by Steve | Nov 4, 1981 | Archive - 1981
Archive: How Ann Became an Evangelist
by Bob Withers, Pastor, Ball’s Chapel and Fairfield United Methodist Church
Copy Editor, The Herald-Dispatch, Huntington, West Virginia
Pastors often hear their parishioners say, “Oh, if God would just give me a message to take to someone.” Or, “I would tell my neighbor about Jesus if I could be sure it’s God’s will.” These thoughts filled Ann Casto’s mind as she traveled to Clarksburg, West Virginia, in a van filled with preachers and other nervous laypeople to participate in a statewide witnessing weekend.
Ann, 47, was no stranger to church work. Since her husband, John, was an area captain for the state Department of Natural Resources and subject to frequent transfers, Ann had worshiped with several congregations. Now at Fairfield United Methodist Church near Glenwood, she was teacher of the ladies’ Bible class. Her pastor had prodded her into participation in this witnessing event. But somehow Ann was jittery about treading through doors usually darkened only by ministers. Personal evangelism—everybody favors it but nobody does it!
As the van neared Clarksburg, Ann’s fears lingered. She was obsessed by a fear of confusing someone—saying the wrong thing and adding to a prospect’s spiritual perplexity.
“Lord, grant a miracle this weekend,” she prayed, “so I’ll know You are in the arrangement.”
Ann and a local escort, Nina, were asked to call at the home of a 57-year-old semi-invalid named Ruth, whose husband worked out of town. Her only weekday companion at home was a 13-year-old son, Billy.
Ruth had already turned away one visitor that day because she wasn’t feeling well. Several health problems had led to lengthy hospital stays and virtual incapacitation. She was scheduled to visit a hospital the next day for minor surgery.
“She may not give you much time,” a friend had warned Nina.
The prospect admitted her visitors but gave them a cool reception.
A short, heavily-built woman with thinning auburn hair, Ruth was not an emotional person. Remaining quiet and nibbling on something, she seemed uptight and made no effort to turn off a nearby television. It was obvious she didn’t intend to open up.
Through faltering conversation Ann began to see Ruth’s extreme loneliness. She was a member of Broad Oaks Church in Clarksburg, but hadn’t been counted among its worshipers for several years. One thing became certain: she was not sure of her salvation.
After a few minutes, Ann sensed the Holy Spirit taking over. Her fears began to melt away as Ruth described her lengthy illness and her eroded relationship with God. She talked of problems with her family, finances, alcohol, and a first marriage that ended in disaster. Ann felt an overwhelming sense of compassion for her hostess.
“I’ve done too much; I’m too deep in sin,” Ruth lamented. “No one, not even God, cares for me.”
“The Lord cares about you, Ruth,” Ann quickly countered. “Jesus loves you and died on the cross to atone for your sin. He wants your soul AND body to be healed.” She explained the plan of salvation, the need to confess sin to God, and even the possibility of healing supernaturally as well as naturally.
Ann told her prospect, who now listened attentively, about how God helped her through the ordeal of losing her 14-year-old son to an unexplained ailment.
“Would YOU be afraid to die?” Ruth pointedly demanded of her visitor.
Ann was prompt and firm. “I’m sure I wouldn’t when my time has come. But I think God has more plans for me.”
Ann reacted politely to objection after objection.
“Ann had an answer for everything,” Nina recalled later. “And she wasn’t pushing or cramming. She said everything in an easygoing way.”
To her amazement Ann found that the dialogue wasn’t strained as she thought it would be, not hard work at all. “Everything seemed to just fall into place,” she said, crediting the guidance of the Holy Spirit and a solid grounding in the Word.
Finally, she asked, “Ruth, may we pray with you?”
Somehow, the shut-in’s shell had been shattered. Ruth’s eyes were brimming with tears as she nodded in affirmation. Her guests knelt beside her chair, placing their hands on her head. Ann began to pray audibly.
When the prayer was over, all three were crying. A radiance—punctuated with a warm smile—had transformed Ruth’s face.
“I sure do feel good,” Ruth declared. Her despondency had disappeared. “You all really care, don’t you?”
Outside, Ann and Nina hugged each other tearfully. “I wouldn’t have missed this for anything,” Nina exclaimed.
After more calls, the ladies met 19 other visiting pairs at Broad Oaks Church for a sharing session. They began to learn that God works through His people—whether they have ordination papers or not. And they rejoiced!
This story has a sobering postscript.
From the moment of Ann’s and Nina’s visit, Ruth’s destiny seemed to turn. She began to tell her family the good news: ” Now I know I’m saved.” She telephoned neighbors, describing the encounter and affirming that now nothing separated her soul from God.
Five days later, Billy got up to go to school and found his mother’s body on her bedroom floor. God had called her home.
Ann, Nina, Ruth’s family, Broad Oaks Church, and many others rejoiced that God had used the women in such a marvelous way in reconciling Ruth to Himself. And they were equally as glad that the pair had been obedient to God’s leading.
Their story needs to be repeated again and again. Others should enjoy this victory of rescuing a precious soul from spiritual death. How many Ruths are there in the world? Their time is running out, and they don’t know Christ.
