100 Sermon Illustrations on Transformation

Bret Easton Ellis' novel LESS THAN ZERO, offers an unsettling depiction of the moral and spiritual poverty behind the contemporary façade of wealth, success, and fame. The author describes the vacuous life of sex, drugs, and violence among the teen-age children of wealthy entertainers. Though fictitious, the book captures a scene tragically all too accurate. Ellis depicts the bankruptcy and the cries of the human soul, which are by no means unique to this particular lifestyle. The cries are clear and can be heard throughout the story. Is there anybody who really loves me? Is there anyone anywhere who can help me?

Yesterday we looked at the account of Christ and the paralytic man from the Gospel of John. The man had been ill for 38 years and was found sitting at a pool he believed had the power to heal him. And still, Jesus approached him with the seemingly needless question: “Do you want to get well?”

As I shared yesterday, we must note that when God asks a question it is never in vain. In fact, it is often the greatest hint! The cries of the human heart can be heard throughout history, generation after generation. Does anyone care? Is there anyone who really loves me? Is there anyone anywhere who can help? Sometimes it is the bitter cry of loneliness, many times it is the wearisome cry of emptiness, but it is always a call for help. Yet, how often we find that our actions and attitudes contradict the cries closest to our hearts, justifying the question, “Do you want to get well?”

Consider the powerful words of poet W. H. Auden:

We would rather be ruined than changed;

We would rather die in our dread

Than climb the cross of the moment

And let our illusions die. [1]

Where Christ asks, “Do you want to be well?” isn't he also asking, “Do you prefer your pain, to the possibility of change?” His question gently pierces the heart of the human condition we all share, bidding us to receive the very thing we ask, from the only One capable of giving it.

Where you seek meaning, are you willing to be changed by meaning? Where you seek understanding, do you really want to find the Truth? Where you seek help, are you willing to receive instruction? Where you seek healing, are you willing to be transformed?

To every cry of every heart, Christ calls out, “Come to Me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest.” The question we must ask ourselves is: “Do I want to get well?”

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1. As quoted in Risvolti, (Mars Hill Review, Issue 19), 158.)

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Copyright © 2003 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

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Part of our ministry team works on a remote Indian reservation in the Southwest. In fact, our sons launched this ground-breaking outreach to Native young people a decade ago and named it “The Path.” In the past couple of years, that ministry has become a part of ours. Together, we've had the opportunity of launching, by the miracle working of God, a low-power FM radio station on this reservation. A reservation that's hard to reach - spiritually, as well as geographically. Now the light of Christ is going out 24 hours a day across the reservation in an original format that is really making a difference. Part of the adventure was just getting the station on the air - including setting up the tower. That required some special climbing abilities. And one of the Native young men who God sent to help with the station just happens to have that experience - illegally, in the years before he was following Christ. He used to love to climb towers that the law actually forbids people to climb. Now, all of a sudden, those abilities - practiced in a way that did not honor God - were suddenly being used by God to glorify Him. Don't you just love it!

Well, I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about “Yesterday's Shame - Today's Victory.”

This is one of the amazing ways of God - taking what we did against Jesus before we knew Jesus and turning it into something He can use for His glory. That aspect of God's amazing grace may help shed some hope-giving light on some of the very things you are most sorry for. The things you're most ashamed of in your past.

In 1 Timothy 1:12-18, our word for today from the Word of God, Paul tells us how this miracle of spiritual recycling worked in his life: “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has given me strength, that He considered me faithful, appointing me to His service. Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.”

“...Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners - of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display His unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on Him and receive eternal life.” Paul says, “The worst things I ever did have been transformed by God's grace into credentials to show people what He can do.” That's part of the grace miracle described in Romans 5:20 - “Where sin increased, grace increased all the more.” God always has more grace than we've got sin. Grace always trumps sin.

Never is that more dramatic when God takes the sinning you've done, or the sinning that was done against you, and makes it into a boomerang to hit the very devil who once used that stuff to bring you down. Now all that ugly becomes something beautiful in Jesus' hands, causing people to listen to you when you talk about Jesus, providing living proof of His power - and maybe even helping you climb a tower for His sake.

That's why you need to bring all that sin, all that shame, all those awful memories, and all the things you wish you hadn't done to the foot of Jesus' cross. Accept the forgiveness He made possible by the shedding of His blood for all that garbage. And ask Him to redeem those regrets and lost years by somehow using them for His glory and to help others come to know Him. There's a world of people out there who are where you were before you met Jesus and, under His leadership, you are uniquely equipped to work with Him in rescuing them. They'll listen to someone like you. You've been there.

That's one of God's great grace miracles, and it's waiting for you. Yesterday's shame, touched by the Master, can become today's victory!

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Copyright © Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, Inc., PO Box 400, Harrison, AR 72602. Used by permission. Written by Ron Hutchcraft. "Practical Answers to Real Life Issues"

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A beard really changes people - especially men. You can make a man look older, scruffier, wiser, or more suspicious. A beard does amazing things. Some wives and girlfriends can't wait for the man to grow it. Others can't wait for him to shave it. My friend, Lou, spent much of his life clean-shaven. He also spent many of those same years as an alcoholic. They were terrible years for his wife and daughters. One day, Lou became so desperate that he surrendered the control of his out-of-control life to Jesus Christ. From that moment on, the Savior beat that bottle that had always beaten Lou, and right about then, he started to grow a beard. He's actually had it for several years, but a couple of years ago he decided to shave it one morning. He walked out to his family, and he said, “Hey, what do you think?” His little daughter began to cry. She begged her Daddy to grow his beard back. See, the old face made her think of her old Dad. She was afraid the old Dad was back.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about “The Old Guy's Gone for Good.”

Our word for today from the Word of God is 2 Corinthians 5:17. It's a promise from God to do something we could never do for ourselves. It's a miracle only He can do. Listen to this: “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” What words! “New creation,” not from the outside in. That's what happened to Lou. It was from the inside out, and it could happen to you. You've got to come to the point where you're tired of not being the man or woman you really want to be; who those you love really need you to be.

Okay, here's my right hand on the right side of this table. This is the man I want to be - that people need for me to be. Now, here's my left hand over here on the other side of the table - this is what I actually am. And I can't close this gap between these two hands. That admission in itself is the first step to having a new you. Behind our mask of having it all together is a man or woman who's addicted to selfishness, unfaithfulness, to depression, or maybe we're addicted to a temper that's out of control, to a sexual appetite, to a habit. We've tried reforming. It hasn't worked!

That's what gets us ready for Jesus. And you're ready, as this verse says, to be “In Christ.” Without Him, we're in trouble. The ultimate diagnosis of our inner darkness is called sin. We've got the wrong person running things. And the Bible says, “Sin, when it is full grown gives birth to death.” Sin separates us from the people we love, from the person we want to be; that we need to be. It separates us from our Creator forever, unless we are “In Christ.”

How do you get in Christ? John 3:16 - “God loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him will not die, but will have eternal life.” All the faith that you've put in yourself and your religion and in other people - put it all in Jesus now, and say, “I'm Yours.”

Then there's a new beginning, a new Dad, a new Mom, a new son, a new daughter, a new mate, a new friend. Someone much stronger will be in the driver's seat. He will take your life places you never dreamed it could go and daily recreate you into someone who is becoming like Jesus Himself. If you've never had that new beginning with Jesus Christ, would you tell Him today, “Jesus, I'm Yours.”

As my friend's daughter found out, a new Dad is more than just a new face. It's a transformed heart. It's a miracle only Jesus can do. And it's a miracle that Jesus is waiting right now to do for you.

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Copyright © Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, Inc., PO Box 400, Harrison, AR 72602. Used by permission. Written by Ron Hutchcraft. "Practical Answers to Real Life Issues"

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“Christians aren't always nice people,” stated a friend of mine. This was incredibly troubling to her. Her reasoning was valid. “If Christianity is true,” she said, “why wouldn’t it follow that Christians are naturally nicer than non-Christians?”

