Preaches the Gospel
7. The One Who First States a Case Seems Right
8. So That God's Works Might Be Revealed In Him
9. The Real Stuff and Fake
7. The One Who First States a Case Seems Right
Wine reveals one's real nature. One who usually is like a lamb would change his nature to a ruffian when he drank. Sometimes it happens that a passenger who looks like a gang harassing and tormenting the driver turns out to be an elite business man later.
One night I picked up a drunken passenger, who bursted into anger without just cause and began to shout " I'll kill you". Necessarily seeking and finding a police station, I stopped and tried to walk to there.Surprisingly the passenger stepped out and rushed toward the police office ahead of me and began to complain, "This driver is a bad fellow". Unhappily the policeman being young and unexperienced, I came near to be made a bad one.
The Bible has a verse fit in so neatly with my experience of that time. " The one who first states a case seems right, until the other comes and cross-examines". Prov 18:17
Can we not say the same thing concerning the matter of faith? Some one asked me, " Why do you believe in Christianity which came into Japan later, in spite of our having traditional religions like Buddhism and Shintoism?". I used to answer to the question as follows.
Buddhism is an Oriental religion born in India not for the purpose of saving people from sin and it's curse, but only for alleviating the agony and worry of people living in the world. Buddha the founder of Buddhism was the same man with us having sin and he did die not for our sin, but for his own sin and did not resurrect from death as Jesus did. Jesus Christ came being supported by lots of prophecies in the Old Testament. Buddha experienced a certain awakening for himself, but it has no relation with our salvation and no power to save us from our sin and it's curse.
People are far more concerned with this worldly matters than with the next world and spiritual truth. This is the reason why they hold fast to their ancestral religion only by reason of having inherited it from ancestors. Eight members of Noah and his family were rescued by the ark from the judgment by the flood through faith in the word of God. The Bible warns us that God will judge this world by fire in the last day (2Pet 3:7-13). But for each one of us the day to die is the day to be judged. " It is appointed for men to die once, but after this judgment". Heb 9:27
8. So That God 's Works Might Be Revealed In Him
We sometimes carry physical handicapped persons and their family members. Especially when I see the family members exert themselves to live taking care of physical handicapped children in serious condition, I am moved with deep sympathy and respect.
One day "as he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, ' Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?' Jesus answered, 'Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him'" (John 9:1-3).Jesus denies decisively the doctrine of transmigration of souls here. Setting aside this question, Jesus opened the eyes of this blind man by birth completely later.
We understand by this that Jesus meant his healing miracle by the words "God's works" in the primary meaning. A lot of miracles on the same level with ones of Jesus happen now all over the world through the faith and prayer of Christian churches. It is because the Lord Jesus is the same yesterday and today and forever (Heb 13:8), and because we Christian churches have the promises of Jesus, as follows, " Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father" (John 14:12).
Either the ex-born blind whose eyes were opened, those who were healed by miracles from serious illnesses, or those who were made alive from the dead will die when their time have come. Therefore the healing of body and soul in this world is not the final salvation. The final, decisive, and eternal salvation of Jesus, that is the greatest work of God, is the eternal life which is born within us by the faith in Jesus and stand forever both in this world and in the world to come. The eternal life is the life with forgiveness of sins and the peace and joy of heart which are never taken away forever and the life which is given the same glorious body with the one of resurrected Jesus.
Those who ignored Jesus throughout all his life have to be judged by the law of God who investigates minutely not only his works, but also his sayings and his thought. Everyone who ignored Jesus and did not live the same sinless life with Jesus' will be thrown into the eternal fire, that is the destiny decided by God.
"But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the polluted, the murderers, the fornicators, the sorcerers, the idolaters, and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death" (Rev 21:8).
9. The Real Stuff and Fake
One day a comrade showed me some dollar bill which he said a foreign passenger paid instead of Japanese Yen telling he had no money with him except them. On the surface it was printed "Only For Game". In the night time we could be foisted fake one.
There are false ones not only in the money and jewelry, but also in the religion. We can find fakes especially in the things valuable for human life. The Bible says that in religion we can tell the real one from the false one by the fruits born by them.
" No good tree bears bad fruit, nor again does a bad tree bear good fruit; for each tree is known by its own fruit." ( Luk 6:45-44).
However pay attention to the next verses, "And no wonder! Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is not strange if his ministers also disguise themselves as ministers of righteousness." (2Cor 11:14,15). The Bible reveals Satan to be a liar, thief, and killer (John 8:44; 10:1-11). There are some religious bodies which expose the nature of Satan, the true Boss of the bodies, to the front, but many religious bodies disguise themselves as good peoples and try to steal souls of people to Satan and it's destruction.
There are fakes in Christianity. The primary distinctions in doctrine from true Christianity are in the following two points. 1.The denial of Holy trinity of God, and 2. the denial of forgiveness of sin by Jesus' death on the cross and His resurrection from the dead. The Jehovah's Witness and Mormon belong to these false group. Attention please to the fact that there are churches which having a cross on the roof do not believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus and look like salt having lost its taste.
For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths ( 2Tim 4:3,4).
16 April 2006 Published
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