Somehow, the church has to awake to the call of the Great Commission and realize that evangelism is everybody’s privilege. Nowhere in Scripture is it reserved for pastors. In fact, Acts 8:1,4 shows that when persecution forced Christians out of Jerusalem it also fanned the fires of evangelism, for they went everywhere preaching the Word. Notice that the Apostles, church leaders of the day, stayed behind. The “church members” carried the message.
Paul sets the church’s priorities straight in Ephesians 4:11-12. There he states that it is the pastor’s job to equip or train the church members. They, in turn, must do the work of ministry. Here is not a view of an ordained minister evangelizing and answering to a church full of critics. It is a picture of an evangelizing membership with a pastor who is their trainer, coach, and cheerleader.
Today many congregations have lost this vision. With few exceptions, they exist as an inert army of believers who cower in their barracks, expecting their generals to wield the Sword of Truth for them, while their own swords remain tucked away in their scabbards. Meanwhile, millions around the world perish without Christ.
In a nation where three out of four homes are un-churched, and 45, 000,000 children are a part of nobody’s Sunday school, it doesn’t take a mental giant to realize that the ordained ministry must enlist help from the pews. Otherwise, America and the world will never be won for Jesus Christ.
Paul’s challenge to the Romans speaks loudly to us:
“…Now it is high time to wake out of sleep … the night is far spent, the day is at hand. …”
by Steve | Nov 3, 1981 | Archive - 1981
Archive: No Room to Spare
by Joseph Bayly, Vice President, David C. Cook Publishing Company Elgin, Illinois
Second thoughts about the infamous innkeeper …
Was the Bethlehem innkeeper heartless or very sensitive? Countless sermons have been based on the former viewpoint. “And she gave birth to her first-born son and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn ” (Luke 2:7).
Last Christmas season I was at Williamsburg, Virginia. Like most visitors, I went through an old inn, rebuilt at the site. When we reached the second floor, the sleeping quarters, we found connecting dormitory rooms. The guide explained that seldom did a woman—especially a lady—stay in an inn in 18th century America. Her husband might stay there, but she would stay in a private home.
Then I read an article on the Bethlehem innkeeper in the Journal of Pastoral Care. L. Paul Trudinger suggested that we’ve been misjudging the innkeeper all along, and—for the same reason I had learned about in Williamsburg, but complicated by Mary’s pregnancy—he was actually an extremely sensitive man. Let me quote Dr. Trudinger.
“Without a doubt, in the preaching of the Church down through the centuries, these words ‘no room in the inn’ have been heavily loaded with pathos. The overriding mood which they convey has been one of sadness and sympathy for Mary on account of her rejection. The imagination of expositors and preachers has been fired and the scene has been painted of that heartless innkeeper who refused Mary entrance to the inn and relegated her to the animals’ stables. Luther, in a celebrated Christmas sermon, reacts with anger to the unfeeling conduct of the Bethlehemites. ‘Shame on you, wretched Bethlehem,’ he fulminated, ‘that inn should have been fired with brimstone; for while thieves and cut-throats lounged and caroused in the inn, Mary and Joseph were refused a place and were sent to the stable!’
“This mood of rejection has also given rise to a pious challenge to us today, that we should ‘make room’ for Jesus. ‘Have you any room for Jesus?’ asks the gospel song. And many have sung: ‘Come into my heart Lord Jesus/There is room in my heart for Thee.’
“But is the rejection of Joseph and Mary at a time of need the obvious and unquestionable meaning of this passage? Or have we allowed our evangelical piety to run away with our imaginations in quite an unwarranted way? The text says an unwarranted way? The text says nothing about Joseph and Mary coming to the door of the inn and asking for admission. It says that they ‘went up … to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, … and while they were there the time came for her to be delivered.’ They may well have been guests at this very inn for several days before the birth. Why then was there ‘no room in the inn’?
“It is so very easy to read our modern Western customs into the Bible story. This was no modern hotel or even 18th century English inn. This was a typical Eastern travelers’ resting place of the first century, A.O., or B.C. for that matter. And in parts of the East things haven’t changed much since. There would most probably be just one large room where everyone stayed. Here they all bedded down, dressed, and washed, if the luxury of water were available. At a busy time such as during a census, this room would be packed. This was no proper place for a baby’s delivery. Surely at such a time the mother should be allowed shelter from the common public gaze ….
“Luther may well have been right about the presence of thieves and cut-throats. The landlord, I suggest, was humane and sensitive enough to know that this was not the kind of company suitable to such a moment in Mary’s life. This is what the text very simply concludes: ‘… for it was not the place in the inn.’ The word used in the Greek text for ‘room’ is topos, a word which frequently means ‘the appropriate place.” The landlord, compassionate as he may well have been, and knowing the awkwardness of a delivery in a crowded inn, offered the only other accommodation which he had, namely, the animals’ stalls at the back of the inn. Here, at least, Mary and Joseph could have shelter and, above all, some privacy. Here Mary need not be stared at, nor need she hear the coarse remarks of the ‘thieves and cutthroats.’ Thus, ‘she gave birth to her first-born son . . . and laid him in a manger,’ thanks to the thoughtfulness and sensitivity of an innkeeper who felt that ‘it was not the proper place in the inn’ for Mary to have her baby. …
“This reconstruction naturally requires some romanticizing and use of the imagination, but surely no more than does the traditional understanding. In fact, it is probably more faithful to the plain meaning of what little detail Luke does give us. Are we allowing the contemporary human-interest, pastoral-psychology oriented mood to influence a first century text unduly? I think not. There are indications that just such a mood was not far from Luke’s heart.”
by Steve | Nov 2, 1981 | Archive - 1981
Archive: Farewell to Welfare?