I appreciate this question on more levels than one. It awakens me to the reality of my own Christian testimony. And where I do not contend with judging a religion by its abuse, I do suspect it is a sincere question that has crossed many minds. C.S. Lewis found it a question on the hearts of quite a few people who corresponded with him. He always responded that the word “naturally” is where our attention needed to be focused. His point is well-stated. It is natural, in the sense that it is reasonable, to expect that one's accepting Christianity should lead to a changed person. (We know that Christ himself expects results from our commitment to him.) But it is not natural at all, in the sense that it is effortless or instinctive, to defy human nature. In fact, it is altogether unreasonable to expect that becoming a Christian obliterates all imperfections, bad attitudes, and wayward cravings.

Shortly after the film “A Beautiful Mind” won an Oscar for Best Picture, John F. Nash, the exceptional mind behind that true story, was asked what it was like to live daily with Schizophrenia. As a Nobel Prize winner he was an extraordinarily brilliant mind, and yet his was a mind that suffered daily with paranoid delusions. Dr. Nash carefully noted that imperative to overcoming the tormenting visions of his disease was the emphasis he placed continually on putting his “mind on a diet.”

The imagery of his words is perhaps one that illustrates the condition of the Christian. The Christian, like the non-Christian, is subject to the cravings of the flesh, bombarded with tempting visions, and delusional feelings. We don't always feel like being nice, or moral for that matter. The Christian is not perfect, and shouldn’t claim to be. It is Christ we claim who is perfect. And we struggle to live well by that vision, by the truth of who we are in light of him. With Christ as our vision of hope, we learn to deny the cravings of the flesh; we learn to put our minds on diets.

The great preacher Charles Haddon Spurgeon once powerfully explained this life-giving, life-sustaining hope by which the Christian lives. “The Lord knows right well that you cannot change your own heart,” wrote Spurgeon. “It would be a very wonderful thing if one could stand at the foot of the Niagara Falls, and speak a word which should make the river Niagara begin to run up stream... Nothing but the power of God could achieve that marvel: but that would be more than a fit parallel to what would take place if the course of your nature were altogether reversed. All things are possible with God. He can reverse the direction of your desires and the current of your life, and instead of going downward from God, He can make your whole being tend upward toward God. That is, in fact, what the Lord has promised to do.”(1)

That is a compelling promise to live by! As Oswald Chambers beautifully noted, the only way to respond to that heavenly vision is “to give our utmost for His highest — our best for His glory.” The Christian is a work in progress, called to obedience, clinging to the hope of Christ.

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1. Charles Spurgeon, All of Grace, Ch. 6 “Concerning Deliverance from Sinning.”

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Copyright © 2004 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

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It is said that Termites eat through wood two times faster when listening to Rock music. Now what can we learn from that? We have slow chewing Termites — we play soft string music.

Do you remember the day you gave your heart to Christ? What difference did it make in your life? The experience is called “conversion.” One of Webster’s uses for conversion is “something converted from one use to another.” For example, in my wood shop I can take a flat oak board and make out of it a beautiful table top book rack. That’s converting or transforming it from an unplanned use to a specific use.

That is a picture of what should happen to us when we become converted to being a follower of Christ. We go from having no or wrong motives to having what should be specific God directed motives.

Our pastor said Charles Colson’s conversion caused Charles to transform his personality from “tough to tender.” In Charles’ case, conversion was dramatic — it made a very noticeable difference. That same tough to tender conversion should be true of every one of us. Our belief in Christ should have made a difference in our lives that others can notice. Can they?

2 Cor. 5:17 (NLT), “.those who become Christians become new persons. They are not the same anymore, for the old life is gone. A new life has begun!” That’s conversion

In his book RIVER OUT OF EDEN, Oxford scientist Richard Dawkins explains, “The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”(1) In a similar vein, Dawkins praises the humorous rejoinder of Douglas Adams to arguments claiming an apparent order and purpose in the universe. Writes Dawkins, “To illustrate the vain conceit that the universe must be somehow preordained for us because we are so well suited to live in it, [Adams] mimed a wonderfully funny imitation of a puddle of water, fitting itself snugly into a depression in the ground, the depression uncannily being exactly the same shape as the puddle.”(2) Their claim is clear: Humanity has adapted to a blind and indifferent universe like water to the shape of its container.

Ernest Gordon may have at one time agreed. An officer of the British army during the Second World War, he was captured by the Japanese while at sea. At the age of 24, he was sent to work in the prison camp that would be constructing the Burma-Siam railroad. [see HolwickID #1795]

For every mile of track, 393 men are said to have died. Wearing nothing but loincloths, they worked for hours in scorching temperatures, chopping their way through tangled jungles. Those who paused out of exhaustion were beaten to death by guards. Treated like animals, the prisoners became themselves like beasts trying to survive. Adapting to their harsh captivity, theft was as rampant as disease among them. Gordon himself eventually became so weak from illness that he was removed and placed in the Death House. He describes his purposeless existence in that cruel and indifferent setting: “I was a prisoner of war, lying among the dead, waiting for the bodies to be carried away so that I might have more room.”(3)

Each night the Japanese guards would count the work tools before anyone was permitted to return to camp. One evening, when a shovel was found to be missing, a guard shouted relentlessly that the guilty man must present himself. When no one responded, he ordered callously, “All die! All die!” At this, a young man stepped forward, confessing to the theft, and was immediately killed before them.

The railroad prison camp was a place where many could have observed in horror, “the universe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no God watching over those in dire need of hope.” Like water conforming to the shape of its container, the captured men became like men fighting to survive, void of right and wrong, void of reverence for life, void of all meaning. Yet, amidst the stagnant waters of hatred and bitterness, something was astir.

After the incident with the shovel, upon returning to the camp, one of the guards discovered a mistake in their counting. There had never been a missing shovel. One innocent man had sacrificed his life to preserve the life of his fellow inmates.

Attitudes among the camp began to change dramatically. Instead of men in a detached game of survival of the fittest, they began to look out for each other. One of the men remembered the words of Scripture: “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” Gordon, who once lay forgotten for dead, was slowly nursed back to health by fellow prisoners. Fully recovered, he eventually became a makeshift chaplain of the camp. When the prison was liberated in 1945 — three years after his capture — Gordon entered seminary to become a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. “Faith thrives where there is no hope but God,” he later testified. How contrary to the words of Richard Dawkins.

The transformation in the men of the prison was so thoroughly unlike the world they were forced to live in that one could argue it was more like a waterfall defying gravity and moving upstream than a puddle naturally fitting into the crevice that holds it. The sacrifice of one innocent man can reverse the flow of history. The Kingdom of God is among us, a spring of living water in a dry and weary land.

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1. Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden (New York: Basic Books, 1995), 133.

2. As printed in The Guardian, May 14, 2001.

3. Ernest Gordon, To End All Wars (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002).

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Copyright © 2005 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

One of the cities that symbolizes for me the charm of the Old South is Charleston, South Carolina. When you go down to the harbor and hire a carriage ride to go to the old part of the city, you feel like you're suddenly back in “Gone With the Wind” or something. Those antebellum houses and mansions are classic. I thought it was great that this historic part of the city had been so well preserved over the years, until the carriage driver told me what really happened. These old buildings had actually deteriorated terribly over the years and the area had become pretty shabby until some people took an interest in financing a renewal.

According to our driver, they only had a limited amount of money, so they decided to invest it in one building. Now the owner used those funds to convert this dilapidated old building into a historic masterpiece. You say, “Well, that's only one building. What about the neighborhood?” Well, the fellow next door was so inspired by what had happened to the neighboring property, he decided to find somebody to restore his building. Then the next neighbor did the same thing, and then the next neighbor, until finally the entire neighborhood was finally transformed.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about “How to Shape Up the Neighborhood.”

The recovery of historic Charleston demonstrates dramatically the renewing power of a model, and so does the story of the great Jewish leader Ezra at a time when God's people looked pretty dilapidated.

We read part of that story in Ezra chapter 9, our word for today from the Word of God beginning at verse 3. He says, “When I heard this, I tore my tunic and cloak, pulled hair from my head and beard and sat down appalled. And I sat there appalled until the evening sacrifice. Then, at the evening sacrifice, I rose from my self-abasement, with my tunic and cloak torn, and fell on my knees with my hands spread out to the Lord my God and prayed: 'Oh my God, I am too ashamed and disgraced to lift up my face to you, my God, because our sins are higher than our heads and our guilt has reached to the heavens.” Now what have we got here? We have a man so torn up over the sin of his people that he passionately repents - even publicly repents - and grieves over sin. And here's the result in chapter 10, verses 1 and 2. “While Ezra was praying and confessing, weeping and throwing himself down before the house of God, a large crowd of Israelites gathered around him. They, too, wept bitterly.” Then they went on to confess publicly.

