OPEN LETTER TO ANGUS BUCHAN From: Alan Lester P.O. Box 1903 Bronkhorstspruit 1020 www.graceunlimited.co.za OPEN LETTER TO ANGUS BUCHAN................................................................1 I HAVE BEEN ENCOURAGED BY YOU..............................................................................................3 I HAVE WRITTEN AN OPEN LETTER BECAUSE….............................................................................3 I DESIRE TO BUILD YOU UP...........................................................................................................4 THE SHOCK OF JOB’S “COMFORTERS”..........................................................................................4 THE CHURCH IS TRANSFORMED BY THE TRUTH...............................................................................5 UNIVERSAL PRONENESS TO COME TO WRONG CONCLUSIONS........................................................5 I SPEAK AS A SON TO A FATHER....................................................................................................5 WHAT DID WE SAY WRONG?..........................................................................................................5 WHAT MUST I DO TO BE BORN AGAIN?..........................................................................................6 GUTTING A FISH............................................................................................................................6 THE GLORIOUS GOSPEL OF THE BLESSED GOD..............................................................................7 Your Hearer’s Need................................................................................................................7 Your Hearer’s Hope................................................................................................................9 Your Hearer’s Reward..........................................................................................................24 THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD...........................................................................................................29 How God Relates to His Created Universe..........................................................................29 Providence is Difficult to Understand....................................................................................29 Definition...............................................................................................................................29 Preservation..........................................................................................................................30 Concurrence.........................................................................................................................30 Government..........................................................................................................................35 THE WORD OF GOD.....................................................................................................................35 God’s Word Alone.................................................................................................................35 God Speaks Through Nature................................................................................................36 God Speaks Through His Word............................................................................................36 The Sufficiency of Scripture: Is the Bible Enough For Knowing What God Wants Us To Think Or Do?.........................................................................................................................36 WHAT IS REVIVAL?......................................................................................................................39 Introduction to Revival?........................................................................................................39 Personal Revival...................................................................................................................42 Revival is from God and Not from Man.................................................................................43 Revival is a Rediscovery of the Holy Spirit...........................................................................44 Revival is a Rediscovery of Prayer.......................................................................................44 Revival is a Rediscovery of Preaching.................................................................................45 Revival is a Rediscovery of God and His Presence.............................................................46 Definition...............................................................................................................................47 Conclusion............................................................................................................................47 IS GOD ALL-KNOWING OR DOES GOD FORGET?..........................................................................48 Could God Forget Me?.........................................................................................................48 Does God Have a Faulty Memory?......................................................................................48 God Sees Christians through the “Package of Righteousness”...........................................48 God Deliberately Chooses Not to Remember......................................................................49 God Promises Not to Hold This against You........................................................................49 CONCLUSION...............................................................................................................................49 2 I HAVE BEEN