A Fragrance
“For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing.
To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task?”
2 Corinthians 2:15,16
There are two kinds of people that hear the message of Christ those who smell the sweet aroma of life everlasting through accepting Christ Jesus as their saviour and those who see it as the smell of death, those who reject Christ.
The apostle Paul writing to the Corinthians in a previous letter wrote,
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”
1 Corinthians 1:18.
Christians are entrusted with a sacred duty to present the two options all people have to accept Jesus as Lord and Saviour of their lives or to reject Him. Jesus said,
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son."
John 3:16-18.
Christian teaching is black and white. Either you accept Jesus as your Lord and Saviour and go to heaven or you do not. There is no in between.
C. S. Lewis wrote,
“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
The choice however is up to the reader.
I would urge anyone who is truly seeking the truth about God to pray and ask Him to show you the truth.
I would ask you read the New Testament read carefully the first four books, the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and see what Jesus and others said about him. Then make up your own mind.
Please think about it.
Showing posts with label Foolishness of the Christian life?. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Foolishness of the Christian life?. Show all posts
Friday, 13 March 2015
Monday, 22 September 2014
Foolishness
Foolishness?
I met a man one time who had very little good to say about Christians. He called Christians brainwashed, even deluded. He said the Bible didn’t make sense. When I asked him how much of the Bible he had read he acknowledged not much. He had relied on other people.
The man is however not alone. Many well read intellectuals and scholars say the same thing.
The Apostle Paul wrote of such people.
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.
Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.”
1 Corinthians 1:18-25.
Even in the time of Jesus most of the religious leaders of his day refused to call him the Messiah. They expected a conquering ruler that would lead them against their oppressors.
Even to day those of the Jewish faith cannot admit that Jesus is the Messiah.
Kenneth Scott Latourette said,
“The most that one of Jewish faith can do - and some have gladly done it - is to say that Jesus was the greatest in the long succession of Jewish prophets. None can acknowledge that Jesus was the Messiah without becoming a Christian.”
Kenneth Scott Latourette
Such and admission from any faith leader especially that Jesus was the Son of God the Jewish Messiah calls into doubt what they believe.
Jesus did not come to earth in the way man would have expected. That’s because God does not use man’s logic.
Jesus was born of lowly parentage in order that he could rightly and justly tell all who will stand before him that he understands what it is to be human.
Jesus knows it all. He lived on this earth.
Think about it. He experienced what you and I have experienced. The sun on our face. The rain as it came down. The smell of flowers in bloom. He went to weddings that’s recorded and if he did that he more than likely went to other parties.
He knows what it feels like to be wrongly accused of a crime. To be beaten without mercy and to die in a most hideous way.
That’s why now when a man stands before him in eternity he can say “I understand.”
If God had used man’s logic Jesus would have come as a mighty King. But most kings don’t know what it’s like to live in a small house. To have to budget for food. To do the day to day things the average person does.
A.W. Tozer wrote,
“If man had his way, the plan of redemption would be an endless and bloody conflict. In reality, salvation was bought not by Jesus' fist, but by His nail-pierced hands; not by muscle but by love; not by vengeance but by forgiveness; not by force but by sacrifice. Jesus Christ our Lord surrendered in order that He might win; He destroyed His enemies by dying for them and conquered death by allowing death to conquer Him.”
Alexander the Great conquered much of the known world. The Romans did likewise. Napoleon, Hitler and many more attempted to conquer the world. All are in their grave the empires they strived to create by force are gone.
Yet today on this earth over two millennia after his death and resurrection Jesus has a following estimated at 2,200,000.
Historians call him the greatest man that ever lived.
Not bad for a carpenter from a small nondescript village in a backwater area of the Roman empire.
When two disciples stood trial for preaching in the name of Jesus a wise man rose in their defence and said,
“Therefore, in the present case I advise you: Leave these men alone! Let them go! For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail.
But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God.”
Acts 5:38,39.
Over two thousand years later I would say the movement started, what we today call Christianity is of God. For it has not stopped increasing in numbers no matter the persecution.
Today people everywhere are given the same choice as the people were when Jesus walked this earth.
To believe or not to believe in him.
Think about it.
I met a man one time who had very little good to say about Christians. He called Christians brainwashed, even deluded. He said the Bible didn’t make sense. When I asked him how much of the Bible he had read he acknowledged not much. He had relied on other people.
The man is however not alone. Many well read intellectuals and scholars say the same thing.
The Apostle Paul wrote of such people.
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.
Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.”
1 Corinthians 1:18-25.
Even in the time of Jesus most of the religious leaders of his day refused to call him the Messiah. They expected a conquering ruler that would lead them against their oppressors.
Even to day those of the Jewish faith cannot admit that Jesus is the Messiah.
Kenneth Scott Latourette said,
“The most that one of Jewish faith can do - and some have gladly done it - is to say that Jesus was the greatest in the long succession of Jewish prophets. None can acknowledge that Jesus was the Messiah without becoming a Christian.”
Kenneth Scott Latourette
Such and admission from any faith leader especially that Jesus was the Son of God the Jewish Messiah calls into doubt what they believe.
Jesus did not come to earth in the way man would have expected. That’s because God does not use man’s logic.
Jesus was born of lowly parentage in order that he could rightly and justly tell all who will stand before him that he understands what it is to be human.
Jesus knows it all. He lived on this earth.
Think about it. He experienced what you and I have experienced. The sun on our face. The rain as it came down. The smell of flowers in bloom. He went to weddings that’s recorded and if he did that he more than likely went to other parties.
He knows what it feels like to be wrongly accused of a crime. To be beaten without mercy and to die in a most hideous way.
That’s why now when a man stands before him in eternity he can say “I understand.”
If God had used man’s logic Jesus would have come as a mighty King. But most kings don’t know what it’s like to live in a small house. To have to budget for food. To do the day to day things the average person does.
A.W. Tozer wrote,
“If man had his way, the plan of redemption would be an endless and bloody conflict. In reality, salvation was bought not by Jesus' fist, but by His nail-pierced hands; not by muscle but by love; not by vengeance but by forgiveness; not by force but by sacrifice. Jesus Christ our Lord surrendered in order that He might win; He destroyed His enemies by dying for them and conquered death by allowing death to conquer Him.”
Alexander the Great conquered much of the known world. The Romans did likewise. Napoleon, Hitler and many more attempted to conquer the world. All are in their grave the empires they strived to create by force are gone.
Yet today on this earth over two millennia after his death and resurrection Jesus has a following estimated at 2,200,000.
Historians call him the greatest man that ever lived.
Not bad for a carpenter from a small nondescript village in a backwater area of the Roman empire.
When two disciples stood trial for preaching in the name of Jesus a wise man rose in their defence and said,
“Therefore, in the present case I advise you: Leave these men alone! Let them go! For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail.
But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God.”
Acts 5:38,39.
Over two thousand years later I would say the movement started, what we today call Christianity is of God. For it has not stopped increasing in numbers no matter the persecution.
Today people everywhere are given the same choice as the people were when Jesus walked this earth.
To believe or not to believe in him.
Think about it.
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