It's like the renewal of Old Charleston. The revival of one man sparked the revival of the people around him. In the Spring of 1995, we began to hear some extraordinary spiritual renewal stories that were taking place on Christian college campuses. What began in one school spread to many others, and in each case there were hundreds of students confessing their sins publicly, being surrounded by fellow students praying with them and for them. There was the public destruction of what I call “sin props” - videos, magazines, books, music. Broken relationships were restored, and suddenly the Holy Spirit exploded across entire student bodies.

In almost every case, it began the same way. Not with a sermon or a series of meetings. It began when one student spontaneously walked to the front of a meeting and asked if he or she could say something. And in each situation it was a student whose heart had been broken over a sin, like Ezra, who wanted to make it right with the accountability and support of their peers to solidify it.

In Ezra's day - in our day - revival conditions begin when one person becomes what Ezra embodied - a radical repenter - someone who's sick of their sin, sick of the wicked ways around them. Someone who's willing to repent of that sin publicly, passionately, which leads us to your neighborhood, whether that's your church or your organization or your family, your circle of believers. Would you ask the Lord to help you see the immediate world around you through His eyes - and to see your sin and the sin around you? Would you dare to look at it in light of Jesus dying on the cross for it? And then maybe the Lord will ask you to be the one who makes it right in a public way. Who knows what might happen? If one person attacked what is decaying and began a renewing work, God might use it to transform everyone around.

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Copyright © Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, Inc., PO Box 400, Harrison, AR 72602. Used by permission. Written by Ron Hutchcraft. "Practical Answers to Real Life Issues"

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If we were to draw out in symbols and timelines the road maps of our lives, we could pencil in both single and crucial moments as well as entire years marked with particular themes of development. In any picture of a life laid out before us, there are abrupt moments of pivotal formation and gradual phases of transformation. It is a paradox that insight seems to grow gradually and yet it also seems to arrive in overpowering moments of abruptness.

As Peter, James, and John climbed the mountain with Christ, they were startled when Elijah and Moses appeared before them, talking with Jesus. It must have seemed a moment of both honor and awe. Peter immediately responded to it; “Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will put up three shelters — one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah” (Matthew 17:4). But before he had finished speaking, a bright cloud enveloped them and a voice from the heavens thundered, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased. Listen to him!” The disciples were terrified. And then as suddenly as it all began, they looked up and saw no one but Jesus.

There are transforming moments in our lives that may seem isolated in both time and vividness. We remember them as mountaintops, points in life lifted above the majority of the map. But are they not also much more than this? Whether distinguished by joy or pain, a transforming moment is always more than a moment; they are no more isolated in the pictures of our lives than they are isolated in the picture of reality.

Professor and theologian James Loder was on vacation with his family when they noticed a motorist off to the side of the road waving for help. In his book THE TRANSFORMING MOMENT, he describes kneeling at the front fender of the broken-down car, his head bent to examine the flat tire, when he was abruptly alerted to the sound of screeching brakes. A motorist who had fallen asleep at the wheel was jarred awake seconds before his vehicle crashed into the disabled car alongside the road and the man who knelt beside it. Loder was left pinned between the car he was trying to repair and his own.

Years later, he was compelled to describe the impact of a moment marked by pain, and yet unarguably something much more. Writes Loder, “At the hospital, it was not the medical staff, grateful as I was for them, but the crucifixes — in the lobby and in the patients' rooms — that provided a total account of my condition. In that cruciform image of Christ, the combination of physical pain and the assurance of a life greater than death gave objective expression and meaning to the sense of promise and transcendence that lived within the midst of my suffering.”(1)

His encounter with God, like the Transfiguration of Christ to a small group of frightened disciples, did not merely transform a moment; it was a moment that transformed reality and thus, the whole of life. Writes Loder, “Moments of transforming significance radically reopen the question of reality.”

When the disciples came to the end of their mountaintop encounter and looked up, they saw only Jesus. Moses and Elijah were no longer there; the cloud that enveloped them disappeared and the heavens ceased to speak. But the divine Jesus was fully and humanly present to them, the glimpse of God in that transforming moment on the mountain a radical reality shaping all of life.

There are times when truth must dazzle gradually, until it is given its proper place. Other times we seem to find ourselves moved nearly to blindness as we encounter more than we have eyes yet to see. Sometimes, like Peter, we interpret these moments of transcendence imperfectly. Yet God is at work even in the deciphering, and in the final examination, the content of our transforming moments is Jesus alone, the transfigured one, the transforming one, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.

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1. James E. Loder THE TRANSFORMING MOMENT (Colorado Springs: Helmers & Howard Publishing, 1989), 2.

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Copyright © 2006 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

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Despite falling crime rates, the Japanese are becoming more fearful of crime, so the marketplace is responding. For instance, there’s a new dress for women: if they’re afraid they’re being pursued, they can put themselves against a wall and pull a panel out of their dress that disguises them -- as a vending machine. Also available: a handbag that unfolds into a manhole cover: women can flip it open and toss it into the street. Thieves will supposedly think it’s an iron disk and not pick it up and find the owner’s wallet. For children, there’s a backpack that unfolds into a fire hydrant so the child can hide inside.

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New York Times

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #20859]

For as long as I can remember I have been self-conscious about my smile. Teenage girls spare little mercy, particularly when it comes to perceiving their own flaws, and I was no exception. Thus, the small gap between my teeth (a gap most people could never see) came to affect the way I laughed -- with a hand often raised in front of my mouth. And it similarly affected my smile, which was slightly uneven -- as if somehow aware of the space it was trying to hide.

Combating similar insecurities was an ongoing process when I worked among youth. Sympathetic to the throes of adolescence, I spent a great deal of time attempting to unravel the meaning of IMAGO DEI. “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27). IMAGO DEI is the Latin expression of the biblical hope that we are made in the “image of God.” To a world cruelly obsessed with appearance, such an idea seems foreign at best, perhaps even unhelpful. To my youth group, the concept fell similarly short. Knowing they were made in the image of God did not take away the desperation to belong or the pain of being told they did not. The hope of IMAGO DEI meant very little to any of them, until it was an image they learned to see.

If we will plumb the depths of what it means to be made in the image of God, we discover the implications are far-reaching. It is reminiscent of Aslan's response in PRINCE CASPIAN: “'You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve,' said Aslan. 'And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor in earth.'“ We are bearers of the image of God, made with the intention and care of the Father. To live as children made in his image is not a static hope, but an active calling to reflect our maker. Even so, it is a calling we fail to answer, a reflection that has become blurred. The image of God in humanity is an image tarnished by sin. We have been made in his image, but it is an image that needs his restoring touch.

When Jesus healed the ten lepers who approached him outside of Jerusalem, he restored wholeness and health to a group of ailing men. He removed the affects of a fallen world and made clearer the image of God in each one. Yet, only one was transformed by the touch of the savior; this man threw himself at Jesus's feet and praised God. Though ten were healed of leprosy, Jesus only noted the restoration of one: “Rise and go; your faith HAS MADE YOU WELL” (Luke 17:19).

God's transforming work among us moves beyond what ails us to the heart of our true illness. You see, diseases can be healed, scars removed, and flaws corrected. But these things do not change the heart that needs to be transformed. Oddly enough, a dentist fixed the gap in my teeth years ago, and yet my smile remains slightly uneven, molded by what was once there. I have come to see it as a part of me, a unique and quirky scar from a sensitive childhood -- even as it reminds me that God drew powerfully near to the child. Transformation involves a presence far more enduring than the dentist, more familiar than a friend.

Being made in the image of God is not about maintaining a flawless facade, a perfect record, or even a life without scars. All the power of God that raised him from the dead did not erase the scars left by Roman nails. These marks of suffering were not removed. The resurrected Christ, the perfect image of God, chose to keep the scars of the Cross. Yet it is his image we are being made to reflect, and we are called to come as we are.