ENCOURAGED BY YOU My Dear Brother Angus It is with great joy that I have watched you make use of the opportunities God has given you. Opportunity to speak for God is a privilege you have been granted. This was Paul’s attitude when he said, “make the most of every opportunity” (Colossians 4:5. See also Ephesians 5:16). He saw them as precious gifts to be used properly for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I have also been encouraged by your zeal as you speak for God. This was one of the distinguishing features of the Lord Jesus Himself as he lived in this cursed world (John 2:17). In fact, Paul instructs Christians never to be lacking in zeal but to keep their spiritual fervour (Romans 12:11). Another commendable thing I have seen in you brother, is your boldness over the issue of sin. Far too many Christians are ashamed of the word “sin” today in the face of a world that makes fun of sin. Scripture says that it is fools who mock at making amends for sin—they think sin is a trivial thing (Proverbs 14:9). You have stood in front of fools and have boldly spoken on the issue of sin. That is commendable. This was the way in which the writers of Scripture spoke as well (Matthew 23, Mark 7:20-23a, 1 Corinthians 6:9-11). Furthermore, you have done well to place accountability on the individual, insisting that he/she deals with their own relationship with God rather than saying, “But what about them?” (Remember, the Lord even rebuked Peter for doing this—John 21:21-22). Scripture sees each individual as standing or falling before God as an individual (Romans 14:4) and insists on each individual making sure that his own personal life is pleasing to God (1 Thessalonians 4:11). Particularly for those who preach the Word of God or serve in the church of Christ, they have a responsibility before God to manage their own families well (1 Timothy 3:4-5). Your teaching and attitude in this regard has been a refreshing change from the self-pity emphasis that comes from many pulpits today. Modern preachers tend to see their hearers as helpless victims who are so affected by things other people have done to them that they can’t possibly be expected to live exemplary lives. Thank you for that! Other things I would like to commend you for are these: □ Your declaration that you stand on the Bible, the Word of God. □ Your declaration that it is critical to be born again □ Your declaration that it is faith in God that is important and not faith in faith □ Your declaration that there is no alternative but to trust in God □ Your call to your hearers to humble themselves before the Lord □ Your call to your hearers to forgive others unconditionally—dealing with relationships before issues, as does Scripture I HAVE WRITTEN AN OPEN LETTER BECAUSE… 3 I have written to you, brother, and have chosen to write this as an open letter, for the following reasons: □ You have become a very well-known and prominent person, and therefore, anything you do has an impact on a wide audience. You know more than anyone, I’m sure, what kind of responsibility you bear, being in such a visible position. It is because you are a public figure, and what you say is said in public, that I have written a public letter. □ I also am a man who serves the Lord by preaching the Gospel of the Lord Jesus on a regular basis, and as such, people regularly ask me what I think of your ministry. Now I do not desire to speak negatively about you nor slander you, so I am writing my position formally so I can direct people who ask me about you, to this letter. □ Finally, I write this letter to you as an appeal, from one Christian to another. I am your friend, not your enemy. As such, I desire for you even greater opportunity to preach, to find joy in your preaching and to know that your preaching is honouring God. I DESIRE TO BUILD YOU UP I am aware, dear brother, of the attacks you have received in the press. You have also surely been attacked in many letters from irate people. I humbly request that you view my letter, not as an attack, but as a word of encouragement. I desire to build you up, not break you down (Ephesians 4:29); to help you, not to assault you. I desire to be a friend, if you so desire, to whom you can speak on spiritual issues. As I stand with you brother, allow me to share something with you that frightens me. I can think of few scenarios more alarming than being a prominent public figure, and unwittingly teaching something in error, and no-one loved me enough to call my attention to it. Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses (Proverbs 27:6). I know what it is to speak in public and to have people write me opposing letters. Immediately my pride inflates indignantly, and thereafter, I have to go through a process of confessing my sin to God, becoming humble and receiving the truth of what was said to me. May I respectfully ask you to consider what I have to say, even if it makes you angry at first? THE SHOCK OF JOB’S “COMFORTERS” You will remember what God said to Job’s “comforters” after they had mashed him with their counsel: After the Lord had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. 