The Sign of Tongues

Posted on by korgrocker

“So you see that speaking in tongues is a sign, not for believers, but for unbelievers. Prophecy, however, is for the benefit of believers, not unbelievers. Even so, if unbelievers or people who don’t understand these things come into your church meeting and hear everyone speaking in an unknown language, they will think you are crazy. But if all of you are prophesying, and unbelievers or people who don’t understand these things come into your meeting, they will be convicted of sin and judged by what you say. As they listen, their secret thoughts will be exposed, and they will fall to their knees and worship God, declaring, “God is truly here among you.””
1 Corinthians 14:22-25 NLT

Paul seems to contradict himself in these verses today. On the one hand, he said that speaking in tongues is a sign for unbelievers, but then he says that “if unbelievers or people who don’t understand these things come into your church meeting and hear everyone speaking in an unknown language, they will think you are crazy”. Which is it? If we extend what this all means to today’s Western churches, then we can see the problem. Most established churches have a liturgy that excludes the possibility of speaking in tongues in public during the meeting. I can just imagine that the church wardens would descend on such a person and, unless they desisted from their message, they would be escorted out the door. Those churches with a freer form of service, such as the one I attend, still only rarely hear the public message of tongues, although it features greatly in personal prayer and praying for healing, for example. But someone walking in off the street and hearing a church full of people all speaking out their messages in tongues would very quickly reach the conclusion that everyone there is mad! 

On the other hand, Paul said that the same random person, an unbeliever, who walked into the church and found messages of prophecy being spoken out, would be able to understand what was being said and would be convicted of sin. This would be because the Holy Spirit brings the prophecies. We know the ministry of the Holy Spirit from what Jesus said, referring to the time when the Comforter comes, in John 16:8, “And when he comes, he will convict the world of its sin, and of God’s righteousness, and of the coming judgment”. Paul said such people, hearing the prophecy being spoken, would “fall to their knees and worship God, declaring, “God is truly here among [them]””. 

“God is truly here”

This was all good practical advice from Paul, as he appealed to the intelligence of the Corinthian believers, and logically explained something that, surprisingly, had not occurred to them. But why should Paul be concerned about what unbelievers think? That is an easy question to answer, because Paul was not only an Apostle, but was an extraordinarily effective evangelist. He was very concerned about the salvation of the peoples in his time, and in particular, his fellow Jews. He wrote to the Romans, “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race, the people of Israel” (Romans 9:2-4a). Later on in Romans, Paul wrote, “It has always been my ambition to preach the gospel where Christ was not known, so that I would not be building on someone else’s foundation” (Romans 15:20). And we can read from 2 Corinthians 11 what Paul suffered in the process of evangelism.

We pilgrims, too, must be concerned about what people think. Too many Christians adopt an offensive attitude toward the unsaved people around them. They behave in ways that demand a contemptuous response rather than one that is attractive and able to perhaps open a door for the Gospel to be delivered. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 9:19-23, “Though I am free and belong to no-one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings“. In that context, Paul perhaps foresaw a situation in which a believer invited an unsaved neighbour into the church. What would this person find there? Chaos with the church members babbling away in tongues, or a place where there were prophetic messages, bringing conviction of sin?

“Is the Holy Spirit alive
and well in my church?”

We pilgrims go to a church, I’m sure. Do we feel comfortable about inviting our friends and neighbours there, or is it a place that, deep down, we’re ashamed of? Is it a place where the Holy Spirit is alive and well, and able to bring messages through His gifts that will bring conviction of sin? If we think not, or we’re not sure, perhaps some further prayerful thought is required about where our spiritual home should be.

Dear Father God. We want to be in the place where You want us to be. It must be a place where Your Spirit is free to live and move in the hearts and minds of believers, and where You can be freely worshipped. Please lead and guide us, we pray, and help us to reach out to those around us with the Gospel and Your message of hope. In the name of Your dear Son, Jesus. Amen.


Judging The World

Posted on by korgrocker

“When one of you has a dispute with another believer, how dare you file a lawsuit and ask a secular court to decide the matter instead of taking it to other believers! Don’t you realise that someday we believers will judge the world? And since you are going to judge the world, can’t you decide even these little things among yourselves? Don’t you realise that we will judge angels? So you should surely be able to resolve ordinary disputes in this life. If you have legal disputes about such matters, why go to outside judges who are not respected by the church? I am saying this to shame you. Isn’t there anyone in all the church who is wise enough to decide these issues? But instead, one believer sues another—right in front of unbelievers!”
1 Corinthians 6:1-6 NLT

Paul made the astonishing statement that one day “believers will judge the world”. And he went on to make another astonishing statement, that believers “will judge angels”. Where did Paul get all this from? I don’t believe for a moment that he made this up, because he must have had a revelation from the Holy Spirit when he wrote it, but Scriptures to confirm this are not exactly plentiful in the Bible. The commentaries point to Revelation 2:26, “To the one who is victorious and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations”, quoting the words of Jesus to the church in Thyatira. We also read in Revelation other indications that believers will rule and reign with Jesus. In Revelation 20:4-6, John wrote, “I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony about Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshipped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection. The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ and will reign with him for a thousand years“. Earlier in Revelation we also read, “You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign on the earth” (Revelation 5:10). In Matthew 19:28 we read, “Jesus said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, at the renewal of all things, when the Son of Man sits on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel“. I believe Paul had a glimpse through the Holy Spirit of a time to come when believers today will be in a position to judge unbelievers, but how that will be isn’t very clear. Perhaps the reference to judging angels applies to the time when the devil and the fallen angels are judged and then cast into hell (see 2 Peter 2:4).