What the one leprous man recognized in Christ was enough to bring him to his feet in worship. It is this image that continues to erect the heads of the poorest beggars and bow the shoulders of the greatest emperors; it was the image of Christ that made its way into the insecurities of some in my youth group. Though there was “nothing in his appearance that we should desire him,” he lived as one touched by another kingdom, obedient to the Father even unto death. In Christ, God supersedes every longing and pain, every sin and scar, with a FACE. It is this image within us, this image we were created to reflect. IMAGO DEI is the hopeful commission to become more like the one we follow. It is the cry within us to be who we ARE: children made in the image of the Most High.

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Copyright © 2006 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

The population of the United States soared past 300 million in October, with no signs of declining anytime soon.

Only two other countries contain more than 300 million people: China and India, with more than 1 billion each. Like those two giants -– and unlike most of Europe and other “developed” countries -– the U.S. population continues to climb.

Our young nation took nearly a century and a half (until 1915) to reach a population of 100 million. It had doubled a little over a half-century later, in 1967. The 300-million mark was reached less than 40 years after that, and demographers project we will hit 400 million by 2043.

Natural increase (more births than deaths) explains much of the annual growth in population, according to the Population Reference Bureau. But immigrants account for about 40 percent of the growth.

Foreign-born people in the United States now number more than 35 million, ranging from unskilled laborers to highly skilled professionals and international entrepreneurs. Non-Hispanic whites account for just over half of the population today. Hispanics, African Americans and a rainbow of other colors and ethnicities make up the rest. Additionally, up to 30 percent of the population will be multiracial by 2050, according to some projections.

Americans face plenty of social and economic problems, but we’re generally healthier, more prosperous and better educated than ever. So, despite our current unpopularity in various quarters abroad, we will continue to wield great social, political and economic influence worldwide for the foreseeable future.

But what about the prospects of evangelical Christians in –- and beyond -– America?

We’ve come a long way, to be sure. We help decide national elections and determine social policies. Our numbers continue to grow -– albeit more slowly in recent years. Increasingly, our voices are being heard in the international arenas of war and peace; the fight against genocide, poverty and AIDS; and the struggle for human rights and religious freedom.

But some evangelical researchers say we’ve begun to decline. We’re losing our own young people, they warn, while failing to reach far enough beyond our pews to touch the unchurched.

Overall church attendance remains virtually unchanged from 15 years ago despite national population growth, according to Dave Olson, director of the American Church Research Project. Population is increasing faster than church participation even in the traditional Bible Belt, he reports. Evangelical ranks, he says, are becoming “suburban, affluent and educated” –- a plush ghetto, but a ghetto nevertheless.

“We live in a world today that is post-Christian, postmodern and multiethnic,” Olson told a gathering of evangelical church leaders Oct. 12 at the annual meeting of the Mission America Coalition. To reach that world, he said, “the church needs to have an attitude of brokenness, humility and repentance.... It needs to be less self-righteous, individualistic and materialistic. It needs to be more biblical, Christ-centric and holistic.”

Amen to that. But let’s not get discouraged about our potential for transforming American culture –- and other cultures.

The world is “not so secular as it looks,” observed John Stott, one of the great elder statesmen of modern evangelicalism, in a recent interview with “Christianity Today” about the state of the movement. Even in Stott’s native England, which is far more “post-Christian” than the United States, “it’s interesting in a so-called secular culture how many people are looking for something beyond,” he said.

What are they looking for? Three things, Stott believes: transcendence, significance and community –- “the very things we have to offer them.”

The amazing ethnic and cultural variety of America also is an unprecedented opportunity. For one thing, immigration brings the world to us, which opens endless opportunities for missions and ministry. For another, many of the people coming here from Latin America, Asia and Africa already are evangelical believers and potential partners in mission.

Abroad, the potential contributions of millions of American evangelicals are greater than ever –- as missionaries, volunteers, evangelistic tentmakers, teachers, mentors and trainers of the growing “two-thirds world” missionary force, relief workers, encouragers, prayer partners.

And don’t forget the positive power of money well spent. Christians give about $4 billion a year to the top 20 U.S. mission agencies, reports mission researcher Justin Long. Sounds like a lot, but it’s a tiny fraction of 1 percent of our combined income.

“Globally, the average Christian gives 15 cents to foreign missions each week. The average North American believer gives 50 cents; the average European believer, 25 cents,” Long says. “How much was that cup of coffee before church?”

Evangelical influence in addressing political, social and human-needs issues around the world is significant. But as evangelist and Samaritan’s Purse founder Frankin Graham says, one of our most important challenges in the next 50 years is to “make sure we don’t dilute our faith as we respond to hurting people around the world.”

An American living in China recently invited some Chinese friends to dinner -- including a Buddhist, a Communist Party member and a man who was having an adulterous affair. Within a few weeks of the supper, all three had decided to follow Jesus as Lord.

One sent the American a note: “Jesus is our bridge to God. You were my bridge to Jesus. If you hadn’t come to share Jesus, I think we would still be in the dark.”

Transformed hearts transform societies, not the other way around. The only force that truly transforms hearts is the Gospel.

When it comes to controlling alcoholism among the homeless, one Seattle group is charting new territory. Last December, the Downtown Emergency Services Center opened a highly controversial facility, known as 1811 Eastlake, in order to house seventy-five of the city’s most inebriated homeless.

Taxpayers had grown weary of shelling out up to $50,000 a year per homeless citizen to pay for visits to the emergency room, jail, and recovery facilities. So, the city decided to redirect some of its funds — over $11 million to be exact — toward permanent housing for these hard-core alcoholics.

But here’s the catch — residents are allowed to drink to their heart’s content! While 1811 does not discourage sobriety, it does not require its residents to enroll in any sort of recovery program. Bill Hobson, the program’s executive director, says that the community needs to face the so-called “fact” that the most chronically intoxicated will likely remain that way. Hobson offers an example of a resident who was drunk ten minutes after spending sixty days in a detox facility. Referring to the worst drunks like this, he says, “Once you’re an alcoholic, you’re always an alcoholic.”

Well, the reasoning goes, if an alcoholic can’t change, instead of racking up taxpayer dollars to pay for jail cells and treatment, why not fund less expensive housing? Just keep them off the streets.

It might be cheaper, but it’s also immoral. You see, the idea that people can’t change is the result of a naturalistic, deterministic worldview. If people are truly the result of random evolution and their environment, and only the fit can survive, then indeed, homeless drunks don’t have a chance. Give them a bottle, wish them well, and just keep them out of trouble.

But Christians know better. In thirty years of prison ministry, I’ve witnessed time and time again the transformation of the most incorrigibly hardened criminals imaginable — drug addicts and alcoholics among them. And believe me, it costs taxpayers far less to promote the transformation of prisoners than to simply warehouse them and hope they won’t return to a life of crime. That’s why six states have now welcomed the InnerChange Freedom Initiative® (or IFI), a faith-based program launched by Prison Fellowship, which has proven to drastically reduce recidivism among prisoners.

Ironically, as many of you know, a federal judge has ordered the IFI program in Iowa shut down, charging that it violates the separation of church and state — this, while taxpayers in Washington state are financing a homeless shelter that practically enables addictive behavior all to save, so they say, a few dollars.

But so much more is at stake than taxpayer dollars. Hope is. The director of 1811 Eastlake says that we need to face the reality that some people will never change. Well, he’s wrong. Any society that just writes off a class of persons can someday put groups of people gently to sleep. The Nazis proved that so.

As Christians, we know that hardened criminals can be radically transformed by the saving power of Jesus Christ. We don’t write off anybody, including so-called “chronic inebriates.”

________

Copyright (c) 2006 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

I’ve frequently said that our greatest witness as Christians is when we’re caring for the poor, visiting the prisoners, tending the sick. When we take these things seriously, others can’t help but see the power of the Gospel.

Recently, the faithful witness of some Christians in Malawi turned the head of a British journalist and atheist who traveled to Africa before Christmas. Writing in The Times of London online, Matthew Parris said that these Christians not only proved to him that Africa needs God, but also have challenged his atheistic convictions.

