. The idea that God was powerful enough to do this was not born in the 16th century, unless you would like to argue that point.

[continuing:] ... or "my eyes are green because God made them that way" or "I am poor/rich/stupid/smart/healthy/sick/disabled etc. because God made me that way, for His glory."

If God does not determine these things, then who or what do you say does? Blind luck?

That "historic" Christianity (more like Manicheanism) also denies that prehistoric man existed, or that dinosaurs ever existed. When my older daughter, for social reasons, started to attend a Baptist Church in her early teens she told me the fossils were planted in the earth by Satan to deceive us. She learned this from "historic" Christianity. The "historic" Christianity may have plenty of answers, but not all answers are valid answers, FK.

I can assure you that Southern Baptists do not teach that satan buried fake dinosaur bones. However, neither do Southern Baptists accept classic Darwinism. Many scientists throughout time thought that in their day they had figured out "the truth". How many of them were right by today's standards? How many of them will still be right 500 years from now? Man LOVES to fancy himself as having figured everything out.

[Forest Keeper]

FK: "I have plenty of evidence that I am the son of who I think my parents were."

I wasn't questioning if your parents were your biological parents, FK. I am surprised you misconstrued it that way. I was talking about believing delusions and believing they are real.

Relax, I didn't take it personally. :) I was responding that I know it can't be a delusion because I have evidence, etc.

[Forest Keeper]

FK: "Oh, well, I have to admit, I wasn't expecting that [The death (and resurrection) of Christ is a matter of belief, not of historical fact]. :) I have no idea what to say. :)"

And here you just told me that "historic" Christianity has plenty of answers.

Yes, but I fully accept you as a Christian. That ties my hands to a major extent. :)

And even some of His own eleven disciples didn't believe in resurrected Jesus when they saw Him [my emphasis]:

"But the eleven disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated. When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some were doubtful. [Mat 28:16-17] Why do you think we are holier than they?

I don't think we are holier than anyone else in time. We just have an advantage that many did not, the Holy Scriptures complete, God's word.

[Forest Keeper]

Where does Ezekiel say God will give us new hearts for salvational purposes?

It's in the same passage:

Ezek 36:26-29 : 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. 28 You will live in the land I gave your forefathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God. 29 I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the grain and make it plentiful and will not bring famine upon you.

A new heart always results in belief. Belief always results in the Spirit entering the believer.

[Forest Keeper]

“We already existed before this world, because our creation was decided by God long before our actual creation. Before our creation we therefore existed in the thought of God, we who later turned out to be intelligent creatures of the Divine Word. Thanks to Him, we are very ancient in our origin, because ‘in the beginning was the Word.” +Clement of Alexandria

Yep, that is definitely what I was thinking and he said it much better than I did. Thanks for the quotes.

[stfassisi]

We look at the universe and realize what is around us (I am not sure how many believers really do, but that's another story), and they say "wow!" It's overwhelming and humbling. This causes us to ask the question we can't answer: "Who or what made it?" Obviously someone or something that existed before all this existed, which some call "God." From there on, it is God who made all this. But this is just what we believe. It doesn't mean that's what it is. It's a blind faith and it's reached by a leap of reason, but it is not baseless, that is, for no reason whatsoever.

I like what Blessed St John Damascene says so beautifully

"" It is impossible for things contrary and discordant to fall into one harmonious order always or for the most part, except under some one guidance, assigning to each and all a tendency to a fixed end. But in the world we see things of different natures falling into harmonious order, not rarely and fortuitously, but always or for the most part. Therefore there must be some Power by whose providence the world is governed; and that we call God"" -St John Damascene (De Fid. Orthod. I, 3)

I never cared for the Leap of Faith idea, especially after reading Kierkegaard's influence on it during my years studying the New Age Movement.

Lust my own personal opinion though

[stfassisi]

Correction
“Lust my own personal opinion though” should read...

“Just my own personal opinion”

One of those days where I can't type -;)

[Forest Keeper]

FK-””From what you quoted from Blessed Saint Aquinas I don't think you accept the distinction between God USING evil and God CAUSING it. “”

It's very simple Dear Brother, God is the first cause of everything created and God is flawless eternal goodness in anything He creates because He Himself is perfect goodness. Therefore evil cannot be in God, if it were, than God would be flawed.