By Virgil E. Maybray, Executive Secretary of the Good News-related Evangelical Missions Council since 1976.
“Federal budget cuts provide an opportunity and challenge for the Church of Jesus Christ to fulfill her mission,” claims Virgil E. Maybray, Executive Secretary of the Evangelical Missions Council of Good News.
Proposed cutbacks in government spending for welfare programs have caused some alarm. Church benevolent organizations that have been the beneficiaries of federal funds are also concerned.
Anguish is heard in the land: “The needy will be neglected! The poor will be ignored!”
That should not be. Indeed, must not be. It need not be if the church will once again become the church. Our government got into the welfare business primarily because the church had abdicated her responsibility. The church failed; so the government stepped in.
As the church became more and more institutionalized and turned its attention inward, as we became more and more concerned with buildings and the preservation of the ecclesiastical organization, we became less and less concerned with individuals. We began to spend an ever-increasing percentage of our financial resources on ourselves. Because buildings and programs seemed to represent growth, progress, and success, they became a primrose path down which the devil easily led the church. Unfortunately, some of the most evangelical denominations are traveling the same road that United Methodism has been traveling the past 50 years.
Perhaps we should welcome every effort at alleviating suffering from whatever source it comes. Help from other sources, however, should never be an excuse for the church to withdraw from these ministries. Our Lord never commissioned the federal government or the United Nations to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, or care for the fatherless and widows, but He did commission the church to do these things. It will be the church, not the government, that will stand in judgment for failure.
We must also recognize that when the government enters into welfare ministries there are many drawbacks. First, there is the simple matter of cost. When the government gets into any activity it always costs more than when the church does it. It is estimated that from 9 to 18 billion dollars for welfare programs is to be slashed from the federal budget. These same ministries could be performed by the church for much less. The church has always been able to do more with a dollar than government or secular agencies.
Second, when the government engages in social welfare programs they become very impersonal. Governments deal in statistics. The church deals with individuals. The more impersonal a program becomes the more it encourages waste and corruption and these, in turn, increase the cost of administering a program.
Third, and certainly most importantly for the church, when we withdraw from the social welfare scene we lose a glorious opportunity to witness for our Lord. We also lose an opportunity to witness to our Lord for He said, “Inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brothers, you have done it unto me.” Witnessing to the love of God, and our love for God, should always be our motivation.
Even when the church and government do some things jointly the church is robbed of an opportunity to witness. By its very nature, the government cannot be religious or sectarian. When the church seeks, and accepts, government help in her benevolent programs strict regulations are placed upon her, preventing the church from being the effective witness it might otherwise be.
When we accept government assistance for our benevolent programs we must also abide by government guidelines for employment practices. I was informed recently that there was a Jew and a Muslim on the staff of a certain church and community center. They were dedicated to human betterment, but they were not dedicated to Jesus Christ and making Him known and loved. In their ministry to human needs they could not speak to man’s deepest need. They could not speak a word for Jesus. The church could not say that their work was being done in the Name of Christ. We cannot honestly say that it was being done in the name of the United Methodist Church for only about one tenth of the total budget was church funded.
When we accept government aid for our benevolent programs we also subject the church to ridicule and scorn. The head of a United Methodist Community Center told me that the non-Christians on her staff never miss an opportunity to needle her because of the church’s failure to support its own benevolent programs.
One of the staff executives of our Board of Global Ministries privately lamented to me about having a Hindu and Buddhist working as part of the office staff. If we are not very effective in winning the world to Christ, it may be that we are trying to do it with persons who don’t know the One for whom we are laboring. As one district superintendent said, “Our trouble is we are trying to build the Kingdom with people who don’t love the King.”
The present reduction in government welfare spending may be a providential opportunity for the church once more to become the Church. We have an opportunity to fill the gap the government’s withdrawal will leave. The Rev. Woodie White, General Secretary of the Commission on Religion and Race, is quoted in the May, 1981 issue of Interpreter, as saying, “The church will have to come to the aid of the poor, the dispossessed, the needy, as perhaps never before.”
Thank God, some have already moved boldly in this direction. The April 10th issue of Texas Methodist/United Methodist Reporter carried an encouraging article about the efforts of a cluster of churches in Atlanta who minister to the people of their area. It is a story that can be repeated many times over – and should be by the media: first, to let the world know that the church is doing something good, and second, to encourage other churches to become so involved.
If “charity begins at home” and if, as Paul writes to Timothy (I Timothy 5:8) “… anyone does not take care of his relatives, especially the members of his own family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever” (TEV), then the first step to solving the problem of government welfare spending is for every Christian to take more seriously his responsibility for the members of his family. Before we overindulge, gratifying our personal desires, let us ask ourselves, “What are the needs of my family that I can meet?” Perhaps we need to broaden our sense of family so that it is greater than “me and my wife, my son and his wife, us four, no more, Amen.”