After visiting a charity that provides water pumps to rural communities, Parris noticed that many of the organization’s African leaders were strong Christians who gently demonstrated their faith in quiet conversation and action. They reminded him of the Christians he knew when he was a young boy living in Africa with his family.

These Christians, he recalls, were a “different” kind of people whose faith seemed to give them what he describes as a “liveliness, a curiosity, an engagement with the world, [and] a directness in their dealings with others.”

If this isn’t a winsome demonstration of faith, I don’t know what is!

The Christian missionaries Parris met when he returned to Africa in his twenties had a similar impact on him. Wherever missionaries lived, he wrote, “something changed in the faces of the people we passed and spoke to.” They had broken through what he calls “crushing tribal groupthink.” They see themselves as individuals who stand in direct relationship to God — not as subservient subordinates who must kowtow to tyrants like Robert Mugabe.

Parris is sure that Christian faith has something to do with this. And of course he’s right! He says he has “become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone won’t do it. Education and training alone will not do.”

“In Africa,” he writes, “Christianity changes people’s hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. And the rebirth is real. The change is good.”

Parris says that what he’s observed among Christians in Africa “confounds [his] ideological beliefs” and has “embarrassed [his] growing belief that there is no God.”

He had this to say about the Christians he met who were providing water pumps: “Their work was secular, but surely affected by what they were. What they were was, in turn, influenced by a conception of man’s place in the Universe that Christianity had taught.”

Here is an atheist who gets it: Worldview matters! How you see the world, what you believe about where we come from and where we are going, will affect how you live.

When you understand that every human being is made in God’s image, and that God Himself died on a cross for sinners, people will see you ministering to prisoners. They will see you feeding the hungry and clothing the naked.

Or, like Matthew Parris, they may even witness you bringing water pumps to rural villages in Africa. They will see Christ before their eyes.

________

Copyright (c) 2009 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

The resurrection stories in the four Gospels aren’t about going to heaven when you die, as many Evangelicals preach every Easter. In fact, there is almost nothing about “going to heaven when you die” in the whole New Testament. Being “citizens of heaven” (Philippians 3:20) doesn’t mean you’re supposed to end up there. Many of the Philippians were Roman citizens, but Rome didn’t want them back when they retired. Their job was to bring Roman culture to Philippi.

That’s the point which all the Gospels actually make, in their own ways. Jesus is risen, therefore God’s new world has begun. Jesus is risen, therefore Israel and the world have been redeemed. Jesus is risen, therefore his followers have a new job to do.

And what is that new job? To bring the life of heaven to birth in actual, physical, earthly reality. The bodily resurrection of Jesus is more than a proof that God performs miracles or that the Bible is true. It is more than the Christian’s knowing of Jesus in our own experience (that is the truth of Pentecost, not of Easter). It is much, much more than the assurance of heaven after death (Paul speaks of “going away and being with Christ”, but his main emphasis is on coming back again in a risen body, to live in God’s new-born creation).

Jesus’ resurrection is the beginning of God’s new project, not to snatch people away from earth to heaven, but to colonize earth with the life of heaven. That, after all, is what the Lord’s Prayer is about.

The resurrection is the foundation for a renewed way of life in and for the world. Many liberals want to “spiritualize” Easter – removing the miraculous while keeping the message of transformation. But to get that social, political and cultural result you really do need the bodily resurrection, not just a “spiritual” event that might have happened to Jesus or perhaps simply to the disciples.

When Paul wrote his great resurrection chapter, 1 Corinthians 15, he didn’t end by saying, “So let’s celebrate the great future life that awaits us.” He ended by saying, “So get on with your work, because you know that in the Lord it won’t go to waste.” When the final resurrection occurs, as the centerpiece of God’s new creation, we will discover that everything done in the present world in the power of Jesus’ own resurrection will be celebrated and included, appropriately transformed.

Easter is about new creation, a huge and stunning fresh gift of transforming grace, not about discovering that the old world has been misunderstood and needs simply to be allowed to be truly itself. Romans 6, 1 Corinthians 6 and Colossians 3 stand firmly in the way at this point.

With Easter, God’s new creation is launched upon a surprised world, pointing ahead to the renewal, the redemption, the rebirth of the entire creation. Every act of love, every deed done in Christ and by the Spirit, every work of true creativity – every time justice is done, peace is made, families are healed, temptation is resisted, true freedom is sought and won – this very earthly event takes its place within a long history of things which implement Jesus’ own resurrection and anticipate the final new creation, and act as signposts of hope, pointing back to the first and on to the second.

Did you ever read Bret Harte’s story THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP? Roaring Camp was supposed to be, according tot he story, the meanest, toughest mining town in all of the West. More murders, more thefts -- it was a terrible place inhabited entirely by men, and one woman who tried to serve them all. Her name was Cherokee Sal. She died while giving birth to a baby.

Well, the men took the baby, and they put her in a box with some old rags under her. When they looked at her, they decided that didn’t look right, so they sent one of the men eighty miles to buy a rosewood cradle. He brought it back, and they put the rags and the baby in the rosewood cradle. And the rags didn’t look right there. So they sent another of their number to Sacramento, and he came back with some beautiful silk and lace blankets. And they put the baby, wrapped around with those blankets, in the rosewood cradle.

It looked fine until someone happened to notice that the floor was so filthy. So these hardened, tough men got down on their hands and knees, and with their hardened and horny hands they scrubbed that floor until it was very clean. Of course, what that did was to make the walls and the ceiling and the dirty windows without curtains look absolutely terrible. So they washed down the walls and the ceiling, and they put curtains at the windows. And now things were beginning to look as they thought they should look. But of course, they had to give up a lot of their fighting, because the baby slept a lot, and babies can’t sleep during a brawl.

So the whole temperature of Roaring Camp seemed to go down. They used to take her out and set her by the entrance to the mine in her rosewood cradle so they could see her when they came up. Then somebody noticed what a dirty place that was, so they planted flowers, and they made a very nice garden there. It looked quite beautiful. And they would bring her, oh, shiny little stones and things that they would find in the mine. But when they would put their hands down next to hers, their hands looked so dirty. Pretty soon the general store was all sold out of soap and shaving gear and perfume and those kinds ... the baby changed everything.

That’s the way it is for those of good will. That’s the way it is for those who please God. The baby enters into their lives, and he slips into every crevice of their experience, until they say “Hark! Listen, the herald angels sing! God is for us. And Christmas is forever.”

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Bruce W. Thielemann, “Hark! The Herald Angels,” Preaching Today, Tape No. 63

A small band of former homosexuals representing about 10 organizations stood on the steps of the Supreme Court in late July to demand recognition and equal rights under the Constitution. They protested the claim by homosexual activists that people with same-sex attractions cannot change.

“Anti-ex-gay extremists say that I do not exist -- that we don’t exist,” said Christopher Doyle, president of Voice of the Voiceless and Equality and Justice for All. “Tell that to my wife of seven years. Tell that to my three beautiful children.”

Some of the activists spent the morning in meetings on Capitol Hill. Doyle said he met with Democrats and Republicans, all cordial, but “Republicans were definitely more sympathetic.” The event marked the first Ex-Gay Pride Month, which the group designated as the month of July. Organizers had originally planned a reception at the Family Research Council, but emailed and phoned threats from homosexual activists caused them to postpone the event until September at an undisclosed location. Mat Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel, will receive the first Ex-Gay Pride Freedom Award at the event.

Greg Quinlan, president of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays (PFOX), said homosexual activists have no room for other opinions because they want to “take over” education, health care and government so that theirs is the only voice heard. Quinlan, a lobbyist, said he learned his trade while working with the Human Rights Campaign Fund in the 1980s and ‘90s.

“When you see that equality sign in their logo, it’s not about equality -- it’s about dominance,” Quinlan said. “It’s not about human rights. It’s about sexual rights of a small sexual minority.”

The gathering at the Supreme Court only numbered about a dozen but they said there are thousands of ex-gays around the country who are afraid to identify as such.

“I have suffered more discrimination and intolerance as an ex-gay than I did when I was actually in the [homosexual] lifestyle,” said Grace Harley, an African American woman who lived for 18 years as a transgendered man named Joe.