I don't recall that I have ever disagreed with any of your above. God is the first cause of everything created - TRUE. God is flawless eternal goodness in anything He creates - TRUE. God Himself is perfect goodness - TRUE. Evil cannot be in God - TRUE. God is not flawed - TRUE.

“God saw all things that he had made, and they were very good “(Gen. i, 31): “He made all things good in his own time” (Eccles. iii, 11): “Every creature of God is good (1 Tim. iv, 4).

I guess you disagree with this Scripture?

I don't disagree with any scripture. :) The first is fine on its face, since no one argues that God created satan. The second two are also fine, as long as we understand that all that God created was good, FOR ITS INTENDED PURPOSE. For example, God created poisonous animals. That is still good because God had specific intentions for them. Another example is that God created Judas with the intention of him betraying Jesus. For God's will, that was good.

In other words... Now you have accepted what ever sins you have committed as part of God's plan for your life.

I have accepted that my sins were paid for by Christ's work on the cross. And since I cannot know what God's plan is, there is no reason for me to ever seek sin. Scripture teaches that I must not sin, so that is my goal. As far as God's plan for my life, scripture tells us:

Jer 29:11 : For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

"Prospering" includes learning through mistakes.

In this way of thinking you elevate evil as something God needs to create in order to be sovereign.

I don't know how. As a Sovereign, God "needs" for nothing. He does, though, make choices for His own purposes.

You have fallen into the heresy of accepting everything as fate now. In doing this you will have to accept Hitler's reign, lucifer being cast out of heaven, the fall of Adam and Eve etc... as part of God's created plan.

They WERE all part of God's created plan, or else God is not omnipotent, but rather impotent! In addition, there is a great difference between fate and predestination. From B.B. Warfield:

... What, now, is the real difference between this fatalism and the predestination taught, say, in our [Westminster] Confession? "Predestination and fatalism," says Schopenhauer, "do not differ in the main. They differ only in this, that with predestination the external determination of human action proceeds from a rational Being, and with fatalism from an irrational one. But in either case the result is the same." That is to say, they differ precisely as a person differs from a machine. And yet Schopenhauer can represent this as not a radical difference! Professor William James knows better, and in his lectures on "The Varieties of Religious Experience" enlarges on the difference. It is illustrated, he says, by the difference between the chill remark of Marcus Aurelius, "If the gods care not for me or my children, there is a reason for it," and the passionate cry of Job, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him!" Nor is the difference solely in emotional mood. It is precisely the difference that stretches between materialism and religion. There is, therefore, no heresy so great, no heresy that so utterly tears religion up by the roots, as the heresy that thinks of God under the analogy of natural force and forgets that he is a person.

There is a story of a little Dutch boy, which embodies very fairly the difference between God and fate. This little boy's home was on a dike in Holland, near a great windmill, whose long arms swept so close to the ground as to endanger those who carelessly strayed under them. But he was very fond of playing precisely under this mill. His anxious parents had forbidden him to go near it; and, when his stubborn will did not give way, had sought to frighten him away from it by arousing his imagination to the terror of being struck by the arms and carried up into the air to have life beaten out of him by their ceaseless strokes. One day, heedless of their warning, he strayed again under the dangerous arms, and was soon absorbed in his play there—forgetful of everything but his present pleasures. Perhaps he was half conscious of a breeze springing up, and somewhere in the depth of his soul he may have been obscurely aware of the danger with which he had been threatened. At any rate, suddenly, as he played, he was violently smitten from behind, and found himself swung all at once, with his head downward, up into the air; and then the blows came, swift and hard! O what a sinking of the heart! O what a horror of great darkness! It had come then! And he was gone! In his terrified writhing, he twisted himself about, and looking up, saw not the immeasurable expanse of the brazen heavens above him, but his father's face. At once he realized, with a great revulsion, that he was not caught in the mill, but was only receiving the threatened punishment of his disobedience. He melted into tears, not of pain, but of relief and joy. In that moment, he understood the difference between falling into the grinding power of a machine and into the loving hands of a father.

That is the difference between fate and predestination. And all the language of men cannot tell the immensity of the difference.

Amen. Predestination is born of love. Fatalism is born of chance.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

AMEN to Warfield and your excellent posts, FK, each filled with Scriptural truth.

