Posted on 01/27/2008 7:56:14 PM PST by 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."
Perhaps a collection for tissues would be of service?
Good point. Their practices actually FOSTER the very thing they swear up and down they do not believe. It's like they are tempting themselves.
Yeah, I've noticed you're not too choosy about counting your "blessings."
I chose my forum name because I loved Tom Terrific and Manfred the Wonder Dawg as a kid. My father used to claim that there was a period of a couple years where I would not answer to him or my mother unless they called me “Manfred”. It continued to be my nick-name until my dad passed away.
Cousins? Could be.
PD sufferer? Please let me know :-)
Ask MarkBsnr -- "(I would not believe in the Gospel if the authority of the Catholic Church did not move me to do so.)"
Mark, did you really say that? The authority of the church gives one a belief in the Gospel?
You could not and would not believe in the Gospel by your own Spirit-led reading comprehension? By your own quickened mind and reborn heart? With your own two eyes and ears given by God alone?
We can conclude from this logic that if the church moved you away from the Gospel you would follow happily since the church has all authority.
You have a keen eye. No doubt for the laity Mary is the archtype.
It gets even worse, however, for the “professional” class. When you hear them say, “there is no bible without the Romanist Church”, the necessary inference is that the Church is Christ himself, the Word, that the Church is in hypo-static union with Christ for it to declare itself the Word. The Church is the archtypal Christ.
I can think of no higher idolatry.
Who believes that? Can you cite a specific reference, from an authoritative source that echos that statement? If you're referring to the concept of the magesteriem, I would remind you that "who hears you hears Me".
It gets even worse, however, for the “professional” class. When you hear them say, “there is no bible without the Romanist Church”, the necessary inference is that the Church is Christ himself, the Word, that the Church is in hypo-static union with Christ for it to declare itself the Word. The Church is the archtypal Christ.
I can think of no higher idolatry.
= = =
INDEED.
Thanks for your kind words though any keen eye is obviously not my doing but my Creator’s.
Hmmmm
So, IF Mary has taken the place of Holy Spirit
and the magicsterical has taken the place of Holy Spirit . . .
Sounds like a lot of competition for Holy Spirit’s job, to me!
Ping some Orthodox and find out. I think you'll be surprised at teh level of devotion they have , and rightly so, to the great Panhagia.
This is why the mission field is so fruitful in South and Central America. Once we can get Bibles into peoples hands they see the TRUTH. I believe we see so much idolatry because they are seeking, but they just haven't been shown that's not THE WAY.
So the leadership of the Holy Spirit is inept?
However, the closer a church adheres to the written word of God, the more confidence that church and its members may have that it is being led by the will and purpose of God by the gift the Holy Spirit.
So churches aren't so much "led" by the Holy Spirit as "advised" by Him.
WESTMINSTER CONFESSION OF FAITH
As usual, all footnotes denotes Scriptural proofs found at the provided site.
What's that for? The Bible doesn't have any Westminster Confession of Faith, does it? What are Scripture references for when you've got Scripture itself?
Your pardon; I had thought that you professed allegiance to the OPC rather than simply church hopped as the whim struck you. Very well, then. I stand corrected.
***Some churches perceive God’s grace more clearly than others, as these threads attest.***
True. Some churches follow foreign government sanctioned doctrines of men. And some pretty strange doctrines at that. I mean just imagine the silliness at leaving England to pursue religious freedom and then slavishly following the religious doctrines commissioned, bought and paid for by that same government.
***I’ve sent Mark to the Westminster Confession of Faith, but sadly, he does not see the splendor of its Scriptural foundation.***
Any Scriptural foundation of the WCF is twisted and warped to the point where it is unrecognizable to Christians. I suppose that I’ve been concentrating more on the offensiveness of its unChristian theology.
***Any church that adheres to the Bible cannot go too far astray.***
There are a bunch of Bible only churches such as the Worldwide Church of God that are totally asea.
***So we preach the Gospel as God has commanded.***
Reformed apologists quote mostly Paul and the OT.
I was wondering when the sado-evangelism was going to start up again.
THAT
is sadistic, to you?
Fascinating.
Yep. And this error was what drove the Reformation when the church at Rome insinuated itself between God and man, and replaced the Holy Spirit with the doctrines of men.
And here's a great little piece I found today that I think you'll like, Quix. (It's at the bottom of the page.)
To construe such as sadistic indicates that for others to
cast ANY ASPERSIONS
on the ‘SACRED IDOLIZED OPINIONS’
of any RC rep
is to be sadistic.
Fascinating.
Well, certainly the RC edifice has to be the historical expert on sadism. I will have to concede that.
However, in this era, I think quite a number of folks will find that rubber dictionary daffynition to be quite outrageous.
I think we should all be aware of this new daffynition. Not that we need agree with it in the least. But it helps us understand the . . . perspective . . . of the RC edifice better.
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