8 So now take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. My servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to your folly. You have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.” (Job 42:7-8 NIV Emphasis mine) What a shocking thing it must have been for those men to have sat with Job in his calamity, and to have advised him according to what they thought was accurate, God- 4 honouring counsel, and then have God declare that He is angry with them because they had not spoken of Him what is right. What they thought was right and what was actually right were two different things. In fact, in verse 8 God calls their application of what they thought was right to Job’s case, folly. THE CHURCH IS TRANSFORMED BY THE TRUTH Down the centuries since then, human minds are still plagued by the haze of sin. Our thinking has been damaged by sin so that what we think is right may not actually be right at all. What a blessed thing it is to sit under the teaching of a true servant of God who has uncovered some element of truth from Scripture, and he teaches it so clearly that our sin-warped perspective is suddenly cleared in that area! To grasp a glorious new truth from Scripture is a wonderful thing. Something like this happened at the time of the Reformation. A central truth of Scripture that had been hidden in the blackness of the 1000-year Dark Ages was suddenly re-discovered. Coming to understand this basic teaching of Scripture revolutionised the church, so much so that God’s people were willing to have their blood spilt to protect this new ray of light, beaming from the pages of Holy Scripture. UNIVERSAL PRONENESS TO COME TO WRONG CONCLUSIONS What I am saying dear brother is that the fallen human race—as you surely know—is prone to coming to the wrong conclusions about their standing before God, about God, about God’s universe, the meaning of life; everything. Neither you nor I are exempt from this wretched haze of sin. What seems right to a person in this world may actually be the pathway to death (Proverbs 14:12 and 16:25). Our thinking is deceptive (Jeremiah 17:9). God says that there is not one person who understands accurately (Romans 3:11). Our thinking did not escape the fall of Genesis 3. I SPEAK AS A SON TO A FATHER Brother, I speak to you with the respect of a son to a father; If the entire human race fell into this erroneous thinking (among other things) with Adam as Romans 5:12-21 teaches, it is entirely possible that you and I have both believed a certain degree of error, and have both taught a certain degree of error? Would you not be filled with joy if this error could be shown to you clearly and you could see the truth? I surely would, and I surely have been filled with joy as my beliefs have been challenged over the years and my errors have been pinpointed. It is the wise man who listens to advice, but the fool who persists in his own way because he thinks it is right (Proverbs 12:15). WHAT DID WE SAY WRONG? If God were angry with you as he was with Job’s counsellors, because they didn’t speak of Him what was right, wouldn’t you want to know what it was you said that made God angry? Wouldn’t you want to repent of what you had said and believed and wouldn’t you 5 want to go out and preach the truth with full confidence that what you are saying has God’s blessing? I certainly would! Supposing you have agreed with what I have said, may I put before you, for your consideration, what I have noted while watching your sermons on DVD? I have made it my express purpose not to nit-pick, but to be helpful on major issues in which it appears to me, brother, you have not spoken of God what is right. May it never be said of you or I that we are zealous for God, but our zeal is not based on knowledge (Romans 10:2). WHAT MUST I DO TO BE BORN AGAIN? The first issue I would like to raise is the issue of being born again. You will remember that this is one of the items I commended you for at the start of this letter. I was so thrilled when you announced at Loftus that by the end of this event, everyone will know what it is to be born again. Brother, I waited in eager expectation for you to preach to the people on what it is to be born again, but I was left hungry. The people went away not knowing what it is to be born again. I took notes and tried to understand from your preaching, what concept you have in mind when you speak about being born again. You spoke about personal decision, you seemed to be challenging the people to do what is right, you taught that people should be committed to Christ, and you even ended your message with the statement that it is not good people who go to heaven, but believers. Don’t misunderstand me, I support you wholeheartedly in your appeals to the people to do these things. My concern is that these things do not add up to what it means to be born again. Dear brother, the Lord could use you so powerfully if you laid hold of the true, potent Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and preached it with the passion He has given you! I desire to see you drawn up higher in your spiritual understanding so you shine with a new vibrant message! GUTTING A FISH Before I describe something of the wonderful landscape of the glorious Gospel of the Bible, may I quickly make one more observation that saddened me? There is so much wrong teaching today that guts the Gospel much like we gut a fish we have caught. It urges people to believe that the critical focus of the Gospel is that there needs to be reconciliation between people and people. While I agree sincerely with reconciliation between people, that does not form the heart of the Gospel. People who have been genuinely born again do exhibit a sense of urgency about being reconciled to people they have sinned against and who have sinned against them. Reconciliation between people is a breathtaking result of being born again, but it is not the substance of being born again. If a person makes a decision to be reconciled to a father, son, mother, daughter, friend, as a result of hearing the preaching of the Word of God, that is something to praise God for, but that doesn’t mean the person has been born again. Please forgive my repetition; it is not meant to be disrespectful, but to bring clarity, that I may not be misunderstood. 