“Former homosexuals like me need protection,” Harley said. “Ex-gays are more hated than gays are.”

Various participants explained how they believe they ended up in the homosexual lifestyle, including childhood sexual abuse, emotionally incestuous relationships with parents and unresolved bitterness toward fathers.

One man, Chuck Peters, said he was molested by his Boy Scout troop leader, which sexually disoriented him and led to 22 years in the homosexual lifestyle. He held up a printed copy of sworn testimony from Nicholas Cummings, the former American Psychological Association president who led the effort to declassify homosexuality as a mental illness, to point out that homosexuals have the ability to change.

Peters said after his boyfriend died of AIDS, he decided to seek therapy to determine why he had such a strong attachment to other men. He eventually found the help he sought, but not before being told “over and over again that I was born that way and I should accept it.” Peters, now the clinical director of the Sexual Orientation Change Institute in Beverly Hills, California, said therapists told him he had internal homophobia that made him not want to be homosexual.

Richard Cohen, who appeared with his wife of 33 years, said he was delivered from unwanted same-sex attraction and now helps others experience the same. Cohen, a psychotherapist and director emeritus of the International Healing Foundation in Bowie, Md., said he’s found there are many reasons people become gay over the course of thousands of counseling sessions. He said he has an 85 percent success rate with those who want to change their orientation, using a three-step process: identifying root causes, healing root causes and helping people bond in friendship with their own gender.

“We should have the right, like all Americans, to be able to express our views without intimidation,” Doyle said while wearing a pink “Ex-Gay is ok!” lapel pin. “We’re not going anywhere.”

Francine Perry and her daughter Laura recently sat down to look at family photos. As they reflected on the good times, they also could see how God was at work, especially through the difficult times -- and there were many of those.

Francine, left, and Laura with a family photo album

On the heels of rebellious teenage years, Laura lived as a transgender man for nearly a decade of her adult life. Other than her family and select friends, though, most people just knew Laura as “Jake.”

Laura was living with a partner who also identified as transgender, and had become estranged from family members and the church.

Laura had grown up in a Christian home. Her parents, Paul and Francine, were and are active members of First Baptist Church of Bartlesville, Okla., where they took Laura and her siblings to church nearly every time the doors were open.

“I grew up going to church constantly,” Laura said. “I was in Sunday School, children’s choir, GA’s, Bible Drill, VBS and more. But ultimately I lacked a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.”

James Biesiadecki, left, pastor of First Baptist Bartlesville, Oklahoma, baptized Laura in 2016.

Growing up, Laura constantly struggled with her sexual identity and did not “feel” like a girl. She experienced other various challenges through childhood, which culminated in poor choices in her teen years, and later embracing a transgendered life during her 20s.

When they found out about Laura’s choice to embrace a transgender male identity, Laura’s parents were devastated.

“At first I said, ‘how could you do this to us, after all we have done for you?’,” Francine said.

Though she had support from friends in church and in her ladies Bible study, Francine felt depressed and isolated because of the family’s plight.

Out of a sense of desperation and hopelessness, Francine began to dive deeper into God’s Word.

Laura Perry and her mother Francine share a hug. After many rocky years, God has fully restored family relationships.

“I realized, through our ‘prodigal child’ experience, that I had a more works-based faith in Christ, a more legalistic mindset,” Francine acknowledged. “I was Pharisee-like in so many ways.”

God, though, began to soften Francine’s heart. Her ladies Bible study group began to lift up Laura in prayer. Yet things got worse before they got better.

Laura once wrote a letter to her mother that said, “This is what I was supposed to be. Please accept me.”

Francine and Paul began to become more open in sharing their struggles.

The Perrys also refused to believe that God would leave Laura in the transgender life. They asked people to pray.

Meanwhile, Laura had delved deeper into the transgender life, attending pro-LGBT support groups and even taking hormonal and surgical steps to become less feminine and more masculine.

“I bought into the lies of Satan, believing that my sinful choices would make me happy,” Laura said. “Inside, I was miserable and searching for real peace.”

Laura’s transgender partner happened to be a staunch political conservative, and this exposed Laura to various talk radio and teaching programs.

“I got fascinated with the idea of absolute truth,” she said.

Her interest in politics led her then to listen to biblical preaching on the radio.

One day a co-worker asked if she was a Christian. Laura said, “Yes.”

“That was the first time in a long time that I said I had anything to do with Christianity,” she said.

It would be a long road leading home, but God began to awaken faith and belief in Laura.

“I always knew about Jesus and believed. But I never knew Jesus personally or made Him Lord of my life,” Laura said.

Eventually, the truth began to get through, bit by bit. And Laura began to reach a breaking point.

“God opened my eyes to the truth. He made me realize that the transgender life was not His will for my life, that it was a dead end. But I was still conflicted.”

One day, through tears and much struggle, Laura prayed and asked God for help. She was, however, still in a transgender lifestyle and relationship. God continued to work on her heart.

Francine and Paul kept the lines of communication open, and met with Laura from time to time.

Francine said, “It was as if God said to me, ‘If you keep trying to fix Laura yourself, I will not. If you just sit down and leave Laura to me, I will work.’”

That began the change, not only in Francine’s life and heart but Laura’s.

Laura asked her mother one day, “Is it OK if I come to church?” Francine, who was the church pianist, struggled with the idea of Laura coming to church.

“I thought if she showed up to church looking like a man, she only would embarrass us. That shows you how far I still had to go in my walk with Christ,” Francine said.

Laura did come to church that day, and the message was on the prodigal son. The person to feel convicted by the sermon, though, was Francine.

“Satan whispers in your ear along this dark road, but God’s grace won out,” Francine said.

Laura eventually made the hard, painful decision to turn away from her transgender life, leaving her partner, and made the step home, moving back home with her parents.

“I didn’t know what came next,” Laura said. “But I was clinging to God’s promise that He would take care of me. I experienced such love and acceptance from my mother’s Bible study group. It was hard, but I had never experienced such peace and love as when I came back to the church.”

The ladies group helped Laura acquire a new wardrobe, including earrings and dresses. Members of First Baptist have continued to walk alongside Laura.

Brandi Biesiadecki, wife of pastor James Biesiadecki, has mentored Laura.

“It is so encouraging to see the true repentance and restoration Laura has undergone,” she said.

Last August, Laura made her decision to follow Christ public in front of the church and was baptized the following month.

Today, Laura has fully embraced her God-given sexuality as a woman, and she is active in the church.

The journey home, which took place a year ago, has led to both restoration and reconciliation. Francine and Paul believe God answered their prayers, and they believe that parents should never stop praying for their “prodigal” child or children.

They give all glory to God. “Only God could have done this,” Francine said.

Pastor James also sees God’s grace demonstrated in the Perry family.

“Laura’s testimony, and the testimony of the Perry family, is proof that Jesus is the answer to sin and life’s struggles,” he said. “I am so thankful for this dear family, and I pray Laura’s testimony of salvation and new life in Christ will continue to inspire many people.”

In addition to co-teaching a Sunday School class at church, Laura has been able to share her story in front of audiences, as well as on Tony Perkins’ national radio program.

“I am living proof that God’s love is greater than the devil’s lies,” Laura said with a smile.

April 22, 1973. It was Easter Sunday. In the African country of Uganda — a nation at the time under the absolute rule of Dictator Idi Amin — Kefa Sempangi was a pastor in that tortured land. Under the growing shadow of Amin, Uganda was becoming a land of terror. Still fresh in Sempangi’s memory was a face burned beyond recognition, the sight of soldiers cruelly beating a man, and the horrible sound of boots crushing bones. Sempangi was exhausted and wondered what difference his sermon that morning could make. He prayed for wisdom and strength and then delivered his sermon to 7,000 people.

Afterward he made his way to the vestry, tired but joyful. Five men followed him into the small building and closed the door behind them. Sempangi turned around to find five rifles pointed at his face. He had never seen any of them before, but immediately recognized them as the secret police of the State Research Bureau — Idi Amin’s assassins. Their faces were full of pure hate and rage. “We are going to kill you,” said the leader. “If you have something to say, say it now.”