The next step, logically, would be to have greater concern and greater responsibility for the Family of God. Juan Carlos Ortiz, Pentecostal pastor in Argentina wrote in his book, Call to Discipleship:
We sought to put an end to poverty in our congregation. If we could not bring social justice to our own congregation, with people who had Bibles under their arms, we could never bring it to others. Social justice had to start within our congregation – the household of faith. This means it was unthinkable for one brother to have two TV sets while another brother didn’t even have a bed to sleep in. It was unthinkable for one person to have three cars while another person had to walk twenty blocks to catch a bus. We knew that only when we became living examples could we go with authority and tell them about social justice. (page 104)
Certainly it ought not to stop there! We ought not to turn our attention to the needy of the world only after we have adequately cared for our own. As with home and foreign missions, the two should be carried on simultaneously. Our care for our immediate family, our care for the Family of God, and our care for all God’s children everywhere should be but parts of the total ministry of the Church of Jesus Christ.
Asking the church to take up the slack caused by cutbacks in government welfare spending may seem like an overwhelming and nearly impossible task. Jesus, when confronted by a hungry multitude, (Matthew tells us, “five thousand men, besides women and children”) says simply to His disciples, “You feed them.” The disciples would have sent them away into the surrounding villages to seek bread as we too, in the past, have sent them away to government agencies.
As we have said, the figures for federal cutback in welfare spending vary from 9 to 18 billion dollars. Even if we use the outside figure, that still is not an impossible task for the church. It is reported in the 1980 Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches that there are 128 million Americans aligned with some branch of the Christian church. This means that it would cost each professing Christian about $140 per year—even if it cost us as much to do the job as it does the government! No great sacrifice that! Many of us are spending more than that on personal pleasures. Unfortunately, at this point the Christian has allowed the world to press him into its own mold (Romans 12:1,2, Phillips). We have convinced ourselves that we, too, must live at an economic level far above what we could or should live. When a needy world cries out and our Lord says, “deny yourself,” we have indulged ourselves and justified it!
Let every church survey its own neighborhood and seek out those who are in need of ministry. Let every church examine its budget and ask some hard questions about its spending priorities. In light of the needs of the world and the opportunities for witness, let every disciple take a long hard look at his/her own personal spending and ask whether the God we love and serve would rather have the government or the church do it!
I know that it looks like an impossible task, but there is no doubt in my mind that God has provided His people with the resources to do whatever needs to be done for His world. God will again multiply the resources we have. If we don’t have the resources, He does! All we need to do is step out in faith and become involved in the needs of the world, allowing ourselves to be the channel for His blessing.
But if someone who is supposed to be a Christian has money enough to live well, and sees a brother in need and won’t help him – how can God’s love be within him? Little children, let us stop just saying we love people; let us really love them, and show it by our actions. (I John 3:17,18, Living Bible)
by Steve | Nov 1, 1981 | Archive - 1981
Archive: “Veiled in flesh the Godhead see, Hail th’incarnate Deity.”
by Leonard J. Bauer, United Methodist theological student, Wheaton, Illinois
As we began the fifth of a twelve lesson home Bible study, one of the class members startled me with the statement, “Yes, I believe Jesus is the Son of God, but I have never believed He is God.” I was at a complete loss for a response, but not because Scripture is not clear on this point; it is. I was at a loss because that statement came in the middle of a study of the Book of John – the Gospel whose central theme is that Jesus is who He claimed to be … God.
From many pulpits of our mainline denominations, from many seminaries, and in a vast number of books currently available from well-known and otherwise conservative authors, we are presented with a Jesus stripped of His Godly nature and paraded about as something of a model human being. This position is well-illustrated by the recent statement, “We must not substitute Jesus for God and forget that God was loving and gracious before Jesus was born and in places Jesus had never been. We affirm, not that Jesus was God, but that God was in Christ. …”[1]
In contradiction to this affirmation, the first eighteen verses of John (often referred to as “the prologue”) offer a clear statement on the deity of Christ. Jesus, this man from Nazareth, is indeed God.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God (1:1,2).
To grasp what John is saying to us we should read the first chapter of Genesis. The parallelism between its opening verses and those of John is startling, but also instructive. The idea the author of Genesis intends to convey is revealed in the repeated variations of the statement “and God said, ‘Let there be …’ and there was.” This chapter conveys best for us the Hebrew meaning of “the word,” which has been lost by modern cultural usage. To a Jew the word spoken was indistinguishable from the deed it portrayed. A word was not passive but carried with it the activity itself. Thus, a word spoken was a deed done.
In the Genesis account this concept is carried to its fullest in God Himself, where the act of creation rested solely on the word and had no other cause. That is, the deed was done because the word was spoken.
John, being a Jew and speaking originally to a church with a number of Jewish Christian members capitalized on this Hebrew concept. For the Jew who heard these opening verses, whether he spoke Hebrew or not, this understanding of the word would have been a part of his interpretation. This is true even though the Gospel of John was originally written in Greek.