"Predestination and fatalism," says Schopenhauer, "do not differ in the main. They differ only in this, that with predestination the external determination of human action proceeds from a rational Being, and with fatalism from an irrational one. But in either case the result is the same." That is to say, they differ precisely as a person differs from a machine.

AMEN!

[stfassisi]

FK (referring to Hitler and Lucifer)-””They WERE all part of God's created plan, or else God is not omnipotent, but rather impotent! “”

Evil is a secondary cause and opposite of the primary cause of All things created by God,that primary cause is love and goodness ALWAYS WILLED by God

Your view of God makes both evil and goodness primary causes of God's creative power .Thus making Evil and goodness EQUIL,Thus making God eternal evil and eternal goodness in order to fit the reformed view of a sovereign God.

You fail to recognize that God allowing evil to exist has NOTHING to do with Him creating evil,which God does not do

I don't think you realize this,fk, but what you're doing is saying the devil is not the cause of evil because you believe that God planned the devil to be evil.

CHILLING,FK. Simply chilling!

Read the scripture again...

“God saw all things that he had made, and they were very good “(Gen. i, 31): “He made all things good in his own time” (Eccles. iii, 11): “Every creature of God is good (1 Tim. iv, 4).

I pray you wake up,Dear Bother!

I wish you Blessed evening

[Forest Keeper]

"Pleasing God" is an anthropomorphism. It is a figure of speech, perhaps even a wish. Just as we can't do enough to earn our way into heaven, there is nothing we can do that's sooooo great as to please God (if God were subject to pleasure).

If God cannot be pleased, in contradiction to more than 100 verses in scriptures, then He is a machine and impersonal. Such a God would be no more than a supercomputer. Glory be to God that His word says just the opposite.

[blue-duncan]

“If God cannot be pleased, in contradiction to more than 100 verses in scriptures,”

How can He judge and determine rewards (”Well done thou good and faithful servant”) if He is not pleased.

[Forest Keeper]

I am not sure what you mean when you say The mechanics really don't matter. Paul describes what I would call mechanics in Romans 9:10 - 17 regarding a history prior to this flesh age.

I was just referring to the "when", within time, God creates a soul. I was saying that God's specific intention is "as good as" existence for purposes of this discussion. The passage you cite appears to support where I am coming from.

There is no other way that it could be said that the Heavenly Father in an instant created a soul say like Esau or Pharaoh for the purpose of being hated without cause. This goes against everything that the rest of the WORD has to say about the perfection of the creation.

Are you saying that Paul contradicts Christ? I am sorry if I am misunderstanding you.

[kosta50]

If God cannot be pleased, in contradiction to more than 100 verses in scriptures, then He is a machine and impersonal

No, just supernatural. God doesn't seek pleasure. We believe God wants us to be virtuous and moral beings and to obey His will. Those whose will is in harmony with God's will are sinless, Christ-like. The Bible verses that speak of God being pleased are either anthropomorphism, or allegory.

[kosta50]

“God saw all things that he had made, and they were very good “(Gen. i, 31): “He made all things good in his own time” (Eccles. iii, 11): “Every creature of God is good (1 Tim. iv, 4)

Amen, STA. There is no evil in anything from God.

[kosta50]

Therefore there must be some Power by whose providence the world is governed; and that we call God"" -St John Damascene (De Fid. Orthod. I, 3)... I never cared for the Leap of Faith idea, especially after reading Kierkegaard's influence on it during my years studying the New Age Movement

Yes, that power is gravity, which is inherent in all matter. There is no way for us to know if that property of matter is there by design or by chance.

Those of us who believe it is by design do so by a leap of faith.

[kosta50]

Kosta: Where does Ezekiel say God will give us new hearts for salvational purposes?

FK: It's in the same passage: Ezek 36:26-29 : 26..."And I will put my Spirit in you...I will save you from all your uncleanness."

Saving from all your uncleanliness is not the same as salvation! All Ezekiel is saying in Hebrew understanding of the words is "I will empower all of you to keep my laws and keep you from tendencies not to obey me."

Belief always results in the Spirit entering the believer

the Hebrew understanding of the Spirit of God meant simply the power of God, not the Christisn concept of the Holy Spirit. You are reading the Jewish Bible with a Christian dictionary.