Sempangi stood there feeling himself lose control. He thought of his wife and child and began to shake. Somehow he managed to speak. “I do not need to plead my own cause,” he said. “I am a dead man already. My life is dead and hidden in Christ. So if I die, I’ll be alive. It is your lives that are in danger; you are dead in your sins. I will pray to God that after you have killed me, He will spare you from eternal destruction.”

The leader looked at him with curiosity. Then he lowered his gun and ordered the others to do the same. “Will you pray for us now?” the leader of the assassins asked. Though fearing it was a trick, Sempangi asked them all to bow their heads and close their eyes. “Father in heaven,” he prayed, “You who have forgiven men in the past, forgive these men also. Do not let them perish in their sins but bring them unto yourself.”

Sempangi lifted his head, waiting for the men to pull the triggers. But then he noticed their faces. Gone was the hate and rage, and when the leader spoke, it was without contempt. “You have helped us,” he said, “and we will help you. We will speak to the rest of our company and they will leave you alone. Do not fear for your life. It is in our hands and you will be protected.” Relief and joy flooded Sempangi’s heart. God’s love had given him the strength to say a simple prayer — one that changed the lives of those five men forever.[1] No, six men, for Kefa Sempangi’s life was changed forever. No, a church of 7,000 people was changed forever.

I’m glad Jesus wasn’t there in the tomb on Easter Sunday 1973. I’m glad He went on to Galilee in Uganda. I’m also glad Kefa Sempangi followed Him to that Galilee in Uganda. I’m glad lives were changed that day. Easter always grants us strength to change.

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1. This story appeared in WEAVINGS: A JOURNAL OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE (May/June 1988) 3, pp. 33-36.

The leader of a reparative therapy ministry in the United Kingdom has come to the conclusion that the process doesn't work.

Jeremy Marks, director of Courage, United Kingdom, reached an agreement with parent organization Exodus International giving Courage "sabbatical leave" for at least two years, according to the Exodus site. The break from Exodus -- an ex-gay Christian organization -- will give Courage the chance "to explore its new direction and practice."

That direction, according to Marks, is away from the fundamental goal upon which Exodus is based: freedom from homosexuality. "We are definitely wanting to be separated from the 'ex-gay' label and be more focused on supporting Christians who are gay," Marks said.

Marks' personal experiences as a gay man, as well as a minister who has participated in conversion therapy for more than 14 years, led him gradually to the realization that the process simply does not work. "None of the people we've counseled have converted no matter how much effort and prayer they've put into it. There is much more benefit to the more honest view," he said.

The underlying assumption that being gay is an anathema to being Christian is damaging to most people, he said. "They end up fighting themselves in an internal war."

Marks said his wife of nine years is cautiously accepting of the change in his ministry. In spite of his change of heart about homosexuality, he said he has no intentions of pursuing a gay relationship. "This is because I believe in keeping the vows I made before God, and my wife deserves to be loved, not deserted," said Marks. "Having said that, in truth my orientation has not changed." He said close, affectionate, but not sexual relationships with male friends help him withstand temptation to be unfaithful to his wife. Restraint is not the same thing as denial, he said.

Mike Yaconelli, a well-known leader who has spent most of his life in Christian service, much of it at a national level, recently turned fifty. Looking back, he comments in his monthly magazine column that “in these last four decades my faith has truly taken a beating.” He tells how from his conversion at the age of ten he was taught that “if I was a Christian, then PEOPLE WOULD SEE A MARKED DIFFERENCE IN MY LIFE!!! And...that the closer I was to God -- the more spiritual I was -- the greater and MORE VISIBLE that difference would be” (emphasis by Willard).

Now at fifty he has seen so many of his mentors “who stumbled and fell, never again to recover their faith; so many `truths' about the Gospel that turned out to be false; so many casualties, so many losses, so many assumptions that turned out to be just that -– assumptions, not truth.” Finally, he says, “I don’t believe that anymore.”

He still believes Jesus changes you, but his definition of “change” has changed. “Whatever the change is, it is not so much outward as it is inward. This difference that God makes is often visible ONLY to God...and no one else.... I haven’t abandoned my faith, I have abandoned a way of LOKKING at my faith.... Life is different. But what is different is different than I thought.” [1]

The suggestion is that the change that makes a person Christian, whatever that is, may be totally undetectable from the human point of view. Only God can detect it. Apparently that is "Christian reality" now.

________

1. Adapted from Mike Yaconelli, "The Terror of Inbetweenness," THE DOOR, vol. 126 (November/December 1992), page 36.

WHEN AND WHERE WAS JACOB SAVED? We have no trouble answering this question if we will line up our thinking with the Bible and what it states concerning real salvation. Our biggest problem in this Laodicean church age is that we have a tendency to twist the Bible to line up with our traditional thinking. This is not wise!

Many say Jacob was saved in Genesis chapter 28 when he had an encounter with God through a dream. When he awoke he said, “Surely the Lord is in this place and knew it not.” (Gen. 28:16) It is true that God made a promise to him in Gen. 28:13-15, “I am the LORD God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.” Jacob also made a vow in Gen. 28:20-22, “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace; then shall the LORD be my God: And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God’s house: and of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee.”

You may say that sounds like he was saved to me. But let me ask you some questions to see if this experience Jacob had lines up with what the Bible has to say concerning real salvation.

First, can one be saved by making a bargain with the Lord? Notice Jacob said, “If God will be with me and etc., then shall the Lord be my God.” Does the Lord save man on your terms or His? Salvation is of the Lord and He will never save anyone on their terms. One must come to the end of himself and make a whole hearted surrender to Jesus as Lord before He will save that individual. No one can do that himself. It takes a work of the Holy Ghost to reprove (convict and convince) a man of sin, righteousness, and judgement. (John 16:8-11) We see a New Testament example of this in John 6 where a multitude of people were following Jesus desiring to make Him King. They would have gladly made a bargain with Jesus similar to what Jacob did in Genesis, but Jesus placed upon them the demand of whole-hearted reception of Himself as their Lord in John 6:53, when He said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.” And they were not willing to make such a commitment. They said it was too hard for them (verse 60) and turned away from Him and walked no more with Him. (verse 66) Our Lord did not save them on their terms and neither did He save Jacob on his terms in Genesis 28.

Second, did Jacob’s life change after Genesis 28? The Bible says a man’s life changes. II Cor. 5:17 states, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” Jesus said in Mat. 23:25-26, “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.” There will be a change in one’s life when he is saved. We do not see a change in Jacob’s life after Genesis 28. He is still the same old conniver and deceiver that he was before, just as his name implies. The name Jacob means supplanter which implies being a conniver and deceiver. (Gen. 27:36)

Therefore, we conclude Jacob was not saved in Genesis 28. Many would object by saying, “But he had an encounter with God!” There are many others in the Bible who had an encounter with God and were not saved. Samuel is one example in I Sam. 3:4-14 where verse 7 states plainly, “Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord.” Another was the rich young ruler in Mark 10. Yet again there is the multitude in John 6 which we have already discussed. I could give you more, but if you will not believe these mentioned you sure would not believe some of the others. Tradition denies the Lord showing anything to a lost person, yet the scripture declares plainly in Psalm 25:8 that the Lord “will teach sinners in the way.” This states plainly that He will teach a lost person as he travels the narrow way to the strait gate. Theologically the Bible always refers to the “lost” as sinners and the “believers” as being saints. The Lord always has an encounter with the lost in some form or fashion. (John 6:45) If He did not reveal Himself to a person how could he ever believe God is (exists) and seek Him? (Heb. 11:6)

Since Jacob was not saved in Genesis 28, where was he saved? In Genesis 32, where we see him coming to the end of self and relying totally upon the Lord. This occurred 20 years after Gen. 28 when he was returning from Laban’s house with his wives and children where he is about to meet Esau who had vowed to kill Jacob the next time he saw him.

Jacob divides the people that was with him and the flocks, herds, and the camels into bands and sends them ahead with a distance between each one to meet Esau. Then for the first time (recorded) he prays (Gen. 32:9-12) unto the God of his fathers but never mentions Him being his God. When he was left alone, God began to deal with him. He wrestled with him in the form of a man. God had to wrestled with Jacob because Jacob still wanted things his way. He was trying to get God to leave him alone. This is just what every man does when the Holy Ghost begins to bring man to the end of self.