6 THE GLORIOUS GOSPEL OF THE BLESSED GOD The Gospel of the Bible is all about people being reconciled to God, not people being reconciled to people. Even as you read this, I’m sure you know this, but there is an astonishing element to the Gospel that I believe I need to describe in more detail. Please brother, if you are feeling annoyed at my personal manner, I humbly request your forgiveness. Please do not let my awkward, perhaps abrasive words stop you from sitting back now and enjoying with me the subject that thrills our hearts the most—the glorious Gospel of the blessed God (1 Timothy 1:11). For the purpose of clarity and organization, I have arranged my comments on the Gospel under three headings: Your Hearer’s Need, Your Hearer’s Hope, and Your Hearer’s Reward. Your Hearer’s Need People Resembled God God created man in His image (Genesis 1:27, 9:6). God created man more like Himself than any other creature on the face of His newly created earth. Man was a glorious being, who, when the animals and angels looked upon him, resembled God. This is how the words image and likeness are intended to be understood in Genesis 1:27 and 9:6, judging from the way Moses uses the words image and likeness again in Genesis 5:3. Just as a son is like his father in a limited number of ways, so mankind was like God in a number of ways. Surely he was a superb being. People are Disgraced This glorious resemblance to God, however, didn’t last long in its unstained form. Oh the disgrace as Eve, then Adam, choose the lies of the devil over the promises of God. We find them disgracing themselves in front of the kind, spotless, radiant God, hiding in the garden because they are afraid and ashamed. Instead of holding their heads high in joy and purity, they now hang their heads in shame. The have reason to be filled with shame because they have done an immeasurably shameful thing. One can only imagine the sorrow in the hearts of the heavenly host as Adam and Eve are driven from Paradise and out into a weed-infested, thorny, cursed, unfriendly environment. While work in the garden was always a thrill and brought satisfaction, work was now harsh, unpleasant and slavish (Genesis 2 and 3). People are Seriously Separated from God Mankind, who had once been nearer to God, in fellowship and likeness, than any other created being, is now driven from God’s presence in disgrace. Man is now alienated from God, separated from God, in exile from God. The wonderful fellowship in the garden is smashed. The majority of unbelievers today don’t consider this separation from God to be a serious thing. They still think that all that is needed for a person to come back into the presence and favour of God is a decision, a commitment to Christ, 7 an effort to live a more holy life. This mindset is at war with what the Bible teaches about man’s true, macabre position before God. People are Dead! Scripture gives us the perfect analogy for this condition of separation from God; death! (Ephesians 2:1, 5, 5:14, 1:19-20, John 5:21, 25, Romans 8:2, Colossians 2:13, 1 John 3:14, etc.) When a person dies a natural death, death brings about such a changed state in his person that his body is no longer able to communicate in this world. You can speak to a corpse, but he can’t hear. You can urge a corpse to make a decision, but he can’t. You can urge a corpse to commit his life to Christ, but he can’t. (See Jesus teaching on this inability in John 8:47) God says that the barrier between Himself and the unbeliever is like the barrier between a living person and a dead person. That is how you and I need to think about unbelievers. They are dead. People are Avoiding and Blaming God The effects of this death, (the fulfilment of the warning of God before Adam and Eve fell into sin—Genesis 2:17) are immediately visible, even in Paradise. Look at Genesis 3. They sin against God and as soon as they hear Him walking in the garden they feel shame (verse 7), they hide from Him (verse 8), they fear Him (verse 10), and they make excuses for their sin, shifting blame (to God ultimately) (verses 12-13). See how radically they have changed. Judgement has come crashing down upon their heads. The Judge of the Universe is confronting them on this tiny spec of cosmic dust (earth), and they think they can argue their way out of the offence they have caused! Notice further that their minds are so warped that even though they are gripped with fear, their fear is like that of a self-preserving scavenger dog. They no longer have a twitch of respect for God, even daring to blame Him for their sin! (verses 12-13, see also Psalm 36:1, 55:19 and Romans 3:18). People Won’t Beg God for Mercy Still more needs to be seen. Notice that when God does what He is obligated to do— judge sin—Adam and Eve are so disrespectful and so righteous in their own eyes that it doesn’t even occur to them to beg God for mercy. Doesn’t this whole situation scream out “Mercy!”? Don’t you want to shout out on their behalf, “God have mercy on me, a sinner!”