We mustn’t forget, however, that today, in the here and now, we pilgrims are in a position to judge the world. Although Jesus said, “do not judge lest you be judged”, we have to be aware of God’s position on sin and evil. If God has said something is sinful, then we too must agree, and this effectively means that we have to make a judgment about another person’s behaviour, or a situation that has arisen in our society, or even about a law that our secular lawmakers have passed. Such a judgment has to be made in accordance with God’s absolute truth, not the relative truth that the world adopts. Take abortion, for example. Our lawmakers have passed a law legalising the abortion of babies still in their mother’s womb, even though God’s truth is that a new life starts at the point of conception (see Psalm 139). So we believers judge that the very act of abortion is wrong and sinful, because we have God’s authority from His Word to say so. In a similar, less dramatic way, if we see someone “shoplifting”, that is stealing goods from a shop or somewhere, then we have the right to judge this act because the Bible is clear about the fact that theft is a sin. However, Jesus was clear that those who observe such a thing happening must be careful about casting judgement because He said, “For in the same way as you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2). We must also be careful that we don’t judge someone based on what they look like. For example, if a person looks a bit shifty or is dressed in a way that offends us, then we mustn’t cast judgment on them purely because of their appearance. In John 7:24, Jesus said, “Stop judging by mere appearances, but instead judge correctly”. A quote from “Gotquestions.org”, “Christians are often accused of ‘judging’ or intolerance when they speak out against sin. But opposing sin is not wrong. Holding aloft the standard of righteousness naturally defines unrighteousness and draws the slings and arrows of those who choose sin over godliness”. John the Baptist got his head chopped off because he called out Herodias for her adulterous relationship with Herod. He may have been silenced, but Herodias and Herod’s sins were clearly written in God’s books; Revelation 20:12, “And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books”. 

If we pilgrims find ourselves in a situation where we are judging, then we must be careful about what we judge and how we go about it. Jesus said, “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye” (Matthew 7:3-5). We need discernment and courage as we interface with a sinful world. We need to pray, and pray again, to properly receive God’s truth and His recommended course of action, because without it, we might end up in a difficult situation that impacts us directly. We may one day find ourselves in a place where we are judging the world, but today, this is not something we need to concern ourselves about, because perhaps the only person that we should be judging is ourselves.

Dear Heavenly Father. You are Truth, the whole Truth, and everything about You is true. We pray for discernment and a reigned-in tongue, so that we will not speak out of turn, or in error, in judgment in any situation in which we find ourselves. Please lead and guide us, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Only Fools

Posted on by korgrocker

“Only fools say in their hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, and their actions are evil; not one of them does good!”
Psalm 14:1 NLT

The Bible, particularly in Proverbs, says much about “fools”. One verse I particularly like, as being very applicable to modern times, is Proverbs 18:2, “Fools have no interest in understanding; they only want to air their own opinions”. In these days of strange ideologies, where people stand up and stridently declare their views, “their own opinions”, one cannot but think that the word “fool” fits them very well. But then, we can’t call them that, because it might hurt their feelings. The Bible, however, has no such constraint, and God’s Word stands inviolate. But back in Psalm 14:1, David, the Psalmist, calls those who deny the existence of God, “fools”, and such an opinion, or belief, exposes their real problem – their corrupt ways, their evil actions and their lack of doing good. Those who deny God do so because otherwise they would have to face into their sin and its consequences. 

Much of what the people in the world think about God is misconstrued, twisted, invented and even libellous, but such false knowledge isn leveraged to build a picture to justify people’s actions, or lack of them. But for many others, they look around and see no evidence of God at all because, “Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe. They are unable to see the glorious light of the Good News. They don’t understand this message about the glory of Christ, who is the exact likeness of God” (2 Corinthians 4:4). Many of our scientists stay awake at night trying to plug holes in their theories of how the universe happened without God. So the conclusion of most is that there is no God, but if He does in fact exist, the knowledge is of no relevance to them. After all, they might say, knowledge of God won’t pay their bills. 

We pilgrims, of course, declare that God exists, and we know that we have a personal relationship with Him. We know Him as the Creator of the Universe. We know Jesus who died on a cross at Calvary to take on the punishment for our sins. We know that our God sent His Spirit to be with us, and live within us, a Helper and Counsellor always there for us. And we praise and worship God with thankful hearts, grateful for His love, grace and mercy. We keep short accounts with Him, always aware of our humanity and propensity to fall into sinful ways. Always humbly confessing our sins before Him who one day will judge the world.