The vast majority of the audience to which John’s Gospel was addressed were not Jewish, but Gentile—with a rich understanding of Greek language and culture. In the Greek John was stating that in the beginning was the logos. This was not startling to a Gentile familiar with Greek philosophy. They already knew that in the beginning was the logos, for logos conveyed more to them than the mere expression of an act or object through a word. A logos was the thought, the mental faculty behind that thought, and the motive expressed by that thought. It had a strong philosophical connotation and a spiritual implication, referring to what the Greek understood to be divine source and initiative. That divine source was both rational and known through reason. Interestingly, the English word “logic” is derived from the word logos.
A second English word derived from the Greek logos is “logo.” The meaning of this word is not limited to a symbol. As I sat in an airport I noticed the logo for a particular airline. It was painted on their planes, establishing them as part of the corporate family. The same symbol was displayed at the gate and ticket counters, establishing that part of the airport as “belonging.” Employees of the airline wore the logo, identifying themselves with the corporation. My ticket had the logo; the envelope containing my ticket had the logo; the baggage claim had the logo. In fact, everything associated with that airline was identified by the presence of the logo. Or, to state it correctly, the logo represented everything you could associate with that airline, all that was tangible and intangible. The logo was not only an expression but all encompassing in its expression. Likewise, the logos that John spoke of was the complete, all encompassing expression of God.
When John said that in the beginning was the logos he told the Greeks nothing new. They fully understood that. What was new to the Greek—especially if he was not a Christian—was that the Word, the Logos, was Jesus Christ.
The Word did not come into being in the beginning, but in the beginning He was. In His pre-incarnate state He was already in existence before the foundation of the world. In other words, before there were any creatures in the world, before there was a world, before space, before time, there existed the Word.
And The Word was with God. A distinct personal being, He was with God, sharing in the glory which He had with God before the world was (John 17:5). Distinctly with God from the beginning, the Word was God. Not like God, not the embodiment of God’s power, not a spirit of love which would become incarnate in the man Jesus at a point in history, the Word – Jesus of Nazareth – was God. Being with God, and being himself God, He was sent forth from God to reveal God among men.
All things were made through Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made (1:3).
Two complementary, and yet distinct, statements are made in this very important verse. First, all things which were made and came into being, all of creation, came through and by Jesus Christ. Jesus not only existed from the beginning in a passive sense to be with God, but He was active in the divine operations at the beginning of time. He was active as a co-participant with the Father in that very deed which was the exclusive domain of the Almighty God. The second statement is seen to refute any notion that the opposite of the first statement can be true, for John says that without Jesus nothing that was created came into being. In other words, Jesus was not only a participant in the creation, but the creation could not have come into being without Jesus.
In his commentary, Matthew Henry draws a beautiful parallel: “This proves the excellency of the Christian religion, that the author and founder of it is the same that was the author and founder of the world.”[2] In our worship and praise of Jesus, the founder of our faith, we worship and praise the founder and creator of all the universe.
In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it (1:4,5).
The God who created the universe is Himself life. And life is beyond the physical, being manifested in man—who was created in His image as intellectual, emotional, moral, and spiritual. And it is the spiritual life, not the physical life, which John emphasizes throughout the Gospel. It is that life which does not cease.
Just as in nature life does not exist without light, as God’s uniquely created being, man does not exist without the revelation that he possesses—his ability to perceive, spiritually, both within and beyond himself. To state it in the dimension which John addresses: in Jesus, the Light of the World, is God’s full revelation of the spiritual and eternal life—the essence of life itself. If Jesus is the life and the light—the essence and the revelation—then the light shines in a fallen world. In this world is darkness (the absence or rejection of the light) and death (the separation of man from his Creator). But the darkness did not overcome the light, nor shall it.
There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came for testimony, to bear witness to the light, that all might believe through Him. He was not the light, but came to bear witness to the light (1:6-8).
Leaving this broad expanse of timeless eternity which is Christ’s domain, the apostle turns to worldly specifics surrounding the events at the time of Jesus. Notice the sharp contrast between the first five verses in which we encounter the Word who was with God and who was God. In these verses, we are introduced – not to another timeless, cosmic being but instead to a man who was “sent from God, whose name was John.” He was a man with a mission.
He came to prepare the way for One greater than he. He came to turn us away from our sinful ways. He came to point us toward God. John came as a witness, to bear a testimony.
That testimony was to the light. But we might ask why that light had need of a witness. A light shines and bears its own witness. Its truth is self-evident and, in fact, cannot be extinguished.
However, that light cannot be seen by those who have shut their eyes to it. To be seen, those eyes needed to be opened. To open those eyes there was a man sent by God to bear witness to the light. John was not that light. His mission was only to give testimony to the light.
The true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, yet the world knew Him not. He came to His own home, and His own people received Him not. But to all who received Him, who believed in His name, He gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God (1:9-13).
The One who was to come, the true light, the revelation of God Himself, is said now to have appeared. In other words, the One who created the world now entered His very creation in the form of a created being … and the people did not recognize their Creator. Furthermore, even the Jews, who had been given all previous revelation, including the coming of their Messiah, rejected Him when He appeared.
But to those who recognize Him as other than an impostor, who receive Him in belief and conviction, they shall become the children of God. Moreover they are empowered in the Spirit to be heirs of everything God has set aside for His children—both in this world and the world to come.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld His glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father. … And from His fullness have we all received, grace upon grace. … No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has made Him known (1:14, 16, 18).