? (Luke 18:13). But no, this is what death looks like; spiritual death. No ability to see God clearly. No ability to understand God’s economy. No ability to see the desirability of doing what is right. Death is Universal Sadly, this was not the end. Paul thumps the corpse down before us again in Romans 5:12. (This theme is taught forcefully in many texts in between Genesis 3 and Romans 5, but I am moving ahead to Romans 5 for the sake of brevity.) See what he is saying. Paul 8 is reminding us of a sobering fact. At exactly the same time that Adam stood before God and received his death sentence (dying spiritually, and the process of death beginning in his physical body) so you and I, along with the entire human race died. No, of course we weren’t born yet, but when a “dead” person marries a “dead” person, they bear “dead” children. This condition of death has passed from Adam to every single person born into this world. The unsaved person is dead. He cannot see God, he cannot see the kingdom of God (John 3:3), he cannot sense his sinfulness or his true distance from God (Psalm 36:2). Oh the dreadful sadness of this state. Being so blind that you cannot even see your own need! We Preach to Dead People who Need Life Brother, it is to dead people that we preach. What is their need? They are dead and they need to be raised to life. I will discuss this raising to life under the next heading, but allow me the liberty to comment on one more matter in your Loftus sermon. You asked your audience what their need was. Oh I was so saddened when you elaborated on their need. Instead of their true need, dead people who need to be raised to life, you identified their needs as things like cancer, sickness, financial problems, relationship problems, etc. Oh dear brother, see that lost, miserable crowd’s need! They are deprived of the truth, starved to death, suffocated. They are dead and face the terrible wrath of God for ever and ever (See the terrifying truth of Romans 1:18-32). Whether they appear this way or not, God says they are hostile toward Him in their hearts and they cannot (like a corpse) submit to God’s law (Romans 8:7). What they need is not a cure from a painful sickness. They need LIFE! (John 10:10). (Incidentally their pain may be accomplishing God’s purpose of driving them to Christ in repentance (Psalm 107:12, Revelation 16:11)) The modern scourge is that the masses see Jesus as the great genie in the lamp. They are happy for Him to respond to their expedient rubbing of the lamp to heal their sicknesses and cause their businesses to prosper, but He must leave them to be the kind of people they want to be (John 5:40). Yes, you preached against sin, but you didn’t deal with their real need. Your Hearer’s Hope How are Dead People Raised to Life? Upon grasping the gravity of man’s true need before God, the thought must begin to prickle within out minds. If an unbeliever is truly dead, as Scripture declares, then how does he come to life? How can I even speak to him about Jesus? How is it that he ever comes to see Jesus at all and call out to Him for mercy (like blind Bartimaeus in Mark 10:46-52). It is here that the Gospel shines so brightly. This is why I have been so burdened that I have felt compelled to write this letter. It is only the Gospel that God uses to blast life into unbelieving corpses so that they can see God, see the kingdom of God, see their true sinfulness and repent (John 3:3). Faith Comes From Hearing THE Message 9 God uses the medium (the “hosepipe”) of faith to grant salvation life from spiritual death. This is exactly what Paul is teaching in Romans 10:17, “Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.” Is this not remarkable? You have a corpse who can’t hear a thing because he is dead. But there is one point of access, and that is faith that is given to that corpse, as he is exposed to the Gospel message. Do you see what is happening? The preacher preaches and the sound waves of his voice shake the surface of the eardrums of the dead person. Nothing happens, just as nothing happens when you preach to a tree. But then suddenly, faith comes! How does it come? God gives that corpse, at the moment of His (God’s) choosing, faith (Ephesians 2:8). WHAT Faith Comes? What is this faith that God graciously gives this corpse as a gift? Look at Hebrews 11. In this chapter, the author is showcasing some of the results of the kind of faith we are speaking about. He traces the lives of many of the saints to whom God gave this faith and shows how radically different their lives were from the lives of the faithless masses. Just a quick comment before we look at the Hebrews 11 kind of faith. I am aware that some people teach that everyone has faith, and they use the old (worn out) idea that everyone exercises faith when they—for example—sit on a chair. They believe that the chair will hold them. They swig out of a Coke can by faith, simply believing that the black, sticky substance in the tin really is Coke. They then go on to tell you that all you have to do is direct that faith toward Christ. This is contrary to what Paul taught in 2 Thessalonians 3:2 when he said, “not all men have faith”. Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones called that idea of faith the principle of mathematical probability. You simply use your experience in calculating a situation to make a decision as to whether you can do a certain thing or not. With experience, a person can, at a glance, estimate the strengths of materials. The chair has always held you so it will probably hold you again etc. I also think that this kind of talk about faith is confusing and unhelpful. True God-Given Faith Produces Results Back to Hebrews 11, let us examine the nature of true saving faith. Many people jump into Hebrews 11 and declare that verse 1 is a definition of faith. Rather, I believe, with people like John Calvin (see his commentary on Hebrews 11:1), that Hebrews 11, including verse 1 is speaking about some of the results of saving faith. In other words, if a person has saving faith, this is the kind of action that will progressively become natural to him/her. Surely then, if you or I are struggling to live holy and exemplary lives (the results of God-given faith), the first question we must ask, has to do with our faith. Do I have the kind of faith that drives and empowers me to live the life of faith? Remember what I said a moment ago, not all men have faith! (2 Thessalonians 3:2) What is True God-Given Faith? 10