I believe Jacob had a backup plan if the plan to appease Esau with the bands of people and cattle did not work. I cannot prove this, but I believe he thought if all else failed he would outrun Esau to spare his life. At some point in time while wrestling Jacob, God touched the hollow of his thigh (the strength of his leg) and then Jacob took hold of God. At which point, God said, “Let me go.” But Jacob knowing all hope in self was gone said, “I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.” In essence, he was saying, “There is no one else to turn to. You’re all the hope I have. I don’t want to bargain any longer. I just need you.”

At that point, Jacob was saved. God changed his name from Jacob (supplanter) to Israel which means “prince of God” or “prince with God.” This occurred 20 years after his first encounter with God at the place he named Peniel which means “the face of God.” You can read this in Gen. 32:24-30.

After Gen. 32 we see Jacob a changed man. He shows compassion for those with him where before he was willing to sacrifice them for his own hide. (Gen. 33:12-14) He built his first altar (first recorded) at Shechem. (Gen. 33:18-20) He had his family put away their idols, a sure sign of a changed life -- a new creature. (Gen. 35:2)

We conclude that Jacob was saved at Peniel in Gen. 32, twenty years after his first encounter with God at Bethel in Gen. 28. This may not be acceptable to traditional thinking, but it lines up with the Bible and its teaching concerning real salvation. I think I will believe the Bible, God’s Holy Word instead of man’s traditional teaching.

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THE PERSUADER

Aug.-Sept., 1995

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #5129]

It is said that Termites eat through wood two times faster when listening to Rock music. Now what can we learn from that? We have slow chewing Termites — we play soft string music.

Do you remember the day you gave your heart to Christ? What difference did it make in your life? The experience is called “conversion.” One of Webster’s uses for conversion is “something converted from one use to another.” For example, in my wood shop I can take a flat oak board and make out of it a beautiful table top book rack. That’s converting or transforming it from an unplanned use to a specific use.

That is a picture of what should happen to us when we become converted to being a follower of Christ. We go from having no or wrong motives to having what should be specific God directed motives.

Our pastor said Charles Colson’s conversion caused Charles to transform his personality from “tough to tender.” In Charles’ case, conversion was dramatic — it made a very noticeable difference. That same tough to tender conversion should be true of every one of us. Our belief in Christ should have made a difference in our lives that others can notice. Can they?

2 Cor. 5:17 (NLT), “.those who become Christians become new persons. They are not the same anymore, for the old life is gone. A new life has begun!” That’s conversion

The story is told of a college professor who visited the Fiji Islands. Being agnostic, he critically remarked to an elderly chief, “You're a great leader, but it's a pity you've been taken in by those foreign missionaries. They only want to get rich through you. No one believes the Bible anymore. People are tired of the threadbare story of Christ dying on a cross for the sins of mankind. They know better now. I'm sorry you've been so foolish as to accept their story.”

The old chief's eyes flashed as he answered, “See that great rock over there? On it we smashed the heads of our victims. Notice the furnace next to it? In that oven we formerly roasted the bodies of our enemies. If it hadn't been for those good missionaries and the love of Jesus that changed us from cannibals into Christians, you'd never leave this place alive! You'd better thank the Lord for the Gospel; otherwise we'd already be feasting on you. If it weren't for the Bible, you'd now be our supper!

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Another version from Wit&Wisdom, July 7, 2006:

James Calvert (1813-1892) was a zealous missionary to cannibals on the Fiji Islands. His faithful work bore fruit in the lives of those accustomed to taking the life of others. Years later an English earl visited the Fiji Islands and was critical of a chief's conversion to Christianity. “You're a great leader but it's a pity you've been taken in by those foreign missionaries. No one believes the Bible anymore. People are tired of the threadbare story of Christ dying on a cross for the sins of mankind. They know better now. I'm sorry you've been so foolish as to accept their story.”

The old chief responded with a gleam in his eyes, “See that great rock overt there? On it we smashed the heads of our victims. Notice the furnace next to it. In that oven we formerly roasted the bodies of our enemies. If it hadn't been for those good missionaries and the love of Jesus that changed us from Cannibals into Christians, you'd never leave this place! You'd better thank the Lord for the gospel; otherwise we'd already be feasting on you. If it weren't for the Bible and its salvation message, you'd now be our supper!”

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Quoted in Autoillustrator.com, “SPIRITUAL GRATITUDE” from, Kindred Spirit, Volume 16, Number 1, p. 6

The Bible can change not only a life but an entire lifestyle. Most of us have heard the story of the Mutiny on the Bounty, but few of us have heard how the Bible played a very vital part in that historical event. The Bounty was a British ship which set sail from England in 1787, bound for the South Seas. The idea was that those on board would spend some time among the islands, transplanting fruit-bearing and food-bearing trees, and doing other things to make some of the islands more habitable. After ten months of voyage, the Bounty arrived safely at its destination, and for six months the officers and the crew gave themselves to the duties placed upon them by their government.

When the special task was completed, however, and the order came to embark again, the sailors rebelled. They had formed strong attachments for the native girls, and the climate and the ease of the South Sea island life was much to their liking. The result was mutiny on the Bounty, and the sailors placed Captain Bligh and a few loyal men adrift in an open boat. Captain Bligh, in an almost miraculous fashion, survived the ordeal, was rescued, and eventually arrived home in London to tell his story. An expedition was launched to punish the mutineers, and in due time fourteen of them were captured and paid the penalty under British law.

But nine of the men had gone to another distant island. There they formed a colony. Perhaps there has never been a more degraded and debauched social life than that of that colony. They learned to distill whiskey from a native plant, and the whiskey, as usual, along with other habits, led to their ruin. Disease and murder took the lives of all the native men and all but one of the white men named Alexander Smith. He found himself the only man on an island, surrounded by a crowd of women and half-breed children. Alexander Smith found a Bible among the possessions of a dead sailor. The Book was new to him. He had never read it before. He sat down and read it through. He believed it and he began to appropriate it. He wanted others to share in the benefits of this book, so he taught classes to the women and the children, as he read to them and taught them the Scriptures.

It was twenty years before a ship ever found that island, and when it did, a miniature Utopia was discovered. The people were living in decency, prosperity, harmony, and peace. There was nothing of crime, disease, immorality, insanity, or illiteracy. How was it accomplished? By reading, the believing, and the appropriating of the truth of God!

The Tale Of The Tardy Oxcart

Charles R. Swindoll, Word, pp. 50-51.

The story is told of an old man who lived on a farm in the mountains of Kentucky with his young grandson. Each morning, Grandpa was up early sitting at the kitchen table reading from his old worn-out Bible. His grandson who wanted to be just like him tried to imitate him in any way he could.

One day the grandson asked, “Papa, I try to read the Bible just like you but I don’t understand it, and what I do understand I forget as soon as I close the book. What good does reading the Bible do?”

The Grandfather quietly turned from putting coal in the stove and said, “Take this coal basket down to the river and bring back a basket of water.”

The boy did as he was told, even though all the water leaked out before he could get back to the house. The grandfather laughed and said, “You will have to move a little faster next time,” and sent him back to the river with the basket to try again. This time the boy ran faster, but again the basket was empty before he returned home. Out of breath, he told his grandfather that it was “impossible to carry water in a basket,” and he went to get a bucket instead.

The old man said, “I don’t want a bucket of water; I want a basket of water. You can do this. You’re just not trying hard enough,” and he went out the door to watch the boy try again.

At this point, the boy knew it was impossible but he wanted to show his grandfather that even if he ran as fast as he could, the water would leak out before he got far at all. The boy scooped the water and ran hard, but when he reached his grandfather the basket was again empty. Out of breath, he said, “See Papa, it’s useless!”

“So you think it is useless?” the old man said. “Look at the basket.”

The boy looked at the basket and for the first time he realized that the basket looked different. Instead of a dirty old coal basket, it was clean. “Son, that’s what happens when you read the Bible. You might not understand or remember everything, but when you read it, it will change you from the inside out.”

That is the work of God in our lives. To change us from the inside out and to slowly transform us into the image of His son.