Here, in these closing verses of the prologue John gets to the heart of the matter—the core of the Christian faith. God, the Creator of the universe, became man in the form of Jesus of Nazareth and dwelt among us. He came as truth, the divine truth which only the Father could reveal. And He came bestowing on us grace upon grace—the free unmerited favor of God. He came not from the dust of the earth, as in the first Adam, but from the very bosom of the Father.
Is Jesus God? Certainly, if Scripture has any authority in the matter, no better witness could be found to bear testimony to this than the opening verses of John. By His attributes as the eternal cocreator of the universe, giver of life, and revealer of all divine truth, there can be no doubt of John’s testimony. Jesus of Nazareth, the son of a carpenter, is God.
Scripture portions here are quoted from the Revised Standard Version, copyright 1901, Thomas Nelson Publishing House
[1] Leaders Guide for “Christian Studies for Late Teens,” summer 1981 United Methodist church school curriculum.
[2] Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry’s Commentary, Vol. V (Mclean, Virginia: MacDonald Publishing Co., 1721), p. 849.
by Steve | Sep 6, 1981 | Archive - 1981
From New Mexico to Nashville, the Lord moved a young man
Archive: From Hostility to Service
by Tony Peña, UM Youth Service Fund Staff Person, Nashville, Tennessee
There I was in Toronto, Canada, casually conversing with Peter Moss—the head of the Youth Department of the World Council of Churches—about global issues facing the youth of today’s church. Suddenly, I thought, How in the world did I ever end up here? I have asked myself that question in New York City, Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans, Houston, Phoenix, and a couple dozen other places. “What am I doing here? How did I, a ‘good ol’ boy’ from New Mexico, ever end up living in Nashville, Tennessee, as a staff person with the National Youth Ministry Organization of the United Methodist Church (NYMO—the youth advocacy agency)?” Well, folks, I suppose it has something to do with the old saying, “The Lord moves in strange and mysterious ways,” because at times the Lord moves me in strange and mysterious ways.
I was born and reared in Clovis, New Mexico. New Mexico is the state just the other side of Texas and before you hit Arizona. Believe it or not, we joined the Union several years ago, and we are bona fide United States citizens. Many well-known people have come from Clovis, but I cannot think of any names right off the top of my head. By tradition, my family was Methodist with a few Baptists added in to flavor up the broth. So I, too, was brought up in the Methodist Church, and I was confirmed and joined the church before I knew what hit me. Unfortunately, not much “religion” sank in, and by the time I made it to junior-high and senior-high school I only went to church on rare occasions. When I started college I was a confirmed unbeliever, and I was hostile to Christianity in general.
My first roommate in college, by “accident,” was a Christian, and I am sure he thought I was his cross to bear. Every night he would read his Bible and then kneel beside the bed to say prayers. I had never seen anything like it! I thought it was hilarious, so I started kneeling by my bed exclaiming blasphemous, mock prayers, and reading the Bible out loud as irreverently as possible. All that, combined with some less than Christian habits I had, made my poor roommate move out before the first week was up. Nevertheless, through his actions the seed of faith was planted; and the seed was ready, waiting to be watered.
One month later the seed of faith got a little more watering than expected by the student president of the campus Baptist Student Union. I was one of about a dozen hippies on campus, but somehow or other I knew the BSU president. One day I passed him on the street. I said, “Hey, man, where ya going?”
He then, without blinking an eye, answered, “To heaven! Where are you going?”
I got the message, the seed of faith within me was watered good and hard, and I was madder than “an ol’ wet hen.”
Harvest time came November 30, 1971, Tuesday night after a Campus Crusade meeting. A newly converted friend had invited me, and why I decided to go I will never know. But I went, and the first thing I heard was that God loved me and had a plan for my life. When I heard those three simple words, “God loves you,” it was as if I had been hit by an atom bomb! I heard nothing else the entire meeting. All I could think of was, “God loves me.” After the meeting I went out to a quiet place, and I asked Jesus Christ to take over the control of my life.
From that time on I have lived happily ever after, and I have never had another problem. No, wait, let’s back up to that last sentence and try it one more time. From that time on, I have always known Christ is with me, and He helps me face my problems head on. Following Christ is not some kind of “wonderland” existence (that comes later in heaven), but it is a day-to-day commitment allowing His Spirit to be my Helper and Counselor.
It took me five or six years after becoming a Christian to return home to the United Methodist Church. During my studies in college (one of my majors was religion), I became intrigued by the life and teachings of John Wesley. I started attending the Wesley Foundation on our college campus. Wesley Foundations are college campus ministries supported by the United Methodist Church. The director and I became good friends, and we had many discussions about the United Methodist Church. No matter how much I argued, he kept making sense; and in the end the United Methodist Church won me back.
About the last week of school, two days before graduation, I noticed a job announcement on the Wesley Foundation bulletin board. It was a two-year staff position with the National Youth Ministry Organization. I had never heard of it and neither had my Wesley director. I applied, and I got the job! No one was more surprised than I.