It is so tempting at times to investigate the views of those who air their own corrupt opinions. We spend time thinking through the logic of devil-inspired arguments and ideologies, in case we have missed something. And before we know it our own view of God becomes skewed. There are many believers who post their own opinions on social media. They make videos of convincing scenarios that burden and confuse their viewers. They preach strange ideas that lead many astray, their charisma overcoming the doubts of their followers. Jesus warned about such people in a passage that describes what will happen in the End Times, and we read in Matthew 24:11, “And many false prophets will appear and will deceive many people“. So, we must be like the Bereans of Acts 17:11, “And the people of Berea were more open-minded than those in Thessalonica, and they listened eagerly to Paul’s message. They searched the Scriptures day after day to see if Paul and Silas were teaching the truth”. In the end, it is God’s Word that prevents us from becoming fools, and we must be on our guard against false teaching. Paul had strong words for the church in Galatia, “Oh, foolish Galatians! Who has cast an evil spell on you? For the meaning of Jesus Christ’s death was made as clear to you as if you had seen a picture of his death on the cross” (Galatians 3:1). 

So we pilgrims exercise caution when we hear a message or see a video. We carefully select books to read, always being vigilant to discern error. However, the denial of the existence of God may not just be an outward declaration from those unbelievers in the societies around us. Their secular and atheistic influence can also insidiously creep upon us until the God we say we believe in is a long way from the truth. Everyone believes in a god of some kind, and the devil is out to so corrupt us that we end up believing in a false god as well. That is a terrible place to be because we end up believing our own opinions rather than in the true God we know and love. The world may consider us fools, but better to be a fool for Christ than a fool denying His existence.

Dear Father God. In the eyes of the world we may appear foolish, but rather that than be numbered with real fools. Thank You for Your grace and mercy. Amen.

The Second Death (1)

Posted on by korgrocker

“But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practise magic arts, the idolaters and all liars – they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulphur. This is the second death.“
Revelation‬ ‭21:8‬ ‭NIVUK

From His throne, Father God concludes His instructions to the Apostle John. He lists eight categories of people who will end up in the fiery lake. At this stage in the End Times narrative, there will be none of these people left, because the time of the Great White Throne judgement has passed. So why was God reminding John about these things? John, of course, knew what was acceptable behaviour and what wasn’t because he spent over three years in Jesus’ company. He was there when Jesus taught about murder and adultery. He had been brought up in the Jewish culture and knew right from wrong. There are two possible answers to our question.

God asked John to write down this warning, so that back in his time-bound world, there would be no doubt about the fate of those violating God’s laws. Only the eight traits listed were mentioned but, as we will see, there were deeper implications behind them. God was also giving John the assurance that in Heaven there will be no sin. In Heaven, no one practising sorcery, for example, would be there. They would instead be finding out what life in the fiery lake was all about.

So who are those people God listed? We will all have our own thoughts when we read this verse, but here are a few of mine.

The cowardly are those who failed to stand firm in their faith when persecuted. This is really hard, because when faced with extreme levels of persecution, it is easier to deny Christ than continue to declare allegiance to Him. “How would I react in these circumstances?” is a difficult question to answer until we understand that God will give us the grace and strength when we need it. Jesus clearly warned His disciples of the difficulties ahead of them, as we can read in Matthew 10, but these two verses provide comfort, “But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it. At that time you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.” (‭‭Matthew‬ ‭10:19-20). And we look at the privations experienced by the early Apostles, in particular Paul. As I read some of the testimonies provided by Open Doors and other organisations that work with persecuted Christians, I am constantly humbled by ordinary people who experience so much opposition and persecution just for declaring the Lordship of Jesus.

Coupled with the cowardly are the unbelieving. These are the people who just don’t believe in God. They may express outright opposition to God, or just be “lukewarm” as Jesus warned in His message to the church in Laodicea. We read in Revelation 3:15-16, “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth!” Controversially, they may be people claiming to be Christians but who deny the laws of God and seek to dilute, change or ignore His Word, the Bible. However, I should hasten to add that God’s grace and love is there to grasp. He will not reject a repentant sinner. 

God’s warning communicated through John will be no surprise to us pilgrims. We have spent our redeemed lives very much aware of the need for personal holiness, because we have read the verses in 1 Peter 1:15-16, “But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”” Amongst other things, to be holy means to be set apart. We must not allow ourselves to adopt any of the worldly practices God was warning John about. That, of course, does not mean we should sell up all we have and then go and become a monk or a nun, although some have. As Jesus said in John 17:15-16, “I’m not asking you to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one. They do not belong to this world any more than I do.”‭‭ We can only share the message of God’s grace and love with our friends and families, and the people around us, by being in the same place as they are. But we make sure we are not tainted by the contact. We read in Galatians 6:1, “Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself.” There are a few words at the end of James 1 that are a warning, “Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means ….. refusing to let the world corrupt you.” ‭‭

But I’m sure all the pilgrims reading this today don’t need reminding. We have a wonderful and loving Heavenly Father, and our relationships with Him are precious and above all the things of the world around us.

Dear Father God. We thank You for Your love and compassion that You have lavished so freely on Your people. We pray for strength to stay the course and to keep ourselves separate from the world around us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.