Now I am the Youth Service Fund Staff Person. The Youth Service Fund (YSF) is the mission fund sponsored and supported by youth in the United Methodist Church. I work closely with national YSF projects and with the National Project Review Committee who actually picks the projects. I participate in Conference Youth Events all across the nation. If I had three more books, I could not begin to tell all of the things I have been privileged to do. The experiences I have had, the places I have been, and most of all, the people I met have all been wonderful. I thank the Lord for allowing me to have this chance to serve Him and the youth of His United Methodist Church.
by Steve | Sep 4, 1981 | Archive - 1981
Invited to visit the Raleigh prison…
Archive: They Cared Enough to Come Back
by Cynthia V. Lanning, freelance writer, Cincinnati, Ohio
The petite, tastefully dressed woman opened the letter from the mailbox in front of her comfortable suburban home. It was not a newsy letter from a relative or distant friend. It was from a girl who was struggling with the powers of evil, and with God’s help, was winning.
“Dear Ann,” the letter began. “I used to worship Satan instead of worshiping our Lord. I studied everything I could about Satan. It got so bad that I was into drugs, booze, prostitution. You name it, I was into it. … Well, I got arrested for prostitution and they kicked me out of town or go to prison. … In a way I’m glad I came here because I met you. At first I just walked the other way.
“Then someone told me you had a bunch of money in your wallet and to try and get it. So, that was the first time I spoke to you. But there was something about you. You had so much love and you cared about me as a person, that I just listened to what you had to say. That first time didn’t mean all that much, but I kept thinking about you and how you really believed in Jesus and how He would forgive us if we would only believe in Him.
“Well, after a couple of visits I needed so badly to talk to you—I wanted to tell you about me, and how in the world would the Lord ever forgive a Satan-worshiper, especially when I offered my next child to him for something I wanted him to do for me? How could God ever forgive a person like me? You know what? God did forgive me.
“I might be here in this prison, but I know God is with me. … There’s so many things God has done for me since I let Him come into my life. Thank you, Ann, because I don’t think I would’ve found Him without your help. You can’t begin to know how really grateful I am, because when I get out of here I know I can make it with God’s help. … “
Although today Ann Davis leads a group of Raleigh, North Carolina, United Methodist laywomen in an effective prison ministry, she was not always enthusiastic about visiting prisons. It all began the summer of 1977 when a musician friend decided to hold a concert for the prisoners in the North Carolina Correction Center for Women, and invited Ann to accompany her. Ann recalls thinking, I cannot go into that gate. There is no way. Besides the usual middle-class horror of prisons, she had a leftover fear of institutions from visits she and her husband used to pay to a relative in a mental institution.
But God answered her prayers and prepared her for that evening. After the concert an invitation was given and a woman went forward.
“A finger was pointed at me to go over and lead her to Christ,” Ann remembers. “I went through the motions and God blessed me there. I gave her the Bible I carried in my purse, but that was all I gave her. When the program was over and we were walking out, two inmates asked me, ‘Are you going to come back?’ I answered, ‘I don’t know,’ but in my mind I thought, If I ever get out of here I will not be back. They responded, ‘Anybody comes once, but who cares enough to come back?’ This statement haunted me. God used it to convict me.”
After further confirmation of God’s will, Ann invited other women to join her. Several offered to help. “Pray and make sure God is calling you into this,” Ann urged, “because these girls have had nothing but disappointments.” Within 10 days six women were called by God to follow Ann into the prisons.
But it was not smooth sailing after this initial decision. “It seems as though it is just as hard to get into a prison to minister as it is for the girls on the inside to get out,” explains Ann. A chaplain advised them that it would take months to clear the red tape unless they joined an already established group. So they attended training classes for the Yokefellows, a nation-wide prison ministry, in order to begin their work more quickly.
Ann and the others soon found out that God gave them a supernatural power to love the women inmates. “Prison is a real culture shock,” says Ann. “Homosexuality is rampant. It’s terrifying. You have to get used to it—tattoos, and earrings in the nose.”
In prison, values are often turned upside down. For example, inmates are given different colored clothing to classify them according to their crime. But instead of causing shame, this gives them incentive to earn a higher level of criminality, to be proud of a new color.
The women involved in the prison ministry quickly learned to be as gentle as doves and as wise as serpents. “They’ll corner you,” Vickie Stevens explains. “You have to watch for manipulation.”
The group’s ministry includes the body as well as the soul. They operate a clothes closet at St. Mark’s UM Church in Raleigh. People from all over the city send clothes for women who need something to wear when they leave prison for job interviews, to go home, or to court.
“We go with them to court,” says Ann. “We sponsor them. We take them to church outings, church concerts, into our homes. We take them to speak at churches and at schools. We write letters. Many girls in prison never receive a letter. Some never have a visitor. We pray with them in groups and individually.”
The ladies encourage inmates to leave with as much education as they can obtain. After 12th grade they can go to college, technical schools, or upholstery school. They can learn sewing skills in prison workshops where they sew clothing for thousands of inmates.
In all their work, the prison ministry group relies on the Holy Spirit for leadership. “He has made me very bold,” says Ann. “I found myself one evening asking a girl, “Do you know Jesus Christ personally?’ and I nearly flipped over when those words came out of my mouth. That night I led her to Christ. I let the Holy Spirit nudge me to say what He would have me say.”
This holy boldness extends not only to witnessing to inmates but in dealing with guards and authorities, too. “We’re there to help those girls if they have needs that are not being taken care of,” Ann explains. “If they’re being mistreated or if officials aren’t acting in their capacity, God gives us the wisdom and opens the doors for us to go higher to see that it’s done. We go as the doors will open for us.”
“Never speak against the authority to anyone,” advises Virgie Banks, another member of the group. “Don’t give them a hassle—God will open the door. If we act rebellious, how can we show those girls anything?”
“Guards’ pay is not great,” Ann observes. “You have to have a college degree to work with zoo animals, but not to work with humans in prison.”
The group often confronts the comfortable prejudices of church people who believe that prisoners have gotten only “what they deserve” and ought to languish in prison.
“People who feel this way are self-righteous,” says Virgie. “It’s not what we do but what we are. Compared with Christ, we all have failed.
“Probably two-thirds have had a terrible home life,” continues Vickie, “and have been brought up in the streets.” She quotes this excerpt from a letter:
“As you know, I have been using opium since the age of 11. I am now 18. I have been taking pills since the age of six and drinking since the age of four. Maybe I have a mixed-up family, as my mom and grandmom have lived on the street. …They felt it was funny to see me high, so as a child I was high quite often. My mother also couldn’t cope with a child, so I was often shot with dope so I would fall asleep or just sit and be quiet. …”
In a world where children are raised in situations like this, “it’s only by the grace of God that we aren’t there,” says Ann. “It’s like escaping accidents.”
“Many are in prison not for the crime they’ve committed,” adds Hazel Hevenor. This includes women who retaliate against men who abuse them and young women innocently involved in the schemes of others.
Once a woman enters the prison, however, her chance of rehabilitation is not great. The prison ministry workers lead prisoners to God’s re-creating power instead.
“Re-creation is something the state can never give those in prison,” Ann points out, “no matter how many millions of dollars they pour into federal programs.”
The group feels that one of its most important ministries is attending “reception” every week. Reception is a quarantine period during which new inmates are isolated from other prisoners for three to four weeks. The state uses this time to administer psychiatric tests and to check for venereal and other diseases.
“We know that important decisions are made during that time,” reports Ann. “‘Do I go homosexual?’ ‘Do I begin using drugs?’ ‘Do I choose the correct walk in life?’
“The first month in prison is the worst,” she continues, “because you are frightened. Instead of being a person, you become a number. We go in and learn these girls’ names and let them know that they are worthy. We build them up by showing them that Jesus loves them, and died on the cross for them, and that it doesn’t matter what sins have been committed because we all have sinned. They can ask forgiveness, ask Jesus into their hearts, and can become new creatures in Jesus Christ.”
After attending reception, the group holds its regular services in the prison auditorium. Although the number attending often dwindles discouragingly, the prison chaplain believes their ministry is of utmost importance.
“The girls know that the women will be there on Thursday morning,” he says. “When they have a problem or need, they come to see them.”
The prisoners who meet on Thursday mornings have influence beyond the meetings themselves.
“Inmates do respect the Christian in prison who really lives the Christian life,” says Virgie. She tells about Lucy, a woman in prison for murdering her husband who had tormented her for years. Lucy had been a Christian for 16 years before she entered prison. Through Christian prison volunteers she found a renewed faith in God and forgiveness to ease the terrible guilt she bore daily. Although she is serving a 25-30 year sentence, Lucy cheerfully describes herself as a missionary behind prison walls.
“She shares whatever she has with others who need it,” adds Hazel. “If Lucy says something, we believe it.” Lucy now enjoys “work release,” helping to care for an elderly woman in her home. She is the only inmate with the privilege of working in a private home, on a come-and-go daily basis.
The volunteers have learned patience through their ministry. “I would like to tell you that all the girls we have worked with go home and don’t return to prison,” says Ann. “Even though some of the girls have professed Jesus, they have backslidden and it just breaks our hearts when they come back in. But we have a choice: do we still love them, or do we knock them for what they’ve done? Which do you think Jesus would do?”
The group is not discouraged. Ann estimates that 90 percent of the girls who are really committed to Christ don’t come back.
Ann tells how, a few weeks earlier, a girl shared her whole life story. She had been convicted for shooting (not fatally) her boyfriend who beat her. She was bitter toward the judge who had sentenced her and suggested that she pay the wounded boyfriend’s hospital bills. Ann couldn’t get through to this girl, so she gave her some books.
The next Thursday, Ann talked to the girl again, but still didn’t seem to have dented the girl’s perspective—she still wished she had killed the boyfriend. But Ann noticed that the girl quietly cried all through the singing of the hymns. The next visit, the girl came to the auditorium all smiles. She asked if she could be involved in a prison ministry when she was released from prison.
“God is faithful,” says Ann simply.
“One of the most profound statements we hear is when a girl says she’s glad she came to prison because she found a personal relationship with Christ,” adds Hazel.
The women in the group spend much time together in prayer, the prison ministry itself, and contagious fellowship. “We’re truly sisters,” says Ann, “and I would not take anything for the closeness that we have. We love each other, we understand, we all hurt when one is hurting.”
